The Serpent Bride
“All your estates and inheritances,” he said, “to be given to me, along with yourself. Why? Surely there were greater and better alliances the Coil —”
“All I know is that Aziel, the archpriest, told me that the Great Serpent instructed him that we would make a good marriage, and that it would be good for the land.”
“Ah …” For a moment Maximilian tried to believe that the only reason Light had sent Ishbel to him was to strengthen the Persimius line. It was a seductive and reassuring idea — that was the only reason Ishbel had come to him — but Maximilian knew he could not ignore the vision he’d had on the way to Pelemere. “What about your family, Ishbel? The Brunelle family. Is Brunelle an Outlander name? Or an émigré from … somewhere else?”
“Outlander.” Her voice and body were more relaxed now. “We have always been Outlanders.”
“Hmmm. The family had no contact with Escator?”
“I was eight when I lost my family, Maximilian. I have no idea who my father corresponded with.”
“I’m sorry. I am asking too many questions, but I want to understand you so much.” He paused, one hand gently stroking her shoulder and upper arm. “Tell me about when you lost your family. When the plague struck and—”
“I’d rather not.” Ishbel paused. “Not now. Sometime else perhaps.”
“Of course. We have, after all, a lifetime.”
“And will you tell me about your time in the Veins, if I ask?”
“Yes, I will do that.” Ishbel was very touchy, which Maximilian could understand given the circumstances of the night, and he also understood that further questions likely would not be a good idea, but he wanted desperately to know how much she understood about her bloodlines. Thus far she’d given no indication she understood anything, either about her Persimius heritage, or about Elcho Falling.
“When I first received the offer of your hand from the Coil,” Maximilian said, “I looked at a map of the Outlands to see where Serpent’s Nest was. A mountain home, yes?”
“Yes.”
“Right on the edge of the world,” Maximilian said softly, watching Ishbel carefully.
“Serpent’s Nest is on the east coastline of the Outlands,” she said. “It is …”
“Yes?”
She shrugged. “I was going to say that it is my home.”
“Was.”
She did not reply.
“A mountain is a strange place for a home.”
She sighed. “Maximilian …”
“I know, I’m sorry.” He leaned over, and kissed her softly. She did not return it, and he knew he had stayed long enough. Besides, it would be dawn soon, and he had a long ride ahead of him to rejoin Egalion and Garth and the Emerald Guard — all of whom were no doubt fretting about his continued absence.
“I have to go,” he said. “I should be out of the house by dawn.”
“You need to leave while the darkness still affords you cover,” Ishbel said.
He hesitated a little before replying. “Yes. I shall tell you about that one day, if you want.”
She nodded, not really knowing what to say, only wishing that having said he would go, he actually would. The thought of solitude brought her a rush of relief. Perhaps, then, she could finally relax and snatch a few brief hours of sleep.
As if in answer to her prayers Maximilian rolled away from her and rose from the bed. He hunted about in the dark for his clothes, dressed, then sat down on her side of the bed as he pulled on his boots.
Having buckled both boots, he sat still, looking at her. “I had no idea I would want you so much,” he said. “I distrusted you, and —”
“Still do,” Ishbel said.
“Aye, yes, still do, although I distrust the motives of the Coil more. I shall be a watchful husband, Ishbel.”
“We have not yet agreed on marriage, Maximilian.”
He laughed, then leaned down and kissed her. “You must marry me, Ishbel. You have completely ruined my reputation with your seductions, and only marriage will save my name.”
She smiled, reluctantly, but with genuine humour.
Maximilian rose. “The King of Escator shall arrive with his full retinue in three days, Ishbel. He shall be gladder to see you than he had expected.”
He took several steps to the door, hesitated, then strode back to the bed and kissed Ishbel one more time, hard. “Three days, Ishbel,” he whispered, then left her.
Maximilian cloaked himself once more in the darkness, walking through the house undiscovered. Once in the stable, he located his horse’s stall, then stood for a long moment, his forehead resting gently against the horse’s neck, thinking.
Elcho Falling was more likely than not about to stir, and Maximilian needed to marry this woman, and return to Escator. There to … well, there to see what happened next. If Elcho Falling was about to stir, then Maximilian would need to be home in Escator.
Ishbel. Gods knows how they were blood-connected, or how many generations ago the Persimius family had splintered, but connected they most certainly were. Maximilian had not planned to seduce her. But having once taken her hand, he was unable to resist her. Partly this was their shared Persimius blood, but mostly it was the woman herself.
She was astounding. Maximilian replayed every moment of their lovemaking in his mind, remembering how she had felt beneath his hands and body, her scent and her taste. If, one day, she might respond to him with genuine passion … oh, gods … what a day that would be.
His ring chattered softly, asking if they were leaving soon. It had been quiet all night, as Maximilian had instructed it when they’d entered the house, and now it was restless.
“Yes,” whispered Maximilian. “Yes, we are leaving now.”
After Maximilian had left, Ishbel slept.
She dreamed.
She walked through a hall that glittered with glass and colour that spiralled in strange corkscrews far overhead.
She dreamed people filled this hall, tens of thousands of them, all standing back to allow her passage, all watching her.
She dreamed that she was filled with loss and sorrow, and in her dream she sobbed, because she knew what that sorrow portended.
In her hands she carried a goblet. It was heavy, made of exquisitely carved glass, with leaping frogs all about its outer rim.
It was a gift for the man who stood, his back to her, at the far end of the hall.
He was a dark man, and blackness seethed about him.
More than anything Ishbel wanted to turn and run, but her feet would not follow her command. Instead they carried her inexorably forward, until she stood before the man, and then her traitor legs bent beneath her, and she abased herself, and held out the Goblet of the Frogs to the Lord of Elcho Falling.
He turned his head a little, looking at her over his shoulder, and darkness and despair engulfed Ishbel’s life.
1
PELEMERE, CENTRAL KINGDOMS
Ishbel stood in the covered courtyard, listening to the approach of Maximilian Persimius, King of Escator. Maximilian had arrived in Pelemere the previous afternoon, received by King Sirus of Pelemere in two formal ceremonies: the first at the city gates, the second at the palace itself. Maximilian had then stayed at Sirus’ palace overnight, being royally dined and entertained.
To none of these events had Ishbel been invited. She was still merely the Lady Ishbel Brunelle, prospective wife of the King of Escator, and until Maximilian formally accepted her as his bride, Ishbel was excluded from the royal receptions and entertainments. Today, however, having partaken of Sirus’ hospitality and having also, presumably, slept the night away in a luxurious apartment within the king’s palace, Maximilian was paying a visit to the Lady Ishbel’s house in order to meet her and, should that meeting prove satisfactory, perhaps open more personal negotiations for a marriage.
What a farce all this is, thought Ishbel, listening to the sound of horses’ hooves and jingling bits getting closer. Four nights ago he spent the night in my bed, and here we must act as if we’ve never seen each other.
Ishbel had expected Maximilian might appear in her bedchamber last night as well. She’d spent virtually the entire night awake, watching every shadow, listening, waiting. But Maximilian had not appeared, and Ishbel supposed Sirus had provided more amusing entertainments for Maximilian.
Perhaps StarWeb was with him.
Ishbel was far more nervous than she liked. She didn’t know how she would feel when she saw Maximilian again, and she had a tiny, niggling, horrible fear that when Maximilian rode into the courtyard it wouldn’t be the same man she’d slept with a few nights ago.
Twisted in with all her anxiety and nervousness was a horrible sense of resentment; had Maximilian spent last night with StarWeb? Was she going to have to share her husband with the birdwoman?
There were shouts from the guards at the gate now, and Ishbel barely had time to draw in a hasty, shaking breath before Maximilian rode into the courtyard at the head of a retinue some twenty strong. Dressed in a wine-coloured velvet jacket quilted with seed pearls over dark leather breeches, he looked very different from the night he’d appeared in Ishbel’s chamber. Very regal and, impossibly, even more certain of himself.
Ishbel’s first emotion was one of profound relief — this was the man who had come to her bedchamber.
Her second emotion was one of overwhelming confusion at just how glad she was to see him again, and how desperately she hoped StarWeb wasn’t in Pelemere.
Strangely, although Ishbel continued to resent everything to do with this marriage, as well as the marriage itself, Maximilian was the only thing she had resembling a friend within eight weeks’ travel.
Maximilian pulled his horse to a halt, lifted his right leg over the horse’s wither, and slid to the ground.
His eyes never left Ishbel the entire time.
She was very nervous. She held herself extremely still, watching him with apparent calmness, but he could see her nerves in the spots of colour in her cheeks, in her overbright eyes, in her rigidity of bearing and in the manner in which she pressed the palms of her hands too close to her silken skirts.
Behind him the rest of his entourage drew their horses to a halt. They would not dismount, not even move, until Maximilian had greeted Ishbel.
He walked up to her, very deliberately, slowly pulling the leather gloves from his hands. The wind whipped his dark hair into his eyes, but he didn’t blink, or make any move to brush it away.
“My Lady Brunelle,” he said, coming to a halt before Ishbel. “How pleasant to finally meet you. I trust your journey to this point has been comfortable?”
She wanted to shout at him, he could see it in her face, and his eyes crinkled in amusement. Taking a final step forward he took her right hand and raised it to his lips. “Thank the gods I picked the right bedchamber four nights ago,” he murmured. “All this time I’ve been terrified I might have seduced the laundress instead.”
She relaxed. Her shoulders lost their tension, and she let out her breath on a shaky soft sigh.
“Are you all right, Ishbel?” he asked, serious now.
“Yes,” she said, having pushed her dream of the Lord of Elcho Falling to the very back of her mind. “Yes, I am.”
Baron Lixel now stepped up, greeted Maximilian warmly, and made the formal introductions. Then Maximilian turned and waved forward two members of his entourage: a young man who Ishbel thought was a year or so younger than herself, and an older man who was the captain of Maximilian’s escort and who wore an emerald uniform jacket with a Manteceros outlined in brilliant blue on its front.
“Commander Egalion,” Maxel said, introducing the older man first. “He captains my Emerald Guard, and is one of my closest friends.”
Ishbel held out her hand for Egalion to take. “Commander,” she murmured politely.
“And this is Garth Baxtor,” Maximilian continued as Egalion stepped back to make way for the younger man. “Garth is court physician, another close companion.”
Baxtor had an open, attractive face, very non-threatening, and Ishbel liked him immediately. She smiled as she held out her hand for Garth.
“Physician Baxtor,” she said as his fingers closed about hers.
Unlike Egalion, Garth did not immediately let go of Ishbel’s hand. A strange, but not unpleasing, warm sensation passed through Ishbel’s fingers and suddenly all the friendliness in Garth’s eyes vanished.
“My Lady Brunelle,” he said, dropping her hand before stepping back so abruptly it was almost rude.
Maximilian frowned, but then Lixel was ushering them all inside, and Maximilian contented himself with taking Ishbel’s arm and asking her about her journey to Pelemere as they entered the house.
All the light had gone from Garth’s day. All he wanted now was to speak with Maximilian urgently, but Maximilian was not leaving Ishbel’s side. They had gone from the courtyard into the main reception room of the house where, to Garth’s surprise (and Lixel’s, and just about everyone else’s except, he noted, Ishbel’s), Maximilian pronounced an intention to get down to the nitty-gritty of the final details of the marriage contract between himself and the Lady Ishbel immediately.
“You have no objections, my lady?” Maximilian said to Ishbel.
She hesitated very slightly, then shook her head. “None, my lord.”
“Well then, Lixel,” Maximilian said, “to work! Do you have the necessary documents to hand?”
Still looking taken aback, Lixel showed Maximilian and Ishbel into a secondary chamber, where Maximilian closed the doors firmly on the entourage.
Garth and Egalion exchanged a look. “What was that all about?” Egalion said.
“I have no idea.” Garth stared at the closed door, almost too shocked to be capable of coherent thought. For weeks and weeks Maximilian had been extremely wary. Over the past day or so, however, since his return from his time spent alone, his mood had changed, and he’d appeared far more confident and relaxed about the proposed marriage. Even so, Garth had hardly expected him to leap off his horse, take the lady’s hand, and immediately drag her and Lixel into final conference about the matter.
“What do you think of her?” Egalion said. “I’d half anticipated a dumpy pockmarked crone … but …” He gave a soft laugh. “No wonder Maxel has hurried her off to sign what papers he must.”
“I hope he doesn’t sign them too fast,” Garth murmured. “I need to speak to him. Badly.”
Egalion looked at him, frowning. “What did you feel from her, my friend?”
As Maximilian and Ishbel sat down at the table, Lixel retrieved the marriage contracts from a satchel. He couldn’t believe Maximilian was moving this precipitously. By gods, there hadn’t even been the time for a convivial glass of wine first, let alone any time put aside for Maximilian and Ishbel to see if they liked each other or not.
As Lixel sat down at the table, sliding the contract towards Maximilian, he rather hoped that Maximilian had been so smitten by Ishbel at first sight that the king would grant Lixel immediate permission to return to Escator.
“I believe you have hashed out the contract with StarWeb, Ishbel?” Maximilian said.
“Yes,” said Ishbel, and Lixel was not surprised to see a hardening of her expression and a tightening of her shoulders at the mention of StarWeb.
Maximilian nodded, running his eye over the document. “Are you prepared to sign?” He looked up at Ishbel then, and something passed between them that Lixel could not identify.
“If you are agreeable,” she said, softly.
“I am agreeable, Ishbel,’ Maximilian said. “Shall we make a marriage, then?”
There was a long pause, then Ishbel dipped her head. “Yes.”
Lixel’s mouth dropped open. Never had he witnessed such an unemotional, almost clinical assenting to a marriage. Why not spend time together, getting to know each other? Wasn’t that what this entire exercise of meeting in Pelemere had been about?
“Lixel,” said Maximilian, “can you fetch Garth and Egalion in to witness?”
Lixel closed his mouth, nodded, and did as he was told.
Garth had not answered Egalion’s question truthfully. He couldn’t. Not before he’d spoken to Maximilian. He’d fudged an answer, and was grasping about for something to say to distract Egalion when the door to the secondary chamber opened, Lixel appeared, and requested Garth and Egalion enter.
Garth could not believe what was happening. Maximilian was about to sign the contract within a few minutes of meeting the woman for the first time. What in the name of all gods was he doing?
Maximilian was running through the clauses, checking them, as Garth and Egalion entered.
“This one …” he said, tapping the document and looking between Ishbel and Lixel. “How did this come to be here?”
“StarWeb insisted on it,” said Ishbel, her tone strained. “She said you would not ratify the marriage, declare it valid, until I was … um …” She glanced up at Garth and Egalion, clearly embarrassed.
As she has every reason to be, thought Garth, getting angrier by the moment.
“Until you were pregnant and in Ruen,” said Maximilian. “Well, I think we can dispense with that, yes?” and with a single stroke of the pen he drew a thick black line through the clause. “Now, Ishbel, if you would sign here, if you please —”
“No!” Garth broke in. “No. Maxel, I beg you, a moment of your time, please.”
Maximilian looked at him. “Explain yourself, Garth.”
“Maxel,” Garth said, “a moment of your time, I beg you. If you care or trust me at all, then grant me this moment. Please.”
Maximilian looked at Ishbel. “I apologise most sincerely for this unwelcome intrusion,” he said, then rose, walked over to Garth, took his elbow in an ungentle hand and ushered him out of the room.
“Garth!” Maximilian said. “What was the meaning of that?”
“Maxel, Ishbel is pregnant.”
Maximilian went utterly still. “What?”
“Not much, perhaps a week … she has only just conceived. But she is pregnant. You know I can feel this.”
Maximilian nodded. Garth had the Touch; determining an early pregnancy was but a trivial task for him. “And so,” he said, “your point is …”
Garth was growing more astounded by the moment. Maximilian’s anger had faded and he was now regarding Garth with an amused air.
“The Lady Ishbel is not as virtuous as you had hoped, Maxel,” Garth said, wondering if he needed to put this into one-syllable words for Maximilian to comprehend. “Dear gods, my friend, you would take a woman to wife when she’s carrying someone else’s bastard?”
Maximilian grinned, the expression so surprising that Garth felt his mouth drop open. “It’s my child, Garth.”
Garth was now so shocked he could not speak.
“Where did you think I went,” Maximilian said, “when I rode ahead of the main retinue and left you and Egalion to your own company for well over a week?”
Garth gazed at him, struggling to come to terms with what Maximilian had done. “You said … the forest …”
“Yes, yes,” Maximilian said, waving a hand dismissively. Then he smiled, and actually winked. “Changed my mind. Thought I’d see if I couldn’t make Ishbel’s acquaintance under less strained circumstances than a formal meeting.”
“Well, you surely made it very well,” Garth muttered.
Maximilian laughed, and clapped Garth on the shoulder. “She is well with the child?”
“Yes. Yes, she is well. There is no problem that I could feel.”
“Good. Then perhaps you can come back in and apologise to my future wife for your behaviour.”
Garth wasn’t going to allow Maximilian to get away with this entirely. “And perhaps, later, when your future wife is safely out of hearing range, you can apologise to Egalion and myself for your deception.”
“A bargain,” said Maximilian, and led the way back into the room.
Ishbel was growing more certain that her entire time as Maximilian’s wife would be spent in this terrible state of feeling completely overwhelmed. Maximilian had arrived, greeted her, swept her inside, asked for the marriage contract, scratched out the clause StarWeb had fought so hard for, and all within a relatively few short minutes. Ishbel doubted that enough time had yet elapsed from his arrival for his entire entourage to have completely dismounted.
Adding to this sense of feeling completely overwhelmed by Maximilian was a stab of hurt that Garth Baxtor had so obviously taken an immediate and deep dislike to her. Ishbel had liked Garth — he had such an open, friendly attractive face which invited instant trust — but then he’d taken her hand and within a heartbeat his face had closed over and he had turned his back to her.
And now he’d demanded that Maximilian talk with him privately.
What had Garth discovered? Ishbel’s heart was beating fast, pounding in her chest, and her hands were damp where she clutched them in her lap. Garth had felt something when he’d touched her … Great Serpent, please let it be that he hadn’t felt —
Maximilian and Garth re-entered the room, and Ishbel jumped slightly in sheer nervousness.
Maximilian looked at her with amusement — and something else that she couldn’t quite fathom — although at least the amusement reassured Ishbel somewhat, but Garth’s change in attitude was nothing short of extraordinary.
“My Lady Ishbel,” he said, dropping to one knee beside her chair, his face alive once more with friendliness, “I must beg your pardon for my behaviour earlier. Sometimes I can be a clump-headed fool, and too often I underestimate Maxel’s courage and daring. Will you forgive my former behaviour? I promise herewith that in future I shall ask before judging.”
Ishbel had no idea at all what was going on about her. She glanced again at Maximilian, more for reassurance than anything else, then, at his slight nod, gave Garth a small and somewhat uncertain smile.
“Of course,” she said.
Garth’s smiled broadened slightly, then he rose. “I beg everyone’s forgiveness for my rudeness.” He winked at Egalion, who was looking as confused as Ishbel felt, then stepped back a little from the table.
“‘Maxel’?” Ishbel said to Maximilian, more to fill in the silence than out of any real curiosity.
“Maximilian is such a mouthful,” he said. “Those closest to me always call me Maxel, and I hope you will, too.”
Ishbel gave another uncertain smile, unable to stop herself imagining StarWeb calling out the name in the grip of passion, then cursing herself yet again for being weak enough to allow StarWeb to rattle her. By the Great Serpent, Ishbel thought, what has happened to me? l am a stronger person than this.
“Now.” Maximilian sat down and spun the marriage contract towards him. He picked up a pen. “All we need decide on is a date for the marriage. I don’t think we need wait, Ishbel. Shall the day after tomorrow be suitable?”
“I do not see the need to rush,” Ishbel said. “I had thought this period in Pelemere was to be spent getting to know each other. I —”
“Ishbel,” Maximilian said quietly.
Ishbel made the mistake of looking at him, and seeing the expression in his eyes. Seeing the memory in his eyes. Why do 1 bother with this? she wondered. The Great Serpent wants me to marry him, after all.
“The day after tomorrow,” she agreed, and Maximilian smiled, then signed the document. He pushed the contract and pen over to Ishbel and, after the barest of hesitations, she signed as well, wishing she had the courage to list her true titles under her name.