“I’ll take the master bedroom,” Prince Hedrick said. “Your servant can make the bed.”
“Make it yourself,” Emily snapped. “She’s not here to serve you.”
She turned away while the prince was still spluttering for words. It was hard to believe he didn’t know how to make his own bed, although... she supposed it was possible he didn’t. He might never have been without servants. He’d been in the military, but he might have had a valet. God knew there’d been aristocratic soldiers during the war who’d insisted on bringing a small army of servants on campaign with them. They’d been loathed by the men they were supposed to lead.
“I’ll cast a handful of wards,” Lady Barb said, as she returned from the loft. “They’re not going to last very long, though. Not without a proper anchor.”
“Yeah.” Emily mulled over the mystery for a long moment, then put it aside. “Do you think they’ll let us bring in a proper wardstone?”
“No,” Lady Barb said, flatly. “They’ll be too concerned about what else we could do with it.”
Emily nodded. “I’ll put myself in the middle bedroom, and you can have the one next to me,” she said. “That should reduce the amount of space we need to cover.”
“Yes, My Lady,” Lady Barb said, dryly. “It will be done, My Lady. Was there anything else, My Lady?”
“Sorry.” Emily flushed. “I didn’t mean to push...”
“You are meant to be in charge,” Lady Barb said, mischievously. “Just remember... you won’t always be in charge.”
“I know,” Emily said. Her cheeks felt hot. “I’m sorry.”
“You’re still learning,” Lady Barb assured her. “Don’t give Hedrick any room to play games or you’ll regret it. If he goes out of the house without permission...”
Emily sighed. “Is he that stupid?”
“Probably.” Lady Barb shrugged. “He’s the second son. Right now, come to think of it, he’s second in line to the throne. He may not have realized that, not yet, but I guarantee you he will. And then he’ll start thinking about how he can make himself the king instead. He wouldn’t be the first brother to put a knife in his sibling’s back.”
“No,” Emily agreed. She found it hard to believe Dater would turn his back on his brother, but... they were brothers. She had no siblings, as far as she knew, but the idea of her friends suddenly turning on her was difficult to grasp. “What if... he tries to dicker with the rebels privately?”
“That could be a problem,” Lady Barb agreed. “And I’m sure someone, not too far away, will start thinking about the advantages of having an idiot on the throne.”
Emily rubbed her forehead. “Charming,” she said. “The disadvantages would probably outweigh the advantages.”
She started to turn away, then stopped. “Can you tighten the wards on Silent’s room, once she decides which one she wants?”
“Of course,” Lady Barb said. There was a glint of approval in her eyes. “Good thinking.”
Emily nodded as she headed down the corridor. Silent could have whatever room she liked. She didn’t have to sleep below stairs, let alone beside the dogs like a servant in a manor. She could sleep in the next room and Emily wouldn’t give a damn. Besides, it might be advantageous. Silent deserved her privacy, too. She certainly didn’t deserve a horny prince battering down the door and demanding sex.
Bastard, Emily thought. She wondered if she could make the wards a little nastier. There were spells for that, although most of them could only be cast on magicians. Bringing him here was a mistake.
She spoke briefly to Silent, then wandered into the councilor’s study and glanced around. The room looked as though someone had thrown a grenade into the chamber and waited for it to explode. The desk had been torn apart in a desperate search for hidden compartments, the walls battered and broken until the hidden safe had been discovered and torn out of the stone. Emily had no idea what, if anything, the looters had found, but it had been carried out of the house days ago. Judging by the wreckage, the looters hadn’t been the former servants. They’d probably known where everything was hidden, even if they hadn’t dared touch it.
Alassa used to complain her servants spied on her, she recalled. And she was right.
“Lady Emily?” Prince Hedrick stood at the top of the stairs. “Can we talk?”
Emily wanted to say no, but... she sighed inwardly as she walked up and followed him into his room. Lady Barb’s wards hummed around her as she closed the door and looked around. It might have been the master bedroom, once upon a time, but it was as barren as the rest of the house. The paintings had been torn down and thrown into the fireplace. Emily was mildly surprised they hadn’t accidentally set the house on fire. Someone had stripped the bed, removing the old bedding and piling newer sheets on top of the mattress. It looked as if the prince didn’t have the slightest idea how to make the bed.
“My father is dead,” Prince Hedrick said. He looked at her in sudden, desperate hope. “Unless it was an illusion...”
“I’m afraid not,” Emily said, wishing - suddenly - that she knew what to say. She disliked Hedrick intensely and yet... it was hard not to feel a little sympathy. Losing a parent was never easy, but losing one to such a brutal end had to be far worse. “That was your father’s head.”
Prince Hedrick clenched his fists. “They murdered him. They... they broke their oaths to their monarch and murdered him. They...”
His voice trailed off. Emily watched him warily, ready to hurl a spell or jump back if he lashed out. She’d met too many people who tried to bury their grief in violence. Hedrick had insisted she’d been behind the rebellion, indirectly if not directly... if he took it into his head to blame her for everything, she wouldn’t let him land a blow. She’d freeze him and teleport him back to his brother.
“I’m sorry,” she said, quietly. “Your father was a good man.”
“And yet, they murdered him,” Hedrick said. He stood and started to pace the room. “How could they?”
Emily swallowed the urge to point out that the rebels hadn’t considered the king a good man, let alone a good ruler. King Jorlem had been stubborn, too slow and set in his ways to accept the need for change. If he’d let some of the tension out before it was too late, he might have been able to make reforms... she shook her head. He hadn’t realized what was going to happen until it had been far too late. And now, he was dead.
“I hoped to save him,” Prince Hedrick said. “I’d thought...”
His voice trailed off. “The queen. What happened to the queen?”
“I don’t know,” Emily said. “I didn’t see her at the gates.”
She scowled, inwardly. The last verified report had stated that the queen was in rebel custody. She hadn’t seen any female heads on pikes, but that didn’t prove anything. The queen might be sitting in a prison cell or dead, her body lying in a pile of others. Who would know the queen was the queen, if the rebels stole her jewels and clothes before executing her? Or... Emily’s imagination provided too many possibilities, each worse than the last. She thought it would be better to keep those thoughts to herself.
“Ask them,” Hedrick said. It was blunt and rude, yet she had the sense he was pleading. “Ask them what happened to the queen.”
“I will,” Emily promised. She had no idea what the public had thought of their queen... their former queen. They might have loved or hated her... they might have seen her as her husband’s helpless helpmeet or the power behind the throne. It wasn’t impossible. She’d heard more than enough nonsense about ruling queens, when Alassa had been declared her father’s heir, to last a lifetime. “And what do you want to do when you find out?”
Hedrick’s hand dropped to his sword. “I don’t know,” he said. “Crush them, perhaps.”
“Perhaps you could offer concessions in exchange for her safety,” Emily said, although she knew they wouldn’t last. The rebels would be foolish to give up such a trump card, at least not without major concession
s, and the royalists wouldn’t want to make any real concessions. “And then, perhaps you can think about trying to make a deal...”
“They killed my father,” Hedrick snapped. “We cannot make a deal!”
His eyes bored into hers. “Whose side are you on?”
“I’m supposed to mediate the talks,” Emily reminded him. “I’m not allowed to have a side.”
But she knew, as she turned aside to peer through the windows, that she wasn’t being entirely honest. She’d grown to detest Hedrick in less than a day. His brother was a better man, but... he was a Crown Prince. She knew she couldn’t trust them to come to terms with the rebels and keep them. Their courtiers would be nagging them to claw back whatever concessions they made as soon as they regained their power. Her sympathies lay with the rebels, she admitted inwardly, and yet she knew the rebellion could easily get out of control. And then the city would descend into madness and death.
They might listen to me, she told herself. But only if I say what they want to hear.
She felt cold as she looked down on the streets. They were almost empty, but she could see a couple of men taking shelter on the far side of the road. Guards? Spies? If she could see two, there were probably others. Some spies were trained to let themselves be seen, in hopes of convincing their target that they’d spotted all the spies. Others had orders to make their target feel watched, in hopes of pushing him into making a mistake.
All this happened too quickly, she thought, as she turned away. Someone is pulling the strings.
There was a knock on the door. She glanced at Hedrick. “I’ll speak to them about the queen,” she said. “And you are to stay inside and consider what you might say to them when the talks finally begin.”
“If they ever do,” Hedrick said. His face darkened. “This is my city. I have the freedom to move where I like...”
Emily met his eyes. “The people outside will recognize you,” she said. Hedrick was very clearly not a commoner. The rebels might not recognize him personally, although she had her doubts about that, but they’d know he was an aristocrat. She doubted he could hide behind a glamor. “And then they will arrest you and chop off your head. And that will be the end.”
“I can’t stay here,” Hedrick said, hotly. “I’m not a coward.”
“No,” Emily agreed. She’d yet to meet an aristocrat who couldn’t be goaded into doing something stupid by an accusation of cowardice. “However, you have to keep your eye on the prize. Going into the city would be brave, but being caught would be disastrous. It isn’t cowardly to stay here.”
Hedrick nodded, curtly. Emily turned away, hoping he’d listen. Thankfully, there was no one to mock and goad him into leaving the house. If the rebels caught him... the nasty part of Emily’s mind wondered if Dater would see it as something of a relief. Hedrick was a dangerously loose cannon. He might make it impossible for the two sides to come to terms.
As if it wasn’t impossible already, Emily thought. Neither side is going to want to be the first one to make concessions.
A young man, barely old enough to shave, stood in the hallway. He wore yet another little cloth cap, and wore a drab tunic, but he looked nervous. Silent stood beside him, living up to her name. “Lady Emily? I have instructions to escort you to the People’s Palace.”
Emily smiled, as reassuringly as she could. “It will be my pleasure,” she said, as she donned her cloak and muttered a handful of protective charms. She glanced through the open door, somehow unsurprised to see a complete absence of horses and carriages. “Shall we go?”
“Yes, My Lady,” the young man said. Emily guessed he’d worked for the aristocracy in some capacity. He certainly had the manners down pat. “If you’ll come with me...”
Chapter Thirteen
THE STREETS SEEMED TO COME ALIVE as they walked away from the house and up towards the royal palace. It sat next to a brooding castle, the battlements bristling with armed soldiers. Emily could see men, wearing brilliant yellow sashes, drilling the new recruits in everything from route marches to gunpowder weapons. The instructors looked like veterans, probably soldiers from the previous war who’d been demobilized as soon as it became clear the necromantic threat was gone. Emily suspected Crown Prince Dater was cursing his father’s penny-pinching ways right now. The demobilizing hadn’t just dumped hundreds of men into the job market, it had also thrown trained and experienced men to the rebels. One good NCO, Sergeant Harkin had insisted years ago, was worth a dozen aristocratic fops. Emily was inclined to think he was right.
Her escort kept looking at her, as if he couldn’t quite believe it was her. Emily was torn between amusement and annoyance. It wasn’t as if she was a rock star. She’d never really been comfortable with her fame, particularly not with the legends that made her out to be an insane combination of a dozen different heroes and heroines of book and screen. It was easy enough to walk through the streets unmolested - no one believed the young woman on the streets was the Emily - but she was uneasily aware she didn’t live up to the legend. She didn’t arm-wrestle necromancers, she didn’t produce miracles upon demand and she certainly didn’t have a small army of would-be suitors pounding down her door and trying to marry her. The young man had probably been told she breathed fire and would turn him into a toad if he put a single foot wrong. And there was nothing she could do to make him feel any better.
She kept her face under tight control as she was led into the palace grounds. The walls were broken in a dozen places, the trees beyond cut down and left on the ground. Hundreds of soldiers drilled on the grass, tearing it apart as they marched up and down. The palace itself was largely intact, but hundreds of windows had been patched with wooden boards. She guessed it had been looted before the rebel leadership had managed to take control. She wondered, idly, what had happened to the royal family’s possessions. They’d had to leave everything behind when they’d had to move into the castle, then try to escape the city itself.
Althorn met her at the door. “Emily,” he said. He glanced past her, at her escort. “Thank you. That will be all.”
The escort started to bow, remembered he didn’t need to, and touched the brim of his cap instead before turning and hurrying away. Emily watched him go, wishing she’d found the words to talk to him. Perhaps he’d have been more open if he’d been talking to Silent. The maid was a social equal, not... someone so far above him there was simply no point of comparison. She turned to nod to Althorn, who was watching her thoughtfully. It nearly made her flush again.
“He’s a smart lad,” Althorn said. “He used to work here, did you know?”
“No,” Emily said. She’d guessed, but she hadn’t known. “What happened here?”
“The palace fell quickly,” Althorn said. “The royalists fled as soon as the people began to rise.”
Emily kept her mouth shut and her eyes open as they walked into the palace. It had been thoroughly looted, although not as extensively as she’d expected. A handful of paintings remained on the wall, a dozen pieces of furniture remained in their place... she frowned as she saw the smashed remains of a piece of machinery, something that puzzled her until she realized it was a piano. She winced, even though she’d never had any talent for playing music. A genuine handcrafted piano would be worth hundreds, perhaps thousands, of gold crowns. And it had been smashed beyond repair.
“This used to be part of the king’s chambers,” Althorn said, as he led her into a side room. “Now, it belongs to the People.”
Emily nodded. A small group of people were waiting for her, sitting around a long wooden table. It looked so crude she was sure the original table had been smashed and then hastily replaced. She put the thought aside for later contemplation as the party - the rebel leadership, she realized suddenly - stood to greet her. They looked surprisingly welcoming. She found it hard to remember, all of a sudden, that she was meant to remain neutral.
Althorn performed the introductions. Emily listened, trying desperately to keep every n
ame straight in her mind. Scribe Bajingan - a pudgy man who looked vaguely Oriental - was the rebel secretary. He looked warm and friendly, but Emily wasn’t so sure. The scribes had never liked her, with reason. She remembered that Joseph Stalin had been the Communist Party’s general secretary. He’d even kept the title after becoming undisputed ruler of the Soviet Union. Beside him sat Jair, Son of No One. Althorn explained he’d been fathered by an aristocrat who’d given his mother a great deal of money to stay out of his life. Jair was tall and thin, with dark eyes that suggested bottomless fury and resentment. Emily had the feeling he didn’t like her much.
Aiden, a broadsheet writer, was a decidedly odd person. He dressed like a fop, in commoner clothes; he wore a wide-brimmed hat decked with a flower, something that would have landed him in very real trouble if he’d done it in front of the king. His clothes were loose enough to allow him to move easily, yet... Emily’s eyes narrowed. There was something odd about him, something that bothered her. He sat next to Storm, a magician who wasn’t even trying to hide his power. Emily suspected he’d been born and raised in the kingdom. An outsider wouldn’t have risked breaking the Compact by supporting the rebels.
“And this is Sergeant Oskar,” Althorn concluded. “I believe you’ve met.”
“I remember you from the war,” Oskar said. He was a short fireplug of a man, wearing a tunic with a yellow sash. “You were magnificent.”
Emily blushed. She didn’t remember Oskar, but that wasn’t surprising. “Thank you.”
“Thank you,” Oskar said. “If it wasn’t for you, I would never have had my chance to serve.”
The Right Side of History (Schooled In Magic Book 22) Page 13