by Alex Lidell
Despite the early hour, Master Seaborn appeared in a dress uniform, his face set in grim lines. “Servant, cadet.” He offered a small bow to each of them.
Renee tensed at the formality.
Savoy rocked back on his heels. “Skip the horse shit, Connor.”
Seaborn sighed. “As the guardsman overseeing the investigative team, Fisker is charged with presenting the findings on the Queen’s Day attack to the Board of Inquiry this afternoon.” Seaborn handed a sealed parchment to each of them. “Your presence is mandated.”
“Our presence?” Renee looked from one man to the other. She and Savoy had already been interviewed. Ad nauseam. “But we did nothing wrong.”
Savoy glanced at her, his brows raised. “A room full of bodyguards lose control of the situation to a maid, and the royal family gets near massacred in the Crown’s own palace. Do you not see a problem?” He turned back to Seaborn. “What else?”
Seaborn sighed again. “I’ll be the magistrate running the proceedings.”
Savoy chuckled.
“You think Fisker questioning you is funny, Korish?” There was something in the way Seaborn said the second “you” that caught Renee’s notice. “Or that I wish to administer such an inquiry?”
A darkness passed over Savoy’s face as the two men exchanged a glance that she could not interpret. Then Savoy shrugged and, taking up his blade, stepped toward the center of the salle. “It is as it is. De Winter and I have time to make something useful of the day yet.”
Renee’s shoulders tightened from the rising tension. Shaking herself, she slid away from Savoy’s coming blow, which streaked through the air a bit faster than usual.
* * *
Tense, quiet chatter buzzed beneath the domed ceiling of the Justice Hall courtroom. The brown velvet drapes were pulled back to let in wide rays of sunlight. The Board of Inquiry, a four-man panel of judges pulled from the Palace Guard, the military, and civilian officials, sat with Seaborn at a polished wood table at the head of the room. These four would evaluate Fisker’s conclusions and decide what charges, if any, were to be pressed. And against whom.
A gray-clad clerk herded Renee, Savoy, and other members of the protection detail into a roped-off area on the left, across from a gated witness box. A few paces from them, the palace maid wept into her hands. Renee settled into a hard chair and clenched her jaw. The woman cost Savoy an arrow in the shoulder and near murdered the royal family. There was no redemption for that, not by anyone’s measure.
Beside Renee, Savoy tipped his chair back, balancing it on its hind legs and ignoring Seaborn’s scowl. Spectators crowded the benches. Among the solemn bodies, Renee made out the anxious faces of Alec and Sasha, Verin’s intense gaze, and Lord Palan’s forehead. Dabbing his face with a gold embroidered handkerchief, Palan leaned down to speak to a bored-looking Tanil, who was not one to pass up a chance to miss classes. Palan sighed at his nephew, then heaved over to make room for another man. The two shook hands in greeting and Renee felt the hair stir on the back of her neck. The dark coat, the set of the newcomer’s shoulders . . . The man turned and sat, drawing the breath from her lungs. Her father. What in the Seven Hells was he doing in Atham?
Before she could sort her thoughts, the clang of a bell swallowed the room. The proceedings opened. At Seaborn’s direction, Fisker rose.
“Vipers are an abomination,” Fisker announced to the Justice Hall. “An abomination that should be eradicated from Tildor’s soil. And with them, all those who aid them, who heed them, who spread their seed. Vipers—”
“Guardsman.” Seaborn rubbed the side of his nose. “If you would be kind enough to detail your findings on this case in particular?”
Fisker bowed, his face reddening, and continued in a more relevant vein. “While the Vipers undeniably orchestrated the assault against the Crown this Queen’s Day past,” he concluded, tenting his nine fingers, “the actions of several others, whether in assisting the Vipers or showing egregious incompetence in their duty, pose concerns the board may wish to address.”
Incompetence? Renee caught a glance Fisker threw at Savoy and frowned.
Savoy grinned at the guard.
Fisker’s eyes flashed, but he drew a breath and requested that the maid take the witness stand. Her hesitation bought her an armed escort.
“You are Mistress Olivia?” Seaborn’s usually kind voice held a note of cold indifference that chilled Renee. He waited for Olivia’s nod before proceeding. “Guardsman Fisker believes your words will help the Board of Inquiry understand what happened during the Queen’s Day attack. He will ask you questions designed to show a fact pattern to the board. Note that the board may find your actions suspect. If it does, you will be charged with a crime and have access to a defense advocate. Do you understand?” Seaborn waited for another nod and gestured to Fisker. “Go ahead, sir.”
Fisker brushed stray strands of silver hair from his long face. “You opened the window shutter in the palace dining room and, when leaving, obstructed the door lock, is that correct?”
“Yes, sir,” she whispered.
“Why?”
“A letter.” She twisted her hands in her lap. “The third of three I received, all with instructions. When I refused the first, my boy Jakie disappeared. He was a happy, healthy lad. Four years old and lively like a bumblebee.” A tear ran down her cheek. “He was returned but a day later, too weak to lift his head by himself. I . . . I had a bit of savings and I scraped all I had for a Healer. My Jakie, he saw the mage fire around the Healer’s hand and howled and howled, as if he knew what it was. And . . . he did know.”
Nausea brushed the back of Renee’s throat.
Seaborn waited a moment to let the witness regain her composure and prompted her to continue.
“The Healer said a mage violated my Jakie. Ripped his Keraldi Barrier and bled the life energy from him. Left so little that my boy could but breathe. A chill would end his life.” She hugged herself. “I tended him and fed him soft food and a month later he sat up himself again. He is a fighter, my Jakie.”
Renee bit her lip. A registered mage would never dare this, but the Vipers sheltered unregistered ones. And now they used their human weapons to close in on King Lysian. Mistress Olivia and her son were just pawns caught in the crossfire.
Olivia’s eyes closed. “The day after that a second letter came, ordering me to add a powder to the king’s drink. When I refused . . . ” She broke into sobs.
Fisker cleared his throat and looked up at Seaborn. “Healer Grovener examined the child upon his return from the second disappearance. With the board’s permission, I would like him to testify tomorrow to the boy’s condition.” He waited for a nod and turned back to his witness. “When you received the third letter, you followed its instruction, is that right?”
“Yes, sir.”
“You knew you committed treason by doing so?”
“What choice had I, sir?” She straightened her back. “I will sacrifice my life for my son.”
A bearded man seated on Seaborn’s right shook his head. “Your life is yours to give, mistress. But you offered up the Crown’s.”
Sourness filled Renee’s mouth. A rogue Viper mage drove Olivia to her task. And she would hang.
Fisker dismissed the maid and called the bodyguards from the dining room to the stand one by one to relay what they’d seen. Renee stared at the witness box while they spoke, her heartbeat straining. Everything had happened so fast. Arrows flew, people screamed, wounds bled, porcelain crashed to the floor. She hadn’t thought beyond the crisis of the moment, and could not have. But now, the board, sitting in the safe comfort of velvet chairs, would dissect it all. Would they find her incompetent? Images fluttered. The king jesting with his family. Sasha’s gripping fingers, begging her to stay. Renee too weak to budge the shutter. Did she remember it right? Did—
“Cadet de Winter.” Seaborn’s tone said he was repeating himself. “Take the witness box, if you please.”
Forcing her shoulders back, Renee took her place. She bowed, then clasped her hands behind her back and awaited Fisker’s pleasure.
“You are the cadet who closed the window shutter, effectively ending the assault?” said Fisker.
Renee blinked. “At Commander Savoy’s direction, sir, yes.”
“But you recognized the danger first?”
“No, sir. The commander noticed it first.”
Fisker made a show of frowning. “So Commander Savoy was the first to both recognize the danger and the solution, but left it all to a sixteen-year-old cadet?”
Heat rose to Renee’s face. “He had closed the shutter before dinner, sir. When the maid reopened it and the assault started, Commander Savoy was shielding the Crown.”
Fisker tented his hands again, his missing finger leaving a gap in the pattern, and held a pause. “You too had a protected that day?”
“Yes, sir. King Lysian’s cousin, Sasha Jurran.”
“How were you able to cover her while addressing the window?”
Behind her back, Renee clenched her hands together and glanced at Sasha. “I wasn’t, sir. I left her on the floor.”
“Did Commander Savoy order you to do so?”
She ground her teeth. “He instructed me to close the shutter.”
“The shutter was made of heavy metal. Didn’t you have trouble moving it?”
Her face flushed. “Yes, sir, I had trouble.”
“I see. So, the commander ordered you to abandon your post to correct a problem that he knew you were not physically suited to handle . . . while he himself remained in the corner of the room?”
“He was guarding the Crown!” Renee turned to Seaborn in an appeal for reason.
“Answer the question, Cadet de Winter,” Seaborn instructed. “Are the guardsman’s statements accurate or not?”
Renee tensed, her gaze darting around the Justice Hall. Fisker awaited her answer, his eyes glowing with satisfaction. She wished no part of this game. It was unfair.
“Answer the question. Now,” said Savoy.
“Servant Savoy, you will be silent or you will be removed,” said Seaborn. His lips pressed together. “Cadet, answer the question.”
“Yes, sir,” she heard herself say, and was dismissed to her seat. In the audience, her father smirked beneath his mustache.
Savoy was called up before she could apologize. He smiled at his interrogator.
Fisker stepped back and cleared his throat. “Commander, you were the most senior, most experienced bodyguard present inside the dining room. Did you perform a threat assessment when you entered the room?”
“I did.”
“Was the window there?” Fisker asked.
“It was.”
“Did you recognize it as a source of potential danger?”
“I did,” said Savoy.
“And you permitted the Crown to sit facing it nonetheless, did you not?”
Renee shook her head. Savoy had no more say in the seating arrangement of the royal family than he did in their choice of meal.
Fisker pressed ahead without waiting for Savoy’s answer. “And later, when the maid opened the shutter, you begged others to shut it, is that right? You made no move yourself?”
“Yes,” said Savoy, his voice calm.
Fisker leaned forward. “Tell me, sir, do you believe that had you acted, addressing the window yourself instead of making a child assume the task for which she was poorly suited and bear the risk herself, you could have stopped any arrows from entering the dining room?”
“I believe I erred earlier than that, guardsman.” Savoy leaned forward in a matching motion. “Had I replaced your guard unit with twelve-year-old cadets, I would have had a perimeter team able to differentiate its ass from its elbow, and arrest the archer before he took the first shot.”
Seaborn paled and the room erupted in shouts.
CHAPTER 15
“You’d think half the class would be here,” Renee said to Alec, pulling herself atop the cold training yard fence. That morning had welcomed frost on her window and she’d had to dig through her chest for a woolen shirt. A few dozen paces away, the men of the Seventh, all lean and fit, checked laces and adjusted their packs while maintaining a steady roar of conversation. Savoy blended in with them, his face animated with talk and jest.
Alec snorted. “It’s the Seventh’s first day, not last. No one is coming at dawn on a liberty day to watch them do push-ups.”
“But it’s the Seventh. Isn’t anyone curious?”
“Not at this hour.” Alec stretched his back. “Has the Board of Inquiry finished deliberations yet? They’ve been at it for a week already.”
“On everyone but Savoy.” Renee pushed the memory of the sobbing woman from her mind before it seized her thoughts, instead relishing the memory of Savoy’s final words. “Fisker indulged a personal grudge and painted a target on him.”
“Grudge?”
“When Savoy was a cadet, he helped Fisker fall off a horse. A cut festered and . . . ” She waved her hand vaguely. “Point is, personal histories don’t belong in the Justice Hall any more than Fisker’s private moral code does. He had no call to single Savoy out.”
“Well, Savoy was the senior officer in the dining hall. And the only Servant. He was responsible for the room. ”
She twisted toward him. “You think Fisker’s right?”
“No.” Alec held up his palms. “I think he might just be doing his job.”
Renee opened her mouth to respond, but a tall young man, whose tanned skin and dark hair reminded Renee of a hawk, clapped Savoy’s shoulder and pointed toward her and Alec. Savoy looked up, expressionless, while several others erupted in laughter.
Alec pushed away from the fence. “I’ve seen enough. Let’s go.”
Her cheeks heated. Alec was right. There was no reason to be here, watching other people train instead of working her own sword. More chuckles sounded, and when she glanced back, Savoy was studying the sky.
She slid down to the ground. Hawk was watching her again, eyeing her up and down. He was eighteen or nineteen, with broad shoulders, a flat stomach, and a smile that refused to surrender even at Savoy’s sharp call of “Sergeant!”
She wondered if she should bow in greeting.
“We have an essay to write.” Alec touched her elbow. “Something about thieves and motives that I know you’ve not touched in three weeks. Let’s go.”
Right. Seaborn’s essay. Free time was scarce of late. Guilt crept over her, and Renee rubbed her arms. Still, her probation was in combat arts, not academics. And she had to prioritize. Papers didn’t save lives.
“Eh, you two!” An unfamiliar voice cut through the air. Hawk waved them over. “Come here.”
Alec sighed and shot her a scowl, but there was nothing for it now. They trotted over to the group.
“The commander says ye’re his students,” said Hawk. He smiled like a boy hiding a frog in his pocket—a frog he planned to drop down a victim’s shirt.
She bowed. “Yes, sir.”
“He’s ‘sir.’ ” Hawk jerked his head toward Savoy. “I’m Cory Kash.”
Renee blushed. The army reserved sir for commissioned officers. Common soldiers, including sergeants—as Cory’s sleeve insignia named him—were not extended the courtesy. Since all fighter Servants were officers, Renee was unaccustomed to seeing other warriors on Academy grounds, so the slip of the tongue was understandable. But from Cory’s perspective, she must seem either blind or an idiot. The Seventh could have only one officer—and Savoy was it.
She drew herself taut and bowed. “A pleasure, Sergeant Kash.” At least the words came out crisp. “Renee de Winter, fighter cadet, senior class. My classmate Alec Takay.”
Cory whistled at Savoy. “Next thing ye’ll be wanting us to talk like that.”
“I’d settle for you not talking at all,” Savoy told him, drawing chuckles from everyone, including his victim. “Don’t mind Cory, Renee. We t
ry keeping him gagged, but he chews through everything.”
Renee. That felt good.
“Can you run?” Cory loomed over her, his shoulders clearing her head.
She met his dark eyes. “Can you?”
His grin grew wolfish, like Khavi’s, but he looked at Savoy before speaking again. At the latter’s nod, he turned back. “Will you join our wee jog then, fighter cadets?”
Renee accepted quickly, before Alec could bring up homework once more. This was not an opportunity to let pass. He’d thank her later. Maybe.
The lightness of excitement faded within a half hour. Savoy set a hard pace up a never-ending, winding hill. The men ran in a shifting cluster and not, as she had imagined, a military formation. Cory paced her and Alec for a few minutes before speeding up to Savoy’s side. Another man with a sergeant’s insignia followed suit. Although she heard none of their conversation, she marveled at their ability to speak during this run and implored the gods to keep her from falling behind.
Her lungs burned by the time Savoy called a halt. The men dropped to the chilled ground the moment they stopped, and she too collapsed, gratefully gasping air. A sense of someone watching made her look up. The entire squad, including Alec, held a push-up position and waited, all eyes fixed on her. Seven Hells.
“Not yet,” said Savoy. “But we’ll get there.”
Realizing she had spoken aloud, Renee turned deep red and scrambled to imitate the others. Alec chortled. She elbowed his ribs the next chance she got. Hard. But the remorseless goat only chuckled at her again. At least he was enjoying himself.
The “wee jog” Cory promised proved an exercise in masochism. Run. Stop. Drop to the ground and work. Run again. She soon discovered the contents of the men’s backpacks.
“Sandbags?” she asked, crunching up and passing the sack to Cory, whose sweat-soaked hair stuck to his forehead. Her burning abdominals threatened to spasm. He nodded, did a sit-up with the burden, and passed it back.
“Better than rocks, aye?” His hand gently pressed on her shoulder. “Keep moving.”
Renee lay back, uncertain she could rise again. Her body shook, fighting gravity.