Read Online Ivory Lyre by Shirley Rousseau Murphy - Free Book Online Page B

felt it. It touched him like a cold hand, then
vanished. A dark threat, telling him to beware.
    Roast lamb was being served and trenchers of
vegetables and warm, fragrant breads. Teb fell to with enthusiasm.
For nearly five years in Nightpool he had lived on nothing but fish
and shellfish—raw at first, then cooked inexpertly by his own hand.
And before that, there were four years of dry bread and table
scraps when he was prisoner in his murdered father’s palace. He
wished now he could simply enjoy the wonderful food and not have to
try to work information from a woman who, too obviously, had more
intimate things in mind, and who drew the eyes of both king and
prince to him too critically.
    “It is a fine dining hall,” he said,
speaking up table to the king, “beautifully appointed, and the food
is superior. I would guess there is no grander hall or fare
anywhere on Tirror.”
    The king smiled. “The carvings are from the
eastern mountains of the Reinhollen dwarves, brought by barge when
my father ruled. The jewels were dug from our own mines, of course,
as jewels are dug, still, by my slaves.”
    It surprised Teb that the king’s father
would still be mentioned, that any tradition was spoken of here.
Wherever the dark insinuated itself into the land, the past was
wiped from the memory of men, or at least from their conversation
and caring. He studied the hall. Its ornate, crowded, heavily
carved panels were more oppressive than beautiful. The mountain’s
black stone at the back lost itself in its own shadows, except
where water dripped out from underground springs, catching the
candlelight. Teb thought of another hall, his home in Auric, with
walls of the palest masonry and banks of windows. There, sunlight
seemed always to touch his mother’s face, and bright tapestries
hung everywhere.
    By the time he was twelve the tapestries
were gray and tattered, the palace a dismal, smelly camp for
Sivich’s soldiers. His mother was gone. His father was dead, and he
and his sister, Camery, slaves to Sivich, his father’s killer. He
was startled when Accacia leaned over his arm.
    “You must see the city for yourself, Prince
Tebmund. There will be no entertainment tomorrow, but I can show
you Dacia. We can ride out early in the morning if you like,
and—”
    “A party to view the city,” Prince Abisha
interrupted. His look at his fiancée was cold and knowing. “A fine
idea. I will arrange it. But not tomorrow. Grain and stores will be
shipped tomorrow. The streets will be jammed with carts. The next
day, perhaps. We shall see.”
    She glared, then retreated into an icy
smile. “Directly after breakfast would be best, while it is still
cool.”
    Abisha didn’t bother to answer her. He
signaled for more roast lamb.
    Teb thought in the morning he would take his
mounted trainees down into the city on the excuse of giving them
experience on crowded streets. . . . It would be
some action, something different, and he might see something of
value. He itched to be away from the supper table and up above the
earth looking down between Seastrider’s wings. He hated waiting
each night until the whole palace slept.
    It was bad luck he had been assigned rooms
just below Accacia’s apartments and that she could see the stable
from her windows. It was interesting that she had made mention of
it this evening as he accompanied her into the dining hall. But
there was no law against his going to the stable, or against riding
at night.
    “Do you not have stone carvers in Thedria?”
the king was asking.
    “No. No dwarfs of any kind, nor have I ever
seen one,” Teb said truthfully. He could answer that kind of
question. The history of Tirror’s peoples was a part of all
dragon-song lore. It was questions about small new customs that
worried him and that could draw wrong answers.
    “Then how do you decorate your palaces? And
what pastimes, Prince Tebmund, do the folk of Thedria find
appealing? Do you not have stadium