Cazaril waved a diverting hand. “It was all the fault of my noble steed, my lady—attacked, it thought, by a horse-eating deer. It went sidewise, I didn’t. Thank you.” He accepted a glass of wine from the servant with deep appreciation and sipped quickly, trying not to let it slosh. The unpleasant shaky feeling in his gut was passing off, now.
Iselle cast him a grateful glance, which her grandmother did not miss. The Provincara sniffed faint disbelief. By way of punishment, she said, “Iselle, Betriz, go and change out of those riding clothes and into something suitable for supper. We may be country folk here; we need not be savages.” They dragged off, with a couple of backward glances at the fascinating visitor.
“But how came you here, Palli?” Cazaril asked, when the double distraction had passed around the corner of the keep. Palli, too, stared after them, and seemed to have to shake himself back awake. Close your mouth, man, Cazaril thought in amusement. I have to.
“Oh! I’m riding up to Cardegoss, to dance attendance at court. M’father always used to break his journeys here, being thick with the old Provincar—when we passed near Valenda, I made to presume, and sent a messenger. And m’lady”—he nodded to the Provincara—“was kind enough to bid me bide.”
“I’d have cuffed you if you’d failed to make your duty to me,” said the Provincara amiably, with admirable illogic. “I’d not seen your father nor you for far too many years. I was sorry to hear of his passing.”
Palli nodded. He continued to Cazaril, “We plan to rest the horses overnight and go on tomorrow at a leisurely pace—the weather’s too fine to be in a rush. There are pilgrims on the roads to every shrine and temple—and those who prey on ’em, alas—there were bandits reported in the hill passes, but we didn’t find ’em.”
“You looked?” said Cazaril, bemused. Not finding bandits had been all his desire, on the road.
“Hey! I am the lord dedicat of the Daughter’s Order at Palliar now, I’ll have you know—in my father’s shoes. I have duties.”
“You ride with the soldier-brothers?”
“More like with the baggage train. It’s all keeping the books, and collecting rents, and chasing the damned equipment, and logistics. The joys of command—well, you know. You taught them to me. One part glory to ten parts shoveling manure.”
Cazaril grinned. “That good a ratio? You’re blessed.”
Palli grinned back and accepted cheese and cakes from the servant. “I lodged my troop down in town. But you, Caz! As soon as I said, Gotorget, they asked me if we’d met—you could have knocked me over with a straw when m’lady said you’d turned up here, having walked—walked!—from Ibra, and looking like something the cat hawked up.”
The Provincara gave a small, unrepentant shrug at Cazaril’s faintly reproachful glance her way.
“I’ve been telling them war stories for the past half hour,” Palli went on. “How’s your hand?”
Cazaril curled it in his lap. “Much recovered.” He hastened to change the subject. “What’s forward at court, for you?”
“Well, I’d not had the chance to make formal oath to Orico since m’father died, and also, I’m to represent the Daughter’s Order of Palliar at the investiture.”
“Investiture?” said Cazaril blankly.
“Ah, has Orico finally given out the generalship of the Daughter’s Order?” asked dy Ferrej. “Since the old general died, I hear every high family in Chalion has been badgering him for the gift.”
“I should imagine,” said the Provincara. “Lucrative and powerful enough, even if it is smaller than the Son’s.”
“Oh, aye,” said Palli. “It’s not been announced yet, but it’s known—it’s to be Dondo dy Jironal, the younger brother of the Chancellor.”
Cazaril stiffened, and sipped wine to hide his dismay.
After a rather long pause, the Provincara said, “What an odd choice. One usually expects the general of a holy military order to be more . . . personally austere.”
“But, but,” said dy Ferrej, “Chancellor Martou dy Jironal holds the generalship of the Order of the Son! Two, in one family? It’s a dangerous concentration of power.”
The Provincara murmured, “Martou is also to become the Provincar dy Jironal, if rumor is true. As soon as old dy Ildar stops lingering.”
“I hadn’t heard that,” said Palli, sounding startled.
“Yes,” said the Provincara dryly. “The Ildar family is not too happy. I believe they’d been counting on the provincarship for one of the nephews.”
Palli shrugged. “The brothers Jironal certainly ride high in Chalion, by Orico’s favor. I suppose if I were clever, I would find some way of grabbing on to their cloak-hems, and riding along.”
Cazaril frowned into his wine and groped for a way to divert the topic. “What other news do you hear?”
“Well, these two weeks gone, the Heir of Ibra has raised his banner in South Ibra—again—against the old fox, his father. Everyone had thought last summer’s treaty would hold, but it seems they had some secret falling-out, last autumn, and the roya repudiated it. Again.”
“The Heir,” said the Provincara, “presumes. Ibra does have another son, after all.”
“Orico supported the Heir the last time,” observed Palli.
“To Chalion’s cost,” murmured Cazaril.
“It seemed to me Orico was taking the long view. In the end,” said Palli, “surely the Heir must win. One way or another.”
“It will be a joyless victory for the old man if his son loses,” said dy Ferrej in a tone of slow consideration. “No, I wager they’ll spend more men’s lives, and then make it up again between them over the bodies.”
“A sad business,” said the Provincara, tightening her lips. “No good can come of it. Eh, dy Palliar. Tell me some good news. Tell me Orico’s royina is with child.”
Palli shook his head ruefully. “Not as I’ve heard, lady.”
“Well, then, let us go to our supper and talk no more politics. It makes my old head ache.”
His muscles had seized up while he was sitting, despite the wine; Cazaril almost fell over, trying to rise from his chair. Palli caught him by the elbow and steadied him, and frowned deeply. Cazaril gave him a tiny shake of his head and went off to wash and change. And examine his bruises in private.
Supper was a cheerful meal, attended by most of the household. Dy Palliar, no slouch at table when it came to either food or talk, held the attention of everyone, from the Lord Teidez and Lady Iselle down to the youngest page, with his tales. Despite the wine he kept his head in the high company, and told only the merry stories, with himself more as butt than hero. The account of how he’d followed Cazaril on a night sortie against the Roknari sappers, and so discouraged them for a month thereafter, drew wide-eyed stares upon Cazaril as well as himself. They clearly had a hard time picturing the royesse’s timid, soft-spoken secretary grinning in the dirt and the soot, scrambling through the burning rubble with a dirk in his hand. Cazaril realized he disliked the stares. He wanted to be . . . invisible, here. Twice Palli tried to toss the conversational ball to him, to take a turn at the entertaining, and twice he fielded it back to Palli or to dy Ferrej. After the second attempt fell flat, Palli desisted from trying to draw him out.
The meal ran very late, but at last came the hour Cazaril had been both longing for and dreading, when all parted for the night, and Palli knocked on his chamber door. Cazaril bade him enter, pushed the trunk to the wall, tossed a cushion upon it for his guest, and settled himself upon his bed; both he and it creaked audibly. Palli sat and stared across at him in the dim double candlelight, and began with a directness that revealed the trend of his mind all too clearly.