Read Online Deeds of Men by Marie Brennan - Free Book Online

does one thing regarding the French in La Rochelle, and it means something else happens for the Spanish in northern Italy. When you told me England was your concern, I thought to myself, I understand that. But it isn’t just England, is it? France, and Spain, and Holland, and the Germanies, and onward without end.”
    Honest bewilderment tinged his voice. “Not without end,” Deven said, trying to make light of it. “We have no dealings with Cathay.”
    “Perhaps I should go there, then,” Henry said, with a melancholy sort of violence.
    Deven crossed the chamber and laid his hand on the young man’s shoulder. “’Tis not always so fraught. Ten years ago, Europe was a calmer place, and no doubt in ten more years it will be so again.”
    “But one cannot always depend upon calm.”
    “No, one cannot.” Deven sighed, and pressed his fingers into his own brow. “In truth, I think Lune spreads her net too far. She makes no attempt to affect events in those other lands—” Mostly. “But she tries to understand what goes on in them, and it is too much. James follows it all, but he has ministers for such things: the lords of his council, and all their gentlemen and agents and so on. He does not do it alone, or with a bare handful to aid.”
    Henry straightened from his slump. “What happens in France, though, or Spain, or all the rest, can affect what happens here. How can she ignore it, if she wishes to keep England stable?”
    A dry chuckle escaped Deven. “You have just parroted her own words, when I tried to persuade her to a less ambitious course.”
    “And what did you tell her then?”
    “That she might be the first to answer the question of whether a faerie can work herself to death.”
    It both delighted and alarmed the young man. “To say such a thing to a Queen! But if it deters her from answering that question, then so much the better, for all of us.”
    “She has promised to keep to England’s shores,” Deven said, “as much as she can. I have no doubt that here she will find enough to occupy even an immortal life.”
    And a series of mortal ones. Watching Henry stoke the fire, Deven wondered if the time had come to explain to his young friend the purpose of all this tutoring. Henry had likely guessed already, but neither of them had spoken the words. As if, by doing so, they would make real Deven’s age, and the inevitability of his death.
    Deven tried to pretend that was not his own reason for delaying, and failed.
    He must do it soon. It would be easier once he let go of his position as Prince, and lived only as the Queen’s love. But the letting go would be hard.
    I will do it soon , he promised himself. Lune still needed him, not just for herself, but for her court; however much Henry had learned, Deven still knew more. But once this French match was settled…
    Then he would step down, and be Prince no more.

    He that will thrive in state, he must neglect
    The trodden paths, that truth and right respect;
    And prove new, wilder wayes
    —III.iii114-6
    The Onyx Hall, London: 10 June, 1625
    “Quijada.” Lune pronounced the name thoughtfully, her accent far better than Mungle’s. “Until recently, he was in the retinue of the Marqués de la Inojosa, but he was dismissed months ago—I cannot recollect the cause. Don Eyague watched him for a time, having some interest in any Spanish mortals wandering about London.”
    “The faerie envoy from Spain,” Deven said to Antony. “Though more like an immigrant to this court, after so many years. The Marqués—”
    “Is the resident ambassador from King Philip,” the young man said. He added defensively, “My father sits in the Guildhall, you know, and Parliament. And I pay attention.”
    Deven bowed to take away the sting of any insult he might have offered. “I think ’tis fair to say Henry was not in charity with Penshaw the night he set Nithen to follow him. Shortly thereafter, Henry turns up dead, not far from the room Quijada rents.