Alaric’s face had been creasing in an even bigger grin as the puppy’s lineage was unfolded, and he suddenly plopped down in the dust of the stable yard as the puppy tried to climb into his lap, tail still wagging furiously as it continued licking his face.
«I got a royal dog!» he crowed. «Oh, thank you, thank you, Papa!»
Chuckling, Kenneth took Alyce’s arm and walked her on toward the castle gardens, where they whiled the morning away in sweet conversation and gentle dalliance before Kenneth took off with Jared and the other men for an afternoon’s hunting.
That night, after they had dined at Earl Jared’s table and Kenneth had shared the news of court with Jared and Vera and the others privileged to dine at the high table, Alyce and Kenneth retired to the chamber she had called home for the past three months. Alaric was tucked up in his bed in the adjoining room, the puppy curled up in the hollow of his arm, and Llion slept in the room just beyond. The castle was settling into stillness for the night, though red still streaked the summer sky in the west. A gentle rain had begun to fall with the lowering darkness.
«I have missed you», Kenneth murmured, watching her in the mirror as she brushed out her hair. «That, alone, is reason enough to bring me here. But there is another reason for my visit at this time — in addition to Alaric’s birthday. I’ve come to relay a message from the king».
She stiffened slightly, then laid down her brush to turn and look directly at him.
«What message?»
«He asks that you — Name Alaric». He shrugged as she cocked her head to stare at him more sharply. «He said that you’d understand what that meant».
She sighed and nodded a little distractedly. «Oh, I do. It’s…a preparation for the time when Donal must set his Haldane imprint in place, so that Alaric will be able to act for Prince Brion when Donal is gone».
«By your reaction, I take it that this is something outside the normal», Kenneth said quietly, «even magical. Is there danger?»
She shook her head. «No danger. It simply isn’t often done for so young a child».
«I see».
She sighed and considered, then came to sit beside him on the bed. «I shall need your help».
«You know I will do anything you ask», he replied, taking one of her hands to kiss its palm.
Laughing gently, she leaned closer to kiss him on the mouth. «Darling Kenneth, what would I do without you? May I read exactly what the king told you?»
«You mean, read my mind?»
«Yes».
He inclined his head in agreement. «Do what is needful».
Smiling, she slid her hands to either side of his face, thumbs resting lightly on his temples.
«Close your eyes and relax, dearest Kenneth», she murmured.
The next morning was spent in domestic activities, Kenneth retiring to the stable yard with Llion and Jared and several of the other knights while Alyce occupied herself in the solar, settling before her loom and humming an ancient tune as her fingers slipped an ivory shuttle back and forth among the threads of warp and weft. In the garden below, she could hear children’s voices, shrill and excited: Alaric playing with his two McLain cousins.
She glanced outside and smiled at the sight, savoring the late summer air with its scent of sunlight on grass, clean earth, and recent rain. Alaric had found the damp flowerbeds and the pond and was rapidly initiating the slightly younger Duncan into the joyous mysteries of mud. The seven-year-old Kevin was doing his best to remain aloof and clean, as befitted the ducal heir to Cassan, playing quietly with his toy knights on a patch of stone paving beside a more formal fountain, but it was apparent that his interest in the younger boys’ mud was fast becoming more than academic.
No matter. The late-morning sun was warm after the chill of the previous night’s rain. Melissa, Alyce’s maid, and Bairbre, the maid who looked after Duncan and Kevin, would be less than pleased at having to bathe three squirming boys this evening, but it was the first real rain of the autumn; the summer had been dry. Not for months had the weather permitted such boyish pursuits. Alyce laughed aloud when she saw that Kevin had finally succumbed to temptation and was making mud moats and mottes and castles with as much gusto as either of the younger boys.
She heard a rustle behind her and turned to see Vera entering the room with Bairbre, her riding habit of earlier in the day exchanged for a gown of honey-brown the exact shade of her hair, which gave her grey-green eyes a tinge of the sea. While it was well-known that the two countesses were related by marriage, only the two of them knew that they were, in fact, twins, cunningly separated at birth by their Deryni parents so that the second-born Vera might be brought up secretly in a human family, without the Deryni stigma that had been Alyce’s lot for all her life.
Now Vera was Countess of Kierney, by marriage to the widower Jared McLain, whose first countess had died giving him his eldest son and heir, who was playing in the castle yard with Alaric and Duncan. Not even Earl Jared knew that his second wife was full sister to Alyce de Corwyn, one of the last of the High Deryni heiresses.
«I wish you could have ridden with us, earlier», Vera said, coming to embrace her. «I doubt your daughter would have approved, however». She smiled as she glanced down at Alyce’s rounded belly, then nodded dismissal to her maid. «Thank you, Bairbre. You may go now».
As they drew apart, both of them laughing companionably, Alyce took one of Vera’s hands and led her closer to the window.
«Vera, you really must look at this», she said, her casual tone for the benefit of the retiring maid as she directed her sister’s gaze toward the garden below. «I fear that my son has been an exceedingly poor influence on yours. Our maids will be appalled when they learn how dirty three noble children have managed to get in less than half an hour».
Vera laughed and moved back into the room to perch on a stool where she could survey her sister’s weaving. Alyce had been working on the background of a hunting scene showing Castle Culdi high on its hill, with a band of horsemen galloping across the fields in the foreground, bright banners flying. Somehow, she had managed to convey a sense of foggy mystery, as though the riders floated across an early-morning meadow. Vera ran an appreciative finger across the tightly woven threads as Alyce sat down beside her.
«How ever do you manage to get this effect?»
Alyce gave a mirthful chuckle and took up her shuttle again.
«We had a Kheldish weaver at my father’s court when Marie and I were young», she replied. «He was old and sick, even when we first met him, but he still could weave. Father had him tutor us. It seemed a safe enough skill to teach Deryni children».
Vera glanced at the door, which the maid had closed behind her, then passed a hand between them and the door. The spell was not a potent one, but it would muffle their words beyond discernment by any unseen listener. Like Alyce, she had learned early to guard her secrets as though her life depended on it.
«Was the man Deryni?» she asked in a low voice.
Alyce shrugged. «I don’t know. He never said, and I was too young to know to ask. But I realize now that much of what he taught me was the ancient cording lore. Of course, he couched it only in terms of the physical manipulations involved». She smiled as she slipped back across the years in memory. «Our governess, poor, dull lady, thought it but an advanced weaving technique. She had no patience with learning it herself. Had she but known…»
«Praise God she did not!» Vera snorted. «But, could a human even learn the lore behind the cording?»