Lois McMaster Bujold - Chalion 00 by Lois Mcmaster Bujold

Author:Lois Mcmaster Bujold
Language: eng
Format: epub

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

T HE TEMPLE SQUARE WAS ALREADY CROWDED WITH COURTLY

and would-be-courtly mourners when Ingrey arrived there in the midmorning. His eye picked out a few of Gesca's men at the outer edges of the mob, indicating that Lord Hetwar was already within.

Ingrey lengthened his stride and shouldered through the press. Those who recognized him gave way at once.

The sky was a bright autumn blue, and he shrugged in relief as he stepped out of the sun into the shade of the portico. His best court dress was heavy and a trifle hot, the somber sleeveless coat swirling about his ankles and tending to tangle with his sword. The sunbeams shone down also into the open central court, where the holy fire burned high on its plinth, and he blinked at the adjustment from light to dark to light. He spotted Lady Hetwar, attended by Gesca and Hetwar's oldest son, made his way to her side, and bowed. She gave him an acknowledging nod, her glance approving his garb, and shifted a little to make him space to loom in proper retainer's style beside Gesca at her back. Gesca gave him a nervy sideways stare, but by no other sign revealed any aftereffects of their last tense encounter, and Ingrey began to hope Gesca had kept the eerie incident to himself.

Beyond the plinth, Ingrey also noted Rider Ulkra and some of Prince Boleso's higher servants; good, the exiled household had arrived in Easthome as instructed. Ulkra cast him a polite nod of greeting, though most of the retainers who had ridden escort to Boleso's wagon with him avoided his eyes-whether conscious of his contempt or simply unnerved by him, Ingrey could not tell.

From a stone passage, the sound of a temple choir started up, the echoing effect making the fine, blended voices sound appropriately distant and doleful. At a slow pace, the singing acolytes entered the court: five times five, a quintet for each god, robed in blue, green, red, gray, and white. The archdivine of Easthome followed solemnly. Behind him, six great lords carried the prince's bier. Hetwar was among them, both kin Boarford brothers, and three more earl-ordainers.

Boleso's body was tightly wrapped in layers of herbs beneath his perfumed princely robes, Ingrey guessed, though his swollen face was exposed. The delay in his burial pushed the limits of a decomposition that would necessitate a closed coffin. But the death of one so highborn demanded witnesses, the more the better, to prevent later imposters and pretenders from troubling the realm.

The principal mourners followed next. Prince-marshal Biast, resplendent of dress and weary of face, was attended by Symark, holding the prince-marshal's standard with its pennant wrapped and bound to its staff as a sign of grief. Behind them, Earl Horseriver supported his wife, Princess Fara. Her dark garb was plain to severity, her brown hair drawn back and without jewels or ribbons, and her face deathly white by contrast. She had not her brothers' height, and the long Stagthorne jaw was

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