The heart flown from its cage couldn't wait. He had come in such haste that, on reaching Lohenheim, his baron's house was still under repair, and he must for the present lodge in his aunt's house.
So much the better.
His aunt had two sons; the elder, Felix, was a friend close to his heart, and the Odenheim house next door was kin as well, Roland was only a month his elder.
They were cousins, friends, and his anchor for putting down roots in Lohenheim.
Apart from the phantom force of the Frost Ravens, Leon had only twelve guards about him, and ten of those the King's men.
When he came into the Princess's house, he had his aunt plead the awkwardness of a houseguest and let only Linn and Lyle enter to attend him; the serjeant Roderic took the other nine to the new house.
Caution keeps a man alive.
This time he meant not only to live himself, but to keep his two friends, who in the old life had died early and unmourned, alive as well.
Linn took his orders, went out, and looked over the apple tree the Odenheim young lady had been at so long. When he came back to the court a little later, he scratched his head:
"She'd wrapped some clay in cloth, packed it round the branch, and bound two sticks and the branch tight together. Apart from the leaves being a bit wilted, I can't see what it's for."
"..."
Leon didn't know what to make of it either, but he presently recalled the dispute of last night between Felix and Roland: a branch of the apple tree had been trodden through, and the question had been whether to saw it off.
Could it be, what she had wrapped was that broken branch?
He had seen, when a man broke a limb, the royal physicians bind it between wooden splints; could the like be done for a tree?
"Understood. I had thought this court far from the front gate and quiet, I never knew next door would be so loud. Some day we'll go over to the new house and see how long before we can move."
"Yes, my lord."
As he spoke, Lyle knocked and came in, shut the door behind him, and said low:
"My lord, Serjeant Roderic has come into the Princess's house. He's dealing with the Princess Royal, saying that guarding my lord is a charge laid on him by the King, and he's shown her the King's warrant."
"Roderic must have gone back to Augustburg. What did my aunt say?"
"The Princess Royal still turned him back, but she's let him come into the house and live with us." Lyle smiled:
"My lord, never fear, let him come; in a fight he's no match for us."
"Now is no time to make any man our match, we'll all be more careful from now on. So it seems we can't go over to the new house too soon; one Roderic is easier to deal with than a pack of spies."
Stolen story; please report.
Leon's eye went back to the vellum map spread on the long table. In his last life Lohenheim had been sacked by rebel marcher forces; his brother the King had flown into a rage, and his Odenheim uncle had been stripped of his post as Commander of the Lohenheim City Defense and made a deputy, with troops but no command.
Roland had written him then that House Odenheim was wronged, that the rebel marcher forces must have had a friend within to break the Lohenheim line. The dispatch had gone up to the King, and the King hadn't only failed to inquire, he had docked them a year's pay.
But at that time Leon was a fallen baron; a mere itinerant justiciar could insult him at will, how was he to help House Odenheim?
The turn of House Odenheim's fortunes had begun with that very sack of Lohenheim.
The little Odenheim cousin had been pushed into the river and then set upon by an assassin. What did a small girl have to do that someone would hate her so? Could it be tied to that affair?
The thought of this little cousin brought at once to Leon's ears a chorus of giggles, and his brow knitted:
How had Roland not been talked to death by her? Had the woman no brains? Nearly drowned yesterday, and today she could laugh so freely...
True, she had no brains. Yesterday she had lost her memory.
Next door, the little Odenheim cousin hadn't the least idea that she was held in contempt.
She was in the little study with Carl, eating breakfast. Today Carl had brought "steam pies", pies baked in a covered dish, with a filling.
This was no pie, it was meat pies! Good!
The little study held only four low tables, three of them smaller, and Lora had sat herself on one of these as a stool.
Carl laughed: "You forget everything else, but you kept this habit. When you were small you loved to sit on the table. The tutor couldn't beat you, couldn't scold you, so he gave you a nickname, 'our sixth lad,' and called you the man of the house."
"Sounds grand! With five brothers, of course I'm afraid of nothing under heaven." Lora was fingering two marionettes on a shelf, with some pride.
"More than five, surely."
Carl took up one marionette, pulled the purses, and made its arms and legs move in a comical way. Lora's interest rose; she took up the other and, laughing, pulled the purses to make the two fight. Seeing her pleased, Carl went on:
"Felix, next door at the Princess's house, has treated you as his own sister since you were small. This marionette, cousin Felix made it for you. Remember?"
"Felix made it? No wonder it's so ugly."
"Ha ha ha, if he'd heard that then, he'd have dropped dead! Roland made you a toy windmill, and they had a fight over whose was better, and you threw Roland's into the water-lily pond, and cousin Felix gloated for half a day."
"Ah? Was I really that fierce a child?"
"Fierce? A little terror!"
"Surely you're making it up. I'm so gentle and sweet, how could 'fierce' describe me?"
Lora scooped up a handful of potpourri from a wooden bowl on the shelf and scattered it over Carl's head. Carl, seeing his sister happy, grinned from ear to ear.
The two of them played a while. Carl fetched out several small things she used to love, to tease her memory; but she showed no sign of recalling any of it, and he gave over.
"Come, let's go see Brendan. He took that beating for me. He loves a beef pie, and those aren't easy to come by, common cookshops dare not sell beef; only the Salt house's cookshop serves one."
"Why? They've money enough, don't they? A merchant house, can they hold office?"
"Merchants may buy honorary court titles; some buy small posts with real power, all to make more money. But this house, it seems, has no taste for office, they only like to spend florins buying offices for others."
"What's the difference? Those men, once in office, must toe their line. Carry on like this and they'll foul the court past bearing, does the King not rein them in?"
In her old life Lora had read of this King in the histories and thought him a king who meant to do well; from what she heard now, he didn't sound so grand.
Carl gave a scornful laugh: "You think? Would they ever let the King hear of it?"
"Their reach is that long already? Yesterday I saw Simon Salt all bows and deference, I'd not have guessed."
Carl gave a teasing laugh: "With those two little eyes of yours, and a head full of river water, what could you see?"
"Who says my eyes are small? My pride since I was small has been my Madonna-large eyes, how dare you call them small!" Lora made as if to smack him. Carl laughed, clasped his head, and ran ahead, calling back over his shoulder:
"What are 'Madonna-large' eyes? What's a Madonna?"
"It's... the biggest eyes in the world."
"Bigger than a horse's?"
"Carl, you stop right there, you're asking for it!"