The Still by David Feintuch Read Free Book Online Page B

alive, she’d—” Again she stamped her foot, but no words came. Eyes brimming, she threw her hands to her face. Rustin rubbed furiously at his ear.
    I motioned to Rustin, to Elryc. “In the salon, and shut the door.” They rushed out to escape her rage.
    My voice was hesitant. “Please, Nurse ...”
    Her hands came down. “Desecrator!” She slapped my face.
    I chopped off my words, fought the humiliation and the sting. Then, quietly, “Thinkest that thou loved her more than I?”
    Her finger stabbed at the garments strewn about by our negligence. “Is that love, or greed? Oh, you great coarse boy!”
    “If you loved Mother, I beg you, help me. For Elryc’s sake and mine. We must have the Vessels.”
    Her eyes studied my face a long while. Then she nodded, and spoke in my ear.
    After a few moments I opened the door to the salon. “It’s well now. Hester says Mother sent the Vessels back to the vault.”
    Elryc looked to Hester. She nodded. “Guarded night and day, by two men of my lady’s own choosing.”
    Again, the demanding knock, at the door. I ignored it. “Will they open the vault for me?”
    Hester shook her head. “Even if they had the will, they could not. The vault’s locked and wants two keys, held separately by your mother and the Chamberlain.”
    That didn’t sound like the Queen I knew. “She wouldn’t put possessions so valuable beyond her own reach. What if the Chamberlain—”
    “Don’t be a fool. Willem of Alcazar was raised in the castle. Your mother and he played together until they grew to the age where it was not seemly. He was her closest friend, and would no more betray her than—than would I!”
    The knock, ever louder.
    “We’ll have to let them in.” I ran to the bed. “Where’s the key to the vault?”
    “She kept it always on a golden chain around her neck.”
    I reached out, pulled back my hand as if burned. I couldn’t explore my mother’s body as if it were some dead bird I’d found in the field. “Could you—would ...” I gritted my teeth. This was my responsibility. Forcing down bile, I forced my hand to her neck, felt inside her garment.
    “Don’t waste your time.” The Nurse scowled. “She’s already been washed and laid out. Think you they’d have left it on her?”
    “Where is it?”
    “In Margenthar’s hands, if Rowena had her way.”
    We were lost. Dully, I sank upon the bed.
    “But she did not.” Hester fished within the hem of her garment. Her wrinkled hand came forth, closed. Her eyes bore into mine. Then, in an instant, her fingers opened, bright metal flashed.
    “YOU? You had it, all along?”
    “Aye.” She tossed the chain, and I snatched it from the air. “I knew not whom those ladies serve, and took it when their eyes were elsewhere.”
    “To do what with?”
    “Ere day’s end, to give to you, or Margenthar. I’d not made up my mind. You’re not much, but you’re better than he.”
    I thrust the chain in my shirt, responded with the curtness she’d shown. “I thank thee. Rust, we’ll have somehow to get the other key. Let them in, and let’s try to slip out in the rush.”
    Two doors to unlock; the inner, and the main door at the end of the corridor, by the stairs. I opened the inner door, slipped past the diminished flock of ladies, got no more than halfway along the corridor before Duke Margenthar and his entourage swept down on me. Had looks the power to kill, I were extinct.
    “Let the kinsmen come forth!” My tones were regal, but this time Uncle Mar would have none of it. I scuttled aside before he ran me down.
    “We’ll settle this later, boy!”
    Toward the rear of the throng came Lady Rowena, her face triumphant.
    I said, “You couldn’t wait five minutes?”
    “You’d have asked five more, and ten beyond that.” She swept past. Then, over her shoulder, “He who would be King need show a king’s grace! Like your uncle!”
    When the last of the household had passed I waited, until Rustin peered out,