And waited, foot on the rung of the table, one ankle on the other.
Idrys came back and lingered, arms folded, a shadow in the doorway.
Youʼve given me your opinion, Cefwyn said.
Surely now you will need a fifth messenger.
How and where?
To your father the King, to explain what youʼve done.
Blast your impudence! You do surpass expectation.
Idrys remained unmoved. He will surely send to you then, my lord Prince.
The bare foot slipped off the rung. He drew a deep breath and tucked his feet under him, canting his head at Idrys. Tell me truth, master crow. Are you my man or his?
Yours, my lord. Of course I am.
Then grant I have some wit. Grant I do what I must.
Perhaps so, my lord Prince; but you know that it will not at all please His Majesty. You did well to send for Emuin.
Because he will listen to Emuin?
Because the situation on this border is increasingly unsettled. And it would be wise.
I am summoning the lords to consult.
You are raising an army to intimidate the Amefin, and there is no one who will fail to understand that. Best it were a Guelen army, not provincial, raised of their neighbors and quartered about this town.
Yield this inquiry back to my father? Come crawling to his knee and say I could not manage it?
You would win far more by filial humility than by what you propose, my lord Prince. An appeal for more troops would not be accounted an admission of fault or failure.
Are you my man, Idrys?
I have given you my oath, my lord Prince.
Then act like it.
Idrys inclined his head slowly, with just irony enough to sting.
My lord, a second time: wait for Emuin.
Because I will not take your orders, Idrys?
Because you are in danger here and I am not given resources enough to protect you from it. When danger comes into these chambers, I am one man, my lord Prince, with no more resource. The Guelen forces have lost man after man: niggling losses, but good men. Youʼve just sent patrols out into the countryside. The remaining men will be on longer shifts, under the constant knowledge that they are few among these Amefin. The kingdom could lose its invested heir here, my lord; and that would not well please His Majesty, either. I do not know how I should explain it to him. Forgive me, sire, but I seem to have lost your son? I think not, Cefwyn prince.
I hope to save you the necessity. Bear no reports to my father. Give me time to summon the march lords in. Once done is done, once I have the necessary troops to impose peace my father and my brother will accept the settled state they see here.
That is not the way I know my lord King.
He loves me well, Cefwyn said with a twist of his mouth, only so I make no errors. My brother, now, Efanoris the one who will fret himself hollow at my maintaining an army here.
One cannot possibly see the cause.
I am the heir. Am I not? And shall I not, in I hope not imminent prospect, command the armies of eighteen provinces, including the ones Iʼve summoned tonight? And why should my brother be anxious about four, now, as if I had cause to fling over my duties here and leap upon his privileges? Should I care, in his place, if he raised armies? But I do think he will care, Idrys; he was all out of countenance that I had had you to my household when Father posted me to this province. As if my brother should need a general in Llymaryn. And good gods! we have sworn oaths of our brotherhood. I do find it curious what men surmise one will do that they would do, Idrys. Do you ever ponder such curiosities? It seems to forecast their inclinations more than mine.
Your brother has unhappy precedent. Your uncleʼs death
Was chance.
His advisers believe not.
And Father loves Efanor. Let us say the truth. Father loves him and would not mourn overmuch if some Elwynim put a dagger in my back.
Fathers often dote on the lastborn. So Iʼm told. This does not make him first.
So my father set me this duty to teach me responsibility. So he said.
I heard.
Well, then, duty leads me to this measure, and my royal father knows he need have no fear of my diverting that army off the Elwynim border and against him or Efanor. Whatever he thinks of me, he does at least believe me sane, and my brother can learn so.
Your father is old, and it does not well agree with his years or your brotherʼs anxious fears, my lord Prince, to have one son amassing troops in the countryside while the other son is living quietly in Llymaryn. Whatever your father knows or believes of your intentions, there will be concern about this among the northern barons. That is the plain truth.
I am the invested heir; if trouble comes of what I do, then let Father look to the ambitions of the barons whose advice heʼs leaned upon too much, including Heryn Aswydd, chief among them, Heryn Aswydd. I donʼt know whether Father has me watching Heryn or Heryn watching me, and, damn it! I have nothing to gain that is not already mine.
It would still be more politic, my lord Prince, to use only Guelen troops.
And what will that say? Dear father, send me your armies? I promise not to bring them home?
I shall sharpen my sword. Idrys made a second ironical bow. You will have Heryn and his men buzzing about your ears when word of this flies free. You raise the wind, my lord Prince. And there may follow rain. Perhaps a frost.
Given this present situation, Idrys, how would you secure the Zeide from disturbance, without reinforcements?
Disarm the Amefin now, before they can hear what you have done. Put the Guelen on guard at all posts, and bar the Amefin guard from duty and from the armories.
Do it. Tonight.
Idrysʼ brows lifted. That is extreme, my lord Prince.
You claim to be my man. You give me advice. Then you have my authority for whatever needs be done to make it clear to all Ylesuin where this mustering of forces is aimed at Amefin treachery, not my brotherʼs feverous fancies of an enmity I do not bear him. The one is a family matter. The other is an order to me to hold a province with two hundred thirty men. Folly, Lord Commander, and letting Amefin fill out the posts after the business at Emwy I think not. They cherish no thoughts of our good will, only hopes of our timidity. Hence my summons to the southern provinces, which my father may count his elder sonʼs folly, or his elder sonʼs premature ambition, but not if I turn up sufficient stones quickly enough. Lest you marvel, I do not believe Heryn not his rescue, not his protestations.
Is this recent disbelief or longstanding?
Oh, growing apace. Nor patient of further incidents. I take to heart all your warnings about the Amefin. Say to all who ask that the armory is locked to prevent thefts. We have had recent thefts, have we not?
If you say so, mʼlord.
Say, too, that we suspect an Elwynim spy among the guard. I should hate to offend the honest among them. Just let the next shift be Guelen. Will that not make a quiet and quick transition? They wonʼt know the replacement is general until they go back to their barracks. Review all rosters for patrols or issue of equipment. Better we have short patrols for a few days than lose our knowledge of what tidings have flowed to what place in Amefel. And set up the sergeants with the scribes to take down a list of our loyal Amefin guard, man by man, accounting their villages, their residences, their relatives, persons who may vouch for their provenance and behavior, and question the men they name to vouch for them, and check back again. We are foreigners here. How else can we tell loyal men from trespassers? Appoint Mesinis to the task.