David Drake - The Fortress of Glass

Ilna grinned faintly. Cashelwas a well-trained guard dog. His silent bulk was the reason the others nattered instead of snarling, even the two military rivals seated across from one another at the opposite end of the table: Lord Waldron, the army commander, and Lord Attaper who commanded the bodyguards, the Blood Eagles. Without Cashel's presence, they'd have been bellowing at each other, ignoring the presence of Princess Sharina.

Several people began talking all together, disagreeing with Zettin in as many different fashions as there were voices. None of the questions really mattered, and they were dancing around the question thatdid matter: who would rule until Garric returned?

Who would rule if Garric never returned?

Ilna looked at the tapestry on which a peasant plowed behind a span of oxen. On a hill in the background rose a castle whose corner turrets had red conical roofs. It didn't look anything like this palace nor any building Ilna would expect to find on First Atara.

She touched the fabric-wool on a warp of linen-and felt a warm impression of the hills of Central Haft. She might well have passed close to where the tapestry'd been woven when she walked from Barca's Hamlet to Carcosa on the opposite coast a few years before.

She might've been physically close, but the tapestry'd been woven unthinkable ages before she'd been born. It was ancient, a relic of the Old Kingdom like some of the books Garric and Lady Liane read; Garric's fiancee, Lady Liane…

Ancient or not, the weaver hadn't been very skilled. First Atara must always have been the sort of backwater it was today, a quiet place where folk grew grain and minded their own business. Barca's Hamlet had been that sort of place, but then it all changed. That would happen on First Atara too, whether the folk here liked it or not.

Ilna smiled, this time without humor. It didn't matter what people or what threads, either one, thought of the pattern they were woven into.

"With all due respect-" said Lord Tadai. From the tone of his voice, that meant no respect at all. He stopped because he heard loud voices outside the door.

The soldiers at the table rose. So did Cashel, still placid but holding his staff in both hands.

It was Chalcus, though, standing at Ilna's side who murmured, "Stay, child," to Merota. He swaggered to the door and pulled it open with his right hand. Only someone who knew the man Chalcus was would have noticed that the movement put his hand very close to the hilt of his incurved sword.

The six guards outside were Blood Eagles. They'd backed to keep as far as they could from the pair of men coming toward them across the courtyard. Now there was no farther to retreat, so they'd lowered their spears. The men approaching would run themselves onto the points unless they stopped.

Ilna didn't care for soldiers as a class: a life spent in killing other men seemed to her at best unworthy. The Blood Eagles were the best of their sort, however, and she appreciated good craftsmanship in any line of work.

"Please, your highness," begged the chamberlain, Lord Martous, as he stood wringing his hands behind Cervoran. "Please, another time?"

Cervoran-King Cervoran-looked much as he had that morning when Ilna dragged him from the pyre. His garments'd been changed; the trousers and tunic he wore now weren't singed and smoke-stained. Nonetheless the same bluish cast underlay Cervoran's pallor, and his fingers looked like suet-stuffed sausages. He walked normally now, except for a slight hitch in his step of a sort common in old people and not unknown in younger ones.

"Sir!" the under-captain commanding the guards said to Attaper. "We told him to stop, but he just keeps coming!"

The Blood Eagles were brave men by definition: they'd volunteered to protect a warrior prince who regularly put himself in the hottest part of the fight. This officer and his men had watched Cervoran get up from his bier, though.

Wizardry was the only cause Ilna could imagine that would've allowed a dead man to rise. The guards were clearly of the same opinion, and the courage to face death didn't necessarily mean the courage to face wizardry.

Cervoran stopped just short of the spear points. Those in the council chamber watched him; some calmly, some not. The smile on Chalcus' face was probably genuine, but there was sweat on Lord Waldron's brow. The old warrior wouldn't run from what he feared, but his fear was no less real for his ability to master it.

Sharina looked past Cashel's left shoulder; the quarterstaff was a diagonal bar protecting her from anything that might come through the doorway. Cashel's expression was as placid as that of an ox in his stall, but Ilna could see the way the muscles tensed in her brother's throat and bare forearms.

Cervoran raised his right arm and pointed a doughy finger at Cashel. "You," he said, piping like a frog in springtime. "Who are you?"

"I'm Cashel or-Kenset," Cashel replied. His face didn't change. He didn't add a question of his own or put a challenge in his voice, the way a less self-assured man might have done.

"Come with me, Cashel," Cervoran said. "It is necessary."

Attaper stepped forward, his hand on his sword hilt. "Lord Cervoran," he said in too loud a voice, "you have no business here. This is aroyal council!"

"Come with me, Cashel," the former corpse repeated.

"Sharina?" said Cashel. "Do you need me? Because I wouldn't mind going along with him, Lord Cervoran I mean. Since he says it's necessary."

"Yes, all right, Cashel," Sharina said. She put her right hand on his shoulder, squeezed, and released him. "I trust your judgment… and your ability to deal with any problems that arise."

Cashel grinned. "Let me by, please," he said to the guards, but they were already stepping sideways to let him past.

"It is necessary," Cervoran squeaked. He turned and started back toward the opposite wing of the palace-the servants' quarters and storage rooms. Cashel walked at his side, the quarterstaff slanted across his body; the chamberlain followed nervously behind them.

Ilna looked at the pattern her fingers had knotted during the tableau that'd just ended. "Close the door if you would, Chalcus," she said in a clear voice.

She turned and eyed the room, the gathering of the most powerful folk in the Kingdom of the Isles. "Now," said Ilna. "I think it's time to acknowledge Princess Sharina as regent until her brother the prince comes back."

Sharina was startled at Ilna's words, but it was very like her friend to speak her mind. Admiral Zettin-a good man, but one who didn't know Ilna as well as Waldron and Attaper had come to do-looked at her with an irritated expression and said, "I don't think-"

"That's nothing to brag about, milord," Liane broke in, emphasizing by her nasal, upper-class Sandrakkan accent that she wasLady Liane bos-Benliman. "If youdid think, you'd realize-as we all do, I'm sure, in our hearts-that the kingdom needs someone in Prince Garric's place as regent if it's to function, and that the princess is the proper choice. If Garric could've done so, he'd have appointed his sister, as he's done when necessary in the past."

Sharina grinned, but only in her mind. She didn't want the job, but she knew Garric didn't want it either. He was the correct person to hold the mutually antagonistic nobles together-nobody's man, and therefore the man for everyone. While Garric was gone, Sharina was almost the only one who could take his place.

Almostthe only one: Liane too had the knowledge and intelligence to rule. But Liane was from Sandrakkan, while the strength of the royal army and fleet came from Ornifal. Haft, where Garric and Sharina'd been born, had been unimportant since the fall of the Old Kingdom. The haughty rulers of Ornifal and Sandrakkan and Blaise could bow to someone from Haft as representating the Kingdom without losing face to a rival island.