Satisfied, Ventillas said to Cas, “You didn’t have a bow and arrow with you. How did you kill it?”
Cas took his slingshot from his belt and a spiked ball from his pouch. He placed both beside the map.
Captain Lorenz nudged the ball with the tip of his eating knife. “This would do it. It looks like the devil’s marble.”
Bittor leaned around the weavers to see. “Where did you get it?”
“A graveyard keeper in Brisa.” The irate keeper had used them on any animal caught digging up the plague dead and leaving rotting corpses strewn about for the villagers to discover. Cas did not mention these things. People were eating their custard.
Ventillas picked up the ball carefully. “One shot was enough?”
“If you can hit it in the eye. I’ll come with you,” Cas offered.
“Ah . . . no.” Ventillas returned the ball to him just as a girl appeared in the doorway. She was around twelve and had come to inform Cas that Queen Jehan wished to see him this morning, not this afternoon as had originally been agreed upon.
Cas repeated blankly, “Originally agreed upon?”
“Yes, Lord Cassia.”
Frowning, Cas turned to his brother, who shrugged. “Did I not tell you? You’re to meet with the queen today. And the tailors.”
“Tailors?”
Someone snickered. It sounded like Bittor.
“Yes, tailors,” Ventillas said. “It will be . . . what? An hour out of your day? My clothing doesn’t fit you, Cassia. You need your own.”
Carefully, Cas rolled his shoulders, knowing Ventillas was right. He would be lucky if the tunic lasted until supper without splitting at the seams. Ventillas reached for a stuffed egg and popped the whole thing in his mouth. Resigned, Cas turned to the girl waiting patiently by the door and asked what time he was expected. “I’m to bring you now, Lord Cassia.”
Worse and worse. Cas put the slingshot and ball away just as another figure slipped by the girl. The entire kitchen fell silent.
Sorne.
She stopped in the face of so many stares. A terrible mottled heat climbed her neck. Ventillas looked as if he meant to speak, but his mouth was full of egg. She turned to flee.
Cas said, “Sorne.”
Slow and uncertain, she turned back.
“I’m just leaving. Here, take my chair.” Cas rose and held it out for her.
Guilt sat on his shoulder, arms folded, shaking its head in judgment. Palmerin Keep was her home as much as it was his. And last night he had suggested she leave it. Partly for her sake. Mostly, he admitted, for his.
Sorne approached the chair as though it were coated in arsenic. She sat. “Thank you, Lord Cassia.” Her tone was distant. Like a stranger. Which was what they were now. Time and circumstance had turned them into strangers. The thought saddened him.
The chatter picked up again. Ventillas pulled out a chair beside Captain Lorenz and launched into a discussion on how best to hunt rotten lynx, breaking off long enough to tell Cas he would see him tonight.
Reaching past Sorne, Cas helped himself to two more bunubunus, then offered Cook a bow, formal enough for royalty. She laughed. Beside her, the little boy smiled and waved goodbye, his hand covered with flour from another table, another time. As always, Cas averted his eyes and pretended he did not see.
For the next three hours, Cas stood on a pedestal, much like his statue had until its destruction the night before. A hundred bolts of fabric passed beneath his nose. For his approval. Or rejection. No part of his body was overlooked. There was linen for his underdrawers and wool for his cloaks. Silk for the trim on his hats. There were hunting gloves, riding gloves, visiting gloves. Leather tunics and embroidered tunics. Robes that trailed and those that did not. A mind-numbing assortment. The master tailor barked orders to his assistants, who spoke around pins and needles clamped between their teeth. Cas had lost count of the times he had said, “Do what you think is best” and “I will not wear that.” The thought of Ventillas out hunting diseased lynx filled him with a deep burning jealousy.
“He will need something to wear for supper this evening.” Queen Jehan was brisk in the manner of military commanders as she ordered Cas and the tailors about. Only this commander wore blue trimmed with white lace. “That one there,” she said. “Everything else will keep until the end of the week.” And, seeing the tailor’s agony, she added, “Dear sir, don’t despair. We’ll find you more help.” She circled the pedestal, hands clasped behind her back. “He will need shoes as well. Why, this is charming. Lord Cassiapeus, what do you think of these slippers?”
The shoe she held up for his inspection was made of soft leather dyed the color of mashed peas. The tip was long and pointed. It curled at the very end.
“I will not wear that.”
His fitting had become a public spectacle. The tailors and seamstresses had taken over a chamber just off the great hall. Guests strolled in to visit with one another and to offer up their opinions on how Cas should be dressed. Many of the women held fans, delicate, hand-painted, so that the room was filled with the rhythmic tap tap tap of fan against collarbone. At a table by the window, Sorne arranged pomegranate flowers into vases. She kept to herself, alone in a crowded room. Several ladies brought embroidery hoops. Others, like the nurse Faustina, held infants, so many that Cas asked the queen in an undertone, “Your Grace, how many babies are in this keep?”
Queen Jehan compared samples of fox fur and sable. Absently, she answered, “There are forty in your old nursery, including Prince Ventillas.”
Cas nearly fell off the pedestal. “Forty! Where did they come from?”
That brought her head up. “Where babies usually do, Lord Cassiapeus” was her dry response, provoking giggles from a pair of nearby seamstresses.
Queen Jehan smiled across the chamber at her son. To Cas, she said, “Most of the children were born within months of each other. It is human nature, I think, to want to create life after so much death.”
Cas fidgeted. He had no wish to hear about the queen and her need to create life. “I like the fox fur,” he said.
Amused, Queen Jehan gave the fur to the master tailor. It would line the earflaps on a new winter hat. For the hundredth time that morning, Cas wondered why she did this. Overseeing his wardrobe was something Master Jacomel could have done. Or Cas himself. He did not need so much. It was a sentiment echoed by Master Jacomel, who came by to ensure there was plenty of food and drink for their guests. Out of the queen’s hearing, the steward said, “This is not a task for a queen, Cassia. She does you a great honor. Be sure to tell her so.”
“I did not ask her to do it,” Cas protested. At the steward’s look, full of threat, he added, “Fine. I’ll tell her so.”
“Good.” Appeased, Master Jacomel brushed a stray thread off Cas’ shoulder. “Lady Analena is in the archives.”