Free His Majesty's Elephant by Judith Tarr

rising. There was something added to it, something with a tang like hot iron. Magic. It lay in Michael Phokias’ hands, wound about Kerrec as he stood immobile, and maybe he could not move if he had wanted to.
    Michael Phokias was looking a little ruffled. Rowan gave him no time to speak. “My lord, you have to pardon him, he fancies himself clever. Not that he isn’t, mind you,” she said with the best simper she could manage—it turned Kerrec faintly green—“but he does get a little above himself. He likes to think that he can guard a lady’s virtue. Charming, isn’t it? He’s only an elephant’s boy.” She patted him as if he had been her dog, trying not to flinch when her hand touched magic. It felt like ice wound with fire. It itched inside her skin. “But charming, as I said. And very much more interesting than he looks.”
    â€œI hope for your sake, my lady,” said Michael Phokias, “that he is.”
    Rowan smiled, she hoped sweetly. “Oh, I like them when they’re young and awkward. They’re so new to it, you see. So energetic. And so grateful to be noticed.” She widened her eyes, all innocence. “I don’t suppose you know about that. Gisela has always preferred them a little more seasoned. Do you mind giving her back her relic? Father will be so annoyed if he finds out she’s given it away.”
    Kerrec’s breath stopped short. Michael Phokias seemed briefly, much too briefly, at a loss. But his tongue was supple, and he had no shame that she could see. “Oh, you saw that, did you, my lady? She entrusted it to me for safekeeping. It’s very valuable, you know. Much more valuable than she seems to understand.”
    â€œI’m sure she doesn’t understand,” Rowan said. Her heart was pounding hard, but she had gone too far to stop. “Really, I think it would be best if it went back to our father’s treasury. What if the Caliph discovers that a man of Byzantium has taken it? He might put the wrong interpretation on it. And Byzantium is so much closer to him than we, so much easier to attack.”
    â€œI doubt that that will happen, my lady,” said Michael Phokias. “This relic is safe with me. I give you my word on it.”
    The word of a sorcerer. Rowan was not quite mad enough to say that, even now. “It will be safer in the treasury,” she said, “your excellency. As I’m sure my father will agree.”
    There. Let him read that for a threat. He smiled slightly, one might almost have thought kindly. “Perhaps he may. Meanwhile, I shall guard the relic with all the care that it deserves, against the day that he will ask it of me.”
    â€œI think it best that I be the one to guard it,” Rowan said, holding out her hand. “If you please, my lord?”
    â€œMy lady,” he said, still sweetly, still smoothly, “I think not. It was never meant for a woman’s gentle hand. What if it should wake, and burn you to the bone? Such tender white skin, to be so marred.”
    â€œNo Christian relic ever burned a Christian hand,” said Rowan.
    â€œDid I say that this was Christian?” asked Michael Phokias. “No, no, princess. The Caliph may be your father’s friend, but this is no friendly thing. Believe me when I tell you that it were best under guard, and far from your father’s hand.”
    â€œHow do you know?” Rowan asked him. “Are you a sorcerer?”
    Even that did not take him aback for more than a instant. “Why, princess, I know a little of the hidden arts. So does any educated man. This is a work of those arts, and not of their gentler face, either. Come, continue your tryst with your clever ragged boy, and trust that I shall do as I best may, to guard this relic from the East.”
    He did not lay any spell on her that she knew of, but she could not stop him as he walked past her, bowing to her