CHAPTER XX
After the audience with the Queen they rode straight back to the skrayling encampment and Kiiren excused himself, saying he must report to the elders. A servant brought a plate of spiced rice scattered with strips of fried meat and chunks of vegetables, and a jug of aniig. Mal picked at the food, pondering the day's events. The fragile alliance between England and Vinland hung in the balance, and he had been the one to disturb the scales by switching his allegiance between the two. Who was this Erishen, that the mere possibility of his existence could rule the fate of nations?
Kiiren returned after about an hour, looking grave.
"Clan leaders say we must go on with visit and do nothing more to offend Queen Elizabeth," he told Mal. "I am to tell you to obey Leland in all things."
So sudden a capitulation? The clan leaders must have been very persuasive. Perhaps they feared the loss of profits if the Queen cancelled her extravagant celebrations.
"And you?" Mal asked him.
"It is not my place to gainsay our leaders. I am… vessel for words, nothing more."
Mal was not convinced by Kiiren's explanation. Something was going on, some matter of skrayling politics he could not begin to grasp. He had assumed the ambassador had been sent by some greater authority back in Vinland, and the merchants here in England were no more important than the guild masters of London in determining their nation's policy abroad. Now he was not so sure. Perhaps he should not be surprised that the merchants were the ultimate authority amongst the skraylings. But where did that leave Kiiren, and why were they so deferential to him one moment then overruled him the next?
Returning to Horseydown Stairs, they boarded the little gullheaded boat and were rowed to the Tower by six of the skrayling guards. It seemed they were expected, for the water gate had been raised and they quickly passed into the little pool underneath St Thomas's Tower. Mal could not help but recall his first, ignominious arrival here, only two months ago. Then he was a nobody, a landless, penniless gentleman with few prospects; now he was an employee of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth and companion to one of England's most powerful allies. The thought gave him a warm glow of satisfaction. For the first time since he had learnt of Charles' flight and their family's ruin, he allowed himself to hope that better times were ahead.
At the top of the steps, Leland was waiting with a group of gentleman warders in scarlet livery.
"Welcome back, Your Excellency," Leland said, smiling broadly at Kiiren, though the smile did not quite reach his eyes.
"Thank you, Leland-tuur," Kiiren replied. "Judge Sekaarhjarret wish to say he hope we put this tuqanishet, this… misunderstanding, behind us, and go forward in friendship."
"Yes, of course. Her Majesty is most anxious our people remain allies."
I bet she is, Mal thought. If we turn the skraylings away, the French will be in the New World like a shot.
"I've had fires lit in your rooms," the lieutenant went on. "Can't have been pleasant, camping out in that downpour. Mind you, could be worse. I remember when I was a youngster, campaigning in Ireland…"
Leland escorted the ambassador to his lodgings, rattling away about his military career. He had not for a second acknowledged Mal's presence.
Leland eventually left them in peace, and servants brought a light supper of cold meats, cheese, oatcakes and hot spiced wine. Whilst the skraylings gathered around the dining table Mal lingered in the bedchamber, eager to be alone for a while. The fact that he had spent the best part of two days surrounded by hundreds of skraylings was only just beginning to sink in. Not long ago that would have been the stuff of his worst nightmares. Now… He was surprised at how calmly he had taken it.
For want of anything better to do, he rummaged in his saddlebags for his soldiering kit. The river-crossing in the rain had not done his sword belt and scabbard any good, and he had been too distracted by the sudden turn of events to attend to them. He uncorked the bottle and upended it against a wadded rag, then set about rubbing oil into the dark leather, following the grain in gentle strokes.
If Kiiren had not been at the council meeting, things would have been different, of that he was certain. There was something reassuringly familiar about the ambassador, something on the edge of memory, like the music he had heard on that first reconnoitre outside the stockade. Was Kiiren indeed a great deal older than he looked, as his words at the banquet suggested? Had Mal met him, perhaps as a child, and forgotten about it? There had been visitors to Rushdale Hall, sometimes important ones, but he was certain no skraylings had been amongst them. He wondered, not for the first time, if his father had been a Huntsman and introduced Charles into their company, the way Charles had done with him and Sandy. He hoped not.
The rain returned in a violent downpour that rattled the windowpanes and turned the sky black. After a few minutes it slackened off and the setting sun gleamed briefly on the waters of the Thames.
Lost in his task, Mal barely noticed the passage of time until the curfew bell tolled its warning. He looked up, and found Kiiren watching him from the doorway. The skrayling's expression was, as far as he could judge, a mixture of anticipation and anxiety.
"Can I help you, sir?" Mal asked. As an experiment, he added, "Kiiren-tuur?"
"Yes, yes!" The skrayling's mottled face relaxed into a smile. "Please to come this way."
"Of course, sir."
Mal put away the cleaning materials and wiped his hands on a towel. The greasy animal scent of the oil hung in the air, a comforting reminder of his normal routine. From the dining room came the sound of Tradetalk: skraylings and humans talking together? The tower door creaked, and footsteps rasped on the steps outside.
"What's going on?" Mal asked.
"There is something I need to ask of you, Catlyn-tuur. Something important."
"Very well." He followed Kiiren through into the empty dining room. The table had been cleared of the remains of supper and the fire banked for the night. A row of the little lightwater lamps glowed in the hearth, throwing eerie shadows against the plaster walls.
"Where are your guards, sir?" Mal asked, suddenly wary.
Kiiren smiled. "They go to play dice with captain's men."
"Monkton invited them?"
That seemed highly unlikely. The captain had not openly expressed an opinion of the visitors, but if the attitude of his men was anything to go by, he did not discourage prejudice against the skraylings either.
"I ask him to ask them," Kiiren said. "English and Vinlanders should not be apart so much. Bad for friendship."
"I suppose so," Mal muttered. Kiiren was being hopelessly optimistic. Most likely the experiment would end in broken heads and another retreat to the camp. Why Leland was allowing such a foolish venture so soon after the last incident, he could not fathom.
"If we cannot trust our friends, what is purpose to come here?"
Mal had no answer to that. Either Kiiren was far too naive for the role assigned to him, or – no, there was no "or". He shook his head in despair.
Kiiren paused, looking nervous once more.
"I wish to share ceremony with you this night," he said, his voice loud in the empty room. "If it be your will."
"Will it be… like the meeting?"
"Somewhat like. But we two only." He smiled shyly. "No one to spy on us here."
Mal swallowed. More magic. But he had to find out the secret of the skraylings' power, for his own satisfaction as well as the safety of the realm.
"Very well, I accept."
Kiiren produced an armful of cream wool that had lain folded on one of the benches.
"It is also our custom," Kiiren began, "to wash body and wear robe–"
"No more robes, I beg you!" Mal backed away, hands raised. "I will do this as I am, or not at all."
Kiiren wrinkled his nose, but did not press Mal further. He crossed the dining room and opened a small door in the corner.
The western tower chamber was the twin of the chapel at the other end of the ambassador's apartments, a small circular space with whitewashed stone walls, though the floor was of plain terracotta tiles and the windows unglazed. The window openings had been blocked with rush matting and covered with patterned silk, and carpets laid on the floor, so it looked more like the interior of a skrayling tent than a castle tower. Lamps hung from four iron stands positioned at what Mal guessed were the four cardinal points, and a low brazier stood in the centre of the room.
"Please to sit," Kiiren said. "Take off shirt and uncover tattoo."
Mal removed his doublet and shirt and threw them aside. It was almost a relief to strip off in the humid confines of the little chamber, and with his torso swathed in bandages he scarcely felt undressed. Sitting down cross-legged on the matting, he unwound the dressing over his tattoo. The skin around the inking was still red and tender, but with no sign of festering.
Kiiren unfastened his necklace, and gestured for Mal to remove his earring. He did so, and stared down at the pendant.
"Is there magic in this?" he asked the skrayling, examining the pearl.
"Power is in touch of metal." Kiiren held up his necklace, rolling the beads between his fingers. "In English I think it is called 'lodestone'. Powerful protection against evil spirits."
Mal remembered the nightmare presences lurking amongst the rocks, and shuddered. He knew without being told that these were the creatures the lodestone protected him from.
"If it is such a powerful protection, why put it aside?"
"Because it is anchor also, to hold spirit in body. Tonight we must be free."
Kiiren sat down opposite, then opened a small wooden box and threw a pinch of fine powder onto the coals. Mal sneezed repeatedly as a cloud of pungent smoke filled the small room, and wiped his streaming eyes with the back of his hand.
"Please to breathe slowly," Kiiren murmured. "Empty thoughts."
Mal drew a deep breath. The smoke smelt somewhat like tobacco but with an acrid edge. His throat burned and his toes and fingertips tingled, as if he had taken a draught of raw brandy. Kiiren's features blurred, and the lamps within his line of sight dissolved into a rainbow aura.
"Again," Kiiren said, his voice barely audible. "All is quiet. All is forgetting. All is remembering."
Mal breathed in again. He should be afraid, a small detached part of his mind observed, but he felt more content than he had done in months, perhaps years. The feeling combined the bliss of lying spent in a woman's arms with the heightened awareness of combat. He breathed out and closed his eyes, allowing his other senses to fill that awareness.