Read Online The Charnel Prince by Greg Keyes - Free Book Online Page A

FOUGHT to draw a breath, but he felt as if a giant hand were clenched around his throat. “
Sceat
, this
can’t
be right,” he managed to gasp out. “Winna—”
    Winna rolled her blue eyes and shook her honey locks. “Hush, Asp,” she admonished, “don’t be such a kindling. Haven’t you ever worn a Fading collar before?”
    “I’ve never worn any damn sort of collar before,” Aspar grunted. “What’s the point?”
    “The point is, you’re in Eslen, in the royal palace, not tramping through a heath in the uplands, and before the next bell you’re going to see His Grace, the Praifec of all Crotheny. You’ve got to dress for the occasion.”
    “But I’m just a holter,” he complained. “Let me dress like one.”
    “You killed the Black Warg and his bandit band, alone, with nothing but your bow, ax, and dirk. You fought a greffyn and lived. You mean to say now you’re afraid to wear a simple set of weeds?”
    “They aren’t simple, I look stupid, and I can’t breathe.”
    “You haven’t even seen yourself, and if you’ve got enough breath to whinge so, I’d say you’re doing fine. Now here, come to the mirror.”
    He raised his eyebrows. Winna’s young face was broad with smile. Her hair was caught up in a black net of some sort, and she wore an azure gown that—to his mind—was cut far too low at the bodice. Not that the view didn’t please, but it would please every other man who saw it, too.
    “Well, you look—ah—pretty, at least,” he said.
    “Surely I do. And so do you. See?” She turned him toward the mirror.
    Well, he recognized the face, even with it shaved clean. Burned dark by the sun, scarred and worn by forty-one years of hard living, it might not be pretty, but it was the sort of face the king’s holter ought to have.
    From the neck down, he was a stranger. The tight, stiff collar was merely the most torturous part of a doublet made of some sort of brightly patterned cloth that ought to have ended up as a drape or a rug. Below that, his legs felt naked, clothed as they were in tight green hose. He felt altogether like a candied apple on a stick.
    “Who ever thought of dressing like this?” He grunted. “It’s as if some madwoman tried to think of the most ridiculous outfit imaginable, and—Grim’s eye—succeeded.”
    “
Madwoman
? ” Winna asked.
    “Yah, well, no man would ever invent such a clownish suit. It must have been some sort of evil trick. Or a dare.”
    “You’ve been at court long enough to know better,” Winna said. “The men here love their plumage.”
    “Yah,” he conceded, “and I’m damn ready to be away from here, too.”
    Her eyes narrowed a little, and she wagged an accusing finger. “You’re
nervous
about meeting the praifec.”
    “I’m no such a thing,” he snapped.
    “You
are
such a thing! A nervous little kindling thing!”
    “I haven’t had much to do with the Church, that’s all,” he grumbled. “Other than killing a few of their monks.”
    “Outlaw monks,” she reminded him. “You’ll do fine, just try not to blaspheme—in other words, try not to talk at all. Let Stephen do the talking.”
    “Oh, yah, that will be a comfort,” Aspar muttered sarcastically. “He’s the soul of tact.”
    “He’s a churchman, though,” Winna pointed out. “He ought to know more about talking to a praifec than you do.”
    That brought a sharp little laugh from near the door. Aspar glanced over to see that Stephen had entered and was leaning against the frame, clad much as he was but appearing far more comfortable. His mouth was quirked in a smile, and his brown hair was swept back in something approaching courtly fashion. “I
was
in the Church,” Stephen said. “Before committing heresy, disobeying my fratrex, getting him killed, and fleeing my monastery. I doubt much that His Grace the Praifec will have many good things to say to me.”
    “Like as not,” Aspar agreed, “we’ll end this meeting in a