Marguerite ground her teeth. By then they were well among the throng of people. The mermaids with the ill-fitting tails had given up and were passing a wine bottle back and forth. Cupid must have fleas; he was scratching again, and ahead of them were the gates of Nantes, flung open wide, bright with flowers. Virtue? This procession was a stew of vice. The whole city would be making scurrilous jokes abouthorns and unicorns. Or would they? Marguerite’s eye was drawn again to the pure white light that crowned that girl.
Marguerite said, “Did your guardian have nothing to say to this frivolity?”
“Oh, you may ask him,” said Anne. “He is riding in procession with the hunters—there”—she waved, but the gentleman was already riding over. “Jean—you remember the gracious lady Marguerite of France? I am sure you remember Louis of Orléans. My guardian, Jean de Rieux.”
The guardian was a man of middle years and slack, kindly, anxious face, riding a liver chestnut. “Indeed I do,” he said, stiffly. “You are welcome, Madame, Monseigneur.” His gaze was cold when it fell on Orléans.
Louis said, “Come, De Rieux, you needn’t look that way. The war is over.”
“As you say,” said Jean de Rieux, not thawing in the slightest.
A kindly man, perhaps,Marguerite thought, watching De Rieux,if inclined to hold a grudge. But not a man of sufficient fiber to restrain the duchess. The girl might be a fool, but La Trémoille had called her agreeable, andthathad been a damned piece of foolishness. Marguerite had charge of many girls in her own household; she knewimplacably headstrongwhen she saw it. Her glance went again to the fillet in Anne’s hair. To De Rieux, she said, “And you have approved this—the manner in which the duchess will disport herself today?”
De Rieux bristled; Marguerite saw a man who might have doubts himself but would not reveal them to an outsider. “The people of Nantes deserve to share in her triumph, and I hope no one will think Her Highness wanting in conduct—not when she is wearing the proof of her virtue and the unicorn’s favor.”
Anne looked remorseful. “Forgive me, Madame, do you disapprove? I thought it was your sister Jeanne who was the saintly one, the one who they say wept for a month when she was made to marry my lord of Orléans.” Louis’s eyes narrowed. Anne bulled straight on.“Wouldn’t you like to ride the unicorn with us? It is a very respectable construction. Quite safe.”
Jean de Rieux’s mouth gaped, though he said nothing. “I would not,” said Marguerite.
Anne said, “A great pity, but of course you are tired from your journey.” She turned vast, appealing eyes on Louis. “Surely you will like to ride with us? My guardian says that touching the unicorn was an occasion to be commemorated. Don’t you, Jean?”
“I do,” said De Rieux firmly.
Louis said in a smothered voice, “Then I should be honored.”
Anne favored him with a smile that wiped the laughter suddenly from his face.
Marguerite could not resist saying outright, “That band in your hair, is it truly made from—?”
“Unicorn hair,” said the girl. “Isn’t it nice? I borrowed against it to pay for all this.” She indicated the gathering procession with a careless arm. As though the unicorn-hair fillet was a mere bauble, a commonplace surety for the moneylender.
Louis said to Anne in that same stifled voice—Marguerite suspected that he was trying to make the situation worse—“But hold. You must first tell us if the rumors are true, Highness.”
Anne seemed distracted, watching the churn of people getting to their places, but Marguerite, who was watching her, saw the momentary tensing of her shoulders. De Rieux also stiffened. That was interesting.
The duchess said, “What rumors?”
Louis said, “That the king of France has competition for your hand.”
The faintest hesitation. Then Anne said in a new voice, “Oh! You mean the korrigan-king. That.”
Louis, unruffled, said, “Yes, that.”
She said, “Well, we met a man in Brocéliande who said he came straight from the court of the king of the korriganed but no memorydid he have of this court except that its king wished to make me his bride. He said that the korrigan-king would send me signs.”
“You have been hoaxed,” said Marguerite impatiently. “I hope you imprisoned this man.”
“Oh, no,” said Anne. “My guardian said we ought to send him to the Guild—didn’t you, Jean?—and so we did. He says he was a diviner in the court of Philip the Fair. Well, he did not renounce the claim, and so it became Guild business.”
“Poor man,” said Marguerite indifferently. The Guild took impostors very badly, and the diviners didn’t care whether such men were mad or merely criminal. Impostors died slowly and painfully.
Anne was distracted by the adorning of her wooden unicorn. “Yes—more flowers, the lilies!—I suppose being tested wasn’t very pleasant. But this man did pass, you know. He is a diviner.” Earnestly, she added, “My own guards will escort you with honor to the castle, Madame. I am sure if you go to the wall-top you may see something of the Entry. Farewell, dearest cousin, and my best welcome to you.”
The duchess of Brittany kissed her hand gaily to Marguerite and then slid off her horse once again and disappeared into the cheerful throng. Most of her court followed.
Louis gave Marguerite a glance. “I never saw a paragon of virtue as free-spirited as that before. Nor did I ever think to see you stampeded by a girl. She has changed.”
Marguerite was watching Anne go, grimly. “She must be secured for Charles, and that priceless thing she is wearing also, before she trades it to a passing tinker for baubles. See to it, Orléans.”
