‘I will accept your challenge.’ The Prince’s voice rang out, young and strong. Violating all protocol he stepped clear of his chair and moved to face the Narcheska as if this were truly a confrontation between lovers. His action seemed to exclude the Queen, as if she had no say in the matter at all. ‘I will do it, not to prove myself worthy of your hand, Narcheska. I will not do it to prove anything about myself to you, or to anyone else. But I will do it because I would not see the days of negotiation towards a peace between our peoples put into jeopardy over a prideful girl’s doubts of me.’
She was equal to his scalded pride. ‘It matters little to me why you do it,’ she said, and suddenly her crisp diction and precise pronunciation were back. ‘So long as the task is performed.’
‘And the task?’ he demanded.
‘Prince Dutiful,’ said the Queen. Any son would have recognized the meaning of those words. In the naming of his name, she commanded him to be silent and step back. But the Prince did not seem even to hear them. His entire attention was focused on the girl who had humiliated him and then spurned his efforts at apology.
Elliania took a breath. When she spoke again I recognized plainly the polished diction of a prepared speech. Like a courser who finds solid ground beneath her feet, she sprang to the chase.
‘You know little of our God Runes, Prince, and less of our legends. For legend many will term the dragon Icefyre, though I assure you he is real. As real as your Six Duchies dragons were, when they flew over our villages, snatching memories and sense from those who lived there.’
Bitter words that could only wake bitter memories in the Six Duchies folk who heard them. How dared she complain of what our dragons had done to her people, after the years of raids and Forging had provoked us to it? She walked on very thin ice, black water seeping up in her footprints. I think that only the sheer drama of the moment saved her. She would have been shouted down, had not all ardently wished to know what this Icefyre was. Even the Bingtown Traders had suddenly come to a more pointed attention.
‘Our “legend” is that Icefyre, the black dragon of the God Runes, sleeps deep in the heart of a glacier on Aslevjal Isle. His slumber is a magic one, preserving the fires of his life until some deep need of the God Runes folk awakens him. Then, he will rip himself free of the glacier and come to our aid.’ She paused and slowly scanned the whole room. Her voice was cool and emotionless when she observed, ‘Surely, he should have done so when your dragons flew over us? Surely that was an hour of great need for us. Yet our hero failed to arise. And, for that, as for any hero who forsakes his duty, he deserves to die.’ She turned back to Dutiful. ‘Bring me Icefyre’s head. Then I will know that, unlike him, you are a worthy hero. And I will wed you and be your wife in all ways, even if you never become the King of the Six Duchies.’
I felt Dutiful’s instantaneous reaction. NO I forbade him, and for the first time since I had accidentally Skill-imprinted on him the command not to fight me, I hoped with all my heart that it was well and truly still in place.
And it was. I felt him hit that barrier like a rabbit finding the length of the snare. Like a rabbit, he struggled against the choking restriction of my command. But unlike a rabbit, I felt him, even in his panic and outrage, consider the type of stricture it was. He acted as swift as thought. He lifted his head, and almost like a tracing finger, I felt him follow the noose back to me.
He severed it. Not easily. In the moment before I lost my contact with him, I could feel the sweat burst from his skin. For me, it was like being slammed brow-first onto an anvil. I reeled with the impact, but had no time for considering the pain. For I was suddenly aware that the veiled Trader’s pale blue eye-light was visible through his lacy veil. And he stared, not at the Prince, but at the peephole where I cowered, out of sight. I would have given much to see his expression just then. Even as I prayed it was some bizarre coincidence, I longed to huddle down, to shut my own eyes and hide until his gaze had swept past me.
But I could not. I had a duty, not just as a Farseer but as Chade’s extra eyes. I kept my gaze fixed on the room. My head pounded with pain, and Selden Vestrit continued to stare at the wall that should have shielded me. Then Dutiful spoke.
His voice boomed forth, Verity’s voice, a man’s voice. ‘I accept the challenge!’
So swift it all had happened. I heard Kettricken’s gasp. She had not had time to think of nor phrase a refusal. A stunned silence followed Dutiful’s words. Outislanders, including Arkon Bloodblade, exchanged worried glances at the thought of a Six Duchies prince slaying their dragon. At the Six Duchies tables, the palpable thought was that Dutiful did not need to meet this foreign challenge. I saw Chade wince. Yet a moment later, the old assassin’s eyes opened wide and I saw hope gleam in them. For cheers erupted, not just from the Six Duchies tables but from the Outislanders as well. The enthusiasm for a young man roaring like a bull that he would meet a challenge overpowered every shred of common sense that any man in the room might have held. Even I felt a surge of pride in my chest for this young Farseer prince. He could have refused the challenge, and rightfully so, with no loss to his honour. But he instead had stepped up to it, to defy the Outislanders’ slighting assumption that he was less than worthy of their Narcheska’s hand. At the Outislander table, I suspected that wagers were already being laid that the boy would fail. But even if he failed, his willingness to step up to Elliania’s challenge to him had increased their regard for him. Perhaps they were not marrying their Narcheska off to a farmer prince at all. Perhaps there was a bit of hot blood in his veins.
And for the first time I noted the looks of consternation, even horror, amongst the Bingtown Traders. The veiled Trader was no longer staring at my wall. Selden Vestrit gestured frantically, speaking urgently to the others at his table, trying to make himself heard through the roar of sound that filled the Great Hall.
I caught a glimpse of Starling Birdsong. She had leapt to a tabletop, and her head pivoted like a beleaguered wind-vane as she tried to take in every aspect of the scene, mark every man’s reaction and harvest every comment. There would be a song to be made from all this, and it would be hers.
‘And!’ Prince Dutiful shouted into the din. Something in the set of the lines around his eyes warned me.
‘Eda, mercy,’ I prayed, but knew no god or goddess would stop him. There was a wild and stubborn gleam in his eyes, and I feared whatever it was he was about to say. At his shout, the uproar in the Great Hall quieted abruptly. When he spoke again, his words were pitched for the Narcheska. Nonetheless, in the brimming silence in the room, they carried clearly.
‘And I’ve a challenge of my own. For if I must prove myself worthy to wed the Narcheska Elliania, who has no prospects of being Queen of anything, save that she give her hand to me, then I think she must first prove herself worthy of being a queen of the Six Duchies.’
Now it was Peottre’s turn to startle and then grow pale, for the words were scarcely out of the Prince’s mouth before Elliania replied, ‘Call me this challenge, then!’
‘I shall!’ The Prince took a breath. The eyes of the two youngsters were locked. They might have stood in the midst of a desert for all the care they took for the rest of us. The glance between them was not fixed, but alive, as if for the first time