“And tomorrow, another,” said the Fool. “And tomorrow’s morrow. And after and after and after.”
The duke’s house, despite the best efforts of the well-meaning butler, was in a constant state of disarray, suited to the duke himself. Lionheart brought the Fool to a back door but could convince no one to take him and put him where he belonged. Thus Lionheart found himself obliged to drag the poor idiot around the house with him for the next hour as he finished his own arrangements for that night’s banquet. The duke was hosting a merchant from the Far East with the same courtesy (or lack thereof) with which he would have hosted a count of Beauclair, an earl of Milden, or a mere farmer of Parumvir. Social niceties meant nothing to the Duke of Shippening; just so long as he remained firmly at the top of the pecking order, he cared not who dined with him.
So Lionheart, wearing borrowed linens, stood along the wall, ready to wait at table. He’d stashed the Fool away in a nearby corridor, figuring that the poor man was as prepared as he could be for the night’s performance. It bothered him as he stood at his post to think how unhappy the idiot was. But what could one expect from so deep-rooted a madness?
Strange, Lionheart thought. The Fool had not aged a day in the many years since he had visited Southlands.
The duke arrived, along with his guest, and settled comfortably into his chair. The duke was an enormous man with face and hands like a bear’s, lacking only the teeth and claws. His clothing, though rich, was dirty and ill fitting, stretched tightly across his great frame. He treated his apparel with an abandon only the very rich can afford.
After seeing the duke drop food down his front and do nothing to clean it, Lionheart averted his eyes. An utter barbarian and, as far as Lionheart could discern, stupid to boot. Shippening was once a fine land with a fine history, the most powerful trade center on the Continent, governed by a Master of the Six Towers. One found it difficult to recall those glory days when observing its current master.
The eastern merchant was far more interesting, a stern and handsome man richly clad in silks (of which he took great care), with hair blacker than Lionheart’s own, though his skin was pale. Lionheart guessed that he came from the Noorhitam Empire, though he might hail from Aja or any one of the kingdoms of the East. Watching him, Lionheart felt a sudden sorrow, recalling a boyhood declaration:
“When I’m a jester, I’m going to write my own songs. Better ones than Sir Eanrin’s. Just wait. And I’ll sing them for all the kings of the Continent.”
“All of ’em?”
“And the emperors of the East!”
So much for that dream.
Lionheart deduced that this fine easterner thought little of the slovenly duke. The way he watched Shippening’s master gave Lionheart the shivers . . . as though he were measuring him out for meat. Yet there was also a certain fear in the merchant’s eyes, and with it, respect. This puzzled Lionheart. Though he worked for the man, he had yet to discover anything respectable about the Duke of Shippening.
“So,” said Shippening, turning to his guest with his mouth full, “what do you think of our neighbors these days?”
“How means your lordship?” inquired the merchant. His accent was perfect, better than the duke’s.
“Occupied, they say,” the duke replied. “Enslaved by—get this—a dragon. Hence the smoke, see?”
Lionheart went cold.
The merchant nodded. “Do you doubt this tale?”
“I’ve no cause to doubt it. We ain’t heard two words from our brown brothers these many months, and the smoke don’t dissipate, now, does it? Seems farfetched, I’ll grant you that . . . but who among us wants to venture in and verify the truth of the matter?”
It was all Lionheart could do to sit there and listen to the duke’s laughter. His grip on his assigned amphora of wine tightened. But when the duke finished chuckling to himself, he said to the merchant, “I suppose you believe it all, don’t you? Don’t your people worship a dragon? Or some firebird or something?”
The merchant’s face was a mask. “My land is vast and its people varied, stemming from many cultures. There are those who worship the Lady and her Dark Brother, and yes, one of his incarnations is that of a dragon.”
The Lady. This distracted Lionheart momentarily from his thoughts of murdering the duke with a well-aimed swipe of an amphora. The Fool had mentioned a Lady too. Was she the same one the merchant spoke of now? Was she somehow associated with the Dragon?
For the Dragon was unbearably real. Perhaps this Lady was as well.
Half memories tugged at Lionheart’s brain: memories of sleepless nights when bedroom drapes resembled a long-haired woman; memories of a voice and white eyes. But these were stranger even than the reality of the Dragon . . . or the much more pressing reality of the duke’s objectionable existence.