Here at least he could do something. Derk tutted to himself sadly as he stabilized the wounded eye, patched wounds, stopped bleeding, and set feathers growing again. What an awful way to treat harmless, valuable birds! He was puzzled as well as upset by the story they told him. What were these very small men directing fighting mice? Why had they disabled the pigeons and then shoved them out through the doors? It was probably no wonder that Elda had sent to Blade for help. At least, with Kit and Blade on their way there, he needn’t worry about Elda now. But something was very wrong. What were the senior wizards doing to let this sort of thing happen there?
He thought about this while he regenerated the eye and caused another pigeon to regrow a severed foot. When he was finished, he went down and saddled up Filbert. Then he went into the house to find Mara. She was upstairs in the main bedroom, surrounded by open suitcases and heaps of clothing and somewhat impeded by Florence, who was fluttering about her, “helping.” “Oh, good,” she said as Derk entered. “Find me as many of your shirts that are clean as you can.”
He could see she had taken refuge in packing. That was a relief. “Yes, when I get back,” he said. “I’m just off to see Querida.”
“But you don’t like her. Flo, put that down,” Mara said. “Why? Flo, if I have to tell you again, you’ll be sorry. Is it the University? I heard Old George saying—Flo, I warned you. Can’t Kit and Blade see about it? Right, Florence. That is it. Go and play with Angelo. Now.”
Florence, who knew when a parent really meant what she said, drifted to the door. She also knew that Angelo was in a bad mood. Angelo’s great hero was Blade, and he had got Blade back just that day only to have Blade disappear twice in quick succession. He did not want a mere sister. “I don’t want to play with Angelo. He’s making pies in the bath. He’s dirty.”
“Oh, don’t go and tell me tales, or I really shall run up the wall!” Mara said. “Out!” And as Florence reluctantly fluttered away, lower lip stuck out and trembling at the tyranny of mothers, Mara protested, “But, Derk, it’s nearly nightfall! Can’t you go tomorrow?”
“I thought you wanted us all to leave tomorrow,” Derk said.
“I did, I did! I do!” Mara said. “But I’m not sure we can get packed by then. What’s the matter? Is something really wrong at the University? I do wish I hadn’t let Querida persuade me to send Elda off there now. Elda could have come over the ocean with us then.”
“I wish you hadn’t packed her off there, too,” Derk said, frowning. “When a place sends half my pigeons back hacked to bits, you wonder about it, Mara, you really do. I’m going to ask Querida to take a good long look at it while we’re away. I’ll be back for supper, I promise.”
“That makes you and Blade and Kit and Callette, all making the same promise,” Mara said. “All right. We’ll be late eating, anyway. I won’t be able to start conjuring food until I’ve sorted out these clothes and sorted out whatever Angelo’s up to, I suppose.”
Derk kissed her and left before she made him sort Angelo out for her. Mara was much better at managing winged children than he was. “Make the most of this,” he told Filbert as Filbert’s strong chestnut wings carried him northward. “It could be your last proper flight before the voyage.”
“I know,” Filbert answered gloomily. “I’m not looking forward to over a week on a boat. There’s seasickness. You know horses can’t be sick, don’t you?”
“Teach your grandmother,” said Derk. “We’re stowing all you horses on deck. If you get seasick, just take a short flight—unless there’s a storm, of course.”
“I might get swept into the sea!” Filbert protested.
“So swim,” said Derk. “And wait for someone to throw you a rope. All horses can swim.”
“I could be the exception,” Filbert said nervously. “I’ve never tried.”
While Filbert flew northward, further north still, in the kingdom of Luteria, King Luther suddenly canceled the usual arrangements for supper in the Great Hall with the court and decreed a family meal in the Small Dining Chamber instead. It was the sight of Isodel slipping late and
guiltily into the Great Hall for lunch that decided him.
She’s been seeing an unsuitable lover! King Luther found himself thinking. He was ashamed of this thought almost as soon as he had it. He knew very well that every man Isodel encountered instantly became her would-be lover, suitable or unsuitable, and he was fairly certain that Isodel had so far not responded to any of them. But he didn’t know she had not. There was always going to be a time when she did respond, and he gloomily expected it to be to someone quite wrong. He did not know his daughter any longer, that was the problem. He did not know any of his children these days. Lukin seemed to have been avoiding him for weeks. And the other four were big with some secret that made them giggle in corners or rush breathlessly away on hidden errands when he came anywhere near them.
To some extent King Luther blamed Mr. Chesney for this. Chesney’s tours had caused Luther’s wife, Queen Irida, to leave him and live in hiding with her children for safety. She had come back once the tours had stopped, saying—and he believed her—that it was only the tours that had made her do it and that she did in fact love him. Then he was able to get to know his children all over again. But there had been that gap. This gap maybe accounted for the way he felt that all six of his children were becoming total strangers to him now.
Consequently, he waited to be sure that all his children were actually in the castle and would not have time to duck out again. When he had glimpsed even the elusive Lukin turning a distant corner beside Isodel, he gave his orders and put up with the dismay of the cooks and servers in a good cause.
Twenty minutes later everyone gathered in the Small Dining Chamber around an expanse of slightly yellowed and darned white tablecloth and slightly chipped crystal. They were all warmly dressed, since the Small Dining Chamber breathed chilly dampness from each of its stone walls, despite a newly lit fire, and they had done their best to smarten themselves up. None of their clothes were new, and the result was still slightly shabby. King Luther sighed as he looked around at them, wishing the kingdom could afford to dress its royal family more suitably. Isodel, particularly, deserved better than plain blue wool and a threadbare silk shawl. And little Emana, who showed signs of growing up to rival Isodel, could do with dresses that had not gone through two older sisters before her. As for the boys …
Here he met his wife’s alarmed eyes and realized that they were, all of them, extremely nervous at this sudden family dinner. “It’s all right,” he said. “I’m not going to eat you.” He murmured the customary thanks to the gods and sat down. Everyone else but Lukin pulled out chairs and sat down, too. Lukin was unaccountably still standing beside his mother. “Sit down, Lukin,” his father said.
As the servers came forward with oatmeal soup—oatmeal figured a lot in the palace diet, partly from poverty, partly from tradition—Lukin sidled around the corner of the table in a rather curious way to the empty chair nearest the queen. The yellowish tablecloth billowed. Beside the empty chair Princess Erola made a sort of snatching movement and Lukin appeared to sit down. But King Luther could have sworn that just for an eyeblink, Lukin had vanished completely. A server leaning to place a bowl of soup got in the way at a crucial moment, however, and King Luther could not be sure.
That wretched boy has been doing magic again! he thought. And in spite of all I said to him! But as this was supposed to be a friendly family supper, King Luther ate his soup and asked Isodel pleasantly how she had spent her day.
Isodel looked as if she wished he had asked her anything else. “Oh, I, er, took a nice long flight on Endymion. Right over the mountains, you know.”
“And this made you late for lunch?” asked her father.
Isodel colored heavily. “Yes,” she admitted. “Endymion misjudged the time.”
Since Isodel was obviously so uncomfortable, King Luther considerately turned to his two younger sons and asked them the same question. Lyrian replied that they had had lessons in the morning.
“But the afternoon was much more interes—” Logan said, and stopped with a yelp. It looked to King Luther as if Princess Emana had most uncharacteristically jabbed him with a fork. “I was only going to say,” Prince Logan said, glowering at his sister, “that we had a good game of hide-and-seek.”