And it was. I felt him hit that barrier like a rabbit finding the length of the snare. Like a rabbit, he struggled against the choking restriction of my command. But unlike a rabbit, I felt him, even in his panic and outrage, consider the type of stricture it was. He acted as swift as thought. He lifted his head, and almost like a tracing finger, I felt him follow the noose back to me.
He severed it. Not easily. In the moment before I lost my contact with him, I could feel the sweat burst from his skin. For me, it was like being slammed brow-first onto an anvil. I reeled with the impact, but had no time for considering the pain. For I was suddenly aware that the veiled Trader’s pale blue eye-light was visible through his lacy veil. And he stared, not at the Prince, but at the peephole where I cowered, out of sight. I would have given much to see his expression just then. Even as I prayed it was some bizarre coincidence, I longed to huddle down, to shut my own eyes and hide until his gaze had swept past me.
But I could not. I had a duty, not just as a Farseer, but as Chade’s extra eyes. I kept my gaze fixed on the room. My head pounded with pain, and Selden Vestrit continued to stare at the wall that should have shielded me. Then Dutiful spoke.
His voice boomed forth, Verity’s voice, a man’s voice. ‘I accept the challenge!’
So swift it all had happened. I heard Kettricken’s gasp. She had not had time to think of nor phrase a refusal. A stunned silence followed Dutiful’s words. Outislanders, including Arkon Bloodblade, exchanged worried glances at the thought of a Six Duchies prince slaying their dragon. At the Six Duchies tables the palpable thought was that Dutiful did not need to meet this foreign challenge. I saw Chade wince. Yet a moment later, the old assassin’s eyes opened wide and I saw hope gleam in them. For cheers erupted, not just from the Six Duchies tables but from the Outislanders as well. The enthusiasm for a young man roaring like a bull that he would meet a challenge overpowered every shred of common sense that any man in the room might have held. Even I felt a surge of pride in my chest for this young Farseer prince. He could have refused the challenge, and rightfully so, with no loss to his honour. But he instead had stepped up to it, to defy the Outislanders’ slighting assumption that he was less than worthy of their Narcheska’s hand. At the Outislander table, I suspected that wagers were already being laid that the boy would fail. But even if he failed, his willingness to step up to Elliania’s challenge to him had increased their regard for him. Perhaps they were not marrying their Narcheska off to a farmer prince at all. Perhaps there was a bit of hot blood in his veins.
And for the first time I noted the looks of consternation, even horror, amongst the Bingtown Traders. The veiled Trader was no longer staring at my wall. Selden Vestrit gestured frantically, speaking urgently to the others at his table, trying to make himself heard through the roar of sound that filled the Great Hall.
I caught a glimpse of Starling Birdsong. She had leapt to a table top, and her head pivoted like a beleaguered wind-vane as she tried to take in every aspect of the scene, mark every man’s reaction and harvest every comment. There would be a song to be made from all this, and it would be hers.
‘And!’ Prince Dutiful shouted into the din. Something in the set of the lines around his eyes warned me.
‘Eda, mercy,’ I prayed, but knew no god or goddess would stop him. There was a wild and stubborn gleam in his eyes, and I feared whatever it was he was about to say. At his shout, the uproar in the Great Hall quieted abruptly. When he spoke again, his words were pitched for the Narcheska. Nonetheless, in the brimming silence in the room, they carried clearly.
‘And I’ve a challenge of my own. For if I must prove myself worthy to wed the Narcheska Elliania, who has no prospects of being Queen of anything, save that she give her hand to me, then I think she must first prove herself worthy of being a queen of the Six Duchies.’
Now it was Peottre’s turn to startle and then grow pale, for the words were scarcely out of the Prince’s mouth before Elliania replied, ‘Call me this challenge, then!’
‘I shall!’ The Prince took a breath. The eyes of the two youngsters were locked. They might have stood in the midst of a desert for all the care they took for the rest of us. The glance between them was not fixed, but alive, as if for the first time they saw one another as they clinched in this battle of wills. ‘My father, as you may know, was “only” the King-in-Waiting when he embarked on a quest to save the Six Duchies. With little more than his own courage to guide him, he set forth to find the Elderlings that would rise to our aid and end the war your people had forced upon us.’ The Prince paused, almost, I think, to see if his words had struck home, but Elliania remained icily silent in her stern contemplation of him. He cut on. ‘When months passed and no word was heard from him, my mother, who by then was the besieged but rightful Queen of the Six Duchies, set out after him. With but a handful of companions she sought and found my father, and aided him in waking the dragons of the Six Duchies.’ Again, that pause. Again, Elliania refused to put words in it. ‘It seems fitting to me, that as she proved herself by joining my father’s quest to wake the dragons, so you should play a similar role in my quest to slay your country’s dragon. Go with me, Narcheska Elliania. Share the hardship and witness the deed you have laid upon me. And if, in truth, there be no dragon to slay, witness that.’ Dutiful spun suddenly to the room and shouted, ‘Let no man here ever say it was the will of the Six Duchies alone that slew Icefyre. Let your Narcheska who has commanded this deed see it through beside me.’ He turned back to her and his voice dropped to a sugary whisper. ‘If she dares.’
Her lip curled in disdain. ‘I dare.’
It she had said more, the words would have gone unheard, for hall erupted in noise. Peottre stood as pale and still as if he had been turned to ice, but every other Outislander, including Elliania’s father, was pounding on the table. A sudden rhythmic chant in their own tongue burst from them, a song of determination and blood-lust more fit to the rowers on a raiding ship than to treaty negotiators in a foreign hall. The lords and ladies of the Six Duchies shouted as they attempted to be heard. The comments seemed to run the gauntlet that the Narcheska deserved the Prince’s scornful challenge to that she had responded bravely and perhaps there was indeed a worthy queen inside the Outislander girl.
Amidst it all, my queen stood still and tall, silently regarding her son. I saw Chade’s mouth move as if he offered some quiet bit of counsel to her. She sighed. I suspected I knew what he had said. Too late to change it; the Six Duchies must follow through on the Prince’s thrust. To one side of them, Peottre was struggling to mask his deep dismay. And before them the Prince and the Narcheska still stood, their eyes locked in duel.
The Queen spoke, her voice low, the first words intended only to quell the sound in the hall. ‘My guests and my lords and ladies. Hear me, please.’
The uproar died slowly, ending with the thumping at the Outislander table that gradually slowed and ceased. Kettricken took a deep breath and I saw resolve firm her features. She turned, not to Arkon Bloodblade and his table, but to where she knew the true power resided now. She looked toward the Narcheska, but I knew her focus was actually on Peottre Blackwater. ‘It seems we now have a firm agreement. Prince Dutiful is hereby affianced to the Narcheska Elliania Blackwater of the God Runes. Providing that Prince Dutiful can bring to her the head of the black dragon Icefyre. And providing that Narcheska Elliania accompany him to witness the doing of this task.’