In the King's Service Read online

  “Who are you?” Alyce demanded, though instinctively she kept her query to a whisper, for it was clear that Vera was Deryni like herself. Marie merely stared at the other girl in wonder.

  Vera ventured another tentative smile. “Your father told me that I am your sister.”

  “What?” Marie blurted.

  Shaking her head, Vera laid one finger across her lips in an urgent sign for silence, cutting her off in mid-word.

  “I promise you, it isn’t what you’re maybe thinking,” she whispered, humor crinkling at the corners of her eyes, “though our sire was quite the ladies’ man. Actually, you and I are twins,” she said to Alyce. “Fortunately, not identical, though I would love to have had hair like yours.” She nodded toward Alyce’s pale braid. “But if we’d been identical, our parents never would have been able to carry off the deception.”

  “But—how is that possible?” Alyce whispered, stunned.

  Again glancing toward the door, Vera delved into the bodice of her gown and withdrew a folded piece of parchment, well sealed with green wax.

  “This is for you,” she said, holding it up so that the seal was visible.

  The familiar imprint on the seal showed the Corwyn gryphon as an escutcheon of pretense over the arms of Lendour, as Keryell had used them in his capacity as Earl of Lendour and one of Corwyn’s regents.

  “I see that you recognize the seal,” Vera went on. “Before Father left on this last Mearan expedition, he asked me to keep this for you, in case anything ever happened to him. He said I was to make certain you read it in a safe place, where you wouldn’t be disturbed, because it can only be read once.”

  At Alyce’s look of bewilderment, Vera shook her head. “Don’t ask me more until you’ve read it—and I trust you’ve been Truth-Reading me while I’m telling you this. I know you can do that.”

  As Alyce slowly nodded, Vera turned the packet of parchment to display writing on the side without the wax seals.

  “You recognize the hand?” she asked, as Marie crowded closer to see it as well.

  Alyce swallowed audibly and nodded.

  “All right, here’s what you need to do.” Vera placed the packet in Alyce’s free hand and closed the fingers around it. “Take this up to the altar rail, as close as possible to Father’s grave. That way, if anyone should come in while we’re doing this, they’ll think you’re simply praying. Marie and I will continue making garlands, and if necessary, I’ll fend off intruders.”

  “What if it’s Father Paschal?” Marie asked. “He could come through the sacristy.”

  “It’s all right. He knows about this.”

  “Father Paschal knows about you?” Alyce broke in.

  “Well, of course. Who do you think trained me?”

  “But—he never mentioned—”

  “No, and he hasn’t told me much about you,” Vera countered. “That was to protect all of us. Especially in your case, he was somewhat concerned that Father had given Lady Jessamy access to some of your training triggers.”

  “She’s rarely used them,” Alyce murmured, stunned. “We’ve not spent that much time at court.”

  “Would you necessarily know if she’d used them?” Vera replied. “She did come occasionally to Arc-en-Ciel, didn’t she?”

  “Well, yes—but Jessilde was usually with us then.”

  “Jessilde—who is Jessamy’s daughter. It isn’t likely, Alyce, but they could have been working together, to check on you occasionally, if only to see how Paschal’s training was progressing. Now does it become clear why Father felt the need to be so careful?”

  “But, she would never—”

  “Alyce, we don’t know what she would never do,” Vera pointed out. “Have you forgotten who her father was?”

  “I—hadn’t thought about that,” Alyce admitted.

  “I didn’t think you had. And I believe that Paschal has avoided reminding you, for fear of planting an idea in your mind that Jessamy might discover, if she did try to abuse the trust she was given.”

  Alyce found herself shivering at the idea that Jessamy might have been doing just that, without her knowledge. Marie’s eyes were huge with wonder.

  “If that’s a real concern,” Alyce whispered, “what happens when we go back to court? For the next few years, we’re going to be there all the time, now that Father is gone.”

  “Father Paschal intends to modify your triggers before you leave—though I don’t think he intends that Lady Jessamy should know. And he certainly doesn’t intend that she should know about me. Ahern, of course, doesn’t know anything about any of this, except that I’ve been fostered here for the past three or four years.”

  After a few seconds to digest what Vera had just revealed, Alyce said dazedly, “I had no idea about any of this. . . .”

  “Which was the purpose of the exercise,” Vera replied. “But right now, you need to deal with what Father left for you. Before you break the seal, kiss it—and make sure that your tongue touches the wax. That’s part of the means by which the spell is activated for you, personally—I knew you were about to ask,” she added with a grin.

  Despite her mixture of surprise, curiosity, and annoyance that their father had not better prepared her for this, Alyce managed a tentative smile.

  “If we really are twins, I suppose there’ll be no keeping any of my secrets from you in the future,” she said.

  Vera grinned. “Father Paschal has always warned me that there are disadvantages as well as advantages to being Deryni.” She brushed her hand over Alyce’s, closed around the parchment packet.

  “Now, there will be two messages inside. I’m told that the visible one is a simple bequest of some items of jewelry—which is all anyone else would see, if they opened it. The other message is for you alone, written between the lines of the first one. When you open the letter, that second message will glow slightly, so you needn’t worry about having enough light to read it. Make certain you read it through slowly, because you only get one chance; the writing will disappear after you’ve read it.”

  Alyce swallowed down the lump that was rising in her throat.

  “I—believe you,” she whispered. “It’s all just so—so—”

  “—unbelievable. Yes, I know.” Vera smiled faintly. “It’s so audacious, I still hardly know whether to love him or damn him,” she confessed. “But I truly believe that he loved us—enough to do what he had to do, to give at least one of us the chance to develop our gifts away from public scrutiny, without having to contend with—well, with people knowing what we are.” She glanced away briefly before continuing.

  “I’d known him all my life, though I didn’t know who he really was until I came here. So far as I or my ‘parents’ knew, he was simply my godfather, just as he was godfather to many other children of his vassals—though there weren’t any others exactly like me,” she added, with a quick smile at Alyce. “He had me fostered here after he sent the two of you to court and Arc-en-Ciel—which he felt was the safest place he could send you, while he began bringing me into the family picture and started my training—and yes, I do have quite a lot of training now. Fortunately, Lady Rosmerta is not Deryni, and hadn’t a clue what he was up to—silly cow!”

  Marie gave a nervous snicker. “We must be sisters. Alyce and I don’t like her either.”

  “I don’t suppose she’s all that bad,” Vera replied. “You might even spare her a little pity. She knew she wasn’t barren, because she has a grown daughter by her first marriage, but Father wouldn’t give her any more children. He needed a wife, so that he could bring me into the picture, but he didn’t want to complicate the succession. In hindsight, I think he gambled quite a lot on Ahern—an unfortunate wager, as it happens, given his injury—but he may be able to overcome it. And meanwhile, he had us.” She cocked her head at the parchment in Alyce’s hand. “You must be bursting to read that. Have you done this before?”

  Alyce shook her head. She had been numbly Truth-Reading everything V
era said, and had no doubt that everything was true. Truth-Reading was among the rudimentary skills that their father and then Father Paschal had taught her and Marie—and Ahern—during their early years: a particularly useful survival skill for any Deryni, as was the ability to block pain and to induce sleep—skills she had used in easing her brother’s discomfort en route here.

  The procedure to which Vera was referring was simple enough on the receiving end; it would not have been so simple for their father, in the setting up. But now she was eager to learn what instructions their father had left her.

  “I know the theory,” she whispered. “I can do it. And you’ll keep a lookout?” she added, glancing at the chapel door.

  “We shall be the perfect decoys, if anyone should come,” Vera said with a grin. “Now, Marie, we still have a lot to do. You might at least try to look like you’re enjoying plaiting evergreen garlands.”

  Her ready smile brought a smile to Marie’s lips as well, and the other girl re-applied herself to the task as Alyce rose and headed toward the altar. Vera took up a position just inside the door, which she pulled slightly ajar.

  Alyce could feel her heart hammering as she padded softly down the chapel’s short nave, the parchment packet closed tightly between her cupped hands. Three days before, at her father’s interment, the air had been redolent of fine incense and the more cloying perfume of floral tributes. Her stomach stirred a little queasily as she skirted the slab under which Keryell lay, doing her best to recall the incense rather than any faint charnel scent she might imagine in this part of the chapel.

  Steadying herself against the altar rail, she genuflected to the Presence signified by the lamp burning above the tabernacle, then eased to her knees, stretching one foot behind her, under her cloak, so that it touched the corner of the grave slab under which her father lay. Then, after mouthing a brief prayer, both for the occupant’s soul and her own blessing, she dipped her head briefly to kiss the seal as she had been instructed—and hesitantly swept it with her tongue.

  Nothing happened—at least that she could detect—though the taste of honey lingered as she carefully broke the seal. Fragments of brittle wax showered the altar rail as she opened the parchment. Between the penned lines of the promised bequest, written in her father’s tight, crabbed hand, she began reading the glowing words, quite distinct in the semidarkness of the silent chapel.

  Beloved Daughter, it began. In receiving this letter, you will already have made the acquaintance of your twin sister. I ask your forgiveness for the deception I have carried out, in keeping you apart thus far, but your mother and I agreed before your birth that this solution, painful as it was for both of us, represented the best hope of allowing at least one of our children to grow up sheltered from the stigma so often attendant upon those of our blood.

  Happy coincidence suggested the means by which this might be accomplished. It happened that, at about the time your mother fell pregnant with you and your sister, she learned that Lady Laurela Howard was also with child. After a few months, we determined that your mother carried twin girls—and conceived a daring plan.

  Since your mother and Lady Howard had been friends since childhood, it was arranged that the two should share their confinements at Cynfyn, for one another’s company and so that Laurela might avail herself of the midwife serving my household. Unbeknownst to Laurela or her husband, your mother’s second-born was then to be presented as a supposed twin to the child Laurela carried—which is exactly what was done, except that her own child was born still. Thus, what began as a regrettable but necessary deception chanced to have an unexpected and doubly felicitous outcome, easing the sorrow of Laurela’s loss as well as our own—to surrender our beloved daughter into the keeping of another, for her safety’s sake.

  I pray that you can forgive what I have done, and that you may now make the better acquaintance of your twin sister, Veralyn Thamar (de Corwyn) Howard. I have provided for her such training as I could, in the hope that she may share this legacy of our mutual birthright with you.

  My devotion to both of you, my darling daughters, and to dear Marie as well.

  Your loving father, Keryell

  Even as Alyce read the final words, through a blur of tears, the glowing script was fading from the page. The last line alone lingered for a moment longer than the rest, superimposed over the more mundane message penned on the page, before likewise dispersing like wind across water.

  Chapter 15

  “And ye shall read this book which we have sent unto you.”

  —BARUCH 1:14

  ALYCE shared what she had read with her sisters—Marie first, since they were accustomed to working mind-to-mind. Marie wept with emotion when it was done, then dried her tears—glad ones, this time, unlike those of the previous weeks—and gathered up the finished half of the garland to take it to the altar rail, humming one of the more sprightly antiphons of Advent as she carried it down the center aisle.

  “She’s quite amazing, isn’t she?” Vera murmured to her twin, watching Marie retreat. “And very young.”

  “She was always Father’s pet,” Alyce replied, smiling. “And she is still just fifteen.”

  “Yes, I tend to forget that,” Vera said wistfully. “Ahern is so mature for his age.” She shrugged and jutted her chin toward the letter still in Alyce’s hand. “Shall we?”

  They returned to the bench where Vera first had found them and settled in amidst the stockpile of pine boughs and ivy, laying the ivy matrix and a few pine boughs across their laps—diversion, in case anyone should enter.

  Alyce had feared it would not come easily, for other than with Marie, the greatest part of her previous contact with other Deryni had been with Father Paschal, and then always as pupil with teacher. Some little there had been with Jessilde, as part of training exercises, but always under Paschal’s supervision. Interaction with Ahern had been mostly during their childhood, when none of them knew much; their mother had died young, and their father had mostly left their training to Paschal.

  Provision also had been made so that Jessamy might tutor her and Marie, but the pair had been too short a time at court for that to happen. In truth, Alyce had always harbored a certain reticence concerning any too-close interaction with Jessamy, godmother though she was—and “Tante” Jessamy, by her own mother’s wishes.

  She could not explain that reticence. It was not precisely come of any mistrust she felt toward Jessamy herself, but rather, an uneasiness over the apparent ambiguity of a Deryni being openly tolerated at court, in the queen’s own household—though perhaps a woman was not deemed to be so great a threat as a man.

  Alyce had also heard tell of a brother of Jessamy, called Morian, long assigned to the governor’s staff in Meara, who made discreet use of his powers in the service of the king; she had no idea what the Bishop of Meara thought about this bending of secular and canon law. Perhaps it was a prerogative of kings, that sometimes it was acceptable that some Deryni function openly, despite what bishops said.

  Nonetheless, this apparent contradiction regarding Jessamy and her brother had convinced Alyce that it was probably safest not to invite any untoward scrutiny of whatever abilities she herself possessed—and that included scrutiny by Jessamy. The feeling had intensified once she resumed her training with Father Paschal at Arc-en-Ciel. It was nothing he or anyone else had told her; she simply knew.

  She also knew, in much the same way, that she need have no such reticence with Vera, who was her sister and her twin, and with whom she had shared their mother’s womb. Not that mere willingness or even eagerness to also share their minds was sufficient to enable the easy doing of it—not when most of the focus of Alyce’s training thus far had been geared toward keeping others out of her mind, or only allowing access to selected parts of it—or, wielding her power as the weapon it was, insinuating her own mind into another’s, to impose her will.

  No, in this instance there must be a balanced melding of senses, engaging the powers of
mind as tool, not as weapon. Turning more knee-to-knee with her twin, Alyce drew another fortifying breath and laid their father’s letter across her open palms between them, blue eyes meeting sea-gray as she invited contact. With the touch of Vera’s hands on hers, with their father’s words between them, she bade her shields to retract, flinching at the first brush of that other mind.

  But Vera knew far more of such matters than she, and had been taught how to ease the process.

  “Don’t resist,” she whispered. “Relax your shields. You’re trying too hard.” Don’t make it happen . . . let it happen, she went on, shifting easily into mind-speech. Good . . . just relax. We can do this. . . .

  Once past that point, as Alyce yielded to her twin’s greater skill, their deepening rapport segued into a sharing that was profound. It left both of them blinking back tears of wonder, grinning and even laughing aloud as they embraced, and brought Marie back to the rear of the chapel to see what was so amusing.

  “That’s all very well for the two of you,” she said, flouncing onto a seat beside Alyce in mock resentment and showing them her hands. “I’m all sticky with pine sap—though it does smell rather nice,” she added, sniffing at her fingers, “and the two of you have just been gossiping away.”

  “Not gossiping—communing,” Vera murmured. “Oh, it is going to be wonderful, having sisters—though we’ll have to be very careful.”

  AT first, they did, indeed, go very carefully, though the friendship suddenly blossoming among the three of them soon became obvious to all.

  “I knew the three of you would get on wonderfully,” Ahern told Alyce, after Mass on Christmas Eve, as he hobbled painfully beside her on his crutches. “I think she’s always been my favorite of Rosmerta’s fosterlings. Father always liked her, too.”

  Carefully shielding the reason for Keryell’s fondness, Alyce merely said, “She is great fun.”

  “She is,” Ahern replied. “I shall hate to see her leave. Unfortunately, Rosmerta will be taking all her household with her, when she goes back to her father. You did know that our esteemed step-mama is leaving . . . ?”