Forsaken Kingdom (The Last Prince Book 1)

by J. R. Rasmussen

  Already the details were ebbing away, leaving only a raw ache in his chest, as if he’d run a great distance on a cold winter’s day. The man’s (his father’s) words were dissolving, his face hidden in shadow. But Wardin remembered one thing: the inkwell would help him think. And understand.

  He needed it. He was convinced of it, with a stubborn, unhesitating resolve that he was surprised to find himself capable of—but that was, paradoxically, also not an entirely alien feeling.

  He couldn’t steal it. That would be asking for death, as surely as if he followed Falk’s example and threw himself from the tower. But he could at least have another look at it. The king’s scouts might be following Wardin, but they hadn’t gone so far as to post a watch outside his room at night. At least, not as far as he knew.

  The king and queen had once used bedchambers adjacent to the solar, but they’d taken rooms in a newly-built wing the summer before. The solar would be empty at this time of night. It would also be locked, but there were benefits to being an educated man. Wardin was familiar enough with the inner workings of a lock. He was fairly certain he could pick it with a cloak pin and his fruit knife.

  There would be guards patrolling that part of the castle. He might slip past them, if he timed it right. But if he was caught, he would lose his chance. And worse.

  It would be wiser to be patient, and wait for an opportunity to present itself. Until he was called to the solar on some matter, until the king’s back was turned. Even until Bramwell was absent from the palace.

  But Wardin’s throat burned at the thought. He was feeling neither wise nor patient. When he’d woken from that dream, something had awakened within him. Some determination, some daring, that he hadn’t possessed before.

  Boldness isn’t always a virtue, Wardin.

  He swallowed again, this time to banish a thickness that threatened to suffocate him. A lilting voice. A set chin, a waterfall of ink-colored hair. The memory flared and faded again before he could take hold of it.

  By his estimation, the sun would be up in two hours, which meant servants would be moving around the palace in one. There was no time for indecision. Wardin pulled on a tunic and a pair of trousers, but left his feet bare, the better to move silently. He tucked the tools he needed into his pockets then, after a moment’s consideration, fastened a dagger to his belt.

  He took no trouble to hide as he walked the first floor corridors toward the great hall. If any explanation proved necessary, it would be easy enough to claim he was going to the kitchen for some ale or a headache remedy.

  Going upstairs was more daunting; he had no good reason to be there in the thick of the night, and the stairways offered no place to hide. Wardin huffed his thanks to the deities when he made it to the third floor without encountering anyone.

  The solar was only a short walk down two corridors. But they would have to be navigated carefully. He sidled away from the stairs to the nearest alcove.

  Once there, he crouched in the shadows, and cursed the pounding in his ears that made it difficult to listen. He would have to wait for the patrol to pass, and keep hidden when they did. One stray glance from one of them, or one faulty move from him, and he’d find himself awaiting the king’s justice. But it was the only way to determine their pattern, and align his own movements with it.

  He needn’t have troubled himself over hearing the guards. It seemed they’d grown complacent through their years of peace, protecting the most feared king in all of Cairdarin; the pair of them chatted readily, and made no attempt to quiet their footsteps. Wardin held his breath and pressed himself against the alcove’s side wall as they approached.

  They passed him by, walking toward the solar rather than away from it. When they’d gone, Wardin crawled to the opposite wall, to position himself at the most advantageous angle for remaining unseen when they circled back from the other direction.

  He waited in stillness as they passed again, and then twice more. They were in no hurry, and it got more and more difficult to regulate his breathing as he worried over the time he was losing, and the risk of being seen. Only when he’d hidden long enough to be sure of their timing did he finally creep out of the alcove.

  At least their idle pace would serve him well in the next stage of his task. As long as picking the lock didn’t take too many attempts, he would have plenty of time to get into the solar.

  It did take too many: six, in all. It didn’t help that his hands began to shake after the third. When he finally got it open, the click of the lock was like a hammer striking an anvil in the quiet of the passageway.

  Or not so quiet; he heard the distant rumble of the guards’ voices returning. Wardin took a candle from his pocket and lit it on a nearby sconce, but his rush to the solar door killed the flame. The voices were joined by footfalls.

  Ignoring the sweat dripping into his eyes, he lit the candle again and, cupping one hand around it, returned to the door.

  He was still easing it closed when the guards rounded the corner. He didn’t dare latch it for fear they would hear. As they came closer, Wardin turned away from the door and shielded the candle’s light with his body, then held his breath, awaiting fate’s judgment.

  The guards passed, then passed again. All was quiet once more.

  For several moments, Wardin did nothing but breathe slowly and wait for the sudden weakness in his muscles to pass. After all this trouble, it wouldn’t do to announce himself by walking into something, or knocking something over.

  With only a single candle to light the darkness—the windows were of no help, at this hour—the walk across the room seemed endless. The river rush mat was hot and scratchy against his bare feet, after the stone of the corridor. But finally he reached the king’s desk, and the object he had crept through the palace in the dead of night to hold in his hand.

  It was heavy for its size, another sure sign that the silver came from Eyrdon’s mines. Wardin pushed up the lid with his thumb and sniffed; there was no ink inside, and if he was any judge, there hadn’t been for quite some time. Thus assured that there was no danger in turning or tipping the inkwell, he brought the candle closer to inspect the engraving on the lid.

  The lines were so delicate, they were almost impossible to see—Wardin nearly set his hair on fire trying to get the closest possible look. He was fairly certain it was a rendering of an animal. A dragon? That would make sense; the black dragon was Eyrdon’s symbol. An Eyrd silversmith might use it to mark the inkwell’s origin and authenticity.

  But there was something particular about this dragon, the way it sat upright, rather than walking on four legs. As so many things had lately, the thought danced at the edge of his consciousness, deep-rooted, unreachable. While the guards once again chattered their way up and down the corridor outside, Wardin stood still and silent, grasping at a memory that broke apart and faded away like smoke.

  Eyrdri’s teeth. Gripping the inkwell as if he might choke it, he turned it over and ran his thumb across the bottom. There was something there, as well. He brought the candle closer still.

  Two letters, twined together: BR. If it was a mark of ownership, it meant nothing to him. As was often the case with commoners, Wardin had no family name. Those weren’t the initials of anyone he knew.

  At least, nobody he remembered.

  6

  Bramwell

  The rain pounding against the palace’s stone walls made Bramwell think—quite pleasantly—of fist striking bone. He stood at the row of windows and watched the water do what his hands longed to.

  He had put the inkwell on his desk as a test. At the time, he had no way of knowing whether Wardin had seen it at Narinore, before it found its way to Eyrdon’s illegal magistery. But as it was the only Rath possession Bramwell had, it had to do.

  He’d feared that Falk’s trick might have snapped right along with the old man’s back, and knew that if the inkwell meant anything to Wardin, it would show in the boy’s face. Against all odds, Draven Rath’s son was
not an especially capable liar.

  That artless face was why, while it was plain that the inkwell did mean something to Wardin, Bramwell didn’t think it meant everything. He remembered all too well the day the boy had been brought to the garden, how even at the age of twelve he refused to show his fear. The last surviving member of the houses of Rath and Ladimore had his share of pride. If Wardin knew who he truly was, he would be incapable of acting the part of a humble adept.

  And if he didn’t know, if he was merely confused, there was no rush to act. They’d been meticulous in cultivating their deception. Bramwell would not undo all the care they’d put into it by being hasty or untidy now.

  Years ago, after Wardin’s betrayal of the Eyrds and unity with the Lancet monarchy had been convincingly established, Bramwell had made it generally known that he’d settled his young cousin in a country manor, to live out his days in peace and obscurity. People forgot the boy quickly enough after that, at least in Harth. The Eyrds, perhaps, remembered him a bit longer—but they did not do so with fondness.

  As time went by, the number of people in the palace who knew or suspected the truth dwindled down to a trusted few. Wardin was kept closeted away with Jervis, until nobody would associate the young scholar who’d been brought to the palace as an apprentice with the young prince who’d been brought as a prisoner.

  Maintaining one illusion for Wardin and another for the rest of the world depended upon keeping anyone who might recognize the boy at a safe distance. They must never realize he was unaware of his true identity, and they must never be in a position to reveal it to him, inadvertently or otherwise. In a bustling palace where few could spare attention for a lowborn adept of no consequence, in a crowded city where nobody knew the face of a long-forgotten Eyrd of no interest, it wasn’t an unduly difficult arrangement.

  But it was a delicate one. And it must be handled with the utmost care, now that it had been upheld for so long. It would not do for it to come out now that the erstwhile Prince of Eyrdon had spent the past seven years trapped in a contriver’s trick, by order of the very king who enforced the ban against magic so mercilessly.

  And so Bramwell had waited, after Falk’s death, and watched, and tested his young cousin. The trick might have grown so strong, so fixed, that it would survive its caster. The boy might have thought the inkwell familiar, been momentarily bothered by it, then dismissed it as a trivial thing.

  But that wasn’t what had happened.

  Grinding his teeth, Bramwell looked away from the rain, down at the inkwell in his hand. He ran his fingers over the lid, tracing the dragon emblem of the noble and ancient house of Rath—nearly extinct now, but for one.

  Then he turned the inkwell over, and glared at what had so infuriated him when he came into the solar that morning: Baden Rath’s initials, partly obscured by a single drop of candle wax.

  Wardin was not dismissing it.

  Bramwell would never have thought the boy bold enough to sneak into the king’s private room. His staid, obedient young adept must have been very troubled indeed, to risk such a thing. Either that, or the boy had come back to enough of his true self to have a greater appetite for risk.

  A decision would have to be made. But first Bramwell needed to know just how far Wardin had gone, and how far he might go.

  “Majesty?” Guy bowed his way into the solar. “I’m grateful you called for me.”

  “Are you?” Bramwell eased his grip on the inkwell, just enough to bring some color back to his knuckles, and motioned with the other hand for his master scout to come forward. “What have you to tell me, then?”

  “I’ve received some concerning news from our scouts across the sea. It seems Iver of Dordrin may be renewing his ambitions for—”

  “The boy, Guy,” Bramwell interrupted. “What have you to tell me of his whereabouts? Yesterday in particular, if you please.”

  Guy blinked at him. “The boy, Majesty? Forgive me, but perhaps … that is to say, I would advise that this problem with Dordrin be given greater weight.”

  “You would advise?” Bramwell pinched the bridge of his nose and begged Hart for patience. Guy had been a poor replacement for Falk in every way, not least due to his impertinence. He had no great intellect, and of course, no magic at all. But he did possess a certain useful cunning, and in any case, there’d been no help for it. The strain of maintaining the trick had burdened (and finally crushed) Falk until he was quite beyond use. “Guy, keeping Dordrin in check relies in part on our alliance with Aldarine, does it not?”

  The furrow in Guy’s brow deepened. “It does, Majesty. Usher of Aldarine has a son close in age to your youngest niece. I thought perhaps a betrothal—”

  “Usher of Aldarine is precisely the point.” Bramwell’s voice was soft, but it cut Guy off as effectively as a slap. “Surely as my master scout, you are well aware that Usher is fanatical in his opposition to mortal men using magic?”

  Guy swallowed. “I am, Majesty.”

  “Then you will understand that keeping my method for dealing with Wardin a secret is, in fact, of wider importance to us.”

  “As you say, Majesty,” Guy said with a bow.

  “And tell me, one other thing.” The heat in his chest seemed to rise through his throat, and Bramwell finally allowed the full intensity of his ire into his voice. “Do you think it your place to advise me?”

  Guy’s mouth fell open and flapped helplessly for a moment before he was able to regain some semblance of control over it. “No … Majesty … of course not … I merely … apologies, Majesty.”

  Bramwell scoffed. “The boy’s whereabouts, Guy.”

  “Yes, of course. Nothing out of the ordinary, Majesty. If there had been I’d have brought word right away, of course. The usual lessons with the children, a visit to the former master adept. He consulted several old texts for the healers, as well. I believe the queen requested that, some malady among her ladies.”

  “He visited Jervis yesterday?”

  “Yes, Majesty, but that isn’t unusual. I understand he goes nearly every week. I’m told he might have developed an affection for the man’s niece, the baker’s daughter, I don’t recall her n—”

  “Yes yes, that will do,” Bramwell interrupted with a wave of his free hand. “His romantic dalliances are of no interest to me. If he’s anything like his father, he’ll have a bastard or two running around Witmare before another year’s gone by.”

  If I allow him to live that long. He tried in vain to rub the blooming tension from the base of his skull. “Anything else?”

  “No, Majesty. As I said, nothing out of the ordinary.”

  Bramwell turned back to the windows, passing the inkwell back and forth between his hands. The pelting rain was no longer a pleasant sound; he felt a headache coming on.

  “We’ll discuss Dordrin later,” he said finally, without turning to face his master scout again. “And the possibility of an Aldarine marriage for Mairid, as well. You might have some of your people test the waters at Usher’s court.”

  “Yes, Majesty.”

  “In the meanwhile, we’ve something else to attend to. Send someone to fetch Jervis.”

  “I assure you, Majesty, Wardin hasn’t the slightest idea of being a Rath.” Jervis’s voice was faltering under the pressure of long questioning, so that the words were more croaked than spoken. “The ruse is still perfectly intact. He knows nothing.”

  Bramwell leaned back in his chair, stretching his long legs beneath his desk, and arched a brow. “Nothing but what you told him, you mean.”

  “But Majesty, what I told him was only to preserve his ignorance!” Jervis gestured at the inkwell, back in its customary place on the desk, as he paused for a slightly trembling breath. “He knew it had something to do with his family. He told me he thought it was his. You must see that binding a dangerous memory to an innocent fiction was the best possible solution. Wardin already believed it belonged to a relative, so I simply gave him a relative to attach it to. I
t renders that memory harmless, you see.”

  “Jervis, your years as an adept have given you a very unfortunate habit of lecturing,” Bramwell said with a scowl. “Kindly do not tell me what I must see. What I do see is that you readily confirmed the boy’s theory that this inkwell is a family heirloom. His family’s heirloom.”

  “I wouldn’t say readily,” Jervis muttered.

  Guy elbowed the old man in the ribs. “Speak clearly to your king.”

  Jervis teetered sideways, although the blow hadn’t been an especially hard one. His advancing age and a malady of the joints had left him weak and unsteady in recent years. And then, he’d been standing before his king for the past half hour, after a long walk to the palace in inclement weather. Bramwell was mildly impressed that the man was keeping to his feet at all. But as he had not been invited to sit, he had no choice.

  “Apologies, Majesty,” Jervis said. “I assure you, I did not tell Wardin anything readily. I would have greatly preferred to get him to drop the matter. That would have been the safest course for us all, wouldn’t it? Including myself, and I’m wise enough to realize it.” He spread his hands. “But it was clear he was going to pursue it until he got an answer, so I provided one. A simple, toothless one that he could accept and forget.”

  Bramwell snatched up the inkwell, brandishing it like a weapon. “Except he did not forget it, Jervis, and he did not accept it.”

  Jervis swallowed and bowed his head. “I did my best, Majesty. Apologies if I acted in error.” He cleared his throat. “But surely if you gave it another day or two, if you were to be patient, this whole thing would pass. The shock of Falk’s death is bound to have caused Wardin a bit of trouble, but he’s always been a steady, obliging sort. He’ll return to his normal routine, and all will be well, you’ll see.”

  Bramwell scoffed. “He’s been a steady and obliging sort, Jervis, because Falk tricked him into being one. The boy’s true nature is not as admirable as you might think.” He stood and fixed the old man with a glare. “And you do seem to admire him greatly.”