Another place of honor at the long dais went to Prestimion’s mother, the vivacious and sparkling Princess Therissa, who by virtue of her son’s ascent to the throne would soon herself assume the title of Lady of the Isle of Sleep, and take charge of the machinery by which guidance and solace were dispensed to the citizenry of Majipoor while they slept. Beside her on the dais sat the formidable Lady Kunigarda, Confalume’s sister, who had held the rank of Lady of the Isle during Confalume’s reign as Coronal, and now was about to retire from her duties. Then the various high lords of the Council, with Septach Melayn and Gialaurys among them. And at the end of the row were the high magus Gominik Halvor of Triggoin and his wizardly son Heszmon Gorse, smiling at him thoughtfully. Those smiles, he knew, indicated the claim they had on him: for, little as he cared for sorcery and the other esoteric phenomena, he could never deny that the skill at magicking that these two possessed had played no small part in his gaining of the throne.
Prestimion went to each of these people in turn, formally welcoming them to this banquet that honored him.
And then, after he had taken his own seat but before the food was served, it was the turn of the lesser but still major lords to make their obeisance to him—this great one and that, humbly coming up to offer their felicitations to Prestimion , their hopes for the era just dawning—
Now came the start of the ceremony itself. The ringing of bells. The prayers and incantations. The endless toasts. Prestimion merely sipping at his wine, careful not to seem ungracious, but wary of drinking too much during this taxing event.
Then, at long last, the meal. A procession of delicacies from every region of the world, prepared by the most skillful of chefs. Prestimion barely picked at his food. Afterward, a round of poetic recitations: the resounding verses of Furvain’s great epic, The Book of Changes, on and on with the account of the semi-mythical Lord Stiamot’s conquest of the aboriginal Shapeshifter race, and then the chanting of The Book of Powers and The Heights of Castle Mount and any number of other historical sagas of Pontifexes and Coronals of centuries gone by.
The after-dinner singing, then. Thousands of voices raised in ancient hymns. Prestimion chuckled at the sound of Gialaurys’s uncouth heavy basso groaning along beneath the others nearby.
There was much more, ancient rituals prescribed by musty lore. The ceremonial display of the Coronal’s shield, with the starburst rendered in shining silver embellished with rays of gold, and Prestimion’s ceremonial placing of his hands on it. Confalume rising to deliver a longwinded blessing on the new Coronal, and ceremonially embracing him before all the gathering. The Lady Kunigarda doing the same. The Princess Therissa accepting the circlet of the Lady of the Isle from Kunigarda. And so on and so on, interminably. Prestimion patiently endured it all, though it was far from easy.
But to his great surprise he discovered that somewhere along the way, during the course of this long and arduous event, he had shed the strange leadenness of heart that had come over him earlier. All that dejection and bitter cheerlessness had dropped away, somehow. Tired as he was, here at the very end of the banquet, he had found his way back to joyfulness at last. And more than joyfulness: for, somewhere in the course of the evening, he had felt a sense of being truly kingly coming over him for the first time.
One supreme fact had been established today. His name had at last been enrolled in the long roster of Coronals of Majipoor now, after many a travail in the course of his path to the throne.
Coronal of Majipoor! King of the most wondrous world in all the universe!
And he knew that he would be a good Coronal, an enlightened Coronal, whom the people would love and praise. He would do great things, and he would leave Majipoor a better place for his having lived and reigned. And this was what he had been born to accomplish.
Yes. Yes. So all was for the best this glorious day, despite the momentary cloud of gloom that had dimmed its glory for him for a time a few hours before.
Septach Melayn saw the change come over him. During a lull in the festivity he came to Prestimion’s side and said, looking at him warmly, “The despair you spoke of a little while ago in the Hendighail Hall has gone from you, has it not, Prestimion?”
Unhesitatingly Prestimion replied, “We had no conversation in Hendighail Hall this day, Septach Melayn.”
There was something new in his tone, a strength, even a harshness, that had never been there before. Prestimion himself was taken unawares when he heard it ringing in his ears. Septach Melayn heard it too; for his eyes widened an instant, and the corners of his mouth quirked in surprise, and he caught his breath in sharply. Then he inclined his head in a formal way and said, “Indeed, my lord. We did not speak in the Hendighail Hall.” And made the starburst sign, and returned to his seat.
Prestimion signaled for his wine-bowl to be refilled.
This is what it means to be a king, he thought. To speak coldly even to your best beloved friends, when the occasion demands. Does a king even have friends? he wondered. Well, he would find that out in the weeks ahead.
The banquet was at its climactic moment. Everyone was standing now, hands aloft in the starburst salute. “Prestimion! Lord Prestimion!” they were crying. “Hail, Lord Prestimion! Long life to Lord Prestimion!”
And then it was over. The hour had come for the breaking-up of the banquet into smaller gatherings, groups filtering themselves apart by rank and affinity of friendship. At long last, with dawn approaching, the time arrived when the newly consecrated Coronal Lord of Majipoor was permitted to seek his rest, and could tactfully declare the revels ended, and withdraw, finally, to the privacy and peace of his own apartments, his own bedroom.
His empty apartments. His lonely bed.
Thismet, he thought, as he tumbled down in utter exhaustion toward the pillow. In the midst of his great joy he could not find a way to hide from the unending pain of losing her. I am king of the world tonight, and where are you, Thismet? Where are you?
3
In the great city of Stee, well down the slopes of Castle Mount, there was trouble in the household of the immensely wealthy merchant banker Simbilon Khayf.
A fourth-floor chambermaid of the house of Simbilon Khayf had fallen victim suddenly to a fit of madness and flung herself from an attic window of the banker’s grand mansion, killing not only herself but two passers-by in the street below. Simbilon Khayf himself was nowhere near the scene when this occurred: he was away at the Castle, attending Lord Prestimion’s coronation ceremonies as the guest of Count Fisiolo of Stee. And so it had become the task of his only daughter, Varaile, to deal with the grisly tragedy and its consequences.
Varaile, a tall, slender, dark-eyed woman with jet-black hair that fell to her shoulders in a shining cascade, was only in her nineteenth year. But her mother’s early death had made her the mistress of the great house when she was still a girl, and those responsibilities had given her a maturity beyond her years. When the first strange sounds from the street reached her ears—a horrible cracking thud, and then another, less distinct, a moment later, followed by shouts and piercing shrieks—she moved calmly and purposefully toward the window of her own third-floor study. Quickly she took in the grim scene: the bodies, the blood, the gathering crowd of agitated witnesses. She headed at once for the stairs. Servants of the house came rushing up toward her, all crying out at once, gesticulating, sobbing.