“I think that we’re quarreling again,” said Varaile lightly.
He would have taken her hand in his, if he dared such familiarities with the Coronal’s wife. Taking care to keep his tone temperate and mild, he said, “This is a difficult time for us both, and the stress is taking its toll. Let me ask you a second time: why am I here? Was it only because you wanted someone’s company tonight? You could have invited Teotas and Fiorinda, then, or Gialaurys, or Maundigand-Klimd, even. But you sent for me, even though you thought I might be spending the evening with Fulkari.”
She said, “I asked for you because I think of you as a friend, someone who understands the emotions I feel as the possibility of a change in the government begins to unfold, someone who—as you yourself pointed out—may be experiencing similar feelings himself. But also it was a way of finding out whether you were going to be with Fulkari tonight.”
“Ah. How devious, Varaile.”
“Do you think so? In that case, I suppose it was.”
“Why is that something you would want to know?”
“There are tales around the Castle that you have lost interest in her.”
“Untrue.”
“Well, then, do you love her, Dekkeret?”
He felt heat surging to his cheeks. This was unfair. “You know that I do.”
“And yet, your first night back, you preferred your own company to hers.”
Dekkeret toyed with his napkin, twisting it in his hands, crumpling it. “I told you, Varaile: I wanted to be alone. To think about—what is coming for us all. If Fulkari had wanted to see me, she would only have had to say so, and I would have gone to her, just as I’ve come to you. But no message came from her, only from you.”
“Perhaps she was waiting first to see what you would do.”
“And now she’ll think I’m your lover, is that it?”
Varaile smiled. “I doubt that very much. What she will think, though, is that she can’t be very important to you. Why else would you be avoiding her like this, on your first night back? That’s a mark of indifference, not of passion.”
“You heard me say that I love her. She knows that too.”
“Does she?”
Dekkeret’s eyebrows rose. “Have I left her in doubt of that, do you think?”
“Have you spoken with her of marriage, Dekkeret?”
“Not yet, no. Ah—now I see the true purpose of your calling me here!” Dekkeret glanced away. “She asked you to do this, eh?” he said coldly.
Anger flared a moment in Varaile’s eyes. “You come very close to the edge with a question like that. But no, no, Dekkeret: this is none of her doing. I am entirely to blame. Will you believe that?”
“I would never challenge your word, milady.”
“All right, then, Dekkeret: here is the crux. You will soon become Coronaclass="underline" that is clear. The custom among us is for the Coronal to have a wife. The king’s consort has important functions of her own at the Castle, and if there is no consort who is to perform those functions?”
So that was it! Dekkeret did not reply. He cupped his wine bowl and held it without putting it to his lips, and waited for her to continue.
“You’re no longer a boy, Dekkeret. Unless I’ve lost count, and I doubt that I have, you’ll be forty soon. You’ve kept company with the Lady Fulkari for—what is it, three years now?—and not said a word to anyone about marriage. Including, apparently, to her. It’s a subject that ought to be on your mind now.”
“It is. Believe me, Varaile, it is.”
“And will Fulkari be your choice, do you think?”
“You press me too hard here, lady. I ask you to give over this inquisition. You are my queen, and also one of my dearest friends, but these are matters I propose to keep to myself, if I may.” Pushing back his chair, he looked at her in a way that set up a wall of silence between them.
Now it was her hand that reached out for his. Affectionately she said, “It was never my intention to cause you any discomfort, Dekkeret. I only wanted to speak my mind about something that causes me great concern.”
“I tell you once again: I do love Fulkari. I don’t know whether I want to marry her, nor am I sure if she wants me. There are problems between Fulkari and me, Varaile, that I will not discuss even with you. Especially with you.—May we once again change the subject, now? What can we talk about? Your children, shall it be? Prince Akbalik: he’s been writing an epic poem, isn’t that so? And the Princess Tuanelys—is it true that Septach Melayn has promised to begin training her in swordsmanship when she’s a year or two older—?”
When he awoke in the morning he found that a note had been slipped under his bedroom door during the night:
Can we go riding tomorrow? Into the southern meadows, perhaps?
-F.
His household people told him that some Vroon had brought it in the small hours. Dekkeret knew who that had to be: little Gurjara Yaso, Fulkari’s own magus, an inveterate caster of spells and brewer of potions who was her usual go-between in such matters. Dekkeret suspected the Vroon of having used sorcery even on him from time to time in an attempt to keep Fulkari in the prime place in his heart.
Not that any sorcery was needed: she was constantly in his thoughts. He was not in any way indifferent to Fulkari; and all through his sojourn in Normork he had needed only to let his mind drift briefly away from whatever was happening at the moment and there she was, burning like a beacon in his brain, smiling, beckoning to him, drawing him to her—
Certainly, after a week’s separation, the urge to rush to her side upon his return had been a powerful one. But Dekkeret had felt it was important to put some distance between himself and her for the moment, if only to give himself time to begin to comprehend what it was he really wanted from her, and she from him. That resolution shattered in an instant now. He felt a torrent of relief and delight and keen anticipation go through him as he read her note.
“Do I have any official functions this morning?” he asked Singobinda Mukund at breakfast.
“None, sir,” replied the master of the household.
“And no news has come from the Labyrinth, I take it?”
“Nothing, sir,” said Singobinda Mukund. He gave Dekkeret a horrified look, as though to indicate how astounded he was that Dekkeret should feel there was any need to ask.
“Send word to the Lady Fulkari, then, that I’ll meet her in two hours at the Dizimaule Arch.”
Fulkari was waiting for him when he arrived, a lovely, willowy sight in a riding habit of soft green leather that clung to her like a second skin. Dekkeret saw that she had already ordered up two high-spirited sporting-mounts from the Castle stables. That was Fulkari’s way: she seized the moment, she moved swiftly to do what needed to be done. Her waiting, last night, to see if he would make the first move had not been at all typical of her. And indeed when he had not done so she had made the move herself, by having that note slipped beneath the door.
They had been lovers almost three years now, almost since the first day of Fulkari’s residence at the Castle. She was a member of one of the old Pontifical families, a descendant of Makhario of Sipermit, who had ruled five hundred years before. The Castle was full of such nobility, hundreds, even thousands who carried the blood of bygone monarchs.
Though the monarchy could never be hereditary, the offspring of Pontifexes and Coronals were ennobled forever, and had the right to occupy rooms at the Castle for as long as they pleased, whether or not they had any official function in the current government. Some chose to take up permanent residence there and became fixtures at the court. Most, though, preferred to spend much of the year on their family estates, elsewhere on the Mount, visiting the Castle only in the high season.