AUDREY FLAMESWORTH
She had seen many before, but she had never seen this sort of many. The royal household held their feasts in a way greatly different from the way the Flamesworths held theirs, she could see that now. High ladies and lords, all which no doubt would have sworn fealty to the king, her soon-to-be husband, graced the hall. None of them she had ever seen before, and none she might have never seen if not for her newfound place on the high table in this grand outspread expanse of a room; it too was one of the things the Flamesworths never deemed to have. Their own Great Hall was a lot smaller and not as befitting of the word great as this one was, and no doubt had less the people come into it as this one had come to have as well.
Candelabras hung from the arched beams spanning the full length of the ceiling, all lit in golden-yellow flames which came together to brighten and warm the hall with a grandeur she had never been pleased to see before this feast. Domed pillars stood to the west and the east of the hall, and in the midst of their flickering shadows stood the royal guards visored and silver armoured with black cloaks, their hands placed firmly on the hilts of their swords. There was no meat and wine for them during the length of this feast, she surmised, their job was to guard and guard they would do until the feast ended.
But they were not the only ones who weren’t drinking and feasting now. She too was not, and so were the high lords and ladies that filled the hall. They all had to listen first to this knight swear his fealty to the crown, that everyone had to do before the feasting began.
Zephyr stood before the high table on the raised platform where it was situated, gazing at Ser Maurin, the man who had won the tourney, genuflecting on one knee. The knight had discarded his earlier fit of dark-grey armour and donned a new one, this one more dazzling and elegant than his last. His body was now beneath a gilded full plate armour with silver enamelled rondels, greaves, gauntlets and tassels, and a silver raven soared across his breastplate just like the two Kingsknights that each stood at the edge of the long high table she sat before. But he was not wearing the cloak they wore, his back had no silver damask falling from it yet, the cloak still lay before him, folded beside his golden greathelm and his longsword sheathed in its scabbard. Until he had sworn his fealty, he was not yet a Kingsknight.
“You have knelt before His Grace, King Zephyr of House Ravenswood, first of his name and ruler of the lands and seas of Ravenwing, swearing to take up your sword for his cause, to be his shield in the face of the darkness of harm, and to give your life for him. Do I have that to be the truth you claim?” The hall as a whole was in silent serenity as the man spoke, the one she supposed from Renly’s words to be the grand savant. He was grand in age no doubt, with more bones than flesh.
Tonight was the first she had seen him though, she did not take joy in roaming the castle the way her steward did, he preferred to walk about than be by her side to keep her company, and he never heeded whenever she told him to stay. She was seated at the high table now and no matter how many times she had told him she would get him a seat up here too, he still wandered off to a corner in this vast hall, somewhere her eyes could not reach probably, as she could not see him. Ravens be good, what would it take him to just do as she says?
“Aye, I vow to give my life for the king, to be his sword and shield, to bear the honour to face and fight his darkness. I vow to live for him and to die for him. On my honour as a knight, I pledge to serve King Zephyr Ravenswood, the one true raven, until the day I die!” The knight was swearing an oath to the king she was to wed, but Audrey was not impressed. Swearing was one thing, actions another. Renly had sworn the same when they were kids, to never leave her side, well, where was he now?
“If you would do the honour, Your Grace.” The grand savant gestured at Zephyr, and the king cupped his hand forward at the old man, allowing him to pour a tiny bit of oil from the cup he was holding into it.
Zephyr turned to the knight. “On this day I hold you true to your vows. Become one of the golden shields and swords of your king. Become a golden knight of the raven.” He took a step down from the raised platform and smeared the knight’s pale yellow hair with the oil. “Rise, Ser Maurin Lockeheart of the Kingsknight.”
Claps stormed the hall, chasing the choking silence that had once had this place as its home away. As the knight rose from his knee to fasten his sword to his waist and his cloak to his shoulders, Zephyr used the small cloth the grand savant gave him to wipe his hand clean of the slippery feel of the oil.
After he was done wiping, he made his way back to his seat to the right of Audrey on the high table, making his brother grumble in spite through a ruffle of the little boy’s hair as he sat down, while the brand new Kingsknight lent his hand to the grand savant and helped him through the back door out of the hall.
As soon as all was done, Audrey watched the great doors befitting of such a grand hall open up stiffly to allow the foray that seemed to have been waiting for this moment to march into it in a rowdy harmony. Serving maids all dressed in roughspun wools of grey and bleached brown led the charge, in their hands jars and pitchers and goblets and flagons upon trays of silver. They filled the hall completely, going from one table to the other bunging them up with whatever was necessary for quaffing down wine.
There were a lot of lords and ladies, and they were not here alone. Their knights and their knight’s squires also sat the hall, and no doubt their stewards and cup-bearers did as well, along with whatever bastard boy-servants they had. Those ones sat at the end corners of the hall, the edge of the room’s world, the place darkened by shadows with only a glimmer of light, and out of sight from the king. They could not complain in all honesty, their lords and ladies had not even wanted their filth in the Great Hall of the king, but the king himself had requested for them to be let in. Everyone they had brought to this city for the tourney was for the feast, stable boys and knights alike, bastards and betterborns, they all should sit in the hall. That was what he had said, and when she heard she had smiled at that. This man fascinated her, safe for his beauty to boot.
Reading on this site? This novel is published elsewhere. Support the author by seeking out the original.
One fat pot-bellied lord had even come with his children, quite much they were, maybe one-and-five at least. Audrey had tried counting when she saw, and when she could not keep counting anymore, she began to wonder if she would bear such number of children for Zephyr as well after they wed beneath the light of day on the ‘morrow. He would take her after, she was sure of that, but what she was not sure of was if she was ready or if she could handle it. She shivered.
After the serving ladies came the fools smiling as men of their racket always did. Three of them she saw, dressed in motley coats of blue, red and purple, their cap'n bells jingling a jingle as they hopped on one foot to the other with a click clack in perfect rhythm. She had never once laughed at the japes of fools and she doubted she would tonight. Tumblers and jugglers had better chances of appeasing her, and that they did when she saw them come in after. The tumblers came in tumbling, and the jugglers came in juggling. And she had not even noticed, until the songs began to fill the hall, that on a small rostrum at the edge of the hall beside the hearth sat a singer stringing his wooden bard in a hum. He had taken it upon himself to begin singing, but no one stopped him nevertheless. Rymar the Rhymer he called himself in between the songs, hoping this would be the chance to finally make himself known to the high lords and ladies of the court, and perhaps even to the king, and maybe earn himself some favours for a good song sung.
Audrey had no leaning for the singer’s name, and she no doubt knew the lords and ladies of the court felt the same as well. He would find no favours here. After all, he had probably snuck in after some lord or lady and he was lucky that he was not being thrown out yet. The thing she did have a leaning for though, was the song. She had heard it before, and she remembered where. It was at the brothel on the day she had come to King’s City for the first time, and the one she had heard it from was none other than her steward, Renly Bailiff, the stubborn man gone missing in the Great Hall. It was a song of the king, one that praised his beauty, and it sounded ever more beautiful now that it came from a true singer’s lips.
The singing and clamour died down to a swelling stop when the cups and flagons of the court had been filled and the carts of spiced food for the feast began to roll in, all done according to the queen’s clang of her goblet with her finger ring. Theirs on the high table had not been filled yet, but she saw the one who had been given the grace to do such, a serving girl with a clear dark skin glistening beneath the flickers of the candelabras’ bright light, come up on the platform now with gentle strides, a golden pitcher firm in her hands.
Queen Thalia rose to her feet as the serving girl began to fill her cup. “Good lords and ladies of the court, it is my utmost pleasure to welcome you to the Great Hall of Aeron’s Castle. Surely you are as pleased as I am?” They all raised their cups at her, their wines untouched and untasted.
The serving maid moved away from the queen with a bow to fill the cup of Thaddeus. “Then I am glad. We have watched the tourney come and go, and we have seen a victor emerge, the new knight of the king, Queen Ophelia’s nephew.” Queen Thalia turned left to look at the other queen who sat close to the end of the table away from her, but that one spared her no look. Audrey could sense what was between these two queens and it was nothing of love and trust.
Queen Thalia continued, “But why exactly are we holding this feast? I’m sure you all know that as well, but I’ll still do the honour of mentioning it. This day is the day the king, my son, turns twenty. A good day for I as a mother and a good day for the kingdom.” Claps were up and about in the hall once more. The serving girl moved to Zephyr now to fill his cup, and Audrey watched him grace her with a brief glance. “I have gifts that I have prepared for my son, but none I shall give him tonight.” The hall laughed, and Zephyr chuckled to his mother’s words as the serving girl moved to fill Audrey’s cup then. “The gifts shall be his after he has tied the knot,” Audrey eyed the queen turning to her with a gesture, “with this lovely lady he has chosen as his bride. A lady I trust my son has chosen out of his heart, and a lady I doubtless approve of.” She smiled at Audrey and turned back to pick up her goblet. “Now, let us have a toast to the king’s twentieth name-day. To my son’s twentieth name-day.” Everyone with a cup or flagon filled in the hall raised theirs up to join the queen’s goblet in the air, and Audrey heard Zephyr whisper to his brother not to take the drink after the toast, insisting he was too young for alcohol. Thaddeus shrugged that he wasn’t though. He could take it, he said, and Audrey could not help but chuckle softly at his delusion. Even she, a grown lady and all, could not handle her wine.
The serving girl finished pouring her drink. “What wine is this?” Audrey asked before the girl could move to the next beside her, the prince and Zephyr’s brother, Dante, as she had heard him to be.
“The red mist, my lady.” The serving girl told her with a smile.
Audrey too smiled then, but at the wine dancing a swirl in her goblet. “I love this wine.” She was about to join the hall in the toast when she heard Zephyr gasp frightenedly.
“No,” he said softly but sharply, then smacked the goblet out of her hand to the floor, the wine pouring all over her grey velvet garment and staining it red. The toasts ceased as all the eyes in the hall fell on him with a draw of their breaths, and she was no less shocked than his mother and his brother, and everyone else in the hall was too. What had gotten over him?
“Zephyr, what’s wrong?” His mother asked, sounding aghast from where she stood with her goblet still in hand.
Audrey attended the king with her sky-blue eyes as he looked around the hall frantically as if he was searching for something or someone within the eyes of all those who stared, then she watched him turn to the serving girl, who gaped at him sharp in silence just like the others, and heaved out an exhaling sigh. “A taster for the wine first, if you will.”