Yes, Holder Mikaelsson was capable, all business, and fortunately thorough.
Alfie nodded and asked, “Is that all?”
“On that, yes. There is one other small matter, which I think you would be interested to know.”
“It is?” Alfie queried.
“A priest, of this Rising, now in the Keep. His Go’Doan name was G’Seph. His given name is Joseph Durie, of the Airenzian. He has repeatedly told guards he was quite high up in that organization and is willing to share the inner workings of The Rising if a reduced sentence would be considered. There are, as you know, several prisoners who are attempting to make this same request. I report this one for he is the most vociferous in his requests, and he has recently mentioned the names G’Thom and Golden Thomas, which, as you also know, the guards were instructed to note and report if a prisoner cited them.”
“We have ample prisoners in the Keep who can, and are, sharing the inner workings of these miscreants,” Alfie replied. “And this one isn’t the only one who’s mentioned this Golden Thomas.”
“I’ll talk to him,” Apollo cut in.
Alfie turned to Apollo. “I don’t imagine True will be of a mind to be lenient with anyone in that faction.”
“I won’t make any promises,” Apollo assured.
“Then as you wish,” Alfie said.
“I’ll go with you,” Tor murmured.
“Excellent,” Apollo replied.
Alfie looked again to Mikaelsson. “Are we finished?”
Mikaelsson nodded. “Yes, sir.”
“Then, dismissed.”
Mikaelsson nodded again, stood, dipped his chin to Apollo and Tor, then he left the room.
Alfie sat back in True’s chair and turned his gaze to the two men.
But it was Apollo he addressed.
“You have an instinct about this priest?”
Apollo shook his head, but said, “I have heard that name before. In other reports. He is the man who had his hands shorn off by his own comrades.”
“I remember,” Alfie replied. “He also is the man who led Melisse into a trap and nearly got her killed, this after they’d shorn free his hands. My feeling is that indicates a rather extreme level of zealotry.”
“Thus, it would be interesting, whatever he has to say,” Apollo replied.
Alfie could see this.
Apollo put his hands to the arms of his chair and murmured to Tor, “We’ll be away?”
“Once I talk with Cora. Tell her where we’re going,” Tor said.
“I shall also talk with Maddie. Half an hour? On the front steps?” Apollo suggested.
“I’ll call for our horses to be brought ’round,” Tor offered.
Apollo nodded.
They both stood, said their goodbyes to Alfie and left the room.
When the door closed behind them, Alfie looked down to his sticks that were resting on the floor by his chair, hidden from view.
He had been practicing on them as frequently as he could. However, he was finding to his frustration that his lower half was heavy and unwieldy, which made progress slow-going and tiring, so that frequency wasn’t as frequent as he’d wish.
He could navigate across a room.
He could not get himself from True’s study to his chambers without resting in chairs placed along the hall the entire way, this being done for the purpose of allowing him just that.
And stairs were impossible.
But navigating that hallway, under the carefully averted eyes of soldiers he once commanded, was a mortifying enough daily occurrence.
He couldn’t even think on attempting stairs.
He closed his eyes, lifted his hand, and pinched the bridge of his nose just as he heard a knock on the door.
He dropped his hand and opened his mouth but closed it when he heard the latch turning and knew who it was.
He sighed and ignored his stomach warming.
This before who he knew would walk in without waiting for him to call his leave for her to do so, walked in.
Bronagh.
She closed the door behind her and bustled his way, asking, “Is your meeting done?”
Gods, she had far too many curves.
And too much hair.
And those bloody freckles.
“Alfie?” she called, and he started, lifting his eyes from her bosoms to her face.
Her cheeks were pink, but her manner was efficient.
He had, after insulting her gravely, managed to force her to listen to his apology, which she had accepted.
He had then managed to talk her into considering him as friend, which was harder to make her accept.
It was also hard for him to accept.
That said, all he had to do was look at his bloody sticks, his fucking useless legs, and it became a good deal easier.
“Is your meeting done?” she repeated.
“Yes, but I’m waiting on some missives I need to look over,” he told her.
She appeared crestfallen, which was a rather dramatic reaction to his reply.
What on earth?
“I’m uncomfortable in True’s chair, Bronagh,” he reminded her of something he’d shared before in one of their many conversations, for she kept him company in his chambers often, now no longer simply as his nurse. “But I’ve spent so much time in that damned chamber, that damned bed, I’d rather be here than there. If you wish to stay and keep me company, get your book or your knitting, and be here with me.”
“I’d hoped to talk you into going on a carriage ride.”
He blinked slowly, nonplussed.
“A carriage ride?”
She threw herself in the chair Mikaelsson had vacated and Alfie again found himself gritting his teeth as she did, for much of her jiggled (and it was enjoyable to watch) while her hair bounced (and that was enjoyable too).
“Yes, Alfie, a carriage ride. You know, those wheeled conveyances, led by horses that—”
She would be outrageously annoying if she wasn’t so adorable.
“I know what carriages are,” he said with a sigh.
“Yes, well, the day is crisp and cold, but we could get a rug. And I know this bakery that does these vol-au-vents filled with the richest, meatiest stew you’ve ever tasted—”
“I can’t go on a carriage ride with you, Bronagh.”
“Why not?”
He refused to look down at his sticks.
Even if he did, she knew the direction of his thoughts.
“We can have the vol-au-vents brought to the carriage and eat them in there, Alfie,” she said softly.
“I have things to do.”
“It’s always work with you,” she huffed.
“This is because there’s always work to do,” he retorted.
“You have not been out of this castle since you were carried into it.”
He did not like the reminder, but he kept his mouth shut on that.
“And again, this is because there is much work to do, Bronagh.”
“You must enjoy life, Alfie,” she returned.
“I enjoy life fine,” he lied.
And she hooted, rolling her eyes, before she pinned him with them and stated, “Farah told me even before those horrible, horrible men did what they did to you, you were all about work and duty.”
“I made an oath,” he told her.
“I did too,” she shot back. “Nurses take their own oaths, Alfie. To care with kindness. To maintain a steady hand. To ever have a listening ear. To never cease in learning. And that is not only my vocation, it is my calling. But it’s not my life.”
“Well this,” he spread his hand over the desk in front of him, “is my life.”
“It shouldn’t be.”
“Why not?”
“Because…because…” She bounced in her chair with agitation, and gods, his cock jumped with the same as she did, but his reaction was caused by something much different. “Because!” she finished.
“Bronagh, much is happening
,” he said low.
“And it will happen whether you sit in that chair or leave it for a few hours to enjoy a delicious vol-au-vent and then it will be here when you get back!” she declared hotly.
Bloody hell, it was irritating how clever she was.
It was especially irritating when she was clever during an argument.
He scowled at her.
She glared at him.
The door opened and King Wilmer swept in.
“I am now reduced to being summoned by a bloody knight,” he groused instead of saying a greeting. “A crippled one.”
Alfie’s hands curled into fists.
Bronagh leapt from her chair.
When she did, Alfie’s attention instantly shifted to her.
“Bronagh,” he warned.
“No,” she snapped, looking over her shoulder at him, her eyes wild with anger.
And gods, that look in her eyes…
If he had legs…
“What he said was not all right,” she finished.
Fuck.
“Honey, no,” he said gently.
Her eyes warmed considerably at hearing his endearment, something he had never given her, before she seemed to struggle and do it mightily.
But thankfully quietly.
She then declared, “King True will hear of this. And we,” she pointed a finger rudely, but adorably, at Alfie, “are not done.”
With that, she flounced from the room, slamming the door behind her.
“You should not accept that behavior from a nurse,” Wilmer advised.
It would be a snowy day in Firenze before Alfie took Wilmer’s advice.
“There was a massacre in the Lesser Thicket Forest,” he announced. “Thirty-two women had their throats slit after they were violated and stabbed. The bodies of two men were found with them. This in an area that beseeched the crown repeatedly, as women with some regularity for some years had gone missing.”
Wilmer blanched.
Seeing it, Alfie seethed.
This bloody imbecile.
“You know of this?” he pushed.
“Carrington told me he dispatched investigators. They were found to be runaways.”
“I’m certain it is now unsurprising to you, but Carrington lied.”
“By the gods,” Wilmer whispered.
Indeed.
For if Carrington lied about this, it could have to do with his caring naught about the citizens of Wodell.
It could also have to do with The Rising.
“Do you remember aught else about it?” Alfie asked.
“I really…I just really…” Wilmer’s shoulders sagged as he muttered, “I did not pay much attention.”
“Thirty-two women are dead, and it is an assumption, but whatever number of girls went missing before them, they might be in the same state, for they have never been found. Does this not penetrate with you?”
The man’s shoulders straightened as he admonished, “You are still speaking to a king.”
“It is a title True left you with because his mother would wish it. But it has no meaning. And I would assume, by your reply, that the deaths of your citizens by such appalling means actually doesn’t penetrate. Which, in turn, indicates you have no meaning.”
Angry red rushed up Wilmer’s neck to his face.
“We are done,” Alfie muttered. “I have things to do.”
“I would go to Bishop Cross,” Wilmer suddenly declared.
Alfie stared at him.
“Gallienus told me I had an open invitation to holiday there,” he continued. “It is warm at the Cross. And far from here. I will take my manservant and enough staff to manage the castle situated there and I will stay for the foreseeable future. This…all these…” he threw out a weak hand, “goings-on. They weary me.”
Alfie did not remind him that Gallienus was no longer in the position to invite anything.
Nor did he share Wilmer was no longer in the position to requisition staff to take anywhere.
But as True would likely not hesitate to demur, Alfie didn’t.
Thus, he asked, “Will you sail, or will you ride?”
“I see I will not be missed,” Wilmer sniffed.
“No, you won’t,” Alfie affirmed without hesitation.
“You will find, the longer this war lasts in Airen, and True is away fighting it, how onerous is the mantle of rule.”
The Airenzian war, if no ravens had gone astray that provided conflicting information, had now officially lasted all of four bloody days.
Alfie didn’t get into that either.
“On the contrary,” he replied blithely, “I find incarcerating those who caused harm and moving forward in bringing them to justice, righting a troubled treasury, and overseeing the expansion of the scope of our economy in an optimistic manner the likes of which this realm has not ever seen quite rewarding.”
“Yes, and you have the luxury of one day stepping down when all that goes to hell.”
“So did you,” Alfie reminded him, watching Wilmer’s body jerk. “Though, for my part, as my king’s counsellor, and after swearing an oath to protect my land that I intend to keep, regardless I am now crippled, I don’t intend to do that until I retire to a hearth and my books at a day when I am gray with age.”
“I tire of this conversation,” Wilmer decreed.
“This is good, for so do I.”
After giving Alfie a long, hard look, Wilmer whipped his head around before his body in a manner that made Alfie nearly burst with laughter, before he flounced out much like Bronagh had done.
The door again slammed.
And Alfie put Wilmer out of his mind, and doing so, Bronagh entered it.
A carriage ride.
What was that woman thinking?
Alfie then had to force Bronagh from his mind (a much more difficult endeavor), and he did so as he picked up his sticks, hefted himself out of his chair and moved to the fire.
Carefully, he balanced on one stick as he quickly fed fuel to the irons.
He then maneuvered himself to the chair by the fire and settled in, equally pleased with himself he got where he was without a tumble, just as he was frustrated that was something he considered a victory.
He picked up the reports True had commissioned on how the counties and groups of charmed folk were reacting to the idea of a parliament. Files he’d abandoned when Tor and Apollo had arrived after he’d called for them when Mikaelsson came to make his report.
He was in the depths of reading them when another knock came at the door.
Calling leave for entry, a trainee soldier quickly delivered a bundle of parchments wrapped in military green ribbon that was sealed by a sergeant’s wax mark.
He opened it without delay.
It took him an hour.
And he had to drag himself back to the desk to search through the drawers to find a calendar.
Thankfully, Wilmer’s secretary had noted the dates of the quakes in the king’s agenda.
But in making the connections, that was the only thing Alfie was thankful for.
He stared at the parchment on which he’d jotted all the dates with connecting lines.
He then bellowed, “Corporal!”
131
The New Airen
The People of Airen
The Royal Grazing Fields, South of Highgate, Sky Bay
AIREN
The cow herders in the fields and the soldiers that guarded the gate atop the cliffs were the only ones who saw them.
But at what they saw, the news would travel quickly as that news was two unicorns galloping into view from thin air, behind them riding their Prince Regent and his betrothed.
And then…
Then…
Oh, the spectacle!
The King and Queen of Firenze.
The King and Queen of Wodell.
The Dragon Commander and his Ice Bride of Lunwyn.
The Princess Serena and a man with the coveted mantle of a Firenz
Trusted.
And finally…
Vast armies, including men, women, horses and supply carts.
Just as the ravens had heralded.
Just so.
Led by Prince Cassius and his golden-haired Nadirii queen, they entered the steep-graded, switchback avenue that climbed the face of the cliffs that marked the southern boundary of Sky Bay, riding toward Highgate.
The tall gates were open for day entry and the long procession rode right through.
And thus, it was the citizens of Sky Bay who witnessed what seemed to be a never-ending parade of royalty and military might making its way through the paved streets of the city, not dallying, but riding straight toward the lane that would take them to the Sky Citadel.
But birds had travelled far and fast since the Battle of the Heights five days ago, and the Battle of the Veil, which was just four.
Whispers had become open talk about the vanquishing of the Allied Gentry by their Regent in two places far away from each other, one battle which was described much more as a thrashing.
And these rumors, many found humorous.
Oh, those many Airenzian who clung so tightly to their traditions finding their just desserts in humiliation and defeat.
Really, what manner of man was threatened so by a woman?
She could cook and clean and mend and fuck, but not teach?
Not heal?
Not build?
Not guard?
The Nadirii warriors who assisted their Regent in trouncing the Allied Gentry proved all that so misguided, it was laughable.
And many, many, now free to do so, laughed.
Then again, the Nadirii had been doing such for centuries.
It was just now, those nitwits got a direct dose of it.
Oh yes, the veil had been ripped from Airen these past five days as unicorns rode and right prevailed.
And nowhere was it more evident than Sky Bay.
For those who had long since kept their mouths shut under the reign of kings who would shut it for them in unpleasant ways through their oppressive laws no longer had to hide behind closed doors and whisper amongst those like-minded about the impossibility of change.
The Rising Page 12