Cards of Grief by Jane Yolen Read Free Book Online

unpainted strings. They echo, they sound the centuries, just as we older princes do. You see, I still call myself a prince, though I have had the thirty cushions for almost a year.
    But I apologize, I stray far from my tale. You want to know about the Gray Wanderer, you said, not some old prince whose organs shriveled up years ago and whose sole pleasures are in the stewardship of state, small pieces of gossip, and memories.
    Well, I played Gray’s song over and over on my plecta, teaching my mind to remember what my fingers already easily recalled. I was able to embroider the tune a bit, for the strings were wonderfully supple on this instrument, though I had not plucked it for three seasons past. (I had carried only a worn harmonus for my travels.)
    The song echoed in the room till the very walls were party to Gray’s great-grandmother’s immortality. And when I was satisfied that I would not stumble when presenting the song to the Queen, I stood. Gazing out of the window into the courtyard below I was surprised to find that it was already dark.
    “Mar-keshan,” I called out and my servant entered immediately.
    He was old and brown as cow spittle, but I would not let him retire. He had been old when he had come into my service on my birth day. He was, in fact, so old that his blue eyes were practically translucent, yet still—I think—they saw more truly than any of the young servers I have around me today.
    “My lord,” he said, bowing, showing no surprise at my early return or any indication that I had been gone months without a word to him.
    “I will eat and then be dressed,” I said. “Any requests for me?”
    “The Prince D’oremos would see you this evening at your leisure.” He allowed himself a part smile because he knew what such an invitation meant. Mar-keshan had been a server for enough years to understand princely politics well, though he was originally only a Waters man who chose service instead of the sea.
    I smiled back at him. Understand—only in the privacy of my apartment would I ever do such a thing. It is bad form to be intimate with your servants. But Mar-keshan was more than a servant. He was my oldest—well, friend may be too strong a word, but we knew each other well. We said nothing, though. One never knows what holes have been bored behind the curtains to allow for listening ears.
    I signed to him with the hand signals we had long ago adopted: This is interesting and we shall talk of it later. Then I said, aloud, “I will eat first,” and sent him away with another wave of my hand. He left quietly and I made one more tour of the strings, plucking, strumming, bowing. It was good, indeed, to be home.
    D’oremos had an apartment with five rooms, each larger than my entire holding. Though he no longer lay with the Queen—indeed, how could he, being over fifty years, his organs drawn back up since the end of his prime—he was her first adviser. If she listened to anyone, she listened to him. And it was said he still pleasured her in other ways, but I knew she preferred the company of sweet-breathed princes and an occasional muscular girl from the ranks of Arcs and Bow.
    I had been to his room only twice before. The first time was when I had turned thirteen and he had asked to hear my songs. I had been playing at a master level for three years, then, an unusual circumstance. He had heard me often at the consents where I had been something of a prodigy. There I usually played in groups, with small solos. But my reputation had grown steadily and this intimate recital for the chief of the princes would put the cap on it. I played for him.
    He had lain among his pillows, stroking the long waterfalls of his mustaches as I performed. I cannot recall the tunes, but I know that I brought three instruments with me: the violetta, because he had requested it; the verginium, because I was the only one who regularly played it with any facility; and, of course, my sonorous plecta.
    He said