“Yes, I-” Tobas began.
“Well, then,” the king said, cutting him off, “you must marry one or more of my daughters. The gold and the positions in my realm are their dowries. The sole reward for slaying the dragon is the hand of a princess; the dowry comes with that, but you can’t have the dowry without the bride. If we had simply wanted to pay out a thousand gold pieces to have the dragon slain, do you think we would have gone about it the way we did?”
“I hadn’t thought-”
“Of course not! That would be stupid and wasteful. For half that much, we could get a professional dragon hunter down from Aldagmor, or a really good magician of some sort from Ethshar, no disparagement of your own powers is intended, since you were obviously capable of the job, but you must admit you had no prior reputation. No, we wanted to find husbands for my daughters, husbands who would prove their worth against the monster!”
“But-” Elner had been right all along, Tobas realized, and his own suspicions well-founded. Once again his protest was cut short by the king before it truly began.
“It didn’t work out the way we planned, though, with only three of you involved and one of you a woman. We’ve promised the full thousand to whoever slew the dragon, and we’ll honor that, but we’ll be damned before we’ll let you get away with not marrying at least one of our daughters into the bargain!” He glowered down at Tobas.
“But I’m already married!” Tobas said in almost a wail, abruptly aware of his own youth and insignificance before this suddenly formidable figure.
“And what difference does that make?”
Tobas had no good answer to that. He had certainly never intended to have more than one wife; very few men did. However, there was no law against polygamy, nor even any strong custom; Tobas had known men with two wives, back in Telven, and had even heard of men with three. The only restriction custom imposed was that a man had to have enough money to keep two families and a home big enough for them.
With the dowry a princess would bring, and living in Dwomor Keep, Tobas realized he would have both. Even if he left Dwomor, he and Karanissa owned a large enough castle for any number of families.
He did not want a second wife, though. He started to prepare a polite little speech declining the honor, telling the king to keep the gold; after all, with Derithon’s magic he was sure he could earn all the money he would need elsewhere. “Your Majesty, I must-”
Karanissa’s elbow jabbed him in the side. “Don’t be stupid!” she whispered fiercely, obviously aware of what he had in mind, whether by witchcraft or common sense Tobas could not tell. “We can use the gold and the goodwill, and I don’t mind having another wife around. I’m not the jealous type; I couldn’t be, with Derry what he was. But I do like money. Go on and take your pick.”
Startled, Tobas stammered again, glanced at Karanissa, saw her nod firmly, then turned back to the king and said, reluctantly, “Your Majesty, I must apologize for the delay; all of your daughters are so beautiful that making a choice is agony.”
“Take them all, then!” Derneth said, waving an arm recklessly.
“But,” Tobas said quickly, before the king’s suggestion could be taken seriously, “if choose I must, I will choose Alorria.”
“Oh, Tobas!” Alorria shrieked gleefully, her eyes widening with what Tobas could only interpret as delight; she ran to him and hugged him fiercely.
Tinira was somewhat more restrained in embracing Peren.
With that, except for the polite farewells, the audience was over; details of distributing the dowries would be settled only when the heroes were safely married. The king slipped quietly out a back door, presumably to return to his bed, and a moment later Tobas found the Lord Chamberlain at his side, discussing wedding arrangements.
CHAPTER 32
The wedding was to be a grand festival, the biggest event Dwomor had seen in years; it was not only a double royal wedding, after all, but a celebration of the dragon’s death. The entire population of the kingdom of Dwomor was invited, which, Tobas learned to his dismay, was slightly under eight thousand people. All his life he had heard them called the Small Kingdoms, but he had never realized before just how small most of them were. He remembered the endless thronged streets of Ethshar of the Spices and resolved that, princess or no, he would not spend the rest of his life in Dwomor.
He recalled that he had once intended to spend his entire life in Telven, with its population of a hundred or so, and found it hard to believe. It was not that he had any great urge to travel, but that places such as Dwomor seemed so limited in what they might provide in the way of opportunities and comforts.
Karanissa had great difficulty in not laughing when she heard the population estimate. “I’ve seen army camps with more camp followers than this so-called kingdom has people!” she remarked truthfully.
She did not think much of the attempts the castle’s population made at pomp and elegance, either. Dwomor Keep simply did not have a great deal of wealth to display; most of the guests would be fed on simple wooden plates, many of them freshly carved for the event. Banners flew from every turret of the castle, and bunting was hung above the gate, but much of the bunting was faded and the banners did not match. Her own garb, repaired and enhanced by her witchcraft, was finer than Alorria’s wedding dress, though Tinira, as the older sister, managed to outshine Karanissa in an ancient, vividly blue gown of some magically woven fabric one of her distant royal ancestors had somehow acquired.
Due to the time required for all the preparations and the need to spread word of the event throughout the realm, the date was set for the twenty-second of Snowfall and fervent prayers offered to the gods for continued good weather. A sprinkle of snow on the sixteenth caused minor consternation; but, as it had the good grace to melt away within a day or so, hopes remained high.
Tobas spent several evenings staring longingly at the tapestry, but Karanissa remained firm in her insistence that he marry Alorria.
“It won’t bother me,” she insisted. “And you need the money, and it will put you solidly in good with the king here.”
“But I don’t want to stay here!”
“But the flying castle is in Dwomor, or maybe Aigoa, but this castle is closer and on the way to Ethshar. Until you either get the castle airborne again or weave another tapestry, or until you give up the tapestry castle for good, you’re tied to Dwomor, whether you like it or not.”
“I don’t like it. Kara, how can I manage being married to both of you? I’m only eighteen; one wife is plenty for someone my age.”
“Don’t worry about it,” she insisted. “Alorria and I will work out the details between ourselves.”
Tobas was not at all sure he liked that. “Besides,” he said, “I hardly know her!”
He quickly found, however, that the entire population of Dwomor Keep was determined to do their best to correct that; wherever he went, other than his own suite, Alorria was either there waiting for him or would arrive a moment later.
He found it difficult to talk to her; she was too impressed by his magic and his supposed heroism, and had led a life too different from his own. Save for a brief state visit or two to neighboring kingdoms, she had spent her entire life inside castle walls. She was educated and well-read, but clearly had little real understanding of the world.
When she heard the tale of how Peren had been robbed and beaten, she found it almost impossible to believe that the local peasants in that part of Amor had not immediately swept out of their homes in a righteous fury and hanged the entire caravan. When she heard how the wizards of Ethshar had refused to teach Tobas more spells, she assumed that it was because he had somehow been unworthy, not having proven himself yet, or perhaps he had offended them in some way, by failing to make some Guild recognition sign. And she flatly denied almost everything Karanissa said about the Great War and the nature of Old Ethshar.