In Italy, the Ostrogoths hold power, and are at the time when these events occur, under attack by Belisarius, as the Emperor Justinian tries to reassert his authority in the western empire. (For this story see Robert Graves' classic historical novel Count Belisarius - I will review it on this site soon.)
In Constantinople, meanwhile, two children, Gadaric and Sunilda, twins and joint-heirs to the Ostrogoth throne, are held hostage.
They are, however, being treated more or less as a prince and princess should be treated, as we see from Sunilda's letters to her Aunt Matasuntha in Ravenna. Indeed, the empress herself, Theodora, is taking a maternal interest in them, and has arranged for them to spend the summer at a villa by the sea.
However, as I remarked in the review of One for Sorrow, Theodora in this series is depicted as a real bitch, which I don't believe she was though no doubt she could be on occasion (in these books there is no heart of gold concealed beneath the bitchiness of the ex-whore and circus performer among the fawning aristocrats) and John the eunuch, whose own head she continually threatens to have separated from his body, is quite sure that her interest in the twins is less than maternal.
Then prince Gadaric is murdered, during the course of a banquet at the villa attended by the empress and her entourage.
Castor, an actor and acrobat, and a favourite of the empress's, disappears during the same banquet.
On an island off the coast, the sacred goats arrange themselves in weird patterns each morning, and the patterns are interpreted as omens of doom by Minthe, the local herbalist and seer.
THREE FOR A LETTER
Mary Reed & Eric Mayer
Medieval Magic and Mysteries
> the sacred, prophesying goats on Goat Island
> a whale that communicates with a princess
Medieval Outsiders
> a eunuch
> a mime/acrobat who is physically a dwarf
> two royal, Ostrogoth, children held hostage in Constantinople
And a huge whale named Porphyrio, which has been attacking boats off Goat Island, establishes a telepathic link with the princess, who becomes convinced that her brother is not dead at all but has been taken away to somewhere safe by the whale.
This whole sub-plot about the little princess in exile is handled excellently by the authors, and is very real and moving. Taken hundreds of miles from their families, living among strangers and enemies, these eight-year-old twins must have been totally dependent on each other: when the boy is murdered, the girl cannot accept it; she writes letters to her aunt (letters she knows - she has been told - can never be delivered with the war going on) and lives more and more in an unreal world of her own until the whale tells her how to join her brother in the "safe place".
Perhaps not the best book in the series - though it has its excellent side as I have said - but if you are a fan of the place and the period and the people (as I am) don't miss it.
MBG
