The Unicorn Hunters: A Novel(43)

Isabeau just looked mulish.

Elesbed said, coaxingly, “Think of how sad the duchess would be if you disappeared.”

“She’d be all right,” said Isabeau stoutly. “She’d have Brittany. And Henri.” She had a trick of keeping her eyes stretched wide so her tears didn’t fall. “And maybe enchantments,” she added and sniffed. “Maybe we can save all the realm with enchantments.”





Chapter


14

    On the morning that Maximilien of Austria was to board the ship that would take him to Brittany, the king was slow to wake, which was unlike him. Then he stood at the casement of his window, indecisive, which was more unlike him still. He took watered wine, turning the cup in his hand, and instead of going down to the waiting ships, he called his councilors together, and his confessor too. This all took time, while his ships rocked at anchor, and their captains noted the turn of wind and tide and shook doubtful heads.

The councilors were assembled, and all of them heard when the king asked his confessor, “What does it mean if a person walks about after death?”

The startled confessor replied, “Why, that a grave sin was committed in life.”

Maximilien had a flat-headed hunting dog at his feet, and he reached down with uncharacteristic anxiety to pull the beast’s ears. The dog bared his teeth and was cuffed away. Maximilien said, “This person committed no sin at all; she was the best of women.”

Polhaim was there with the rest. At those words, he felt a creeping chill.

Delicately, the confessor inquired, “And you have seen this lady—”

“My lady wife,” said Maximilien. “Mary. For these three nights I have dreamed I heard her voice but never could I see her. This last night, knowing I was awake, I rose from my bed and pushed back the curtains and she was there, standing at the window as she was used. She did not hear my voice, though I called out to her.”

The confessor ventured, “A dream, perhaps, Sire?”

Maximilien was incensed at their doubt. “Do you not think I know the difference between dreams and waking? You shall all watch this night and we shall see.” The councilors shifted with a shimmer of silk, flash of light on chains of office.

Polhaim knew he had to speak. “Sire,” he said. “The tide will not wait.”

It was no good. “We must wait a day. Send the order to the captains.”

The duchess of Brittany was counting on those ships. “If the wind changes, the fleet will be embayed.”

“The wind will not change,” said Maximilien, with a swift wrath that made the hound cringe to his belly. “Send word that I am delayed!” he told his diviner. “One night or three will make no difference.”

The diviner, face as neutral as diviners were trained to keep them, laid out the right cards in the right order and sent the message.



* * *





When Anne at last returned to her own chambers, following the chaos of the Triumphal Entry, she found Isabeau, uncharacteristically, sitting in the garderobe, not talking, embroidering a cloth with yellow flowers and staring into the fire.

“Are you all right?” There were a thousand things Anne needed still to do, and a dozen people waiting to dress her afresh, but first she went to kneel stiffly beside her drooping sister.

“Yes,” said Isabeau, poking busily with her needle. She didn’t quite look up. “I will soon be better with my needle than you. And Hawiz let me help turn out the coffers in the garderobe.” There were still fine things there; Anne had sold nearly everything of true value, but she must have dresses, of course. One of those coffers hid the palm-sized mirror she’d gotten at Paimpont. Anne had thought of selling it too but it seemed a breach of the trust of the lady who gave it her. Even if she was anaon.

Isabeau wasn’t quite herself. Anne asked, “Were you frightened today?”

“No,” said Isabeau. “I’m all right.”

Anne didn’t fully believe her, but the current of her day still dragged her along, the people waiting, the clamor just outside her door, her unwanted guests from France. “We shall speak after supper,” she said, rising.

Isabeau agreed, and Anne, with doubt in her heart, let herself be sponged off, her hair arranged, a proper gown put on.

When they were tying her sleeves, Calyx came, flushed scarlet. He bent near and whispered that Maximilien had not left Flanders that day, and the next day looked uncertain.

Anne managed to keep the set of her lips calm, smiling. But she said, “Is he taken ill?”

“Highness, I do not know.” Calyx sounded distressed. “The message indicated the delay and then for some reason said night and dead. I do not know what that signifies. Some complex meaning that is difficult to convey by color.”

Anne’s lips were numb. He hadn’t left? When would he leave? How long could she deceive Marguerite? “Thank you for telling me,” she whispered.

And what if the king of the korriganed comes before Maximilien does?

She had no answer to that either.



* * *





“They are saying there was some contretemps at your Triumphal Entry,” Marguerite said at the banquet that evening. Anne still went about seeming blithe as a bird, but the tension had begun to tell. She could feel Louis of Orléans’s eyes upon her and had no appetite for her food. She made herself eat, and compliment Marguerite’s dress, which she did actually envy.