The Serpent Bride. Sara Douglass

frogs all about its outer rim.

      It was a gift for the man who stood, his back to her, at the far end of the hall.

      He was a dark man, and blackness seethed about him.

      More than anything Ishbel wanted to turn and run, but her feet would not follow her command. Instead they carried her inexorably forward, until she stood before the man, and then her traitor legs bent beneath her, and she abased herself, and held out the Goblet of the Frogs to the Lord of Elcho Falling.

      He turned his head a little, looking at her over his shoulder, and darkness and despair engulfed Ishbel’s life.

PART THREE

1

       PELEMERE, CENTRAL KINGDOMS

      Ishbel stood in the covered courtyard, listening to the approach of Maximilian Persimius, King of Escator. Maximilian had arrived in Pelemere the previous afternoon, received by King Sirus of Pelemere in two formal ceremonies: the first at the city gates, the second at the palace itself. Maximilian had then stayed at Sirus’ palace overnight, being royally dined and entertained.

      To none of these events had Ishbel been invited. She was still merely the Lady Ishbel Brunelle, prospective wife of the King of Escator, and until Maximilian formally accepted her as his bride, Ishbel was excluded from the royal receptions and entertainments. Today, however, having partaken of Sirus’ hospitality and having also, presumably, slept the night away in a luxurious apartment within the king’s palace, Maximilian was paying a visit to the Lady Ishbel’s house in order to meet her and, should that meeting prove satisfactory, perhaps open more personal negotiations for a marriage.

      What a farce all this is, thought Ishbel, listening to the sound of horses’ hooves and jingling bits getting closer. Four nights ago he spent the night in my bed, and here we must act as if we’ve never seen each other.

      Ishbel had expected Maximilian might appear in her bedchamber last night as well. She’d spent virtually the entire night awake, watching every shadow, listening, waiting. But Maximilian had not appeared, and Ishbel supposed Sirus had provided more amusing entertainments for Maximilian.

      Perhaps StarWeb was with him.

      Ishbel was far more nervous than she liked. She didn’t know how she would feel when she saw Maximilian again, and she had a tiny, niggling, horrible fear that when Maximilian rode into the courtyard it wouldn’t be the same man she’d slept with a few nights ago.

      Twisted in with all her anxiety and nervousness was a horrible sense of resentment; had Maximilian spent last night with StarWeb? Was she going to have to share her husband with the birdwoman?

      There were shouts from the guards at the gate now, and Ishbel barely had time to draw in a hasty, shaking breath before Maximilian rode into the courtyard at the head of a retinue some twenty strong. Dressed in a wine-coloured velvet jacket quilted with seed pearls over dark leather breeches, he looked very different from the night he’d appeared in Ishbel’s chamber. Very regal and, impossibly, even more certain of himself.

      Ishbel’s first emotion was one of profound relief — this was the man who had come to her bedchamber.

      Her second emotion was one of overwhelming confusion at just how glad she was to see him again, and how desperately she hoped StarWeb wasn’t in Pelemere.

      Strangely, although Ishbel continued to resent everything to do with this marriage, as well as the marriage itself, Maximilian was the only thing she had resembling a friend within eight weeks’ travel.

      Maximilian pulled his horse to a halt, lifted his right leg over the horse’s wither, and slid to the ground.

      His eyes never left Ishbel the entire time.

      She was very nervous. She held herself extremely still, watching him with apparent calmness, but he could see her nerves in the spots of colour in her cheeks, in her overbright eyes, in her rigidity of bearing and in the manner in which she pressed the palms of her hands too close to her silken skirts.

      Behind him the rest of his entourage drew their horses to a halt. They would not dismount, not even move, until Maximilian had greeted Ishbel.

      He walked up to her, very deliberately, slowly pulling the leather gloves from his hands. The wind whipped his dark hair into his eyes, but he didn’t blink, or make any move to brush it away.

      “My Lady Brunelle,” he said, coming to a halt before Ishbel. “How pleasant to finally meet you. I trust your journey to this point has been comfortable?”

      She wanted to shout at him, he could see it in her face, and his eyes crinkled in amusement. Taking a final step forward he took her right hand and raised it to his lips. “Thank the gods I picked the right bedchamber four nights ago,” he murmured. “All this time I’ve been terrified I might have seduced the laundress instead.”

      She relaxed. Her shoulders lost their tension, and she let out her breath on a shaky soft sigh.

      “Are you all right, Ishbel?” he asked, serious now.

      “Yes,” she said, having pushed her dream of the Lord of Elcho Falling to the very back of her mind. “Yes, I am.”

      Baron Lixel now stepped up, greeted Maximilian warmly, and made the formal introductions. Then Maximilian turned and waved forward two members of his entourage: a young man who Ishbel thought was a year or so younger than herself, and an older man who was the captain of Maximilian’s escort and who wore an emerald uniform jacket with a Manteceros outlined in brilliant blue on its front.

      “Commander Egalion,” Maxel said, introducing the older man first. “He captains my Emerald Guard, and is one of my closest friends.”

      Ishbel held out her hand for Egalion to take. “Commander,” she murmured politely.

      “And this is Garth Baxtor,” Maximilian continued as Egalion stepped back to make way for the younger man. “Garth is court physician, another close companion.”

      Baxtor had an open, attractive face, very non-threatening, and Ishbel liked him immediately. She smiled as she held out her hand for Garth.

      “Physician Baxtor,” she said as his fingers closed about hers.

      Unlike Egalion, Garth did not immediately let go of Ishbel’s hand. A strange, but not unpleasing, warm sensation passed through Ishbel’s fingers and suddenly all the friendliness in Garth’s eyes vanished.

      “My Lady Brunelle,” he said, dropping her hand before stepping back so abruptly it was almost rude.

      Maximilian frowned, but then Lixel was ushering them all inside, and Maximilian contented himself with taking Ishbel’s arm and asking her about her journey to Pelemere as they entered the house.

      All the light had gone from Garth’s day. All he wanted now was to speak with Maximilian urgently, but Maximilian was not leaving Ishbel’s side. They had gone from the courtyard into the main reception room of the house where, to Garth’s surprise (and Lixel’s, and just about everyone else’s except, he noted, Ishbel’s), Maximilian pronounced an intention to get down to the nitty-gritty of the final details of the marriage contract between himself and the Lady Ishbel immediately.

      “You have no objections, my lady?” Maximilian said to Ishbel.

      She hesitated very slightly, then shook her head. “None, my lord.”

      “Well then, Lixel,” Maximilian said, “to work! Do you have the necessary documents to hand?”

      Still looking taken aback, Lixel showed Maximilian and Ishbel into a secondary chamber, where Maximilian closed the doors firmly on the entourage.

      Garth