Роберт Асприн - Forever After

Princess Rissa nodded. “He kills people. Elegantly.”

“Perhaps weapons would be best.” Daisy sighed. “Something like a ceremonial dagger with a place for the new royal crest to be mounted once you have one.”

“I’ll speak to Rango,” Rissa said, although that was the last thing she really wanted to do. “Certainly he will know a smith who can do the work quickly.”

“You should change first, ducky,” Daisy admonished. “He shouldn’t see the gown until the wedding day!”

In his council chamber, the impending bridegroom was in conference with Lemml Touday. He frowned as the priest finished his report.

“And so, Your Highness, I have diverted discussion from the skull repeatedly. Now that the Temple is in festive upheaval with plans for the wedding and coronation the question should be moot until afterwards.”

“Afterwards?” The Prince raised his elegant eyebrows. “Afterwards everything will be happy. The artifacts will be returned, the magical phenomena will cease, and we will settle down to an era of peace and justice.”

Lemml frowned. “I sincerely hope so, Your Highness. However, I have been researching the history of prognosticatory devices like the skull and they are rarely wrong. Their portents have been misunderstood and their warnings ignored, but if they consistently warn of impending Evil, then that Evil is impending.”

“I see,” the Prince said, sipping his brown, frothy drink with urbane relish, “and you think that I am being overly casual in regard to these portents.”

Lemml took a deep breath. “In a word, sire, yes.”

He reached into the sleeve of his robe and removed the small pouch he had received from the Prince on his last visit. It jingled, slightly fuller even than before.

“I have meditated at length,” he said, “and have decided to return some of your donations to my favorite charity. I will not speak of anything that has passed between us, but I am a priest and I find that I cannot forget my duty.”

The Prince studied Lemml, then his gaze came to rest on the map on the wall. He rose, studied the position of some of his pins, and then returned to his seat.

“Lemml, on that map I have been tracing the progress of several things. The blue pins mark the last known positions of my questing heroes.”

Lemml turned so that he could look. Behind him, he heard the Prince take the cap off one of the bottles and refresh their drinks.

“The red pins mark bandit incursions and monster sightings,” the Prince continued, “the green pins mark natural disasters — floods, earthquakes, tornados. The yellow pins mark unnatural disasters.”

“There seem to be a good number of those in Caltus,” the priest commented, accepting the freshened goblet from the Prince’s hand.

“There do, but there are fewer than there were before,” the Prince said. “Several of my heroes are on their return journeys and the number of disastrous occurrences — natural and unnatural — has been falling off steadily. To be brief, I have been looking for any evidence of the Evil that you and the skull have been fussing about and have seen no trace.”

Lemml sipped his drink. It seemed a trace bitter this time — perhaps the magical sweet stuff had begun to spoil. He rather hoped so. He didn’t share the Prince’s fondness for the drink and longed for a cool goblet of wine or a mug of beer.

“I am relieved that you are being so careful, sire,” he said, “but my position stands. I can no longer serve as your eyes and ears within the Temple. Also, I must warn you that I will be alert to foil those who might be tempted to do so now that I am not.”

Rango shook his head sadly. “You misjudge me, priest. Do you not recall that you came with this offer to me, not me to you? You think that because you were corrupt that others will be or that I would seek to ask other priests to serve both Crown and Temple? No, when you came to me, I took it as an omen that the Deities of Light wished for me to have eyes and ears within their holdings. Now that you depart my service, I will end that phase of my rulership.”

“I hope so.” Lemml rose unsteadily, the strain of the conversation having frayed his nerves. “Then I bid you good day, my lord, and offer my blessings on your impending nuptials.”

“Good-bye, Lemml Touday,” the Prince said with a curious smile. “I shall not see you again.”

Dismissed, the priest made his way down stone corridors that suddenly seemed infinite. His head spun. One stone wall looked much like another. He passed the same tapestry three times without coming to the side door which he had used to come to his meetings with the Prince.

Calling out was out of the question. He did not know what type of reception he would get from the Prince’s Guard, some of whom were tough soldiers, hardened by service in the wars against the Fallen Sunbird. Staggering on, he froze as he heard light footsteps tripping down a stone stairway. Then the Princess Rissa came into view.

“Oh, my!” she cried, kneeling beside him. “What has happened to you?”

He tried to reply and vomited on her shoes.

When next he knew himself, he was lying on a pallet in a cool, shadowy room. The Princess knelt beside him, putting aside a basin of cool water and a rag.

“Am I in the dungeon?” he whispered.

“It depends on how you see it,” the Princess said. “This is the room reserved for my lady companion. Daisy prefers to go home to her husband, so it is empty. After what I’ve been through, no one is terribly worried about guarding my virtue.”

“Ah,” he moaned.

“Now, what happened to you?” Rissa asked. “As best as I can tell, you were poisoned. I administered purgatives then fed you activated charcoal to absorb the residue.”

Lemml Touday gaped. “I was in conference with Prince Rango. I…”

He stopped. This lovely woman was the Prince’s fiancé. She had just saved his life and hidden him away, but could he trust her? She studied him and he remembered the steel within that lovely breast.

“Princess, I have been the Prince’s spy within the Temple….”

He told her the whole story, not even omitting the monies he had received or those he had kept. He told her his suspicions that Evil was looming and that somehow the Prince had an interest in hiding the rise of that Evil. Princess Rissa listened, a frown furrowing her brow.

“I, too, have worried about the Prince,” she confided when Lemml finished his tale. “He has not been acting like himself. He takes pleasure in bookkeeping, accounting, and meetings. When he rides or does sword practice he does it as one would a duty, not a pleasure. I do not know what ails him, but I dread this wedding as no bride should dread her wedding and dread this coronation as no Queen-to-be ever has.”

Lemml sipped the cool, clear water she poured for him from an earthenware pitcher. His mouth still tasted like the sour remnants of a dog’s dinner, but his head was clearing.

“What should we do, my lady?” he asked.

“You said that the Prince said that some of the heroes are already returning?”

“Yes, he did not specify which, but he seemed pleased.”

Rissa nodded “The day for the wedding and coronation will be set soon. You shall become my eyes and ears in the city. There is no way you can return to the Temple, for the Prince clearly meant to have you dead.”

Lemml nodded. “I fear leaving the skull untended. What if the Prince sends someone to steal it or damage it? It is a powerful magical device and the last remnant of the Fallen Sunbird.”

“A good point,” Rissa said. “As soon as darkness falls, you must steal over to the Temple and bring it here. I will rinse the worst of the filth from your robes.”