Track of the White Wolf by Jennifer Roberson

Author:Jennifer Roberson [Roberson, Jennifer]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781101653036
Publisher: DAW

Six

I saw to it Gisella was settled comfortably in a cushioned chair on the dais with three other chairs. Two were for the Mujhar and his queen, the other for me. But all three remained empty.

As I stood solicitously by Gisella, she reached out and caught my hand. The motion reminded me of ’Solde and how she had reached for Ceinn. It reminded me of the conflict in her face as she had removed the lir-torque from her throat and told Ceinn there would be no child.

Holding Gisella’s hand, I looked down upon my wife and the child who swelled her body. Fruit of a man’s labors, and a sign of fertility so necessary to the House of Homana. And yet—it seemed I could hardly recall the first time we had lain together. Only the faintest flicker of a fleeting memory that told me once I had known someone other than Gisella.

Inwardly, I grimaced. I had hardly kept myself celibate before sailing to Atvia. No doubt what I recalled so dimly were the women who did not matter, being more interested in who I was rather than in what I could do to pleasure them.

I thought suddenly of the children born of such unions, the fruit of a man’s labors in fields that had already been well-tilled. I thought it likely I had no bastards because surely a woman who conceived of a prince would tell him in hopes of winning coin or jewel or favor. But I knew also it was entirely possible I had sired a child or two before the one in Gisella’s belly. And it made me think of Carillon, who had gotten a woman with child, and how that child now threatened my very existence, let alone my right to inherit the Lion.

The Lion of Homana. Gisella had asked if I were the Lion myself. And now I looked at the man who was.

He wore Cheysuli leathers dyed a rich, deep crimson, hem and collar set with narrow gold plates stitched into the leather. On his brow he wore a simple circlet of hammered gold and uncut rubies. And at his left side, scabbarded in rune-worked leather, hung the sword others claimed was ensorcelled.

My father did not move about the room; he let the room come to him. Quietly he stood near one of the groined archways and received those who wished to have word with him. He might have done it from the chair upon the dais, next to me. But it was a mark of his nature that he did not, preferring to stay away from such trappings as thrones and trumpeted announcements of his arrival. That he wore the sword surprised me; only rarely did he clasp the belt around his hips. Only rarely did he ever put hand to hilt, as if reluctant to display his absolute mastery of it.

Of course, he would never admit to being the master; rather, the servant. He had told me how once the brilliant ruby, the Mujhar’s Eye, had been perverted by Ihlini magic into a thing of ugliness.

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