C. Brittain - Voima

Kardan felt exhausted and beaten, and yet he kept a core stubborn streak that would not let him believe Karin was already dead. As they rolled up in their blankets, again preparing to sleep by the ship, trying to work indentations into the pebbles for shoulders and hips, he suddenly said, “This all started, Hadros, when you refused to let Karin marry Roric.”

“Of course I wouldn’t let her,” said the other king sleepily. “I had to keep my side of our agreement and send her back to you as the unfettered maid you had sent to me.”

“Well, if we find them alive,” said Kardan determinedly, “I want them to marry at once. I know, I know, you told me that she had spent the night with Valmar during the All-Gemot when I thought she was with you. And I know a marriage between our heirs would keep peace between our kingdoms. But she prefers Roric, and he must be with her or we would have found him again.”

“It was you who was supposed to stay with him yesterday,” said Hadros grumpily.

“I do not even care,” Kardan pushed on, “that he is a man without a family, No-man’s son. If she had married him, fatherless man that he is, she would now be home safe.”

King Hadros suddenly rolled over and sat up. “Do you see the queen?” he asked in a low voice.

“No,” said Kardan, surprised. “Arane’s tent is over on the far side of camp; she must be asleep by now.”

“Well, she never wanted to talk about this,” said Hadros quietly, “and would never let me ask questions. But I am nearly certain who Roric’s mother was. If you’re thinking of having your daughter marry him you ought to know. And I also have a very good guess for his father.”

Kardan thrashed out of his blankets, bit back a shout, then said, “Why did you never tell me this before?” between his teeth.

“It was no concern of yours that I could see,” said Hadros mildly.

“But the man my daughter loves! Tell me at least who his mother is!”

“Well, I cannot be completely certain. But Arane and I have been friends for a long time. There was a time some years ago, when I had been married a while but the lords of voima had not yet granted sons to my queen and me, when I had to visit Arane’s kingdom. It must have been on business of the Fifty Kings.”

“Probably plotting a war against someone,” muttered Kardan, realizing that it could not have been too many years later that Hadros had found an excuse to attack him.

“As I recall,” said Hadros, as though rather surprised at the memory, “I had been going to invade her kingdom. She invited me for a parley, and she talked me out of it. Hard to say how… Well, I stayed in her castle for a week that winter,” he continued after a brief pause, “and she thought I might be lonely and cold, so she sent her maid each night to make sure my bed was warm. Thoughtful of her-and a very sweet maid.”

“And then?” Kardan demanded when Hadros seemed to slip away into pleasant reminiscences.

“Well, it was close to a year later when I was again back that way.” Hadros was only a dark shape, lit from behind by the watch fires. “I did not see the maid this visit; I was only there the one night. But Arane took me aside and asked me a favor.”

“And the favor?” asked Kardan, already knowing the answer.

“She said there had been a baby born in her court, a little boy. Bright red face when I first saw him and a shock of black hair, and yelling as loudly as any grown man. He deserved a good home, she told me, said he was of a lineage that should not be brought up with the children of the housecarls. A baby was the last thing I needed at that point. But I took him home.”

“And that was Roric,” supplied Kardan when the other king fell silent.

“He fought me even then,” Hadros said quietly. “Small enough to fit in my two hands, but he kicked and yelled all the way across the channel and home again. Poor little chap didn’t have anything to eat for two days, though we dripped water in his mouth so he wouldn’t be too thirsty-I tried him on ale but he wouldn’t swallow it. As soon as we got to the castle I had him put to the breast of one of the serving-maids who had just borne a babe of her own. And my wife liked him. He would quiet for her when he wouldn’t for anybody. I didn’t want it generally known that I had been weak enough to agree to carry a screaming baby all the way home with me, and it didn’t seem right to have everyone know he was mine when my queen was still barren. So I put out that he had been a foundling, a little baby lying in front of the gates when we came up the hill from the harbor.”

“Your queen must have known the real story.”

“I suppose she did. I suppose a lot of people did. But she accepted what I told her and started taking him into our bed. The old women had told her that sometimes sleeping with a baby will make a woman conceive. Maybe it did work, but it took a while. He slept with us for several years. He never screamed much after I had him home, but he kicked. Once he was asleep he slept hard, nothing would wake him. But let me tell you what I almost told those old women: if you want your wife to conceive, the wrong way to do it is to have her lying every night curled up around a sleeping babe.”

“So Roric is your son,” said Kardan in wonder. “Did Queen Arane send something with you, some token perhaps you had left with her maid, so that you would be sure?”

“No, and that’s the strange thing. There was a little bone charm wrapped up in his blankets, but it was nothing I’d seen before. Arane certainly wanted me to think the baby was mine, and the timing was about right. But if she had her maid entertain all her important visitors, the lass may not have been sure herself.”

“But you do know that Roric was born to the queen’s maid?”

“Well, who else would the mother be? The queen would never have been concerned over an ordinary servant’s brat. And she has asked me over the years, not every time the Fifty Kings met but several times, how he was getting on. But she would never answer my questions about him, and she did not want to see him herself at the All-Gemot. I’m sure her maid was happy to hear he was brought up as my foster-son.”

Kardan lay down and started again trying to make the pebbles a comfortable bed. He had another question, one he was not sure how to ask. At last he said, “If you think Roric is your son, why did you try to have him killed?”

“He wouldn’t listen to me,” said Hadros sleepily. “He has little room for mistakes, but he keeps making them every time he ignores me. Haven’t you ever wanted to kill your own sons? But that’s right, they’re dead already.”

Kardan gritted his teeth but did not answer. He still could not always tell when the other king was making a joke.

“Besides,” Hadros continued, “I did not in fact want him dead, even if I did suggest something of the sort after drinking all evening. Gizor took me a little too literally! But Roric’s always infuriated me. Maybe he picked up a little of my temperament in those years of sleeping with me; I infuriated my father too. But his telling me he wanted to marry Karin pushed me over the edge. Even if he is mine, he’ll never inherit anything from me, so he has to make his fortune on his own. Even aside from wanting to send your daughter back to you a pure maiden, not tied to a man without kin who would acknowledge him, I didn’t want Roric to be slowed down by a woman while he’s still young. Though I must say, these last few weeks suggest that if anything the princess has speeded him up!”

“So you might allow them to marry after all?”

“Her decision rests with you now, Kardan. But young Valmar-if we find him again-does think he’s betrothed to her.”