to-night to move my matter with him. Meanwhile, madam,” he said to
Zenambria, “I’ll have thee take thy chamber straight. Bolt well the
door, and for more safety I will lock it myself o’ the outer side.
There’s much mirth toward to-night, and I’d not have these staggering
drunken swads offend thee, as full well might befall, whiles I am on
mine errand of state.”
Zenambria bade him good-night, and would have taken her daughter with
her, but Corsus said nay to this, saying, “I’ll see her safe bestowed.”
When they were alone, and the Lady Zenambria locked away in her
chamber, Corsus took forth from an oaken cupboard a great silver flagon
and two chased goblets. These he brimmed with a sparkling yellow wine
from the flagon and made Sriva drink with him not once only but twice,
emptying each time her goblet. Then he drew up his chair and sinking
heavily into it folded his arms upon the table and buried his head upon
them.
Sriva paced back and forth, impatient at her father’s strange posture
and silence. Surely the wine lighted riot in her veins; surely in that
silent room came back to her Corinius’s kisses hot upon her mouth,
the strength of his arms like bands of bronze holding her embraced.
Midnight tolled. Her bones seemed to melt within her as she bethought
her of her promise, due in an hour.
“Father,” said she at last, “midnight hath stricken. Wilt thou not go
ere it be too late?”
The Duke raised his face and looked at her. He answered “No.” “No,”
he said again, “where’s the profit? I wax old, my daughter, and must
wither. The world is to the young. To Corinius; to Laxus; to thee. But
most of all to Corund, who if a be old yet hath his mess of sons, and
mightiest of all his wife, to be his ladder to climb thrones withal.”
“But thou saidst but now——” said Sriva.
“Ay, when thy mammy was by. She cometh to her second childhood before
her time, so as to a child I speak to her. Corund did ill to wed with
a young wife, ha? Phrut! Is not this the very bulwark and rampire of
his fortune? Didst ever see a fellow so spurted up in a moment? My
secretary when I managed the old wars against the Ghouls, and now
climbed clean over me, that am yet nine year his elder. Called king,
forsooth, and like to be ta’en soon (under the King) for Dominus fac
totum throughout all the land if a play this woman as a should. Will
not the King, for such payment as she intends, give Demonland upon
Impland and all the world beside? Hell’s dignity, that would I, and
’twere offered me.”
He stood up, reaching unsteadily for the wine jug. Furtively he watched
his daughter, shifting his gaze ever as her eye met his.
“Corund,” said he, pouring out some wine, “would split his sides for
laughter to hear thy mother’s prim-mouthed brabble: he that hath
enjoined upon his wife, there’s ne’er a doubt on’t, this very errand,
and if he visit it on her at his coming home ’twill but be with hotter
love and gratitude for that she wins him in our despite. Trust me, ’tis
not every lady of quality shall find favour with a King.”
The casement stood open, and while they stood without speech sounds of
a lute trembled upward from the court below, and a man’s voice, soft
and deep, singing this song:
Hornes to the bull,
Hooves to the steede,
To little hayres
Light feete for speed,
And unto lions she giveth tethe
A-gaping dangerouslye.
Fishes to swim,
And birds to flye,
And men to judge
And reeson why,
She teacheth. Yet for womankind
None of these thinges hath she.
For women beautie
She hath made
Their onely shielde
Their onely blade.
O’er sword and fire they triumph stille,
Soe they but beautious be.
The Lady Sriva knew it was Laxus singing to her chamber window. Her
blood beat wildly, the spirit of enterprise winging her imagination not
toward him, nor yet Corinius, but into paths strangely and perilously
inviting, undreamed of until now. The Duke her father came towards her,
thrusting the chairs from his way, and saying, “Corund and his mess of
sons! Corund and his young Queen! If he conjure with the white rose,
why not thou and I with the red? It hath as fair a look, the devil damn
me else, and savoureth as excellent sweet perfume.”
She stared at him big-eyed, with blushing cheeks. He took her hands in
his.
“Shall this outland woman,” he said, “and her sallow-cheeked gallant
still ruffle it over us? Long beards, whether they be white or black,
are too huge a blemish in our eye, methinks. The thing seemeth not
supportable, that this precise madam with her foreign fashions—Dost
fear to stand i’ the field against her?”
Sriva put her forehead on his shoulder and said, scarce to be heard,
“And it come to that, I’ll show thee.”
“It must be now,” said Corsus. “Prezmyra, thou hast told me, seeketh
audience betimes i’ the morning. Women are best at night-time, too.”
“If Laxus should hear thee!” she said.
He answered, “Tush, he need never blame thee, even if he knew on’t, and
we can manage that. Thy silly mother prated but now of honour. ’Tis
but a school-name; and if ’twere other, tell me whence springeth the
fount of honour if not from the King of Kings? If he receive thee, then
art thou honoured, and all they that have to do with thee. I am yet to
learn dishonour lieth on that man or woman whom the King doth honour.”
She laughed, turning from him toward the window, her hands still held
in his. “Foh, thou hast given me a strong potion! and I think that
swayeth me more than thy many arguments, O my father, which to say
truth I cannot well remember because I did not much believe.”
Duke Corsus took her by the shoulders. His face overlooked her by a
little, for she was not tall of build. “By the Gods,” he said, “’tis a
stronger sweet scent of the red rose to make a great man drunk withal
than of the white, though that be a bigger flower.” And he said, “Why
not, for a game, for a madcap jest? A mantle and hood, a mask if thou
wilt, and my ring to prove thee mine ambassador. I’ll attend thee
through the court-yard to the foot o’ the stairs.”
She said nothing, smiling at him as she turned for him to put the great
velvet mantle about her shoulders.
“Ha,” said he, “’tis well seen a daughter is worth ten sons.”
• • • • •
In the meanwhile Gorice the King sate in his private chamber writing
at a parchment spread before him on the table of polished marmolite.
A silver lamp burned at his left elbow. The window stood open to the
night. The King had laid aside his crown, that sparkled darkly in the
shadow below the lamp. He put down his pen and read again what he had
writ, in manner following:
Fram Me, Gorice the Twelft, Greate Kyng of Wychlande and of
Ympelande and of Daemonlande and of al kyngdomes the sonne
dothe spread hys bemes over, unto Corsus My servaunte: Thys is
to signifye to the that thoue shalt with all convenient spede
repaire with a suffycyaunt strengthe of menne and schyppes to
Daemonlande, bycause that untowarde and traytorly cattell that doe
there inhabyt are to fele by the the sharpnes of My correctioun.
I wyll the, as holdynge the place of My generalle ther, that thow
enter forcybly ynto the sayd cuntrie and doe with al dilygence
spoyl ravysche and depopulate that lande, enslavying oppressyng
and puttyng to the dethe as thow shalt thynke moost servychable al
them that shal fall ynto thy powre, and in pertyculer pullyng downe
and ruinating all thayr stronge houlds or castels, as Galinge,
Dreppabie, Crothryng, Owleswyke, and othere. Thys enterpryse in
head is one of the gretest that ever was since yt is to trampe
downe Daemonlande and once and for al to cutt thayr coames whose
crestes may daunger us, and thow art toe onderstande that withowt
extraordinair experiens of thy former merrits I wolde not commyt
to the so greate a chairge, and especially in such a tyme. And
since al gret enterpryses oughte to bee sodeynly and resolutely
prosequuted, therefore thys oughte to bee done and executed at
furthest in harveste nexte. Therefore yt is My commaundemente that
thow Corsus take order for the instant furnesshynge of shippes,
seamen, souldiers, horsemen, officiers, and pertyculer personnes,
wepons, municions, and al other necessaries whych is thought to be
needfull for the armie and hoast whych shalbe levied for the sayd
entrepryse, for whyche this letter shalbe thy suffycyaunt warrant
under My hande. Given under My signeth of Ouroboros in My pallaice
of Carcie thys xxix daie of may, beynge the vij daie of My yeare II.
The King took wax and a taper from the great gold ink-stand, and sealed
the warrant with the ruby head of the worm Ouroboros, saying, “The
ruby, most comfortable to the heart, brain, vigour, and memory of man.
So, ’tis confirmed.”
In that instant, when the wax was yet soft of the King’s seal sealing
that commission for Corsus, one tapped gently at the chamber door. The
King bade enter, and there came the captain of his bodyguard and stood
before the King, with word that one waited without, praying instant
audience, “And showed me for a token, O my Lord the King, a bull’s head
with fiery nostrils graven in a black opal in the bezel of a ring,
which I knew for the signet of my Lord Corsus that his lordship beareth
alway on his left thumb. And ’twas this, O King, that only persuaded
me to deliver the message unto your Majesty in this unseasonable hour.
Which if it be a fault in me, I do humbly hope your Majesty will
pardon.”
“Knowest thou the man?” said the King.
He answered, “I might not know him, dread Lord, for the mask and great
hooded cloak he weareth. It is a little man, and speaketh a husky
whisper.”
“Admit him,” said King Gorice; and when Sriva was come in, masked and
hooded and holding forth the ring, he said, “Thou lookest questionable,
albeit this token opened a way for thee. Put off these trappings and
let me know thee.”
But she, speaking still in a husky whisper, prayed that they might be
private ere she disclosed herself. So the King bade leave them private.
“Dread Lord,” said the soldier, “is it your will that I stand ready
without the door?”
“No,” said the King. “Void the ante-chamber, set the guard, and let
none disturb me.” And to Sriva he said, “If thine errand prove not more
honester than thy looks, this is an ill night’s journey for thee. At
the lifting of my finger I am able to metamorphose thee to a mandrake.
If indeed thou beest aught else already.”
When they were alone the Lady Sriva doffed her mask and put back her
hood, uncovering her head that was crowned with two heavy trammels of
her dark brown hair bound up and interwoven above her brow and ears
and pinned with silver pins headed with garnets coloured like burning
coals. The King beheld her from under the great shadow of his brows,
darkly, not by so much as the moving of an eyelid or a lineament of his
lean visage betraying aught that passed in his mind at this disclosing.
She trembled and said, “O my Lord the King, I hope you will indulge
and pardon in me this trespass. Truly I marvel at mine own boldness how
I durst come to you.”
With a gesture of his hand the King bade her be seated in a chair on
his right beside the table. “Thou needest not be afraid, madam,” he
said. “That I admit thee, let it make thee assured of welcome. Let me
know thine errand.”
The fire of her father’s wine shuddered down within her like a low-lit
flame in a gust of wind as she sat there alone with King Gorice XII.
in the circle of the lamplight. She took a deep breath to still her
heart’s fluttering and said, “O King, I was much afeared to come, and
it was to ask you a boon: a little thing for you to give, Lord, and yet
to me that am the least of your handmaids a great thing to receive. But
now I am come indeed, I durst not ask it.”
The glitter of his eyes looking out from their eaves of darkness
dismayed her; and little comfort had she of the iron crown at his
elbow, bright with gems and fierce with uplifted claws, or of the
copper serpents interlaced that made the arms of his chair, or of the
bright image of the lamp reflected in the table top where were red
streaks like streaks of blood and black streaks like edges of swords
streaking the green shining surface of the stone.
Yet she took heart to say, “Were I a great lord had done your majesty
service as my father hath, or these others you did honour to-night,
O King, it had been otherwise.” He said nothing, and still gathering
courage she said, “I too would serve you, O King. And I came to ask you
how.”
The King smiled. “I am much beholden to thee, madam. Do as thou hast
done, and thou shalt please me well. Feast and be merry, and charge not
thine head with these midnight questionings, lest too much carefulness
make thee grow lean.”
“Grow I so, O King? You shall judge.” So speaking the Lady Sriva
rose up and stood before him in the lamplight. Slowly she opened her
arms upwards right and left, putting back her velvet cloak from her
shoulders, until the dark cloak hanging in folds from either uplifted
hand was like the wings of a bird lifted up for flight. Dazzling fair
shone her bare shoulders and bare arms and throat and bosom. One great
hyacinth stone, hanging by a gold chain about her neck, rested above
the hollow of her breasts. It flashed and slept with her breathing’s
alternate fall and swell.
“You did threaten me, Lord, but now,” she said, “to transmew me to a
mandrake. Would you might change me to a man.”
She could read nothing in the crag-like darkness of his countenance,
the iron lip, the eyes that were like pulsing firelight out of hollow
caves.
“I should serve you better so, Lord, than my poor beauty may. Were I a
man, I had come to you to-night and said, ‘O King, let us not suffer
any longer of that hound Juss. Give me a sword, O King, and I will put
down Demonland for you and tread them under feet.’”
She sank softly into her chair again, suffering her velvet cloak to
fall over its back. The King ran his finger thoughtfully along the
upstanding claws of the crown beside him on the table.
“Is this the boon thou askest me?” he said at length. “An expedition to
Demonland?”
She answered it was.
“Must they sail to-night?” said the King, still watching her. She
smiled foolishly.
“Only,” he said, “I would know what gadfly of urgency stung thee on to
come so strangely and suddenly and after midnight.”
She paused a minute, then summoning courage: “Lest another should
first come to you, O King,” she answered. “Believe me, I know of
preparations, and one that shall come to you in the morning praying
this thing for another. What intelligence soever some hath, I am sure
of that to be true that I have.”
“Another?” said the King.
Sriva answered, “Lord, I’ll say no names. But there be some, O King, be
dangerous sweet suppliants, hanging their hopes belike on other strings
than we may tune.”
She had bent her head above the polished table, looking curiously down
into its depths. Her corsage and gown of scarlet silk brocade were like
the chalice of a great flower; her white arms and shoulders like the
petals of the flower above it. At length she looked up.
“Thou smilest, my Lady Sriva,” said the King.
“I smiled at mine own thought,” she said. “You’ll laugh to hear it, O
my Lord the King, being so different from what we spoke on. But sure,
of women’s thoughts is no more surety nor rest than is in a vane that
turneth at all winds.”
“Let me hear it,” said the King, bending forward, his lean hairy hand
flung idly across the table’s edge.
“Why thus it was, Lord,” said she. “There came me in mind of a sudden
that saying of the Lady Prezmyra when first she was wed to Corund and
dwelt here in Carcë. She said all the right part of her body was of
Witchland but the left Pixy. Whereupon our people that were by rejoiced
much that she had given the right part of her body to Witchland.
Whereupon she said, but her heart was on the left side.”
“And where wearest thou thine?” asked the King. She durst not look at
him, and so saw not the comic light go like summer lightning across his
dark countenance as she spoke Prezmyra’s name.
His hand had dropped from the table edge; Sriva felt it touch her knee.
She trembled like a full sail that suddenly for an instant the wind
leaves. Very still she sat, saying in a low voice, “There’s a word, my
Lord the King, if you’d but speak it, should beam a light to show you
mine answer.”
But he leaned closer, saying, “Dost think I’ll chaffer with thee? I’ll
know the answer first i’ the dark.”
“Lord,” she whispered, “I would not have come to you in this deep and
dead time of the night but that I knew you noble and the great King,
and no amorous surfeiter that should deal falsely with me.”
Her body breathed spices: soft warm scents to make the senses reel:
perfume of malabathrum bruised in wine, essences of sulphur-coloured
lilies planted in Aphrodite’s garden. The King drew her to him. She
cast her arms about his neck, saying close to his ear, “Lord, I may
not sleep till you tell me they must sail, and Corsus must be their
captain.”
The King held her gathered up like a child in his embrace. He kissed
her on the mouth, a long deep kiss. Then he sprang to his feet, set
her down like a doll before him upon the table by the lamp, and so sat
back in his own chair again and sat regarding her with a strange and
disturbing smile.
On a sudden his brow darkened, and thrusting his face towards hers, his
thick black square-cut beard jutting beneath the curl of his shaven
upper lip, “Girl,” he said, “who sent thee o’ this errand?”
He rolled his eye upon her with such a gorgon look that her blood ran
back with a great leap towards her heart, and she answered, scarce to
be heard, “Truly, O King, my father sent me.”
“Was he drunk when he sent thee?” asked the King.
“Truly, Lord, I think he was,” said she.
“That cup that he was drunken withal,” said King Gorice, “let him prize
and cherish it all his life natural. For if in his sober senses he
should make no more estimation of me than think to bribe my favours
with a bona roba; by my soul, in his evil health he had sought to do
it, for it should cost him nothing but his life.”
Sriva began to weep, saying, “O King, your gentle pardon.”
But the King paced the room like a prowling lion. “Did he fear I should
supply Corund in his place?” said he. “This was a cocksure way to make
me do it, if indeed his practice had might to move me at all. Let him
learn to come to me with his own mouth if he hope to get good of me.
Other else, out of Carcë let him go and avoid my sight, that all the
great masters of Hell may conduct him thither.”
The King paused at length beside Sriva, that was perched still upon the
table, showing a kind of sweetness in tears, sobbing very pitifully,
her face hidden in her two hands. So for a time he beheld her, then
lifted her down, and while he sat in his great chair, holding her on
his knee with one hand, with the other drew hers gently from before
her face. “Come,” he said, “I blame it not on thee. Give over all thy
weeping. Reach me that writing from the table.”
She turned in his arms and stretched a hand out for the parchment.
“Thou knowest my signet?” said the King.
She nodded, ay.
“Read,” said he, letting her go. She stood by the lamp, and read.
The King was behind her. He took her beneath the arms, bending to speak
hot-breathed in her ear. “Thou seest, I had already chose my general.
Therefore I let thee know it, because I mean not to let thee go till
morning; and I would not have thee think thy loveliness, howe’er it
please me, moveth such deep-commanding spells as to sway my policy.”
She lay back against his breast, limp and strengthless, while he
kissed her neck and eyes and throat; then her lips met his in a long
voluptuous kiss. Surely the King’s hands upon her were like live coals.
Bethinking her of Corinius, fuming at an open door and an empty
chamber, the Lady Sriva was yet content.
XVII: THE KING FLIES HIS HAGGARD
HOW THE LADY PREZMYRA CAME TO THE KING ON AN ERRAND OF STATE, AND
HOW SHE PROSPERED THEREIN: WHEREIN IS ALSO SEEN WHY THE KING
WOULD SEND THE DUKE CORSUS INTO DEMONLAND; AND HOW ON THE
FIFTEENTH DAY OF JULY THESE LORDS, CORSUS, LAXUS, GRO, AND
GALLANDUS, SAILED WITH A FLEET FROM TENEMOS.
On the morn came the Lady Prezmyra to pray audience of the King, and
being admitted to his private chamber stood before him in great beauty
and splendour, saying, “Lord, I came to thank you as occasion served
not for me fitly so to do last night i’ the banquet hall. Sure, ’tis
no easy task, since when I thank you as I would, I must seem too
unmindful of Corund’s deserving who hath won this kingdom: but if I
speak too large of that, I shall seem to minish your bounty, O King.
And ingratitude is a vice abhorred.”
“Madam,” said the King, “thou needest not to thank me. And to mine ears
great deeds have their own trumpets.”
So now she told him of her letters received from Corund out of Impland.
“It is well seen, Lord,” said she, “how in these days you do beat down
all peoples under you, and do set up new tributary kings to add to your
great praise in Carcë. O King, how long must this ill weed of Demonland
offend us, going still untrodden under feet?”
The King answered her not a word. Only his lip showed a gleam of teeth,
as of a tiger’s troubled at his meal.
But Prezmyra said with great hardiness, “Lord, be not angry with me.
Methinks it is the part of a faithful servant honoured by his master to
seek new service. And where lieth likelier service Corund should do
you than west over seas, to lead presently an army naval thither and
make an end of them, ere their greatness stand up again from the blow
wherewith last May you did strike them?”
“Madam,” said the King, “this charge is mine. I’ll tell thee when I
need thy counsel, which is not now.” And standing up as if to end the
matter, he said, “I do intend some sport to-day. They tell me thou hast
a falcon gentle towereth so well she passeth the best Corinius hath.
’Tis clear calm weather. Wilt thou take her out to-day and show us the
mounty at a heron?”
She answered, “Joyfully, O King. Yet I beseech you add this favour to
all your former goodness, to hear me yet one word. Something persuades
me you have already determined of this enterprise, and by your putting
of me off I do fear your majesty meaneth not Corund shall undertake it
but some other.”
Dark and immovable as his own dark fortress facing the bright morning,
Gorice the King stood and beheld her. Sunshine streaming through the
eastern casement lighted red-gold smouldering splendours in the heavy
coils of that lady’s hair, and flew back in dazzling showers from the
diamonds fastened among those coils. After a space he said, “Suppose I
am a gardener. I go not to the butterfly for counsel. Let her be glad
that there be rose-trees there and red stonecrops for her delight;
which if any be lacking I’ll give her more for the asking, as I’ll give
thee more masques and revels and all brave pleasures in Carcë. But war
and policy is not for women.”
“You have forgot, O King,” said the Lady Prezmyra, “Corund made me his
ambassador.” But seeing a blackness fall upon the King’s countenance
she said in haste, “But not in all, O King. I will be open as day to
you. The expedition he strongly urged, but not for himself the leading
on’t.”
The King looked evilly upon her. “I am glad to hear it,” he said. Then,
his brow clearing, “Know thou it for thy good, madam, order is ta’en
for this already. Ere winter-nights return again, Demonland shall be my
footstool. Therefore write to thy lord I gave him his wish beforehand.”
Prezmyra’s eyes danced triumph. “O the glad day!” she cried. “Mine
also, O King?”
“If thine be his,” said the King.
“Ah,” said she, “you know mine outgallops it.”
“Then school thine, madam,” said the King, “to run in harness. Why
think’st thou I sent Corund into Impland, but that I knew he had
excellent wit and noble courage to govern a great kingdom? Wouldst have
me a wilful child snatch Impland from him like a sampler half stitched?”
Then, taking leave of her with more gracious courtesy, “We shall look
to see thee then, madam, o’ the third hour before noon,” he said, and
smote on a gong, summoning the captain of his guard. “Soldier,” he
said, “conduct the Queen of Impland. And bid the Duke Corsus straight
attend me.”
• • • • •
The third hour before noon the Lord Gro met with Prezmyra in the gate
of the inner court. She had a riding-habit of dark green tiffany and
a narrow ruff edged with margery-pearls. She said, “Thou comest with
us, my lord? Surely I am beholden to thee. I know thou lovest not the
sport, yet to save me from Corinius I must have thee. He plagueth me
much this morning with strange courtesies; though why thus on a sudden
I cannot tell.”