Chapter 210 The Princess Isolde

At the sight of the Queen Mother calling the Lady Charlotte, it wasn't Leon alone whose heart gave a lurch — the Countess was groaning inwardly too:

I should never have brought that child out of doors. And now she's sold into the palace. When her father comes home, what do I tell him...

Ambrose hadn't caught up with it at all. Across the Dowager Lady Elena's face there crossed a thread of embarrassment:

That cut through the Gordian knot — it's aimed at me, plain as day! Your birth never matched mine. Had Voss not reached the Princes' Quarter half a step ahead, back in that year, the woman in the Queen Mother's seat would be me.

The King did no more than praise Lora's parts — never a word of taking her into the palace. And you must run so fast to block Rowan's road — you simply cannot abide to see me have my way...

In the great hall of the Supreme Hall, one still moment — no one giving a thought to what the Dowager Lady felt. Every eye waited on the Queen Mother's voice. She came at her leisure:

"I have borne the King one son only, and no more. Today, with the young Miss von Odenheim of Prince Jasper's household, it was old friendship at first meeting. I mean to take her for my adopted daughter, and grant her a princess's title. As for the style — has the Odenheim house any private domain? If none, then the King may choose her title for her."

It took the whole hall off its feet. When a Queen Mother takes an adopted daughter, it is most often for this: to stand the girl in a princess's place, and send her out to a foreign realm in the marriage-alliances.

There'd been no word of any realm come asking of late. What then was the Queen Mother about?

Leon's hands, gone white from their gripping, took the blood back little by little. Whether the Queen Mother truly meant to lift Lora out of the trap or no — till his own wings were full, the name of the Queen Mother's adopted daughter was the best shield Lora could stand behind.

Happily, the ducal roll of the house of Charwick held the record of the Countess's dowry, and von Klein soon had the Household search it out. Two names of counties stood in it — Lornmere and Isfeld.

The King chose "Isfeld" — and from that county's old princely line, a style for her: Isolde. Down went the Lady Charlotte, to draw up the edict: Lora von Odenheim of Prince Jasper's household, raised to Princess Isolde.

"Countess — I've stolen your daughter on you. Don't tell me you'll grudge her." The Queen Mother made it a joke.

The Countess looked at the Queen Mother with her heart at sixes and sevens. The word was given, and there was no taking it back; she could only lead Lora before the Queen Mother and set her daughter to her knees in thanks.

"For Your Majesty's high regard for our young lady — Pearl is honored, and trembling. If ever in days to come Lora falls short, I beg Your Majesty's forbearance."

As the Countess read it, an adopted daughter was no happy omen. Could a marriage-alliance be brewing? The royal house begrudged its own daughters — and would the great houses begrudge theirs any less?

Lora, for her part, held no fear of it at all. She knew the history cold: Princess Constance, married off to the steppe khanate — Leon's own aunt — was the last princess the Empire ever sent out in alliance.

With that fear off the board, Lora thought having the Queen Mother for an adopted mother a very good thing besides — at the least, the Odenheim house would never again have to dread whose pressure might come down on them.

A Queen Mother with a new adopted daughter — a happy thing. The capital's kinfolk were all in attendance; and when the Countess and her daughter were seen settled in their new places, the women round about came thronging to wish the Countess joy.

Ambrose slunk back to his seat. Leon poured him a cup of the East-Capital Brew, and said, laughing, low: "The Odenheim house holds soldiers. You're out courting suspicion on purpose, aren't you?"

Ambrose lifted the cup, took a sip, and worked his mouth over it twice: "No one in that house trades. How then did they light on a brewing recipe like no other? And the strange part — the fourth Odenheim hasn't the least notion of it..."

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"The Odenheims have five sons. The third has lived in the capital a dozen years and more — doesn't he know the people to know?" Leon said it without turning a hair.

"Just so, Your Highness — and you and young Odenheim are thick enough. Why doesn't the King fasten on you?"

Leon laughed: "Thick with him because my late father assigned him to me as my study-companion, that's all. I'm thick with Felix Fairfax too — why don't you bring him up?"

"So I am — you don't say it, and a body forgets. Her ladyship of Selwood's eldest — where has he got to today? Everyone in the realm on holiday — what keeps a President of the Board of Revenue busy?"

"Him? The envoys of the outer realms presented their gift-lists just now. He's off helping count the gifts, most like."

So it was. The whole world was bringing tribute up on the Birth-Feast; the Exchequer must needs match ranks with the envoys to receive them, and its hands ran short. Felix was President of the Board of Revenue, and the Board had grown out of the Exchequer besides — of course he must go lend his arm.

And there was one other troop of men at the inner Crown Granary along with the Exchequer's — the Household's own inner servants, counting over the birth-tribute the marcher lords and the officials had sent up for the King.

Soft music rose all at once, and dancers in colored shawls came drifting into the great hall — and the two brothers' talk stopped.

Between the two tables, song and dance once begun, the whole hall's stiffness gave way; the neighboring tables fell to toasting one another.

Ambrose stole one look across at Lora: her cousin-aunt was making her known to the kin seated near, and she had drunk — a few cups of the grape wine, by now — a faint flying pink coming and going on her face.

Leon kept his eyes front, and only watched his own fingertips, going round and round the rim of his cup.

He didn't need to look, to know that that woman, so sure of her head for wine, was drinking the sweet grape wine down like water again. His one hope was that by the feast's end, Roland's side could get away.

And past that — he hoped his ears would catch the running feet, and soon: feet flying toward the middle hall, toward von Klein, the Household's man.

But the woman's voice came over, sentence by sentence, missing not one:

"Cousin-aunt — Lora has it by heart. The Long-Flourish Quarter is just hard next our house; Lora will surely come."

Go — go — go where? Old Cedric Lawton: packed off to three marcher lordships, and thrown out of every one — and still dreaming, day in and day out, of the chancellor's seat. And the son no better — the very picture of the Eighth.

"Aunt — how old are the little princesses, by their years?... Teach them? I've nothing to teach... Good at? I'm good at playing. Might I teach them that?"

Good — you know that much yourself. A few sentences more, and the stuffing shows. Would the convent school skip the old Empress's Mirror for Women? Go on — give them a taste of your little reinterpretations, and see if that aunt doesn't take the flat of her hand to you.

Hmm? Why has the voice stopped?

Leon couldn't help lifting his eyes to look for her — and there she sat, glaring at Prince Ian, who was cozening Prince Gawain to eat an "elixir."

That was the daily sport of the King's brothers, baiting Prince Gawain. Lora was setting eyes on the two future kings for the first time — Ian-to-come and Gawain-to-come — and the wonder on her face wouldn't quite stay put.

Young Prince Gawain was a year the King's junior — and he plainly wanted nothing to do with that "elixir." With his stock of simple sweetness he kept his lips pressed tight, shut fast — refusing Prince Ian's pill, and the wine Ambrose had sent over to wash it down.

Leon thought of what Lora had once said to him: that the man who played the simpleton there was his opponent too.

He thought of his life before: taken in, like the King, by Uncle Gawain's simpleton's face. And now, at need, he could have wished, with a very human itch, to turn Uncle Gawain's playing-simple into the real thing.

But over on the far side, Lora had risen to her feet.

Leon turned his chair at once, and made a great show of watching the fun over Uncle Gawain.

She slipped round the dancing girls, came up to Prince Gawain, and beamed all over: "Lora greets Prince Gawain, and the three sworn brothers. What are you all playing at?"

Prince Ian and Ambrose, seeing her come curtsying, let go of Uncle Gawain for the moment.

Ambrose laughed in haste: "No ceremony, sworn sister. Our fifth brother was just inviting Uncle to take his elixir."

Prince Gawain mopped at his brow, and mumbled: "Can't eat elixirs... eat one, and you turn a saint, and fly up into the sky."

"We don't believe it — unless you eat the elixir down and fly for us to see."

The pill Prince Ian had was, in fact, an alchemist's true elixir — but red, where the common run was black. An alchemist had presented it to him, and he hadn't dared eat it himself; it had put him in mind of Uncle Gawain — and so he'd coaxed the uncle over, to run the trial for him.

Lora smiled: "I've a way to test whether this pill is a true elixir or no. Do you want to try it?"

Prince Ian stood struck. He hadn't looked to hear such a speech from her. He'd kept company with alchemists all his life — every one of them swearing his pill was the elixir of ageless life — and never once had there been a way to prove the true from the false.

What way could this little thing have?

He opened his palm, held the red pill out to Lora, and smiled:

"Who knew my sworn sister had arts as well. Then — test it. And set Uncle's heart at rest."