Chapter 3
THREE
The Cyngaleg princes should not be confused with the Khaimlic term.
Prince, as translated from Cyngaleg, refers to one descended from the
oathsworn of the Eternal King, who unified the Isles. Due to the
princes’ martial might and involvement with sorcery, the rulers of Khaim
considered them too dangerous to be left alive. These were the first put
to the sword during Khaim’s hunts of those with sorcery in
their blood (c.613–644 A.S.).
The bastardisation of the title Prince of Cyngalon is also a
sore spot to the defeated, granted to the second-born heir of Khaim
since the time of King Uhtric Arden-Draca himself.
There have been calls in recent years to change the title to Prince of
the Denelands, in order to better reflect Khaim’s efforts to erase the
now-forbidden Cyngaleg language.
Khaimlic History and the Centuries of War with Cyngalon,
E. van der Vos
THREE
‘Consort, Majesty?’ Harlan asked, again.
Osian pushed back the image of those eyes above the dusting of freckles: eyes like a forest, dawn through the trees. The fall of Meilyr’s wavy dark hair, braided. Wed.
‘Forgive me for speaking my mind,’ Harlan continued.
‘I know you were not exactly keen on marrying either of the Earl of Flintwick’s heirs, or that Ectheid from southern Raak.
And the less said about the lordling from the northern territories the better, but…
a Cyngaleg peasant? I know His Majesty the King pushed for a union, but why the rush?
Could this not have waited until the arrival of—’
‘You may always challenge me in private,’ Osian said, without edge, ‘but this subject will not be questioned beyond us.’
‘Of course, Majesty.’ Harlan knew that. ‘I merely thought that if the requirement for potential matches was dire, you might have mentioned it to me sooner.’ There was almost a pout in that, as much as Harlan was capable of pouting. They regrouped, and said, ‘How shall I present it to the rabble?’
‘Our guest is to remain secret.’ No one was to know about Meilyr’s brother.
It was bad enough crownsworn were assaulting townsfolk; it was worse to have innocents involved.
‘As for the rest, keep the details enticingly quiet. Allow a story to slip that we happened upon one another during my previous visits to Cyngalon.’
So temptingly near illicit, the court would devour it like spiced wine.
Harlan raised an eyebrow, then levelled it. ‘Majesty.’
They could all believe what they wanted. It was done, and even his father could not without effort and further scandal undo it.
Meilyr was brought into Eascild’s Great Hall with the shout of a herald, on Prince Osian’s arm, to rapturous applause.
Consort.
There was cheering, muddled with murmuring. A toast as Meilyr was seated – devastatingly – at the head table, atop a small dais, beside the prince.
It was some sort of miracle he had not been violently sick on the way here.
This was far more than he could possibly have prepared himself for.
He had spent years in carefully constructed routine, avoiding anything that might draw attention to himself, clinging to the quiet familiarity of the apothecary and the few brief things that took him beyond it.
His overstimulated mind snagged uncomfortably on details.
The wall behind the high table was taken up almost entirely by the largest tapestry he had ever seen: a gory, stylised depiction of the killing of Y Ddraig Goch, impaled and captured in an instant of acute agony beneath the claws of the White Dragon, and the lance of the not-yet King Adair, their golden hair interwoven with bursts of sunlight.
At least it was behind the head table, so he did not have to stomach the violence whilst attempting to eat.
A vast, ridiculous dinner sprawled across the numerous long tables of the hall.
It was more food than he could have imagined in one place: two great boars, stuffed and staring, several half-plucked peacocks, littered with garnish and vegetables, more meat, mounds of bread in various shapes, entire wheels of cheeses, vats of stews and soups, and so much wine they must have drawn it straight from a river.
What a waste. These people could not possibly eat all this.
‘Try to eat, if you can.’ It was the first thing the prince had said to him since the ceremony: low, and close to his ear. ‘If there is nothing you like, we can have something else made?’
He referred to Meilyr’s untouched plate. It would probably reflect poorly on the prince if his new husband did not like the feast prepared in honour of their union.
‘Thank you, Your Majesty. This is fine.’ He forced himself to have some of the carrots and worried the boar.
It bled across the plate, and he swallowed more bile.
Meat was always touch and go for his weaver senses, and definitely not worth it today.
He went for the bread, softened it in a small bowl of vegetable soup and forced himself to chew.
Stringed music and song lilted, and the strict seating arrangements loosened. Many clapped shoulders with others, embarked upon games of talon or delved into further drinking. Several approached the high table, with various points of order for the prince or to offer congratulations.
To Meilyr’s private horror, the prince introduced each to him personally: nobles, courtiers, Justices – from the Principality itself and from the neighbouring Marches. Their names and faces blurred, his mind worse off than his plate: muddled, over-filled and going cold.
Several people in particular stood out.
‘The Principality’s captain of the crownsworn,’ Prince Osian introduced. ‘Captain Barrett Radnor. Captain.’
The captain was a severe older man, no less strong in build than any knight half his age.
He had approached the dais with the overt air of someone facing a particularly unpleasant but necessary part of his job, helming an outpouring of displeasure and disdain, seemingly aimed at both Meilyr and the prince.
At least he was easy to read.
‘Majesty. Highness.’ A beat. ‘A shame your father could not be here to oversee the union. He will be disappointed.’
Probably in more ways than one.
Prince Osian smiled and said, ‘I am sure he will come to see the benefits of strengthening ties between our territories.’
The captain’s jaw twitched. Territories was not a word Meilyr had heard in conjunction with Cyngalon. Radnor was also the familial name of one of the Earls of March, so the captain was probably a relation.
The captain put his hand to his chest and bowed stiffly. ‘Blessings upon your union.’
With that, he departed.
Captain of the crownsworn. Celyn had killed one of his men earlier. How aware of today’s events was he?
Meilyr felt the stare of the next person to the dais before they approached, and any comfort he felt at Captain Radnor’s departure dissipated with a twist of his stomach.
‘Lord Leighton.’ Tension lined the prince’s jaw. ‘The Earl of Sanford March.’
There were four Earls of March: each reigned like kings in their own right over the regions granted them by the Crown, lands stolen from Cyngalon during the conquest. Sanford was the March nearest the Principality, and its earl was draped in fine fabrics and gaudy embellishments, content to show off the fruits of his position.
Meilyr had never heard a good word said about him. Quite the opposite, in fact.
He directed a look at Meilyr that washed his insides with ice. The earl had weighed what was before him at surface level, and enjoyed what he saw.
‘Majesty. Highness Meilyr Cadogan, it is good to meet you.’
His accent was harshly Khaimlic, Meilyr’s name hard and disjointed where it should have flowed.
Meilyr lowered his head, supressing a shiver. ‘Thank you, Lord Leighton.’
‘My pleasure. I must say, the praise throughout the court does not do you justice. You fit here as though made for it, regardless of your blood. If I may say, the prince is a lucky man indeed.’
‘That I am,’ Prince Osian said. ‘I trust you will enjoy the festivities, Lord Leighton.’
‘I am sure I will. Fascinating choice, Majesty. Fascinating.’
Meilyr prayed he would never have to receive that look again. It left him feeling unclean and even more on edge, reduced to little more than prey in this space where he could neither arm himself nor cry for help.
He sensed rather than saw the next person as she moved into the space to introduce herself, her arrival clearing some of the air Lord Leighton had left behind. She had been sat with them at the head table on the prince’s other side, before approaching from the front.
‘Highness Demelza, the king’s consort,’ Prince Osian introduced with fondness, rising.
Meilyr also rose, and bowed as low as he could.
‘No need for that, Majesty.’ The kind creases beside her eyes spread. ‘Highness Cadogan’ – he would absolutely never get used to that – ‘it is good to meet you. Please, sit.’
Highness Demelza’s twin braids artfully held back the fall of auburn-brown hair from her pale features. ‘I trust this is… a lot,’ she said. ‘So many people to meet, and to remember. But I promise, it will seem a little easier as time goes by.’
Meilyr’s smile was probably rather strained. ‘Thank you, Your Highness.’
The king of Khaim’s consort. The wife of Osian’s father.
She was not queen, he knew. There was no current queen of Khaim. But there was something regal and maternal about her: she was perhaps in her late forties, though it was hard to tell.
‘Please, call me Demelza. I am unyieldingly fond of the young man beside you, so I hope we can come to know one another better. I know first hand how taxing this all is, so should you need anything, please do not hesitate to ask. You may also ask anything of Lady Faina.’ She gestured to the young woman beside her, who dipped an artful curtsy, head full of tight, bobbing curls.
‘She is Eascild’s Keeper of Books, and one of my dearest friends. ’
‘Charmed, and honoured,’ Lady Faina said.
‘Highness Cadogan. Majesty.’ She was sharply attractive: angled cheeks, eyelids dusted with gold powder, striking against her tanned skin.
She addressed the prince with familiar ease.
‘I cannot believe you didn’t invite us! Wait until a certain someone hears about this. ’
The prince braced himself, but there was mirth in it. ‘We only wished for something small. I am not my sister.’
‘And we are all blessed.’ Lady Faina winked: a joke shared.
Quite comfortably, she came and perched in the empty seat at Meilyr’s other side.
‘I trust everyone has given you a thousand names? Let me help, as Keeper of Books – and that is the wonderful-smelling tomes of the reading rooms, rather than any financial nonsense – I like to know everything I can about everyone.’
‘She truly does,’ Highness Demelza warned affectionately. ‘If you need rescuing, you know where to find me.’ She dipped her head with a wink of her own and returned around the dais as two other courtiers approached the table.
Lady Faina chattered warmly, as though they had been acquainted for years. From anyone else it might have been uncomfortable, but there was something charming about her that proved distracting. Her eagerness was almost infectious, not unlike the wine, which Meilyr nursed as she talked.
He had not had wine since… Well, it had been a long time. It would fuzz his head, especially on an empty stomach, but it might help dampen his nerves.
Gods, he had somehow married a gods-damned prince of Khaim – surely he could get heinously drunk if he chose.
‘And Lord Glede, there, with the rather-too-obvious wig. I remembered his name by thinking, good gledes, what an awful wig.’
The face she made cracked his own with sheer, scandalised surprise.
Her grin broadened in victory, before she settled. ‘Of course, there’ll be more of them arriving soon, so the whole headache of remembering everyone starts over. But I’ll help then as well, if you’d like.’
He had been keeping up so far, though her relaxed diction made his own reflexive formality feel stiffer. ‘Forgive me, I do not understand.’
‘Ah, more of the royal house are arriving in a day or so for the start of the coronation festivities. His Majesty wished to arrive early, and some of the home court came with him.’
Meilyr’s already-delicate chest twinged. More royals.
Lady Faina went on, ‘Many have never set foot in the Denelands, though mercifully I imagine I can call it Cyngalon with you if we’re quiet about it.
Prince Osian has been here before, of course, but the rest have likely done little more than hear their grandparents talk about old unrest, and are eager to see it all for themselves. ’
The relief he felt at hearing her call it Cyngalon ebbed at the word unrest. Unrest that had spread across every field and hillside of Cyngalon in the final bloody years of the conquest. A conquest that had supposedly ended after the final hunts, almost seventy years ago, though Meilyr knew first hand that was not quite the truth.
He stole a glance at Prince Osian, who listened to one of the nobles who had engaged both him and Highness Demelza. The firelight caught the simple band of gold he wore about his head, setting it aflame.
Not unlike the saviour in the tapestry behind them.
Their bargain had not taken on the shape Meilyr had feared, but the prince still represented those who had spilled Cyngalon’s blood like rain. He should not forget who – and what – Prince Osian was.