Kushiel's Dart

galliard and the antic hey, and the musicians played in a frenzy, faces shining with sweat. So great were the proportions of the masque, it swallowed even the Prince's party. I circulated with my tray, dizzy from the noise and heat. The evergreen boughs above the roaring fireplace loosed a piney fragrance, rising above the olfactory din of a hundred competing perfumes and heated flesh, punctuated by the pungent opium smoke of Gentian House's incensors.
    We were running short of glasses. The style of the evening had been set, and I'd no way of counting how many guests and adepts downed their joie and shattered their glasses on the floor, shouting. There was naught any of the four of us could do; we carried on, our trays sparsely laden, while the liveried servants of Cereus House darted amid the crowd with brooms and dustpans.
    Such were the profundities that occupied my mind when, beneath the merry skirl of music, the slow beat of the tocsin began. It was the Longest Night; we had almost forgotten, all of us. But the horologists had not-they forget nothing-and the Night's Crier struck the gong at a measured pace, cutting through the din and slowing the revelry. Dancers parted and the floor cleared, celebrants falling back. From behind a screen the Winter Queen reemerged, leaning on her blackthorn staff, hobbling to the head of the colonnade.
    Someone cheered, and was silenced. Everyone looked toward the fast-shut doors to the Great Hall, awaiting the Sun Prince.
    Once, twice, thrice; from the far side, a spear-butt rapped upon the doors, and they fell open at the third blow with a shivering sound from the musicians' timbales.
    He stood in the doorway: The Sun Prince.
    He was a vision in cloth-of-gold, gilding his doublet and hosen, even his boots. His cloak was cloth-of-gold, falling to sweep the parquet floor as he entered. The mask of a smiling youth, gleaming with gold leaf, hid his face, and its rays hid his head. I heard murmurs and speculation as he strode the length of the colonnade, gilded spear in hand.
    At the head of it, he bowed; but as he rose, so did the head of his spear, sweeping up to touch the breast of the Winter Queen. Bowing her head, she let fall her blackthorn staff. It clattered in the silence. With both hands, she raised her mask and swept the wig from her head, shrugging free of her encumbering rags and shawl.
    I gasped, for the Winter Queen was young and beautiful, and she was Suriah.
    But the masque was not done.
    The Sun Prince dropped to one knee, grasping the hand of the Winter Queen. In one swift motion, he drew forth a ring and thrust it upon her finger; harshly, for I saw her wince. He rose, then, grasping her hand, and turned to face the crowd. When he lifted his mask, we saw: It was Prince Baudoin.
    After a brief, indrawn breath of surprise, the Night's Crier swung his baton and struck the gong a resounding blow, letting the tocsin give shuddering voice to the New Year, and the trumpets leapt into the void of silence with a brassy shout, proclaiming joy to all. And in that indrawn moment of surprise, the celebrants found their breath, shouting with the trumpets, hailing the derring of one drunken young Prince of the Blood. And then the exhausted musicians found a new surge of energy, and their maestro tapped his toe, and they swung into a lively tune.
    Somehow, amidst it all, my gaze settled on Anafiel Delaunay. He was watching them; lovely and bewildered Suriah, her ringed hand held aloft by the Prince, with his wild, gleaming eyes; and behind the wise, rustic mask of Faunus, Delaunay's features were composed and thoughtful.
    Such was my introduction to politics.
    cs.

SIX
    After the Midwinter Masque, you may be sure, the weeks could not pass quickly enough for me until my tenth birthday. Now more than ever, I was without place in Cereus House; no longer fit for the nursery, but too young for the fosterlings and apprentices, among whom I was never to be numbered anyway.
    The house was abuzz with the events of the masque, seeing in Prince Baudoin's audacity the portent of a return to days of yore, when the scions of Elua freely sought pleasure and counsel of the Servants of Naamah. This much I learned: Baudoin was nephew to the King, by way of his royal sister, the Princess Lyonette, who was wed to Marc, Due de Trev-alion. He was only nineteen, and had earned a name for wildness at the University of Tiberium, where he had been suspended for unnamed escapades.
    Beyond this, I knew