Katherine Kurtz - King Kelson 3 by Quest for Saint Camber

Author:Quest for Saint Camber
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Published: 2011-09-27T22:29:25+00:00

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

I am clean without transgression, I am innocent.

-Job 33:9

In Alaric Morgan's capital city of Coroth, a very hard day's ride southeast of Dhassa, nothing was yet known of the news Duncan McLain brought. Indeed, even the news of Tiercel's death had not yet arrived, for the messenger Duncan had sent at the beginning of the week was only now disembarking from a ship in Coroth Bay and counting himself fortunate to have reached his destination at all, given the unseasonal spring storms. The monk in the forest green mantle and cassock of a canon regular of Saint George's Cathedral drew some consolation in learning that the weather had been no better in Coroth for the past week, since the duke's return. Today was the first day it had not rained in nearly a month.

Nor, snug in his solarium at Coroth Castle, did Corwyn's duke have any inkling of a messenger's approach, either the man in the harbor or the one riding pell-mell from Dhassa. In truth, events of the outside world were far from his mind at that moment. A cold, damp wind blew off Coroth Bay, wailing around the parapets and whistling shrill and bleak around the window fittings, but it was cozy and warm where Morgan pored over a table covered with tally sticks and counters.

Warm physically, at least. A fire burned cheerily in the fireplace across the narrow room, and a charcoal brazier warmed his booted feet, propped on a green leather foot-stool. But psychic frost in the air made Morgan glad of the heavy, fur-lined court robe he wore this morning, though it was a poor substitute for snuggling next to the sultry warmth of his wife on such a morning, back in their great canopied bed.

Not that such a pleasant pastime was likely, with Richenda in her present state of agitation, even if official duties would not call him from her within the hour. While he had been reviewing revenues for an assizes court to convene shortly in the ducal hall- a tedious task, at best, that was made no more pleasant by his wife's ill humor-Richenda had been pacing back and forth before his table and arguing.

Or rather, Richenda was arguing and Morgan was allowing himself to be preoccupied by the counting board and the tally sticks spread out before him, only half listening, for he had heard all these arguments before. Stacks of markers dotted the checkered cloth covering the counting table, each representing the income of a particular manor in the east of Coroth over the past year-incomes in knights' services as well as cash and kind, the former a vital ingredient for the defense of the eastern borders with Torenth, with which Kelson had charged Corwyn's duke.

And then there was the baby to consider-far more attractive a proposition than Richenda's arguments or manorial incomes, so far as Morgan was concerned. He and Richenda had already chosen Kelric as the boy's first name, to honor Kelson as well as Alaric; and

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