House of Shadows(123)

“And were discovered in this endeavor by my cousin, Lord Rikadde Miennes ken Nerenne. And were drawn by him into his schemes. Is this so?”

The king certainly seemed well-informed. “Yes, eminence. I didn’t know Lord Miennes was your cousin.”

The king made a slight, dismissive gesture. “A trivial detail. So you agreed to serve Miennes, but instead plotted his destruction. You made ensorcelled pipes for this purpose. You used materials stolen from Gerenes Brenededd’s shop in the Paliante? Gerenes Brenededd is also my cousin, on the left,” he added drily, observing Taudde’s surprise.

“Well… yes, eminence,” Taudde admitted. It would hardly have been worth denying, even if the king hadn’t already known everything.

“And you plotted the destruction of Mage Ankennes, who stood behind Miennes. But less directly. There was a letter, I believe. Did you have any other method in mind for Ankennes’s destruction? One hardly believes waking the dragon out of darkness and stone was your idea.”

“Ah… Mage Ankennes represented a greater challenge than… your cousin. Eminence.” Taudde was uncertain of what reaction the king expected from him. “I would have been glad to destroy him, but I merely hoped to entangle him in other concerns so that I could slip his attention and escape.”

“But you moved not only against the conspirators but against my son as well.” This was not a question. There was deep anger in that quiet statement.

Taudde made an abrupt, unexpected decision and said, as quietly, “It was a wrong decision, yes. But… my grandfather’s name is Chontas Berente ser Omientes ken Lariodde.”

There was a little pause. Then the king took a step forward and reached out, disregarding the alarm of his guards, to set his hand under Taudde’s chin and tilt his face up toward the light from the window. He said, “Your grandfather has many grandsons. But I would wager that your father was Chontas Gaurente ken Lariodde. Is that so?”

“Yes.”

“You have the look of him.” The king dropped his hand and took a step back. “I defeated your father on the field of Brenedde, fifteen years past. I put him to death there, when he would not yield to me.”

“Yes,” Taudde said again. He glanced at Prince Tepres, who was staring at him with a strange kind of recognition: one prince to another. Though Taudde was not nearly so close to his grandfather’s throne as Tepres was to his father’s.

Having confessed to royal blood, Taudde got to his feet. The drama of the original gesture would have to serve; he could hardly now outrage his grandfather’s dignity by willingly kneeling to a foreign king. He was relieved, and a little surprised, that no one tried to force him back to his knees.

The king half lifted a hand toward Taudde, then closed the hand into a fist and let it fall back to his side. “That was why you chose to accede to Miennes’s demands. To kill my son, as I had killed your father.”

“The idea had a certain compelling symmetry,” Taudde admitted. “It… gave me a reason to take the easy path, I suppose. It would have been far more difficult to strike merely at Lord Miennes. I suspected that your, ah, cousin would know if I lied to him. Especially with Ankennes working behind him.”

“That is very likely so,” agreed the king. There was no forgiveness in his iron tone. It was merely an acknowledgment of truth.

“Yes, eminence. How much easier, then, to create a weapon that would do precisely as he demanded! I told myself that as Miennes forced my hand, and he no agent of Kalches, it was no outrage against the terms of the treaty to do as he commanded.”

“Sophistry.”

“Not… not entirely, I maintain, eminence.” Taudde’s gaze went to the prince’s face. Prince Tepres returned him a level stare that gave away nothing, very like his father’s. Taudde said, quietly, “Yet almost at once I regretted my cleverness.”

“As soon as you discovered the death intended for me had gone so badly astray,” the prince observed. His tone, too, was like his father’s; his voice held deep anger.

Taudde bowed his head. “In Kalches, gifts are never given away again within the same year they are received. It did not occur to me until far too late that the custom in Lonne might not be the same. For the peril in which my carelessness placed an innocent girl, I am indeed to blame. Yet it was only when I thought my plan had gone astray that I realized I would have regretted success almost as much as failure.” He hesitated, and then added sincerely, “I am sorry, Prince Tepres. Even aside from the treaty, I was wrong to strike at you in vengeance against your father.”