…we make guilty of our disasters
the sun, the moon, and stars, as if we were villains
on necessity; fools by heavenly compulsion; knaves,
thieves, and treachers by spherical predominance…
Edmund, in King Lear - William Shakespeare
It was a cold, sharp wind that blew down from the north. The fortress of Anvard had not, in his grandsire's grandsire's time, been able to endure such cold. Such winters as came then had been from the west, and the mountains had provided a sort of shelter of their own. As winters had grown crueller and deeper—longer, the King thought with a sigh— Anvard had learned to stand against them. Cellars had been deepened, fireplaces added, tapestries hung in every strip of wall that could bear them. Not that such things made a difference if you were summoned out into the freezing courtyard like a squire of one and ten. And it would be hours before the household would gather in the almost-warmth of the great hall even so.
Still, the howl of the wind –fiercer every day, it seemed– made him long for his warm bed. His warm bed, and a weeping wife waiting there; Lune grimaced.
"My lord King."
Larrin stood by the turn of the stables, looking hesitant. He was a solid man, in appearance and deed. Broad, swarthy and stalwart, with a direct gaze and a stout heart; Lune could think of no other he'd prefer to guard his back. But in times of relative peace he had all the heft of a sack of potatoes and was ill-suited to the tedious struggles they were prone to come up against, such as which granaries they could least afford to empty or where the pickle-barrels ought to be stored.
Not a man with much delicacy either, for that matter, though if the Exiles knew what was good for them they'd not take offence at his ways.
Lune sighed. Still, better a plain, soldiering man than a thief and a coward. Better, even, a fool, though Larrin was hardly that.
The reminder made him less pleasant than he ought to have been though: "Yes, yes, what is it? Where are the two-stomached bastards?"
At that precise moment, Lune became aware of the coal-black foreleg of a large plough horse coming from behind the buildings and above it, the torso of a man, broad and bare of everything except some equally black hair. His skin had already grown ruddy in the cold, but he showed no sign that he felt it, though he surely must have. Blast it all.
The centaur Pyrridin gave no sign of having heard Lune's slight either. The horse legs bent and the man's back dipped in a bow. "Your Grace. I bear tidings."
"I gathered." Lune said, now truly rude, both from embarrassment and also a sinking feeling that something else would be required of him. Centaurs never opened their mouths but to burden you with some new wisdom.
They had an ability to make much of very simple matters. In the past months there had been a great deal of talk about the arrival of rulers. (And, to be sure, whatever the centaurs said amongst the Archenlanders would not make up one part in ten of what they talked of amongst themselves.) What Lune could not understand was that if the signs were so clear… why there was so much debate about it.
And, anyway, it wasn't as if he didn't know his own wife was pregnant. Likely with twins, if the horse-men were to be believed.
Pyrridin tilted his head. "You know, my lord, though perhaps not as well as we, how dark have been the skies. Last night in my watchings, I saw the clouds at last had cleared. The morning star looks down on Tarva, Lord of Victory, and Nunus, King of the Wanderers, comes near."
"Speak plain, friend, to one of little learning and less patience." Lune replied, now fully exasperated.
The centaur looked at him, calmly, as if assessing, for a moment. "An encouragement, Your Grace, but also a warning. Glory, and overthrow. Great victory comes, but also great loss."
Lune ground his teeth together. "Victory for whom?"
A man would perhaps have shrugged here, but the centaur's gaze remained steady, calm in the midst of uncertainty. "For the Great King, in the end. The stars speak of rulers established, and of rulers taken away. Of great evil undone… and evil's parting sting."
Lune felt the briefest thrill as Pyrridin spoke. 'Rulers taken away…' Still, could anyone hope for such a thing? It was madness. One could not plan on that. All one could do is make it through the winter, and hope that spring would come soon enough. If it came at all.
"In the end. The Great King." Lune muttered. "Well, that's some comfort I suppose. Do you happen to know whether we'll live to see the end of this? Or is that for other, luckier souls?"
Pyrridin's face was grave, and that was saying something for a centaur. "Only Aslan knows, King. My word to you is to hold fast, and not to falter at the final step."
"And?" There was always something else.
"I seek Your Grace's blessing to depart for the pool of the Southern Marches on the morrow. One glimpse only of the sky was vouchsafed me and much more remains there to be read. The pool may show what the clouds conceal."
The thought of supplying and sending the fool to his death dealt the killing blow to King Lune's tattered patience. In his calmer moments he could recognize that the Narnians were no more or less quarrelsome or too different a burden than his subjects. But they were not his subjects!
"You? Seek my permission?" he burst out. "What do you care for that? You exiles who sit at my table and ride out with my men and yet claim no king but the Good Prince, dead now these hundred years?"
Pyrridin merely inclined his head. "I humbly beg your pardon, King Lune. I mean no offence. But I am of Narnia, and to Narnian kings and queens am I sworn. It is for them that I wait, whether they come in my lifetime or no. Whether they be like the First King, or our last."
What could a man do in the face of such constancy, but grit his teeth and do as he must?
Still.
"The pool will be frozen solid." Lune grumbled.
Pyrridin's gaze did not waver. "Be that as it may."
"Fine. Go. The stable and quartermasters will see you have what you need. If I do not see your face again before the summer it will be too soon."
"Your Grace." Pyrridin made another deep bow, but Lune had already begun trudging back up through the wet snow to the main part of the keep.