Speak to the Devil

CHAPTER 29

“Do try to smile!” snapped Dowager Countess Edita. “You look as if you’re dressing for a funeral, not a banquet.”

“I wonder why?” Madlenka murmured. With her father and brother not ten days in the family vault, a funeral face would be much more appropriate.

Yet here she was, robed in virginal white, being primped and tugged and adjusted by her mother and Ivana, Mother’s crony and personal seamstress. Ivana was all bone and angles, with ears sharper than razors and a tongue to match. Today she was a-tut-tut at this unexpected festivity, shocked by its timing, so soon after the late count’s death. It was officially a recognition of the new count’s accession and a chance for the town dignitaries to meet him, but no one within the castle doubted that it was a wedding feast.

“Mm,” Edita remarked, surveying their masterpiece. “You really are quite beautiful, my dear. In a sylphlike way.”

“Scrawny, you mean.” The hat wasn’t helping. They had insisted she wear a hennin, a steeple hat about two feet high, trailing white lace-the latest fashion from France, they said. She would tower over even Anton. It was totally wrong for her, making her feel like a lance.

“Well, most men do prefer their partners plump, but fortunately the count seems content with the match. Now it is up to you to accept it as equitably as he does and make the best of it. It is the king’s decision and we all owe our duty to His Majesty. By Our Lady, you’re shivering! It isn’t cold in here. You’re not catching a fever, are you?”

Madlenka considered blaming her chill on lack of sleep, caused by two nights of instruction from Anton in how to please him. But there were no laurels to be won in battles with her mother anymore. At the moment she was nothing-no longer a marriageable heiress, not yet a countess. The Church might regard her as Anton’s wife, but in the eyes of the world she was just the count’s bawd. Once she was properly married, she would be able to displace her mother as head of the household and become a somebody, but until then, she was powerless. And by spring she would be hugely gravid.

The door opened and in scuttled Neomi, another of Mother’s gossips. She was fat where Ivana was thin, all butter and smarm.

“Have you heard what happened?” she exclaimed, rubbing fat hands gleefully.

The dowager countess said no she hadn’t, frowning at Neomi’s yellow-fanged leer. Whatever the news was, it must be bad.

“The count’s brother is back! Squire Whatshisname. And several other brothers, with him!”

Madlenka guessed from the sideways glances that the trouble concerned her, and schooled herself to the stoicism of a tombstone effigy. She did not even shrug. What was he to her?

“The count said something to the squire,” Neomi gushed. “Nobody seems to know what… but the squire knocked him flat on his back! Right in the middle of the hall, in front of everybody. Then the other brothers pulled them apart and made them shake hands.”

Mother was looking colder than Mount Naproti in midwinter. “How loutish!” Those two words would be the text for a future three-hour sermon on the theme of See What I Saved You From?

“He was probably upset that he didn’t get invited to the wedding,” Madlenka said sweetly, quite certain she was not blushing the tiniest bit. Wulf was back already! Her heart sang.

Stupid, stupid heart.

Standing at the end of the hall with Anton, Madlenka remembered to add a beaming smile to her appearance. She could gripe at Mother in private, but for outsiders noblesse must oblige. The guests waiting to be welcomed and pay their respects were mostly residents of the town-priests, doctors, a couple of notaries, the wealthier merchants, plus some knights from the backwoods. The day after his accession, Anton had called in his able-bodied vassals to do homage to him and to defend Castle Gallant against the Pomeranian attack. Very few of them had arrived yet, and there had been no time for anyone else to make the journey in the rain, or even be notified. Men greatly outnumbered women.

Give him his due, Anton looked striking in Father’s scarlet, ermine-trimmed robe. Even the absurd upturned mustache seemed less presumptuous when worn under an earl’s coronet, and the golden baldric placed him in the highest ranks of Jorgarian nobility. Life was not turning out as Madlenka had imagined it would, but the unexpected usurper was a more attractive husband than she could have realistically hoped for. So she told herself. She ought to be wonderfully happy by now, and might well have believed she was, had she never met Wulf.

She must not stare too often or too admiringly at the beautiful swelling developing on the count’s jaw. Why on earth had Wulf knocked him down in public? Anton would never tell her, but he would certainly have to banish his brother, so she would never see him again. The scandal would echo around the town for months.

The arrival of more brothers had forced Arturas to tear up two days’ work to rearrange the protocol and seating arrangements. Bishop Ugne still took precedence, of course, pompous popinjay in his glorious robes. After the count and future countess had kissed his ring, he took his place beside them to bless the guests as they came by.

After him came Baron Magnus of Dobkov, future brother-in-law Ottokar, who was a very large man in his thirties with a friendly smile on a tough-looking face. His words were conventional, but she suspected that his eyes saw more than most people’s.

Then Sir Vladislav, the largest man she had ever seen, as tall as Anton and twice as wide. His bristling black beard prickled as he kissed her.

“Understand you’re handfasted with Beanpole,” he boomed. “That’s what we always called him. You’ll find him quite a handful in bed. He’s a terrible rascal with the girls.”

Face flaming crimson, Anton said, “Don’t believe a word of what he says, my dear. Not now, nor ever.”

“Ah, that reminds me-is your ankle all better now, lad?”

“Move along, Vlad,” Anton said resignedly. “The bishop is waiting to hear your confession. This is another brother, Brother Marek of the

… um… Well, he was all our mother could manage after producing Vlad.”

Marek was tiny compared with the others, but he had Wulf’s happy smile and the same twinkle in his eyes. Another clever one, she decided. So those were the four brothers senior, and the youngest did not appear. Of course Wulf should not be presented, for he had already met her and was one of the count’s servants, not a guest. Or possibly he had already been kicked out of the castle gate forever.

The banquet began late, but banquets always began late, and the food was always cold. As was customary, the tables had been arranged in a U with everyone backed against a wall, facing inward. Of course the host presided at the end of the room with his noble guests. Lesser folk sat along the sides of the awkwardly narrow hall, men with their backs to the windows, women facing them. In this case there were enough men to take over half the women’s table also, so the women had to be relegated to the far end, beyond the door, as if they were attending another banquet altogether.

Arturas had completed a frenzy of rearranging. Now the lineup along the head table was Sir Vladislav, Dowager Countess Edita, Bishop Ugne, Count Magnus, Madlenka, Baron Magnus, and then the fireplace. The dais being too short to take more people, Arturas had been forced to improvise even more. Anxious not to insult brothers of the count, he had put Marek at the high end of the men’s table, ahead of the six priests of the town, who were shocked at being thus upstaged by a friar. Wulfgang was directly opposite, next to the corner fireplace, similarly offending the constable and the knights.

Madlenka had endured ghastly banquets before, but never one where she was pinned between a new husband-to whom she must be devotedly attentive-and a brother-in-law she had never even heard of until now, who asked the most extraordinary questions.

Like, “Why did the landsknechte leave, my lady?”

What sort of dinner conversation was that? She rummaged through several possible names-Anton, the count-before settling on the unfamiliar, the unbelievable, “My husband… says that they wanted more money than he could afford to pay.”

“Odd. What does everyone else say?”

“Everyone else was happy to see them go, my lord.”

And so on.

Bishop Ugne kept asking Anton questions he clearly did not want to answer, so he tried to stay in conversation with Madlenka by asking her to name and discuss particular people. She helped prolong the conversation as much as she could by inquiring about his childhood home at Dobkov.

But then the bishop would snatch him away with another question and Baron Magnus-“Do please call me Otto”-would grab his chance again. He was charming, cultured, and wonderful company. He told a few amusing stories about Anton, but otherwise praised him highly, as was to be expected under the circumstances. He spoke affectionately but solemnly of Brother Marek, hinting that he might be having misgivings about his calling. He even apologized for Sir Vladislav’s rough manners, which he blamed on ten years’ campaigning, but he was obviously proud of his brother’s military reputation.

“What did Sir Vladislav mean when he met Anton and asked if his ankle was ‘all better’?” she asked.

The baron rolled his eyes. “That is typical. When Vlad rode off to the Bavarian war two years ago, Anton was going to go with him as one of his squires. The day before they were due to leave, he broke his ankle, so he couldn’t go. Vlad found it amusing to imply that he’d done it deliberately, out of cowardice. That isn’t funny even among family members, all of whom know that Anton is anything but a coward. He nearly went out of his mind because he had to stay home.”

But what had that to do with her? “And how did he break his ankle?”

Otto sighed. “Just remember that I didn’t bring this up, all right? He slipped while climbing up to a window.”

No doubt it had been a lady’s window and that was why Vladislav had mentioned the matter in front of her. Very funny.

Wulf was at the head of the adjoining table, on the other side of the fireplace, not ten feet away from Ottokar. The brothers could speak to each other quite easily if they wished, but Wulf never once glanced that way, because he would have to acknowledge Madlenka also. The fact that Ottokar likewise did not address him showed that he understood the lovers’ problem.

Indeed, he never even mentioned Wulf to Madlenka except to say that their mother had died bearing him and their father had never remarried. So Wulf, Anton, and even Marek must have been reared by servants. Ottokar was obviously head of the family in more than name. The others clearly deferred to him, so much so that she suspected even Anton might still heed his orders, at least until Anton had grown into his new duties as a feudal landowner. She liked Ottokar.

The first course was removed and the second brought in-swan and roast piglets, beans and a spicy sauce, sweetmeats and fall fruits. The baron and Sir Vladislav went to work again, but she could not face another mouthful. Anton nibbled. The poor would do well out of today’s leftovers.

The wine still flowed. The hall became very noisy, with everyone shouting over the musicians who strolled around. Two boys performed acrobatics; jugglers juggled. As each act ended, Anton dispatched gifts to the performers.

Then the entertainers departed and the servants withdrew to the far end of the hall. Madlenka braced herself for the highlight of the feast.

“My lord?” she murmured.

Anton turned and smiled. “My wife?”

“Have you met Jurgen?”

“Remind me.”

“Your fool. He’s a dwarf, about half your height. He can be very funny, but he’ll certainly be making comments about height and, um, related matters.”

His smiled broadened. “Are you worried that I can’t take jokes, or that I have something to be ashamed of? You know you need not worry about either.”

“That’s reassuring,” she said, although she had serious doubts about the way Anton took jokes. “I just wanted to warn you. The bugler will give him a fanfare and he’ll enter in a cart pulled by two old hounds. He may be dressed as a Moor or Julius Caesar or the Emperor Barbarossa. You never know what-”

Her voice was drowned out by the shriek of a trumpet from outside the door. The fanfare, played extremely badly, ended in a very vulgar noise that died away into merciful silence. Thus all eyes were on the doorway as Havel Vranov limped into the hall.