A Crown Disowned Page 35

  King.

  "Now I present to you the lady who has graciously consented to become my wife,"

  Peres announced. "Give greetings to Lady Hegrin, soon to be Queen Hegrin."

  "Q-queen," Ashen gasped, as others around her quickly regained their poise and applauded anew. "When did this happen?"

  "I daresay while we were both away at the war," Gaurin answered wryly. "Smile,

  Ashen. In a moment everyone will stop looking at our daughter, to stare at you."

  Stiffly, Ashen obeyed, feeling that she displayed a grimace even more artificial than the one on Ysa's face. She felt a little ill.

  "We will hold the wedding two weeks from now," Peres said. "Now, let us feast and rejoice to my new sister, and also to my soon-to-be wife!"

  With a shout of pleasure, the people gathered rushed to the prepared tables.

  There they filled plates and goblets, and drank many toasts to both happy events.

  Ashen stayed only long enough to satisfy proprieties, keeping herself as distant as she could from Ysa without being openly rude, after she had offered and received entirely routine and conventional congratulations. Fortunately, the

  Dowager did not seem eager to engage Ashen in lengthy conversation either, despite the apology she had tendered for the way she had treated the one-time

  Bog-Princess.

  She went at once to her apartment and lay down with a cool cloth on her head.

  That evening she refused her dinner, pleading illness, and the next morning, she was sick again in earnest.

  Hegrin was so young, so very young…

  During the whirlwind preparations for a royal wedding, Za-zar sent word to Ashen that Hynnel wanted to see her and Gaurin. She set aside the embroidered skirt she had been working on, and went to find Gaurin. He was already at his kinsman's side in the private room in the physicians' quarters, where Master

  Lorgan could give him his full attention.

  To Ashen's shock, he seemed to have wasted away in the few days since she had seen him last. And to her surprise, Lorgan did not attend her kinsman; Zazar did. A lesser physician hovered nearby.

  "He caught a chill," Gaurin told her.

  "You shouldn't have left the infirmary tent at the Snow Fortress and come out to the battleground," Ashen said immediately. "I was very fearful—"

  "It could have happened then, and it could have happened along the way back here," Zazar said. "There is no way to tell. It could have been foretold the day he was born. All I know is, despite my best efforts, he is dying. Norras is already gone," she added.

  "No!" Ashen turned on her. She felt ill all over again. "Say it not! To say it is to make it sol Send for another physician, Master Lorgan—"

  "Madame Zazar is right," Hynnel said weakly, "and Master Lorgan agrees. In fact, it was I who told them, when I asked that you be sent for. There is that I must settle before I breathe my last." He looked up at the physician. "Have you sent for a scribe?"

  "He waits even now."

  "Then bring him in." Hynnel struggled to move up on the pillows, and Gaurin helped him shift to a more comfortable position, tenderly holding him while he coughed.

  The scribe entered the room, wide-eyed at the sight of the great folk therein about whom legends were already forming. He found a stool, got out paper and ink, and began to write as Hynnel spoke.

  "Put this in the proper form," Hynnel instructed him, "for I know it not. Just write as I speak. I would not claim the title of NordornKing while we were fighting against our common enemies. I lived as just Hynnel, a man of the

  Nordors, thinking there was time enough later, should we prevail, for kingship and all that goes with it. But time has run out and now I shall die as just

  Hynnel. It is enough. I leave the kingdom shattered, but in hands strong enough to rebuild it." He took Gaurin's hand in his.

  Ashen just stared at first, as the implications sank in on her. "No," she murmured. She didn't know if it was a protest against what Hynnel was proposing, or against his dying.

  Hynnel managed to smile. "While the scribe finishes writing it with all the terms and details plainly put forth and hands it to me to sign, tell your lady wife about our country," he said.

  Gaurin turned to Ashen while he continued to hold his cousin's hands in his.

  "Ah, the NordornLand. It is a place of fierce beauty," he told her. "Beyond and north of the deep cleft in the coast where the Sea-Rovers once held sway, there is a range of mountains, atop which is a high country where in summer the air is mild and green grass covers the hillside. Overlooking all once stood the Palace of Fire and Ice, now in ruins, but I remember it as it was. Snow falls nearly year-round, yes, but it is a soft and gentle snow, not like what we have endured for so long. White it is, as white as the fleece of the sheep and lambs whose wool the women spin into cloth so fine an arm-span of it would go through one of your finger-rings. I remember how snow covered the rooftops and sparkled like sugar on a plum cake. We would go out then, and slide on the ice and race sleds.

  Horse-drawn sleighs were decorated with bells that rang clearly in the clean air and people would laugh for sheer joy. You would love it there, my Ashen, once you had seen it."

  "And," Hynnel added with a trace of a smile, "it is a long distance away from the Dowager."

  "Too far from Hegrin," Ashen pointed out through stiff lips.

  "Hegrin is to be married. She will have her own life. She does not need us anymore," Gaurin said. "Come, my Ashen. I told you that duty binds me. That was in regard to my being High Marshal of Rendel. Now a higher duty calls. Royance will find another High Marshal, who will fill the office admirably." He let go his kinsman's hands, arose from the side of the bed where he had been sitting, and took Ashen in his arms. "Will you join me? Will you be my Queen, and sit beside me on the Nordorn throne? Will you come and let me show you the beauties of my homeland?"

  "More to the point, will you honor the wishes of a dying man?" Hynnel said.

  Ashen could not bear looking into Gaurin's beloved eyes at this moment, when he was asking such a heavy thing of her. She disengaged herself from his embrace and walked to the window of the sickroom, where she stared out at the budding trees, twisting the opalescent bracelet on her arm. At last she spoke. "I disowned the crown of Rendel. I cannot also refuse the crown of the Nordors, though I never sought either." She turned to face Hynnel. "Yes, my kinsman, I will accept what the Powers seem to have set aside as my portion. I will honor your wishes, and work with Gaurin as his queen, to rebuild the country that I will take as my own."

  He smiled, and his face relaxed. "Thank you. Now I can die content."

  "He will die in aggravation if you don't get out of the room now," Zazar snapped. "Well, scribe, have you got it finished yet?"

  "Yes, Madame Zazar," the man said. With shaking hands he sanded the paper and then gave it to Hynnel.

  Zazar shook her head in exasperation. "Don't just stand there gawping," she told him. "He can't sign without ink and quill and something to rest the paper on while he signs. Give me your lap desk. I'll heat the wax for the seal."

  With Master Lorgan and other physicians brought in for additional witnesses,

  Hynnel managed to scrawl his name at the bottom of the document. Then both

  Lorgan and Zazar signed under his name, and the others added their marks as well. The writing on the paper covered it only halfway so Zazar drew several diagonal lines to fill the rest and also to keep someone from adding a clause that might have negated the whole. Such things had happened. She dripped wax across the names, and Hynnel pressed his signet bearing the royal arms of the

  NordornLand kingdom into a large blob next to his signature. Zazar held it up and looked it over thoroughly when they were finished.

  "That should pass inspection from anybody," she said. "Now, all of you get out.

  I mean it this time."

  Hynnel put the ring into Gaurin's hands. "Here. Would that I had a crown, but it was lost with C
yornas. This will have to do until you have another made. I give you greetings, fair cousin and now Gaurin NordornKing. Reign long and well."

  "Farewell," Gaurin said. As he had when Hynnel had come to the Oakenkeep, he kissed his kinsman on the lips. "Fare you very well."

  Ashen likewise kissed Hynnel's lips. Then, with dignity, they left the dying man's chamber. It was only after the door closed behind them that Ashen gave way to weeping.

  Hynnel slipped away from life that night, gently, with no pain. Zazar brought the news the following morning.

  "I'm going, too," she told Ashen and Gaurin. "I stayed only for Hynnel's sake.

  And now that reason is no more."

  "You won't attend Hegrin's wedding and see her made a Queen?" Ashen asked.

  "I saw you made one, and that's enough," Zazar retorted. She looked at Ashen keenly. "I will, though, give you a new name. You are Ashen Deathdaughter no more, but Ashen Lifebringer."

  "Please," Ashen said. "Stay just a while longer. I feel that I am just now getting to know you."

  "No, bid me farewell, at least for a time. I daresay I'll see you again before all is finished."

  Ashen knew better than to try to argue with Zazar when she was settled on a course. A day later, the Wysen-wyf, scorning the offer of a fine riding palfrey, set off on foot for the land that had once been accursed with a sickly miasma.

  Now, under the care of the Bog-men, it was turning into a beautiful part of

  Rendel, in which all could take pleasure. Naturally, Ashen and Gaurin informed

  Lord Royance of this good news and also of Zazar's departure. As Head of the

  Council, this was news he needed to have.

  "We will miss your brave kinsman, and also Madame Zazar," Royance said. "Her sharp tongue was ever a delight to me, if you can believe it. It was easy to grow complacent, and she brushed away many cobwebs I had let grow too long."

  He had news of his own. When Gaurin had resigned his post, Lathrom, at Gaurin's suggestion, had been appointed the new Lord High Marshal of Rendel with Steuart as his second in command.

  "Again, it was unanimous. It was helpful that Lathrom is already in residence in

  Cragden, but I think that was just a coincidence," Royance said, his eyes twinkling. "Also, there is talk of Rendelian stonemasons going into the former

  Bog and rebuilding Galinth, making it into a place of scholarly research and contemplation, such as it had been rumored to have been before blight struck the land. Perhaps there are records hidden there that will prove this disaster coincided with the first appearance of the Great Foulness, before his confinement so many years past in the Palace of Ice and Fire, by a long-ago

  NordornKing. We have the story in legend, but it would be good to have the legend confirmed as fact."

  "Zazar will be interested in helping with such a project," Ashen told him. "She knew more about Galinth than she ever told me."

  "She knows more about everything than she ever tells anybody," Royance observed.

  Ashen forbore to inform him that Zazar had made mysterious reference to making preparations for a new Wysen-wyf. Perhaps nothing would come of it, though she doubted her own thoughts.

  When she left Royance's chamber, he bowed low and kissed her fingers. "Do not be a stranger to Rendelsham, Ashen," he said. "Queen though you are, to me you will al-ways be the brave child brought from the Bog and thrust into a world for which she was ill prepared, but which she conquered nonetheless."

  Ashen knew she would miss Royance more than anyone else in Rendelsham, save for her daughter.

  She sent word to Rohan about the great changes being wrought, and he replied by swift courier. She couldn't help smiling when she read his chatty note, obviously written just as things occurred to him:

  Greetings, newly made NordornQueen, and to Gaurin NordornKing as well. Sorry

  Hynnel is dead. He was a good man. You will be as glad to shake the dust of that stifling city from your royal shoes as I was. Don't worry about your goods back at the Oak-enkeep. I've set Nalren and his staff to sorting through and packing.

  You'll want him there in the NordornLand. He is sweet on Ayfare, incidentally, but don't tell her. When you're ready, I'll send the boxes on Spume-Maiden and it can collect you on the way to save a long ride. It's no trouble and Harvas would like to have a look at the old Sea-Rover ruins up there anyway to see if we might resettle at least a colony some day. Oh—Nalren found a vial of some stuff tucked away in a chest of Father's old clothes, wrapped in one of his shirts. It was sealed with wax. Kasai said it was sea-plant poison and probably harmless by now but when I poured it into the harbor, we had dead fish washing up on shore for two days. An-amara is well, and she sends you greetings. Tell

  Gaurin I'm looking for a Rinbell sword for him as a coronation gift. Don't know what to give you, but Anamara will think of something.

  The day arrived for the royal wedding. To Ashen's surprise and pleasure,

  Esander, the priest who had been her staunch friend for many years, presided at the uniting. The royal couple looked very young, but very happy, and every noble had his role in the ceremony and the procession to and from the Great Fane.

  Ashen could not help but think of other weddings in which she had played a part.

  She had never dreamed she would someday fill the role of the bride's mother, and that her son-in-law would be the King of Rendel.

  "May I ask Esander to come with us to the Nordorn-Land?" she asked Gaurin, once they had left the Fane to return to Rendelsham Castle where the feasting had begun in the Great Hall.

  "Of course," he replied. "I think that is an excellent idea. He has always been your friend, and I think he is wasted here in Rendelsham."

  "Yes, I will come," Esander said, when she broached the subject to him. "I would be greatly honored, Ashen NordornQueen."

  "That is the first time anybody has called me that," she said. "We have not put the news about except to a few close to us, lest it detract from the young couple's special day."

  "You were always considerate of the feelings of others," he told her. "When you depart, I will be ready."

  "Thank you."

  Ashen, despite her relief at leaving the city she had little cause to love, felt oddly sad that so much of her old life was ending. To keep herself occupied, she turned to the task of packing their belongings for the journey north.

  During an interlude of rare peace and quiet, Gaurin slipped into the room where she was and interrupted her as she was sorting through the contents of a clothes chest. Carefully, he closed the door behind him and locked it.

  "I have something of grave import to tell you," he said.

  "I've had about enough of 'grave import' to last me for a long, long time," she responded. "What is it?"

  "It is a request, actually."

  Ashen sighed. "I am busy, you know."

  "Well, there is this. We're alone, in private, one of the few times we've had since we came back from the Snow Fortress, and we should make the most of it. I am now the NordornKing. And every King needs an heir." He had a very serious expression on his face, the kind he assumed when he was teasing her.

  She stared at him. He could not maintain his grave demeanor for long, and both dissolved into laughter.

  Then she put her hand to her belly. Suddenly, a number of clues fell into place for her. The Snow Fortress, the narrow camp bed that encouraged intimacy, the ever-present knowledge that each night together might be their last… How long had she been carrying, without realizing it? She smiled at her husband, happy for the first time in many days. "I think the matter is going to resolve itself," she said, "but perhaps we should make sure."

  He gathered her into his arms.

  In her apartment, the Dowager Ysa paced back and forth. All her beautiful schemes, all her plans, gone for naught! Peres married to the Bog-Princess's daughter—no, she corrected herself. She must remember that with Hynnel's death,

  Gaurin was now the NordornKing, which
made Ashen the NordornQueen. She stifled a hysterical giggle at the thought. Well, at any rate, with Boroth's bastard daughter's elevation, little Hegrin was now, beyond any doubt, a worthy match for the King of Rendel. The land of the Nordors would ever be a staunch ally, and best of all, Ashen would live far away. Perhaps she would visit only occasionally, after her grandchildren were born.

  Yes, though it was lamentable that so many of her plans had crumbled to dust before they could be put into operation, it hadn't turned out so badly after all. Both branches of the Great Families who were claimants—or, in the case of

  Ashen, possible claimants—to the throne were now united, this unity to be further solidified with the birth of a new heir in time to come. She sat down in front of the fire that was scarcely needed these days, and by habit held her hands out. She could afford to relax, for the first time in many, many years. An unaccustomed feeling. Rendel, as far as she could foretell, was safe at last and true peace was on the land. Perhaps she would even retire from public life. "Now there's a thought," she said aloud, amused at the notion.