A puppy yowled pitiably as Bran and Brech, the king's twin boys, held its hind legs in the fire.
From the look of King Hermann and Stella, his hard-eyed queen, they would willingly be treating Platt as their six-year-olds were the dog.
"Like nothing you ever dreamed of seeing, excellency," Platt whined.
The outlaw knelt in front of the royal chairs with his forehead to the floor. When he spoke, dust and ash puffed away from his nervous lips. "Lights that hang in the air and move. A mirror that shows far places."
"Pah!" said Salem, a young baron who'd joined Hermann's council since Platt was outlawed. "His breath fouls your hall, majesty. Let me stop it for good."
"Armor fit for the gods to wear!" Platt wailed against the flagstones.
"Wait," said King Hermann.
The outlaw exhaled bubblingly in relief.
Platt had taken the only chance he would ever have of being rehabilitated; but it had looked, and it might still be, that he had lost that final necessary toss of the dice. Unless the king believed Platt's story, the outlaw had nothing to trade for his life; and even before his exile, Platt's word had done little to compel belief.
"But I'll lead you there!" Platt whined to the scorn echoing in his own mind.
"For pity's sake, Hermann," said Stella in a voice like chilled steel. "Tell him to get up out of that ridiculous pose."
Her tongue clicked against the roof of her mouth. "Or kill him. That might be better."
"All right," said the king. "Get up. For now."
Platt scrambled to his feet. He bobbed and touched his forehead to each of the hard, sneering faces around him.
The thrones were on one end of the large, rectangular audience chamber. Hermann's councillors stood to either side with their uniquely-decorated battlesuits behind them as identification and insignia of rank.
The barons hated one another; but they hated Platt more. If the king had suggested it, they would all have cooperated to drown the outlaw in a cesspit.
There was a huge hooded fireplace in each of the sidewalls, cold now except for the fire the twins had lighted for their fun. During the morning levee, the chamber would be filled by suppliants; but Platt had been brought to the king in late afternoon, when Princess Miriam and her ladies in waiting used the room's acoustics for their lute playing.
King Hermann was forty and fleshy rather than fat. His queen was younger by ten years, but she had never been beautiful or even striking, in the positive sense. Her eyes were intelligent and cruel. Very cruel.
"Milord, he lives alone on the northern edge of your kingdom, deep in the forest, and he has treasures beyond belief, I swear to you," Platt said quickly. The words tumbled out like a cascade of smooth, stream-washed pebbles. "He's a smith, and he makes wonders, not just battlesuits. But his battlesuit is, milord, I can't describe its perfection—but I can show you. For my life."
There was a sudden crash and screeching from among the girls on the opposite end of the chamber. Princess Miriam lashed at a servant with her lute.
"How dare you not serve me first?" Miriam shrieked. Fragments of the sound chamber of her instrument flew. She swung again. A string twanged.
The servant, a girl little younger than the fourteen-year-old princess, hunched on the floor. She was afraid to run or even raise her arms to shield against the blows. A platter of candied fruit lay scattered over the stones.
The six ladies in waiting sat rigidly on their stools as if they too were pieces of furniture.
"Miriam, my dear," called the queen in a peremptory voice. "Keep your voice down, please."
The princess looked at the broken neck of her lute and the bits of sound chamber dangling from the strings. She kicked the servant and hissed, "See what you did? Get out of here!"
The servant ran, scuttling the first few steps hunched over like a frog. The puppy had also escaped from the twins during the commotion. It moved with surprising speed on its two good legs and waited until it was beyond the doorway to begin yowling again.
Baron Tealer, an old man and kin by marriage to the girl who caused Platt's exile, cleared his throat. "If this place is in the forest, milord," he said, "then it's not in your kingdom. Our writ doesn't run through the uninhabited wastelands."
"If there's someone living there," said Hermann as he stroked his pointed beard, "then it's not uninhabited."
The king smiled at his manicured hand. "And if there's such wealth there, Tealer," he continued, "then it must be royal wealth, mustn't it?"
Several of the barons shrugged a grudging acceptance of what they saw would be King Hermann's decision.
Stella looked at her husband. "Hermann," she said.
"My dear?" Even the king looked uncomfortable when he heard that tone of voice.
"If you're going to rob a man of such power, a smith . . . ," the queen said deliberately, "make sure you kill him as well. You'll remember that, won't you?"
"I'm his king and he owes me tribute," Hermann muttered without meeting his wife's eyes. "That isn't stealing."