It was the assassin. Molly didn’t know him by face, but she recognized the caped hood of forest green he wore. This was one of Gonzalo’s huntsmen. She watched him wait, carefully hidden behind a hawthorn bush, his bow and arrow at the ready. Now Alaric came riding into view. The huntsman drew his bowstring with a strong arm and practiced grace and let the arrow fly. It soared through the air, perfectly aimed, sure to hit its mark—but then, quite unaccountably, the shaft began to bend into the shape of a sickle. . . .
It all happened as it had in real life. Nothing was changed or new—except that she had seen the archer. That was the reason her spirit had sent her this particular vision. That was the thing she needed to know: that it had not been Reynard’s man, but Gonzalo’s.
Fiercely as she tried to keep her concentration, she gasped at this revelation and couldn’t help asking herself why King Gonzalo, of all people, should want Alaric dead. Wouldn’t that spoil his little game of playing one cousin against the other?
No, she suddenly realized; it would make things even better. Reynard would inherit Alaric’s kingdom, making him twice as rich, with twice as much land and a most formidable army. Gonzalo needn’t choose between Westria and Austlind—he could have them both in the form of a single, stronger ally unencumbered by threat of invasion by its neighbor.
And if Reynard thought he could walk away from the alliance with Cortova, then a little blackmail would quickly change his mind—for the world would accept whatever version of Alaric’s death Gonzalo chose to tell. So if they came to an agreement on Gonzalo’s terms—the very ones to which Reynard had already signed his name—then the king of Cortova would swear it had been an accident.
Molly had entirely lost her focus now, but she knew she could find it again. And she was just about to begin when she heard a clank, then a rattle, as the door to her cell was unbolted and unlocked. When it swung open, there was such a press of soldiers filling the doorway that she could see nothing else but the sky above their heads. Terror passed over her, and then it was gone, replaced by determination. She leaped to her feet, poised and ready to fight.
But fighting wasn’t called for, it seemed. The man in front simply leaned down and set a small wooden bowl on the floor. Then he stepped back, shut the door again, and shot the bolt.
It pleased her enormously that they considered her such a threat that they’d brought a whole pack of soldiers just to deliver her bowl of bread—or slops, or porridge, or whatever it was she had no intention of eating. She smiled and sent a loving message of thanks to Sigrid—who was listening, Molly had no doubt—then she sat against the wall again and prepared herself for more.
It was easier this time. She slid almost effortlessly into the trancelike state, and her next vision came quickly.
For once the cat was not in evidence. Molly didn’t allow herself to wonder why. Nor did she react when she recognized the setting: the long terrace that ran behind the former barracks where she’d been seized by Gonzalo’s soldiers. She fought to keep her concentration, to hold the vision, as Alaric and Tobias came out of the villa and stood together, talking.
She heard every syllable of every word they spoke and followed them, step by painful step, as they moved toward their grim conclusion. And it was devastating, not because they said aloud the things she already knew: that she would die, probably soon, and there was no way they could save her. No, the devastating part was watching the two people she most loved in the world—so close, so lifelike, yet beyond her reach—and knowing she would never see them again.
That was, by far, the hardest thing of all. Beheading (or hanging, or burning at the stake, or however it was they executed criminals in Cortova) would hurt for a moment and then it would hurt no more. But to leave Alaric and Tobias forever was simply past bearing.
This terrible knowledge should have drowned her in another wave of grief, breaking her concentration and sending her back to her former state of hopeless despair. But it didn’t. Molly and her spirit were as one now.
All these years, she’d stood in the doorway of the place where her power and wisdom dwelt, taking the occasional cautious step across the threshold, grabbing something, then stepping back and running away. Now she’d entered the room and closed the door behind her—and once inside she was forever changed. She could grieve and watch at the same time; she was patient yet ready to pounce. All would work itself out according to the fates, and if her own death was written in the stars—she had been warned!—then she was prepared to accept it. But there was still something that had to be done, and her spirit would guide her. When that mission was clear, she would summon everything burning within her and accomplish this final task.
She sat, unmoving, hardly breathing, as if she’d been carved from a block of stone. Her thoughts and emotions floated above her; she could practically reach up and touch them. But they did not distract her. She was keeping watch, all her senses primed, for what her spirit would show her next.
“One of the slaves might get inside,” Tobias was saying. “Maybe we could send a message—”
“To whom? Who inside the walls would help us?”
“The princess. She can’t possibly believe Molly is guilty. They were friends. And she of all people has the power to make Gonzalo see reason.”
“That’s good, Tobias. A very real possibility. But the princess was badly injured in the fire. She might not be well enough to help.”
Behind them, the door from the common room opened—so quietly that any sound it made was swallowed by the wind—and a man slipped out, closing the door again behind him. He was dressed as a slave, but he wasn’t there to toss out slops. He was the perfect assassin: powerful, skilled, and as graceful as a dancer, not a single movement wasted or ill considered. A good actor, too, for he had fooled the king’s knights. Now he crept forward, as silent as a cat, his sword raised and ready to strike.
Tobias saw him first and cried warning; Alaric wheeled around and ducked under the slashing blade. Molly could hear the singing of steel against air. She saw Alaric lose his balance and fall. She watched as the man raised his arm to strike again.
But Tobias, large though he was, had always been quick. Now he threw himself between the killer and his prey. And as the sword came down, he caught the underside of the assassin’s arm, unbalancing him and spoiling his swing.
Alaric scrambled to his feet and drew his dagger. But Tobias and the assassin were now locked in a brutal embrace, spinning and stumbling, so that it was impossible to strike the one without risking the other.
And something else. The swing Tobias had interrupted had struck him on the shoulder instead. Now his blood was pulsing out in great, sharp jets, splattering the walls and pooling on the stone floor, which soon became slippery with gore. And strong though he was, Tobias couldn’t go on much longer.
“Run!” he kept shouting to Alaric. “Go!”
But the king remained, dancing around them with his dagger, trying to catch the assassin as he swung by without doing any more harm to Tobias. Once or twice he succeeded, but never to much effect.
Tobias’s movements were becoming erratic now. He was losing his grip on the man’s arms, and time was running out. He knew his wound was mortal; and once he collapsed, Alaric (who wouldn’t save himself, the bloody, stubborn fool!) would be the next to die.
But there was one thing he could still do, and it wouldn’t take three seconds. Tobias was a full two stones heavier than the nimble assassin; the weight of his body was his one remaining weapon.
And so—still holding on with the rag-ends of his strength, still skidding on the slick, wet stone—Tobias spun around so that he faced the sea. Then he fell, and the man fell with him—over the marble railing, onto the grassy verge, then over the cliff and down, down, down the sickening drop to the rocks and the sea far below.
29
Leondas
FROM A SMALL, LOCKED cubicle within the palace grounds and, beyond the wall, from a terrace that overlooked the sea,
two voices joined in a single cry of unspeakable pain. Alaric was on his knees in a pool of blood, his face distorted with rage. And Molly, still frozen, still held within the secret chamber of her spirit, screamed not with her voice, but with her soul.
And still her spirit wouldn’t release her, because it wasn’t over yet.
Molly watched as the king remained as he was: kneeling alone on the terrace, staring accusingly at the sky, his dagger lying useless on the ground, so heartsick and angry that he’d lost all caution or care for his own safety. She heard from within the villa, as Alaric apparently did not, a riot of clashing swords and grunting men, the thud of bodies falling, and the crash as furniture and crockery were overturned in the melee. Gonzalo’s men had overwhelmed Alaric’s guard. And the terrace, which had seemed a safe refuge, had become a trap.
The dark foreboding of loss and death that had hovered over her these past weeks now all but swallowed her up. But she struggled against it—not because she really thought she could save the king, but because she was so very angry that the fates should be that cruel and because there was something inside her that was growing and boiling till she thought she would burst apart.
It was then that Leondas came into her vision. He was running along the grassy verge at the edge of the cliff, then he darted between the columns of the railing and went to Alaric’s side. The cat rose on his hind legs, pawing the king’s chest, trying to get his attention but only succeeding in spotting his doublet with Tobias’s blood. He let out a plaintive cat-yowl, loud and insistent. The fur rose up on his back with fright. He yowled again.
Molly felt his fear and cried his cries. She touched Alaric with her cat’s paws.
Now they were streaming through the door, others coming up a ladder and over the far wall—three men, five, seven, ten, then more than she could count. In the space of three heartbeats, it would be over. There would be no escape except the one Tobias had already taken.
Molly felt a charge coursing through her body then, as if she’d been struck by lightning. And for a moment it filled her with its fire so that her skin was alive with the heat of it and every hair on her body rose up in alarm. The floor beneath her began to tremble. Her scream became the howl of tempest-winds as she felt all that power flowing back out of her, like some unstoppable force of nature. And in her vision Leondas began to grow and change. He was taller than a man, then taller than the building, and still he grew. His teeth were long and sharp like daggers, his vicious claws bared, and his eyes blazed red with menace: he had become the form of Molly’s rage, a monster of retribution.
Gonzalo’s soldiers froze—those who hadn’t the power or the wit to run away—as Leondas cupped them with his blood-soaked paws and flung them, two or three at a time, over the edge of the cliff. Then he took the king of Westria gently in his mouth, as mother cats carry their kittens, and bore him over the wall to safety.
He stepped carefully over the bodies of Alaric’s fallen men. Molly saw Lord Brochton lying among them and forgave him in passing, thanking him for dying in the service of his king. On Leondas went, away from the bloody barracks in the direction of Alaric’s villa.
Those of Alaric’s men who hadn’t been assigned to guard the villa had been roused by the sounds of battle. Now they were racing toward the terrace, unaware that it was already too late. Then they saw Leondas with Alaric in his mouth, and they actually dared to challenge him. They had to know that such a monster could not be slain with swords, but these were men whom Alaric had chosen for their loyalty and their courage—and like Tobias and Heptor Brochton, they would die trying to save him.
But to their astonishment, Leondas laid the king gently down and turned away. As they watched, stunned, he seemed to grow even more enormous, his graceful cat-steps causing the ground to tremble as he went: through the trees toward the inner curtain wall—built a thousand years before and reinforced many times since—and pulled it down with the swipe of a single paw.
Leondas knew where he was going. He made his way judiciously, not wishing to do unwarranted harm—past screaming people, stepping easily over buildings—until he’d reached the council chamber. There he crouched, and with his nose he pushed in the door and broke away a section of the wall and the roof above it.
Gonzalo had heard the screaming outside and had retreated to the far side of the room, his guards massed in front to protect him. But the cat pushed them aside. They were nothing to him, just soldiers doing their duty. It was Gonzalo he wanted.
Leondas took the king of Cortova in his claws, then squeezed him hard as he pulled him, screaming, out of the council chamber—where he’d played his ugly little games and hatched his evil plans, which had taken the lives of so many valiant men—and popped him into his mouth and bit down hard.
Then he swallowed.
And it was over.
Molly’s rage was spent. She felt it go, and it was as if a cool breeze was blowing across her. She opened her eyes and saw the dust motes dancing in the small ray of light that streamed in from the high, barred window. She looked down at her hands, touching the left with the right, turning the gold ring on her finger and thinking of Tobias. Then she did something quite ordinary and natural.
She wept.
Part Six
Critical move—a move that should be played carefully and slowly.
Critical moves often include complicated decisions, trading pieces, or inflexible plans that cannot be changed.
Draw—a game that ends in a tie.
Promotion—when a pawn reaches the final rank, it can be turned into another piece, usually a queen. Also known as “queening.”
Day Eighteen
30
The Queen of Cortova
THE FURNISHINGS HAD BEEN removed from the king’s reception room—the chair in which Gonzalo had sat over his breakfast, only a few weeks before, and informed his daughter that two suitors would soon be arriving, and the table where, not long thereafter, he’d written out the change of succession. Now it was empty except for the throne, which had been rescued from the ruin of the council chamber.
There Elizabetta now sat, dressed in a simple chiton of cream-colored linen. It had been hastily made—all her clothes having been destroyed in the fire—according to her precise stipulations: that the fabric was to be plain and that the sleeves should be long enough to cover the bandages on her arms. She had compromised on the gold fibulae. Estella had reminded her that she was the queen now and she really ought to look like one, and Elizabetta had granted her the point. But they were the only ornaments she wore. There was not even a crown to be had, except her father’s, and that she’d refused to touch.
She looked out at the assembly before her. Alaric stood on one side of the room with his remaining knights and his ladies. This included Molly, who looked more like an invalid than Elizabetta did. On the other side stood Reynard and his son with an equal number of knights to those that Alaric had brought. With the addition of the queen’s own men, the room was very crowded.
“I thank you all,” she began, “for remaining here till I was well enough to meet with you. And I apologize—though no apology could possibly suffice—for what you have borne at my father’s hand. If you now wish to leave this place where you have known such terrible loss and suffered such indignities, I will certainly understand. But I hope, instead, you will stay and help me build something new and hopeful out of the wreckage of my palace, and my kingdom, and these negotiations.”
There was the soft hum of assent. Acknowledgment and apology wouldn’t bring back the dead; but the words still needed to be spoken, and no one doubted she’d meant them sincerely.
“My lord king Reynard and my lord king Alaric, I will be honest with you, as my father never was. Cortova is under attack by enemies who threaten our trade in the Southern Sea. These past few years we have emptied our treasury building ships and manning them, hoping to pull the prize back out of the fire. The luxury you saw here was just a brave show meant to lure you in,
to trick you into an alliance in which you would pay far more than you would gain.”
The soft hum had grown to whispers and growls, but there remained a willingness to hear her out, if only because at last someone was telling them the truth. She had counted on that and was glad she’d been right.
“But I have a very different proposal to make.”
She waited. The room grew still.
“Our true wealth is the same as it ever was: our coastline, ports, and shipyards; our expert seamen, fine roads, and system of banking. And we have far more ships now, many of them new, than we ever had before. We are like the farmer whose fields are rich and well tilled, in a land where the sun is bright and the rain dependable; all he lacks is the money to buy seed.”
She had their attention now. She folded her hands, doing her best to look regal, and succeeding at it quite well.
“What if we bond together, our three kingdoms? Think of us as partners in a business. You help Cortova fight the Frasians, and in return you will each take a portion of all we earn in trade.”
The room burst into sudden conversation. She let it go on just long enough, then continued to speak without raising her voice. The people grew quiet again so they could hear.
“I am perfectly aware that you two cousin-kings have been enemies these last two years. My father was aware of it too, and used it against you. I personally think it’s a pointless waste. Why not combine our forces and build peace and prosperity instead of sowing hate and distrust?”
“A triple alliance, then?” Alaric asked. “Is that what you propose?”
“Yes. And while I’m being frank and truthful, there is one more thing I must tell you. The document that makes me queen of Cortova bears a stipulation. The change of succession is ‘conditional to the signing of a satisfactory treaty of alliance with either the king of Westria or the king of Austlind.’ I don’t see that a triple alliance is in any way contrary to that requirement. If anything, it’s an improvement upon it, and my legal advisers agree that this is so. But to be plain, if there is no alliance, my brother becomes king.”
The Princess of Cortova Page 17