I was not yet ready to give up my suspicions of him. “If you didn’t intend the horse as a trap,” I asked, “how were you planning to murder Paul?”
Vincent jumped to his feet. Shock, fury, and then incredulity passed across his face in a series of waves of white and red. I saw him ready to attack me, then remember both that he was unarmed and that a sword wouldn’t do much good anyway. Very slowly, he sat down again, staring at me. “Are you serious?”
It was exactly what I would have expected him to do if I was wrong. “How else did you plan to become king of Yurt?”
Both of us sat in silence for a moment, trying to sort out our thoughts. Vincent continued to stare. Below us, the constable’s men were finishing preparing the lists for the tournament. A number of the knights already had their armor on and were walking back and forth between the tents, showing off for each other. The horrible certainty that I had just created a diplomatic crisis between Yurt and Caelrhon grew on me.
V
“Well,” said Vincent after a minute, “maybe I had that coming, for spreading rumors about a wizardly plot against princes. But I do want to reassure you I never intended to be king of Yurt.”
“Then why are you marrying my queen?” I demanded.
“Because I love her, of course,” said Vincent with a smile. “I know you wizards never marry, so you probably haven’t noticed, but she’s the most beautiful and the most delightful and desirable woman in the western kingdoms.”
The one positive thing I might be able to salvage from this conversation was the knowledge that the queen had never told Vincent about my proposal to her.
“I hope you appreciate how ironic this is,” said Vincent. “My brother is terrified that when I marry your queen, Yurt may make it an excuse to take over Caelrhon. And now I find out that you have been expecting the exact opposite!”
I felt I ought to apologize but didn’t know what to say.
“Look, Wizard,” Vincent went on. “Let’s be reasonable about this. The queen and I both want you to stay on as Royal Wizard after we’re married, and I’m certain Paul really does too, even if I may have inadvertently turned him against you for the moment. When you were off at the school this spring, the queen wondered whether she might have to get a new wizard if you ended up staying there, but she also told me she hoped that you’d be back. So let’s forget all this and forgive each other. All right?”
He started to rise, taking my agreement for granted, but I was not through with him yet. “A wizard brought a gorgos to the cathedral city last month, and brought these creatures here today. What do you know about him?”
He paused on one knee. “I don’t know anything about this. Lucas refused to hire a new wizard after Sengrim’s death, and the only other magic-worker I’ve spoken to since then is you.” He stood up. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I really do need to get my armor on.”
Without waiting for an answer, he started back toward the bridge into the castle, whistling. Just before he reached the bridge, I called him back. “Prince Vincent!”
He turned back slowly but not, I thought, particularly grudgingly. If I had been a prince instead of a wizard, I really would have wanted to be just like him. “Can it wait?”
“I have a quick favor to ask you.” He came back and stood before me, hands on his hips. “Could you see if you could find the Romney from whom you bought the horse? Even though”-I just barely kept myself from phrasing it as “Even if”-”you have no plots against Paul, it’s possible someone else does.”
He shrugged. “All right. But I don’t want to be late for the tournament!” He went off through the tents, greeting the knights and joking with them as he went. In a few moments, I saw him reemerge from beyond the tents and this time go directly into the castle. At least, I thought, I had not actually created a diplomatic rift between the twin kingdoms.
A Romney man walked slowly toward me, not uncertainly but as though he wanted me to realize that he moved at his own pace, not mine. I swallowed my impatience and waited.
He sat down next to me and adjusted his red kerchief. “A lot of the knights of Caelrhon have horses they bought from me,” he said casually. “Were you thinking of buying one yourself? I’m afraid we don’t have much with us right now, but I could find you a good steed by next week.”
I had to admire the Romney’s ability to turn any opportunity into a potential sale. “I wanted to ask you about the red roan stallion you sold Prince Vincent at the beginning of the summer,” I answered. “I might want one like that-no ordinary horse for a wizard!”
He gave me a shrewd look from intensely black eyes. Neither one of us believed for a minute the talk about buying a horse. “It might be hard to find one just like that,” he said. “Horses that good are scarce, as you realize. I might be able to have one in a few weeks. If you gave me a down payment now, it might make the search easier.”
I abandoned the pretense of wanting a horse like Paul’s. “You got that horse from a wizard, didn’t you.”
He looked at me in apparent disappointment, though I wasn’t sure if he was disappointed at losing a sale or just at cutting our sparring short. “Well, I did,” he admitted, “though I trained the horse myself. A beautiful animal it was when I got it, but wild.”
“Have you seen the wizard at all recently? Might he be bringing more horses from wherever he got that one?”
He shook his head, almost imperceptibly. “I haven’t seen him in months. Though of course I didn’t tell him I’d buy anything he found, I think he realizes I would if they were like that stallion.”
Vor, Norbert, and the Romneys had all been able to see this wizard-why couldn’t I? And, I thought with a surge of jealousy, he must have an air cart of his own, to be able to transport horses from the borderlands. If I was somehow able to overcome him maybe I could have it for my own.
But this was an unprofitable line of thought. Much more pressing was whether the horse might still be trap, though to be triggered by the wizard himself, not by Vincent. “Thank you for the information,” I said. “Do let me know if you have any horses like the red stallion again.”
The Romney man returned to his caravans without pressing the issue of a down payment. At the bottom of the hill, ladies and attendants were already trying to find the best seats in the stands.
The chief outcome of my conversations was that I knew I had to find the wizard. But I seemed no closer to doing so. He must be here, but he was still thoroughly concealed. I realized uneasily that it had been some time since Theodora had gone to look for him….
A trumpeter appeared in the lists below. Lifting the horn to his lips, he blew a single long blast, then began a lively tune with the rhythm of horses galloping. To general shouts, the knights around the tents mounted their horses. Paul came out of the castle, riding Bonfire. His new armor shone like silver, and he carried a plumed helmet in one crooked arm. For the tournament all weapons were to be blunted. Only the new king himself wore a real sword.
He was halfway down the hill when Vincent came out of the castle, pushing his horse to a trot. He waved as he went by. I had already seen Lucas going down, riding easily with no sign of pain from his ankle. A number of the castle staff, young Gwennie among them, hurried to join the lords and ladies in the audience.
In a few minutes the tournament was underway. The Romneys, stood on the sidelines. From where I sat with the lizards, I had a clear view of the sky. I kept looking and kept seeing nothing but birds.
I heard a step beside me, jumped, and turned to see Joachim. He regarded the lizards curiously for a minute, then sat down on the grass beside me, arranging his robes around him.
For a second I considered ordering him back into the safety of the castle, bishop or no bishop, then realized he was probably deliberately making himself visible in order to bring on a wizardly attack. “These are the creatures that were moving stones around on your new tower,” I told him. “They can’t do any harm now, as long as they’re paralyzed, but if I leave them the wizard will probably break my spell at once.”