‘You’re getting soft.’ Kurik told him. ‘You need a month or two on the practice field to toughen you up. Are you sure you want to wear it?’
‘It’s a formal occasion, Kurik, and formal occasions demand formal dress. Besides, I don’t want any confusion in anybody’s mind when I get there. I’m the Queen’s Champion, and I’m supposed to wear armour when I present myself to her.’
‘They won’t let you in to see her,’ Kurik predicted, picking up his lord’s helmet.
‘Won’t let?’
‘Don’t do anything foolish, Sparhawk. You’re going to be all alone.’
‘Is the Earl of Lenda still on the council?’
Kurik nodded. ‘He’s old, and he doesn’t have much authority, but he’s too much respected for Annias to dismiss him.’
‘I’ll have one friend there anyway.’ Sparhawk took his helmet from his squire and settled it in place. He pushed up his visor.
Kurik went to the window to pick up Sparhawk’s sword and shield. ‘The rain’s letting up,’ he noted, ‘and it’s starting to get light.’ He came back, laid the sword and shield on the table and picked up the silver-coloured surcoat. ‘Hold out your arms,’ he instructed.
Sparhawk spread his arms wide, and Kurik draped the surcoat over his shoulders, then he laced up the sides. He then took up the long sword belt and wrapped it twice about his lord’s waist. Sparhawk picked up his sheathed sword. ‘Did you sharpen this?’ he asked.
Kurik gave him a flat stare.
‘Sorry.’ Sparhawk locked the scabbard onto the heavy steel studs on the belt and shifted it around into place on his left side.
Kurik fastened the long black cape to the shoulder plates of the armour, then stepped back and looked Sparhawk up and down appraisingly. ‘Good enough,’ he said. ‘I’ll bring your shield. You’d better hurry. They rise early at the palace. It gives them more time for mischief.’
They went out of the room and on down the stairs to the innyard. The rain for the most part had passed, with only a few last intermittent sprinkles slanting into the yard in the gusty morning wind. The dawn sky, however, was still covered with tattered grey cloud, although there was a broad band of pale yellow off to the east.
The knight porter led Faran out of the stable, and he and Kurik boosted Sparhawk up into his saddle.
‘Be careful when you get inside the palace, my Lord,’ Kurik warned in the formal tone he used when they were not alone. ‘The regular palace guards are probably neutral, but Annias has a troop of church soldiers there as well. Anybody in red livery is likely to be your enemy.’ He handed up the embossed black shield.
Sparhawk buckled the shield into place. ‘You’re going to the chapterhouse to see Vanion?’ he asked his squire.
Kurik nodded. ‘Just as soon as they open the east gate of the city.’
‘I’ll probably go there when I’m through at the palace, but you come back here and wait for me.’ He grinned. ‘We may have to leave town in a hurry.’
‘Don’t go out of your way to force the issue, my Lord.’
Sparhawk took Faran’s reins from the porter. ‘All right then, Sir Knight,’ he said. ‘Open the gate and I’ll go present my respects to the bastard Lycheas.’
The porter laughed and swung open the gate.
Faran moved out at a proud, rolling trot, lifting his steel-shod hooves exaggeratedly and bringing them down in a ringing staccato on the wet cobblestones. The big horse had a peculiar flair for the dramatic, and he always pranced outrageously when Sparhawk was mounted on his back in full armour.
‘Aren’t we both getting a little old for exhibitionism?’ Sparhawk asked dryly.
Faran ignored that and continued his prancing.
There were few people abroad in the city of Cimmura at that hour – rumpled artisans and sleepy shopkeepers for the most part. The streets were wet, and the gusty wind set the brightly painted wooden signs over the shops to swinging and creaking. Most of the windows were still shuttered and dark, although here and there golden candlelight marked the room of some early riser.
Sparhawk noted that his armour had already begun to smell – that familiar compound of steel, oil, and the leather harness that had soaked up his sweat for years. He had nearly forgotten that smell in the sun-blasted streets and spice-fragrant shops of Jiroch; almost more than the familiar sights of Cimmura, it finally convinced him that he was home.
An occasional dog came out into the street to bark at them as they passed, but Faran disdainfully ignored them as he trotted through the cobblestone streets.
The palace lay in the centre of town. It was a very grandiose sort of building, much taller than those around it, with high, pointed towers surmounted by damply flapping coloured pennons. It was walled off from the rest of the city, and the walls were surmounted by battlements. At some time in the past, one of the kings of Elenia had ordered the exterior of those walls to be sheathed in white limestone. The climate and the pervasive pall of smoke that lay heavy over the city in certain seasons, however, had turned the sheathing a dirty, streaked grey.
The palace gates were broad and patrolled by a half-dozen guards wearing the dark blue livery that marked them as members of the regular palace garrison.
‘Halt!’ one of them barked as Sparhawk approached. He stepped into the centre of the gateway, holding his pike slightly advanced. Sparhawk gave no indication that he had heard, and Faran bore down on the man. ‘I said to halt, Sir Knight!’ the guard commanded again. Then one of his fellows jumped forward, seized his arm, and pulled him out of the roan’s path. ‘It’s the Queen’s Champion,’ the second guard exclaimed. ‘Don’t ever stand in his way.’
Sparhawk reached the central courtyard and dismounted, moving a bit awkwardly because of the weight of his armour and the encumbrance of his shield. A guard came forward, his pike at the ready.
‘Good morning, neighbour,’ Sparhawk said to him in his quiet voice.
The guard hesitated.
‘Watch my horse,’ the knight told him then. ‘I shouldn’t be too long.’ He handed the guard Faran’s reins and started up the broad staircase towards the heavy double doors that opened into the palace.
‘Sir Knight,’ the guard called after him.
Sparhawk did not turn, but continued on up the stairs. There were two blue-liveried guards at the top, older men, he noted, men he thought he recognized. One of the guards’ eyes widened, then he suddenly grinned. ‘Welcome back, Sir Sparhawk,’ he said, pulling the door open for the black-armoured knight.
Sparhawk gave him a slow wink and went on inside, his mail-shod feet and his spurs clinking on the polished flagstones. Just beyond the door, he encountered a palace functionary with curled and pomaded hair and wearing a maroon-coloured doublet. ‘I will speak with Lycheas,’ Sparhawk announced in a flat tone. ‘Take me to him.’
‘But –’ The man’s face had gone slightly pale. He drew himself up, his expression growing lofty. ‘How did you –?’
‘Didn’t you hear me, neighbour?’ Sparhawk asked him.
The man in the maroon doublet shrank back. ‘A–at once, Sir Sparhawk,’ he stammered. He turned then and led the way down the broad central corridor. His shoulders were visibly trembling. Sparhawk noted that the functionary was not leading him towards the throne room, but rather towards the council chamber where King Aldreas had customarily met with his advisors. A faint smile touched the big man’s lips as he surmised that the presence of the young Queen sitting encased in crystal on the throne might have had a dampening effect on her cousin’s attempts to usurp her crown.
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