Cormyr

Chapter 9: Cordials

Year of the Gauntlet (1369 DR)

“Princess Alusair? My dear, she’s probably gallivanting around the realm with all the handsome young men she can grab with both hands! Gone to fight beasts at the borders of the realm, indeed! More likely she’s off to one of the king’s secluded hunting lodges for a weekend of dalliance. That one wants to try out all the nobles in Cormyr before she marries one!”

The prawn-and-cress sandwiches were all gone, and the dove tarts as well. The servants had been dismissed-Darlutheene had bidden them to leave the cordial decanters behind-and the two ladies had settled down in the parlor window seats with the drinks between them for their favorite post-highsun pastime: a good old gossip.

Darlutheene Ambershields was in fine form today. To look at her-something few men cared to do for overlong-you’d never think she’d been born to a family of longtime palace servants. Her gown of royal blue musterdelvys was alive with cut gems-glass, a jeweler would have said at a glance-that glistened like tears, and her formidable bodice was a masterwork of upswept filigree adorned with peacock plumes. The red silk of a fitted chemise flared through her slashed and puffed sleeves, and in half a dozen daring cutouts upon her breast and belly. Huge rings flashed and glistened on every finger as she waved expressive hands, and a small silver ship was under full sail across the raised billows of her blonde hair.

In truth, her companion, Blaerla Roaringhorn, considered this bellow-sailed vessel in very poor taste, but it was after all Darlutheene’s parlor, and her cordials, too, so Blaerla held her peace.

“She doesn’t matter at any rate,” Darlutheene confided in a whisper that set the crystal ringing several rooms away. “They say Azoun has three sons-that’s right, no fewer than three!-shut up in dungeons at High Horn and Arabel and even right here in Suzail, their wits stolen away by those wicked war wizards, waiting to step onto the throne should anything happen to him. The other nobles are simply furious, of course, and have spent quite a respectable amount of money over the years trying to get to these idiot princes. If they grabbed one, you see, they could kill everyone in the Palace at once with magic and still have a recognized blood heir to put on the throne!”

The earrings at Darlutheene’s green-and pink-dyed temples shook with the excitement of her words, tinkling almost like the diamonds they were cut to resemble, rather than the glass that they truly were.

Blaerla leaned forward, jewel-topped toothpick busily at work, to look out over what they could see of the royal gardens, just in case armies of men hired by the nobles were charging the palace to get at one of those chained princes right now, but the shrubs and flower beds were empty of rushing men in armor, perhaps they’d chosen another route. “You speak truth indeed about my mistress, the princess,” she said, putting her glass to her full, very red lips, “but I’ve seen her with a sword in her hand, love, and I tell you if anyone sits on the throne that she doesn’t agree with, we’ll have war!”

“War? Why, Blaerla, you do say such dramatic things sometimes! Why, who would want to ruin all this”-Darlutheene waved a languid hand out the window, fluttering the long, green lashes she’d had glued to her own mousy brown ones that morning-“by attacking and fighting and burning and… all that sort of thing?” To underscore her question, she opened her striking violet eyes very wide.

“Half a hundred ambitious nobles!” Blaerla replied excitedly, her own brown eyes flashing in response, color coming into her cheeks. Her companion’s cheeks always sported a blush-and several beauty spots-thanks to her capable crew of six maids-of-adornment, who also powdered her several chins. “At least twenty noble families consider the crown is as rightfully theirs as it is the Obarskyrs’!” She drained her glass to underscore the gravity of her words.

“You exaggerate, dear,” Darlutheene said indulgently, pouring more of her fourth-best bitter orange generously. Blaerla licked her lips appreciatively, unaware that she wasn’t actually getting the finest amberfly the bottle proclaimed it held. “Azoun is poorly, yes, but he still lives, and everyone, simply everyone, is looking to Tanalasta. It seems our silent miss is to have her chance at last!”

“Is she strong enough to seize it?” Blaerla asked eagerly, eyes snapping with excitement. “Or having taken the throne, to hold it?”

“Ah, but you must be unaware, my dear, that our weak, frail princess of books and sighs has-a man!”

“No!”

“Yes!”

“Tell!” Blaerla demanded, almost upsetting a tall glass with her chin in her forward-leaning eagerness. “Who is this next king of ours? Taldeth Truesilver? That leering one who gives her all the flowers-what is his name Hundilav… Hundilavatar Huntsilver? Surely not that popinjay, Martin Illance?”

“No, no… you’ll never guess, dear, I didn’t!” Madam Ambershields made the most of her moment, pausing to leisurely sip her current glass of cordial while her companion almost bounced and squealed with impatience. She settled for stroking Darlutheene’s hand fondly, several dozen times.

“Well?” Blaerla demanded at last, unable to wait any longer. “Tell me!”

“His name,” Darlutheene said slowly, refilling her glass, “is Aunadar Bleth, a hitherto overlooked young blade of the old and respected Bleth family.”

“Respected, my dear? By whom?” Blaerla was a Roaringhorn, and the Roaringhorns did not think well of the Bleths as a matter of principle. The reasons went back several centuries, and by now the particulars were quite forgotten, but were thought to have been very good at the time.

“By-by, ah, all sorts of highly placed people at court, dear! They say he’s quick with a blade, and handsome enough, and, well… has stayed at her side. A true young gallant!”

“Of the sort that rushes about waving his sword and his jaws nonstop and falling off his horse every tenday?” Blaerla asked dryly, and they chuckled together over their glasses.

“Well, whatever happens,” Madam Ambershields said with satisfaction when she could speak again, “Princess Tanalasta has labored too long in her father’s shadow, supporting him with her every word and act! It’s high time she built a life of her own.”

“Well, yes, she needs to chart her own voyage… but is she ready?”

“Are any of us, dear? It’s true she’s led a sheltered life, and all this may have come rather suddenly, sooner than she might have wished… but she should be happy now that she has a man!”

“Hah! Men!” Blaerla’s passing acquaintance with men had not left her with all that high an opinion of the creatures, dogs barked more frugally and got into less mischief, on the whole. “What do we know about this Bleth boy, really?”

“Well, that is a matter of some spirited dispute, I may say,” Darlutheene allowed. “Some say he has an impeccable character, but it must be said that none speaking so are women. He is rather obscure…”

“But they were saying in the palace yestereve that Tanalasta-delicate rose that she is!-quite lost her wits when the duke died, and though she’s recovered enough to speak and recognize folk and feed herself, she’s still a shattered thing!”

“No, no, my dear. Your sources are quite mistaken. The shattered one is Filfaeril. The queen is quite mad with grief. She’s been shrieking so, and pulling the hair of courtiers, and rushing about half dressed, howling at guards to plunge their swords into her bosom, and I don’t know quite what all else… that they’ve put her away.”

“No!”

“Yes! Locked her in a coach and spirited her away by night, into seclusion clear up in quaint little Eveningstar, at a temple there called the Spires of the Morning or something like that. They say she won’t recover, so there’s no thought of the Dragon Queen ruling on alone, even if such a thing were possible. The crown goes to one Obarskyr-born. Marriage grants you a title but not the throne.”

“All the worse for poor, poor Tanalasta.” Blaerla sighed. “What are the nobles here at court saying? They won’t let us in the palace speak to them, you know!”

“Ah, that’s the master hand of the Royal Magician at work! Always trying to run things, that one-spells enough to turn the realm upside down apparently aren’t enough for some people! He’s got them in a proper frolic at court, you know. The old nobles are furious that anyone’s doing anything until Azoun’s actually dead, of course. The older patriarchs insist that the king will recover and that we do blasphemous treason if we prepare for, or talk about, anything else! Yet I notice not a few of them have sent their sons home to their estates and mustered all the family armsmen-and all the swords they can hire in Marsember-around them!”

“I thought the lower orders would be crying out for Alusair to come riding in and take the throne,” Blaerla said thoughtfully. “They love her, you know.”

“All Cormyr loves our Mithril Princess-but wouldn’t living under her rule be like trying to hold the leash of an angry dog when it sees foes on all sides? And she did vanish off north just when her country needed her most!”

Darlutheene’s closing sniff consigned Alusair to the no-longer-need-be-discussed category, and Blaerla abandoned championing her absent royal mistress in favor of a sigh and a murmured, “So I suppose it’s to be Tanalasta-with all the court nobles hungry to see her on the throne, so that they can tell her what to do.”

“Of course! There’re even some of them who want Filfaeril to rule alone, even if she’s barking mad, so that they can speak for her and do just as they please with the realm.”

Blaerla rolled her eyes. “Is there anyone else seeking the throne?”

Darlutheene laughed heartily, spraying raspberry cordial all over the table and herself. “Of course, my dear. All the timid mice among both merchants and nobles are skulking about the corridors, suggesting that it’s time to install a merchant-or a noble, depending on whose tongue is flapping-council to run the kingdom and put whatever powerless puppy seems most convenient on the throne. One man with little taste and less sense than most actually suggested having Azoun’s corpse stuffed and putting it on the throne to entertain the flies, while everyone else got on with the task of running Cormyr!”

“Gods above!” Blaerla was scandalized. “It’d be just like the regency all over again! If there isn’t one crowned head to spew the orders, everyone spends his time looking over his shoulder in fear, or burying daggers in the bellies of rivals, and nothing good gets done!”

“And that,” Darlutheene said triumphantly, “is where our favorite fat old mage comes in. Vangerdahast, the Lord High Court Wizard, Royal Magician, and Chamberpot Watcher, is being friendly with all of the factions, whispering this here and that there, egging them all on to each others’ throats! Whenever anyone accuses him of double-dealing or speaking falsely, he goes all grim and grand and talks about ‘doing what he must for the safety of the realm.’ You should hear him!”

“What does he truly want, I wonder?” Blaerla mused, suddenly very serious. The palace was all too uncomfortably close to be ruled by madmen, or feuding butcherers or mad wizards. “He could be the most dangerous man in the kingdom.”

“He is the most dangerous man in the kingdom, dear,” said Darlutheene darkly, leaning forward to snatch the last bottle of cordial-lime, her favorite-practically out from under Blaerla’s nose. “The gods help us if he changes.”

“Changes?”

“He’s always been loyal to crown. Still, he is a wizard, and they are tricky in the extreme.”

“Yes, tricky…” Blaerla echoed, and they frowned in unison and shook their heads disapprovingly. One could never tell with wizards.