The Winter Prince (The Lion Hunters:01)(42)

“No!” I spat. “I’ll wear nothing that looks like a crown.”

You turned to gaze down at me. A slow smile played about your lips, a mere twitch at the corner of your mouth. “So that is the way of it,” you said softly, and from another casket drew out a strip of black silk. “This, then.” You stood by me and banded the ribbon across my forehead. I rose and shook out the heavy folds of my robe; you stood away, admiring me as a craftsman admires the work of his hands. “You must have an eardrop as well.” I let you fix one on me, a heavy jewel of gold and jet that I think I have worn before.

“‘In the midst of the lampstands,’” you murmured low, “‘one clothed with a long robe and with a golden girdle round his breast; his head and his hair were white as white wool, white as snow, his eyes were like a flame of fire.’”

I stared at you. “That is from Revelation.”

“Had you been speaking of it?” you gasped in mock surprise, amusement in your gaze. “I know what happened. Agravain was here before you, asking terrible questions of me. But I have set his jealous heart at ease.”

“How could you?”

“I lied to him,” you answered casually, and commenced to brush your hair. “There’s a riddle for you, my virtuous child: Is it worse to deny the truth, or to hide it? I doubt you’ll hurry to set him straight.”

I did not know what to answer. As I hesitated, the guards woman at the door entered; she said to me, “My lord, Caius is asking for you.”

“Send him in,” you told her.

“The rhyming!” I sighed. I had forgotten in my anger. “I cannot go dressed like this.”

“Why not?” you answered. And Caius exclaimed as he came in, “Medraut, you look a prince!” He laughed, and slau="justcame to stand before me and clasp my shoulders as he admired my finery. “You need not change. You know the costumes were made to fit over our clothes.”

“Even so.”

“No fear, we’ll make it part of the performance. I’ll get you a cloak. No one must see you yet.”

“Medraut!”

I turned back to you before I left the room. You said quietly, “Come bid me good night when all is over.”

We took the pageant from door to door throughout the village, nameless, anonymous luck-bringers in our shaggy and shapeless costumes. Our small party had become a parade when we arrived back at the estate, for many of the villagers had followed us on their way to the feast at Camlan. Warm with the cider and ale of Elder Field, we burst shouting into the crowd gathered in the Great Hall, who returned our shouts for greeting. Then Gofan in his great voice called out the opening lines of the pageant:

“Way! Make way!



Yield the floor, clear the way!



We’ll mend all evil’s ill with mirth



On this Midwinter’s Day.”



He commanded silence. The laughing crowd stood still.

“Under your green-girt beams we come



Neither to beg nor borrow;



Happy we play upon your hearth



To speed away all sorrow.



We are the season’s rhymers!



Cry welcome to us here!



Fortune we bring to field and fold



At the closing of the year.”



Now our audience was rapt. The words were old and familiar, and it was too long since they had been spoken in this hall. Caius stepped forward into the small circle of clear ground, the red, holly-trimmed hood hiding his face so that the white linen mask beneath could not even be glimpsed.

“In come I, the Old Year,



Keeper of this fruitful land.



Your stout hoards of grain, ale, and meat



Are blessed beneath my hand.”



A ragged cheer went up. They were apt words from the steward of the estate, but no one was sure that it was Caius.

“Here is your hope, here is your bread,



Your shield against the dark’s sharp blast:



Who boldly dares before me stand



To lay me low at last?”



Bedwyr answered him, the high king’s swordsman, gray-hooded and glittering with icicles of silver foil and mica.

“In come I, the New Year;