The Game of Kings by Dorothy Dunnett

Author:Dorothy Dunnett
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
ISBN: 9780307762320
Publisher: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
Published: 2010-08-11T10:00:00+00:00

III

Mate for the Master

A Quheyne movand scho shuld kepe colour aye,

In hir first moving may scho diverse waye,

First to ye poynt befor ye mediciner,

Syne to two poynts verraye anguler,

To ye poynt void befor ye notair.

1. A Bereft Knight Is Checked by His Own Side

AFTER seventeen days in the field, Richard rode back to Midculter, intending to apologize to his wife. She was not there. She had left some time ago, with a small escort, and it was assumed that she had joined Sybilla at Dumbarton. So he turned his weary horse and rode there too.

They came to the small Queen’s bedroom to tell Sybilla he had arrived. She glanced up, seeing the change in her own heart reflected in Christian’s blind face; then looked down and tucked the two flaying hands under the sheets for a second time. “Tomorrow,” she said. The Queen made a hideous face. “Now.”

“Tomorrow you shall get up,” said the Dowager firmly. “And put on the yellow dress. And go and see Sym’s cuddies in a jug. If you are a reasonable child today.”

Melting eye and embouchure veered from Sybilla to Lady Fleming, just beyond. “When I am ill you must do as I want.”

The Dowager saw the trap before Aunt Jenny did. Aunt Jenny, despite a dig in the arm, said brightly, “But you’re not ill any longer,” and Mary pounced. “Then in that case—”

“You’re convalescent,” finished Sybilla swiftly.

“What’s—”

“It means going to be well provided you do what you’re told.” A thwarted silence. “Then I had rather,” said the Queen sulkily, “be ill.”

“In many ways, things were easier,” agreed Sybilla. She bent over the little girl, curled tight as a leaf bud in the bedclothes, kissed her and handed over her vigil thankfully to Jenny Fleming.

Outside, she took Christian by the arm. “Richard has come—you heard. Will you go with me to see him?”

The blind girl hesitated, but only for a moment. If Sybilla was willing to sacrifice Richard’s pride, it was for a very good reason. And in the coming encounter she had a queer feeling that the Dowager would be more vulnerable than her son.

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