Elder Isles - Madouc Part 8

"Tell me what you know of my father."

Ca.s.sander said ponderously: "I can tell you next to nothing because that is all I know. Apparently he was a handsome young vagabond who chanced to find Suidrun alone in the garden and imposed himself upon her lonely condition."

"Maybe she was glad to see him."

Ca.s.sander spoke with unconvincing primness: "She acted without decorum, and only that may be said for Suldrun. But his was insolent conduct! He made a fleeting mockery of our royal dignity, and well deserved his fate."

Madouc reflected. "It is very odd. Did Suldrun complain of my father's conduct?"

Ca.s.sander frowned. "By no means! The poor little wight seems to have loved him. But tush! I know little of the affair, except that it was the priest Umphred who found the two together and brought the news to His Majesty."

"My poor father was punished terribly," said Madouc. "I cannot understand the reason."

Again Ca.s.sander spoke virtuously: "The reason is clear! It was necessary to teach the churl a stern lesson, and to discourage all others of like mind."

With a sudden quiver in her voice Madouc asked: "Is he then still alive?"

"That I doubt."

"Where is the hole into which he was cast?"

Ca.s.sander jerked his thumb over his shoulder. "In the rocks behind the Peinhador. The oubliette is a hundred feet deep with a dark little cell at the bottom. It is where incorrigible criminals and enemies of the state are punished."

Madouc looked up the hill to where the gray roof of the Peinhador could be glimpsed behind Zoltra Bright-Star's Wall. "My father would be neither of those."

Ca.s.sander shrugged. "Such was the royal justice, and doubtless correct."

"Still, my mother was a royal princess! She would not have loved just anyone who happened to look over the fence."

Ca.s.sander shrugged, to indicate the puzzle took him beyond his depth. "So it would seem; I grant you that. Still-who knows? Royal princess or not, Suldrun was a girl, and girls are female, and females are as wayward as dandelion fluff in the wind! Such is my experience."

"Perhaps my father was highborn," Madouc mused. "No one troubled to ask."

"Unlikely," said Ca.s.sander. "He was a foolish young rogue who received his just deserts. You are not convinced? This is the law of nature! Each person is born into his proper place, which he must keep, unless his king grants him advancement for valor in war. No other system is proper, right, or natural."

"What then of me?" asked Madouc in a troubled voice. "Where is my 'pedigree'?"

Ca.s.sander gave a bark of laughter. "Who knows? You have been granted the status of a royal princess; that should suffice."

Madouc was still dissatisfied. "Was my father put into the hole along with his 'pedigree'?"

Ca.s.sander chuckled. "If he had one to begin with."

"But what is it? Something like a tail?"

Ca.s.sander could not restrain his mirth and Madouc indig antly rose to her feet and walked away.

IV.

The royal family of Lyonesse often rode out from Haidion into the countryside: to join a hunt, or to indulge the king's taste for falconry or simply to enjoy a pastoral excursion. King Casmir usually rode his black charger Sheuvan, while Sollace sat a gentle white paifrey, or, as often as not, the cushioned seat of the well-sprung royal carriage. Prince Ca.s.sander rode his fine prancing roan Gildrup; the Princess Madouc ranged happily here and there on her dappled pony Tyfer.

Madouc noted that many highborn ladies doted on their steeds and frequently visited the stables to pet and nourish their darlings with apples and sweetmeats. Madouc began to do likewise, bringing carrots and turnips for Tyfer's delectation, meanwhile evading the surveillance of both Lady Desdea and Lady Marmone, and also escaping her six maids-in-waiting.

The stableboy a.s.signed to the care of Tyfer was Pymfyd: a tow-headed lad of twelve or thirteen, strong and willing, with an honest countenance and an obliging disposition. Madouc convinced him that he had also been appointed to serve as her personal attendant and escort when the need arose. Without demur Pymfyd acceded to the arrangement, which seemed to signalize an advancement in status.

Early one afternoon, with the overcast hanging low and the scent of rain in the air, Madouc donned a gray hooded cloak and slipped away to the stables. She summoned Pymfyd from his work with the manure fork. "Come, Pymfyd, at once! I have an errand which will require an hour or so of my time, and I will need your attendance."

Pymfyd asked cautiously: "What sort of errand, Your High ness?"

"In due course you will learn all that is necessary. Come then! The day is short; the hours tumble past, while you doodle and dither."

Pymfyd gave a sour grunt. "Will you be wanting Tyfer?"

"Not today." Madouc turned away. "Come."

With something of a flourish Pymfyd plunged his manure fork into the dungheap and followed Madouc on laggard steps.

Madouc marched up the path that led around the back of the castle, with Pymfyd trudging behind.

He called out: "Where are we going?"

"It will soon be made clear to you."

"As you say, Your Highness," grumbled Pymfyd.

The path veered to the left, toward the Sfer Arct; here Madouc swung away to the right, to scramble up the hillside along a trail leading up the stony slope toward the gray bulk of the Peinhador.

Pymfyd voiced a querulous protest, which Madouc ignored. She continued up the slope, with the north wall of the Peinhador looming above. Pymfyd, panting and apprehensive, lunged forward in sudden alarm and caught up with Madouc. "Princess, where are you taking us? Below those walls criminals crouch in their dungeons!"

"Pymfyd, are you a criminal?"

"By no manner or means!"

"Then you need fear nothing!"

"Not so! The innocent are often dealt the most vicious blows."

"Allow me to do the worrying, Pymfyd, and in any case we shall hope for the best."

"Your Highness, I suggest-"

Madouc brought to bear the full force of her blue gaze. "Not another word, if you please."

Pymfyd threw his arms in the air. "As you will."

Madouc turned away with dignity and continued up the slope beside the black masonry walls of the Peinhador. Pymfyd came sullenly behind.

At the corner of the structure Madouc halted and surveyed the grounds at the back of the Peinhador. At the far end, at a distance of fifty yards, stood a ma.s.sive gibbet and several other machines of grim purpose, as well as three iron posts for the burning of miscreants, a firepit and griddle used for a similar purpose. Closer at hand, only a few yards distant, at the back of a barren area Madouc discovered what she had come to find: a circular stone wall three feet high surrounding an opening five feet in diameter.