Shona snatched her hand away from the bird, but if it rattled her at all, she didn’t show it. “I promise you’ll be with her again very soon,” she said gently. “But Rudol has to see you first, or he won’t understand why the others are here. He… might want to harm them.”
Eroh hesitated, looked at Azra. She signed something to him, and then for some reason her eyes strayed toward Josen. When she saw that he’d noticed, she quickly looked away.
“I can’t,” Eroh said. “She says she won’t leave me alone with highlanders.”
“Just let them come, Shona,” said Josen. “There’s no good way to reveal we smuggled swamplings into the Plateaus, so let’s just get all of our surprises out at once. If I somehow get Rudol to listen without cutting my head off and then we immediately tell him we’ve kept another secret, he’ll just be angry all over again.”
“You may be right about that.” Shona turned to Morne. “Cer Falyn, are the Storm Knights ready to keep the peace if this goes badly?”
“Knight-Commander Farrel gave his word,” said Morne. “For now, he’s accepted that I speak for Eian. But he’s not very eager to trust swamplings.” She gave Azra and Verik a sidelong glance that clearly said she didn’t much trust them either. “He’ll be listening to what you have to say as keenly as Prince Rudol will. Make it good.”
So if I can’t do this, we lose the Stormhall too. Josen knew the knight-commander; he’d had to apologize to the man more than once for embarrassing encounters with one knight or another. Farrel had never made it as difficult as he could have, but Josen suspected that had been Eian’s influence more than anything. He doesn’t have much reason to think kindly of me.
But he didn’t protest, just pushed his fingers through his hair and looked to Shona. This was her choice—he’d promised to follow her lead.
She was quiet for a moment, considering, and then she nodded. “Fine. They come with us. But there are some secrets we have to keep. Say nothing about the high chastor. I don’t want to complicate this with witchcraft and resurrections.”
Josen hesitated. “Benedern could be dangerous. Shouldn’t we warn Rudol?”
“He won’t believe the truth. Just… let me take care of it.” She waited until Josen reluctantly nodded his agreement. “Good,” she said. “Then let’s get this over with.”
Morne led the way, and the rest of them followed. Josen had to lean on Verik going down the stairs—he wouldn’t let Shona help him, even when she offered—but that was all. He was still standing on his own feet by the time they reached the hall where Rudol was waiting. Lord of Eagles, it’s sad that I’m so proud of this.
They entered at the back of the assembly hall, through a small door beside the speaker’s dais. Rows and rows of empty benches filled the main body of the room, divided by a long grey carpet rolled down the central aisle. A score of Storm Knights lined the aisle, standing at attention, and a half-dozen blue-clad Royal Swords waited at the far end of the room. Too many men with swords. This could go very, very wrong. From both sides of the aisle, Josen felt the eyes of the Storm Knights watching him—or more likely, he supposed, watching the swamplings. They were all scowls and narrowed eyes, but they held their positions, as Morne had promised. For now, but for how long? But Josen swallowed his unease, and followed Morne and Shona across the hall.
And there was Rudol.
He stood at the end of the aisle in the midst of his Royal Swords, a head taller than any man in the room but Ulman Benedern. Carissa and the high chastor flanked him on either side, but in that moment, they hardly mattered. Josen couldn’t take his eyes off of his brother. The boy he’d grown up with; the man who’d left him to die in the Swamp. Anger and regret and fear grappled with one another in his head and his chest, and then settled into a strange, numb sort of stalemate. How am I supposed to do this? Where do I even start?
Rudol was speaking to Knight-Commander Farrel—a fit older man with thinning black hair and long mustaches—but Carissa tapped him on the shoulder and pointed as Josen and the others approached. His eyes fixed on Josen as if there was no one else to see, as if he didn’t even notice the swamplings or the boy with the eyes of an eagle. The Swords looked to him for direction, but Rudol said nothing. He said nothing, and his face betrayed no more than his voice—he didn’t scowl, didn’t glare, didn’t so much as knit his brow. Someone else might have taken that as a good sign.
Someone else, but not Josen. He knew his little brother too well for that. He glanced down at Rudol’s hands, and sure enough, they were clenched into tight fists.
Josen spoke first. He’d never been comfortable with silence. “Rudol. I’m… sorry for the surprise. I wish it didn’t have to happen like this.”
His brother said nothing, just clenched his fists tighter.
All Josen could think to do was continue with the empty pleasantries. “Carissa. Always a pleasure.”
Carissa bobbed a shallow bow, astonishment plastered across her pretty face.
“And Your Eminence.” Josen inclined his head. “You look… considerably better than the last time I saw you.” You were dead, if I recall.
Benedern didn’t answer, or return the nod. He just stared. About his neck, he wore a pristine white bandage, as if the gaping hole in his throat had been only a flesh wound.
And still Rudol said nothing, though his eyes bored into Josen with uncomfortable intensity.
After a moment, Carissa shifted uneasily and said, “Prince Josen. We… we had heard—”
“I told you not to come back here.” Rudol’s voice, at last, but not the way Josen had expected. His brother didn’t yell. Instead the words were quiet, carefully controlled.
“Believe me,” Josen said, “I remember. I didn’t want to come back. But you also told me once that there are more important things than what I want. This is one of those times. I can explain—”
“What is there to explain? You’re a traitor to your people. I showed you mercy, and now you throw it back in my face.” Rudol’s hand went to the hilt of his weapon.
In an instant, every man in the room did the same, blue and grey-clad alike. Knight-Commander Farrel signalled his men with a gesture; the Storm Knights on either side of the aisle moved to surround Rudol and his Swords.
“Please, Rudol,” Shona said, and took a step toward him. “Don’t do this. We’re not here to fight. We just want you to listen.”
Rudol glanced at the men arrayed around him, and then back at Shona. “So this is why you wanted Morne and the rest sent here so badly. I suppose I made that very easy for you.” Slowly, he took his hand from his sword-hilt, and then motioned for the Royal Swords to do the same. “You disappoint me, Cer Farrel. You would side with a traitor over the king’s rightful heir? I’ve worn the grey. I’ve fought beside you. What has Josen done to make you trust him over me?”
Farrel’s cheeks flushed. “Your Highness, I am your servant and the king’s, you must believe that. I only want to stop you from making a mistake you can’t take back. Cer Falyn swears that she was sent by the lord general. That Prince Josen is not the traitor we’ve been told he is. If that is true, then he is still next in line—”
“Next in line for nothing!” And now Rudol’s control faltered, and his voice grew louder. “He has already been stripped of his inheritance!”
“Under false pretenses,” said Shona. “He didn’t do what Castar claims he did, Rudol.”
“What are they talking about, dear?” Carissa gripped her husband’s arm. “How is he even alive? You said you showed him mercy, but… you told your father he was dead. You told me he was dead.”
“No,” Rudol said through gritted teeth. “No, he lived. I should have killed him and thrown him in the mud to rot. The traitor’s burial no one else would have given him. I should have killed him, but instead I set him free. I let him live. Spirit of All, what a fool I was!”
“Set me free? You… think you set me free?” Josen’s weak arm trembled, and he gripped it with his
other hand to hold it still.
Before he could say anything more, he felt Shona nudge him. When he glanced at her, she shook her head almost imperceptibly.
With great effort, Josen bit back his growing anger. “Maybe… maybe you did. In a way. But you did it for the wrong reasons, Rudol. I never betrayed you, or anyone. All I did was see something Castar wanted to keep hidden. He tried to kill me because I saw Eroh’s true face.” He stepped aside and pointed at Eroh. “That face.”
This was what Shona had brought Rudol to the Stormhall to see, but he reacted as if he’d only just realized the swamplings were there at all. His gaze slid from Josen to Eroh, and he blinked as if waking from a dream. With slow steps, he approached the boy.
All eyes in the room turned to Azra and Eroh then. Azra stood utterly still as Rudol drew near, kept her chin up and her eyes straight ahead. Josen thought he saw her jaw flex once, but she managed an impressive poise for one so young, surrounded in the enemies of her people.
Eroh, though, showed no sign of fear at all. He just looked up at Rudol and cocked his head curiously. On his shoulder, Goldeyes did the same.
“I’m alive right now because a swampling saved me,” Josen said. “They aren’t the monsters you think they are. They don’t send Deeplings to attack us—they kill them. I’ve seen it. And if you don’t believe me, you have to believe the Sky God. Look at those eyes, Rudol.”
Rudol crouched before the boy. “This is… some swampling trick,” he said in a trembling voice. “Duke Castar said… he said he found the boy…” He didn’t finish the thought. With one hand, he reached up to touch Eroh’s cheek, his brown fingers standing in stark contrast against pale swampling skin.
“What trick could make eyes like that, or skin so pale?” asked Shona. “It’s no trick, Rudol. He bears the Sky God’s mark, and he’s a swampling.” She pointed an accusatory finger at the high chastor. “If you’re looking for explanations, ask him. He was beside Castar on the day they presented Eroh at Skysreach. You can’t believe he didn’t know the truth.”
Josen hadn’t noticed it before now, but it was strange that the high chastor hadn’t yet spoken in his own defense. Ulman Benedern wasn’t one to hold his tongue. Even with Shona’s finger pointing at him, his face was unsettlingly blank. He really isn’t in there anymore. That was as frightening as any Deepling.
Rudol whirled on Benedern. “Why? He… he said that I would be a good king. Has he been playing me for a fool all this time?”
Now that he’d been prompted, Benedern spoke at last. “Duke Castar and I feared that people wouldn’t understand, Your Highness. This boy is a swampling, yes, but that is a distraction. It will only lead to fear and confusion. The Word of the Wind tells us that the last Windwalker will show us the way to salvation. For that we must look Above, not below.” It was like listening to a mimic who had studied the high chastor’s voice, Josen thought—he sounded right, but there was no conviction there.
“What does that… I don’t need scripture right now!” Rudol rubbed a hand across his scalp. “Lord of Eagles, if all of it was a lie, then I…” He looked at the white in Josen’s hair as if he was noticing it for the first time. “What do you want from me? Are you here for the crown? I won’t give it to you. Even if I wanted to, it isn’t mine to give. Father still lives.”
“No!” Josen shook his head vehemently. “God Above, no. That is the last thing I want. I’m only asking you to do what’s right. I’m no chastor, but it seems to me that if the Sky God chose a swampling boy to bear his mark, the very least we can do is leave them alone. Promise an end to the purges.”
Rudol’s eyes widened. “Are you mad? One boy with Windwalker eyes doesn’t erase everything they’ve done! If they’d had a chance, they would have used him against us! Maybe that’s why Duke Castar did what he did. Maybe he saw through the trap they were setting.”
“You can’t be serious.” And there was the anger again, surging ahead of everything else. “What about the fact that he stabbed me, Rudol?”
“If you were talking like this, maybe he thought you’d been blood-cursed by a Deepling! Peace with the swamplings is a fever dream! Do you know how many good men they’ve killed?”
“No,” Josen said, and took a deep breath, fighting desperately for calm. “But I know we’ve killed at least as many of them. And both of those numbers are only going to rise if nothing changes.” He heard muttering among the Swords and the Knights of the Storm both, felt the weight of judging eyes from all sides. Damn it to the Deep, they don’t want to hear this. There’s too much history there.
Cer Farrel quieted his men with a raised hand, but even he wore a pensive frown. “You are asking us to trust an enemy that we have dedicated our lives to fighting, Prince Josen. I don’t know if I can do that.”
“Eian Gryston did,” Josen said. And that by itself was reason enough for him to keep trying. He had to, for Eian. For Zerill. For Zerill’s sister, who had died on his sword. For everyone who had sacrificed to get him this far. If I can’t make them understand, all of it was for nothing. “He believed we could have peace. That we might even work together against Castar.”
More murmuring among the knights, and he wanted to believe it sounded more charitable than before, but it was hard to tell. It helped, at least, that he could imagine it did.
“Then where is he?” demanded Rudol. “If he believes so much in this peace, why isn’t he here to say so himself?”
Josen had no idea how to answer that. There wasn’t a knight in the Peaks who would agree to peace if they knew that the swamplings might well have passed their judgement on the lord general already—and probably not a merciful one. He looked to Shona for aid.
“He… chose to go with the swamplings,” she said, picking her words slowly at first. “As an emissary. A sign of good faith. He was willing to risk it because he believed peace was possible. He believed that from the moment he saw Eroh’s face.”
And then Josen couldn’t pick a single voice out of the noise. Rudol was bellowing something, the Swords and the Storm Knights were shouting over one another, and it was impossible to tell one word of it from the next. Only Ulman Benedern was silent and still—which was, as far as Josen was concerned, far worse than if he’d joined in.
Amid the cacophony, Josen exchanged a look with Shona. He raised one eyebrow, and hoped that was enough to ask the question she couldn’t have heard if he’d said it aloud. If Eian doesn’t come back alive, isn’t that going to spoil any truce we make? She spread her hands and swept her eyes over the men shouting on all sides. He understood. They had to deal with this, right now. The rest, they could worry about later.
Again, Farrel raised a hand for silence. This time it took a long while for anyone to heed him, but eventually the roar of voices dulled.
“Is this true?” Farrel asked Morne. “He went with them of his own will?”
“He did,” Morne answered. “You know that I wouldn’t have let him go otherwise.”
For a time, Farrel was quiet, and then he turned to Rudol. “Your Highness, the boy’s face… they aren’t lying about where he comes from. Anyone can see that. If the lord general trusts in him… in this peace… even a temporary truce would leave us free to focus on Duke Castar.”
“You can’t believe this, Farrel.” Rudol stared at the knight-commander incredulously. “Even if Eian was fooled, it doesn’t mean—”
Josen cut him off. “If Eian’s word isn’t enough, or that Eroh bears the mark of a Windwalker, all I can say is that I’ve spent more time among the swamplings than any man of the Peaks ever has. And I’m telling you they don’t deserve to die. I owe my life to a swampling woman, and these two”—he gestured at Verik and Azra—“risked theirs to get me here so I could tell you the truth. Castar tried to kill me to stop that from happening. Why do you think he did that? Or lied about Eroh? Peace with the swamplings wouldn’t be of any use to him. He wants them as a distraction, a common enemy to divert attention away from him
. They aren’t the real threat. He is. He’s going to take what he wants, and then point everyone in the wrong direction when they start to wonder what happened. He’s already done it in Greenwall. The Plateaus are going to be next, if you don’t do something to stop it.”
Rudol looked like a trapped animal. His eyes darted from face to face all around the room, searching for an escape. “He wouldn’t… he must have had some reason. I have to talk to him myself. I’ll send a falcon, summon him here.”
“There’s no time,” said Shona. “He might well be marching on the Plateaus already. He knows that we meant to come here and he knows what we meant to tell you. He has Greenwall now—he can feed an army if he has to. Send a bird if you must, but ready the guard and the Swords too. Send out scouts, muster the militia. Send for aid from your grandmother in Whitelake, and Carissa’s father in the Wolfshead. Don’t let Castar take you by surprise.”
“No one has ever taken a duchy from the Swamp,” said Rudol. “Even if you’re right… he wouldn’t risk some futile siege.”
“I don’t think any gate will stop them long,” Josen said, and couldn’t keep himself from glancing sidelong at Benedern. He’d promised not to say anything, but just being near the man made him uneasy. “I’ve seen what the deepcraft can do, and Castar has a man who can use it. ”
“Deepcraft?” Rudol’s eyes narrowed. “Now you expect me to believe Duke Castar is going to use swampling magic against his own people?”
Carissa gripped Rudol’s arm with both hands. “Maybe… maybe there’s something to what they’re saying, dear. If Duke Castar lied about this boy, what else might he have lied about? Even if most of it is nonsense… It can’t hurt to be ready, can it?”
Rudol stared at her for a long moment, as if he couldn’t quite believe even she had turned against him. And then his shoulders slumped, and he said, “Fine.”
“You’ll fight?” Josen nearly laughed out of sheer relief. He’s going to do it. I’m not going to have to lead Shona’s revolution.
The Swampling King (The Windwalker Legacy Book 1) Page 68