“Already taken care of.” Polly came over with a fresh pitcher and two more mugs. “His Highness will always have a full mug here.”
“Owing more to my blackhound than to respect for the royal house of Rath.” Wardin laughed as the innkeeper swatted him with a towel. “See? No fear at all.”
“If you ask me, Eyrdon’s had enough of fearsome royalty, thank you very much. You just give a shout if you need anything more.”
When Polly had gone, Wardin gestured around the table. “Well, not to imply any lack of confidence in the two of you, but this isn’t quite the army I was hoping for.”
Quinn chuckled. “It’s not so bad as all that. We’ve talked to seventy or eighty, and each of those knows others. Word will spread. All told, I think you can count on two hundred, give or take, to come when you call them up.”
The tightness in Wardin’s neck eased, and he thought he might make a move toward those dumplings, after all. It was a far cry from raising an army, and there was still much to do. But convincing those who’d been fighting for his enemy that day was certainly a start.
“The company started out with more than three hundred Eyrds,” Quinn went on. “I’d say two thirds of that is an excellent number, for twenty days’ work.”
“Especially since you scattered them so effectively,” Baelar added with a smile. “Running men have a tendency to keep running.”
“Very true, and many of them see danger on all sides,” said Quinn. “So far they’ve escaped Tobin’s wrath because he scurried away before he could take a true accounting. He doesn’t know who died, who fled, and who turned their cloaks.”
“Tobin.” Erietta’s eyes went cold. “He lives, then? None of us saw him that day.”
Quinn scoffed. “Most likely because he was hiding in his hole, until he caved it in. But I’m sorry to say he’s back in Narinore now.” He scratched his mostly gray whiskers, and looked back at Wardin. “Things are going to go from bad to worse there.”
Wardin nodded, and some of the relief he’d been feeling ebbed away at the daunting thought of the hardships ahead. “Things will get worse all over Eyrdon. Rest assured, the king hasn’t taken our defense of the magistery as anything less than a declaration of war. He’s coming.”
“Then he’ll come with an army,” Quinn said. “Tobin’s a fool, but his father is not. Old Bramwell won’t underestimate you again.”
“No,” Wardin agreed. “But we have time to prepare. We’re well into autumn, and it was a cold summer. By the time he raises an army—of Harths, obviously, he won’t trust his conquered Eyrds again—the snows will be falling in earnest. This isn’t his first war here. He knows better than to try to fight it in these mountains in the winter. We have until spring, and I intend to use that time wisely.”
He glanced at Erietta, who gave him a small nod and cleared her throat. “In the meanwhile,” she said, “perhaps you can get the word out that we will welcome those soldiers who are still afraid for themselves or their families.”
Quinn’s mouth fell open. “Welcome them at the magistery?”
Wardin frowned, taken aback by the man’s surprise. “Of course. You don’t think I’d fail to protect them, once they gave me their allegiance?”
“Bramwell knows our exact location now,” Erietta added. “Most families don’t want their children here any longer, now that it’s become such a dangerous place. Defending ourselves, defending magic, will always be our first concern. But we’re willing to suspend instruction, temporarily. We have the capacity for several hundred beds, all told, although the accommodations are hardly luxurious under those conditions.”
“Pendralyn is well fortified, highly defensible.” Wardin spread his hands. “And at the moment, it’s the only fortress we’ve got.”
He’d discussed this with Erietta and the other headmagisters some days ago, and the irony had not escaped him at the time: all the struggle and bloodshed they’d suffered to save the magistery, only to stop teaching, and turn it into the center of his rebellion instead. But there was no safety in isolation and secrecy anymore, not when Bramwell would come back for them.
“You misunderstand,” Quinn said. “It’s not the practical matters that concern me. The men … well … they might not be willing to come here.” He gave Erietta an apologetic shrug and ducked his head. “They’re mistrustful of magicians, see. It’s been a long time since magic was practiced openly anywhere in Cairdarin, and old Cadric had a lot of people believing it an evil art, by the end of the dissolution.”
“An impression we’ve only confirmed with our trick,” Erietta said with a nod. “We’ll have to work on improving that. And what better way than by opening our doors to them?”
Baelar started to say something, but he was interrupted by Polly, hurrying to their table with a furrowed brow.
“Wardin,” she said. “Highness, I mean. There’s something upstairs for you. A cask. It was left in one of the rooms, but I don’t know when. One of the maids just found it, and the room was unoccupied.”
Wardin and Erietta exchanged uneasy looks. An enemy might deliver a cask of poison, of explosive powder, even. They quickly excused themselves and followed Polly upstairs.
She gestured down one of the narrow corridors. “Third room on the left. Call me if it’s anything that concerns you. Or that should concern me. I can send for some help, if you need it.”
Wardin nodded at her, partly in thanks, partly in dismissal. If it was something dangerous, the fewer people in the room, the better.
The large cask—it looked to be of the same oak they stored mead in, at Pendralyn—sat in the middle of the floor, where it could not possibly be missed, in an otherwise ordinary guest room. A letter on top of it was neatly addressed to Wardin, and sealed with plain blue wax that bore no mark of its sender.
Erietta knelt before the cask and rested her palm on it. Wardin did the same, then cleared his mind and focused on the wood beneath his hand, the energy—or lack thereof—it suggested to him. Finally he shook his head.
“I don’t detect any magic.”
“No. I don’t detect any traps or danger, either.”
Remembering how he’d escaped Bramwell at Witmare, Wardin picked up the letter and crossed the room. “Stay back, and if I should suddenly collapse, get one of the healers and suggest the culprit might be powdered risalt.”
With that, he broke the seal and unfolded the page. There was no powder, only the heavy, fastidiously straight script Wardin immediately recognized as the king’s.
Wardin,
Congratulations on the continued survival of your magistery. I send you this cask of wine, not only so you might toast your little victory, but in hopes that you will also join me in toasting the recent betrothal of my young niece, Mairid, to Radley, heir to the Aldar throne. (It’s a fine vintage from the north of Aldarine, and quite expensive, so please do not empty it into that stream you so love to pollute out of fear that I’ve poisoned it.)
Mairid grows lovelier by the day, and though she is too young to marry for quite some time yet, I trust this promised match will bring her great joy—something she’s desperately needed since your betrayal. I was sure to tell her how you used her, deceived her into helping you escape after you so coldly murdered poor old Jervis. She was heartbroken, as you might expect, and I don’t think she’s quite recovered from the ordeal even now. Perhaps she never will be.
But no doubt it will be a great comfort to her to know that she is serving Cairdarin by sealing such an important alliance. Radley and his father, Usher of Aldarine, were both quite scandalized to hear that you’ve been hiding a magistery in Eyrdon. They are eager to lend me their support—in both silver and soldiers, both of which they’ve pledged in most generous quantities—to root out this evil from my land. They ask only that I burn every last heretic I find there, to set an example. Naturally, I am more than happy to oblige.
Until spring, then.
Your affectionate cousin,
Br
amwell, King of Harth
“Wardin?”
He didn’t take his eyes from the letter. His face must have been quite a sight, for Erietta to sound so tentative and afraid. But Wardin found he could not reassure her. Rage pounded through his skull, searing the bone, and he feared that if he opened his mouth, flames might erupt from it.
He could hardly draw a full breath, as he thought of the little girl with the crooked teeth and the dreamy smile. The girl who had once wished for a world full of magic. Now she would never get even the smallest glimpse of it. She’d been bartered to a kingdom where magic was a grievous sin.
Because of him. So Bramwell could have an ally in his fight against Pendralyn and Eyrdon.
And for the sheer joy of spiting Wardin. Mairid thought he’d murdered Jervis. She thought he’d manipulated her. It wrenched his heart.
“Wardin?”
“It’s from the king.” He swallowed hard as his gaze drifted to the cask. “He knows about the stream, by the way. He wants me to know he knows.”
“What else does it say?”
“Just what you’d expect. That he can’t stand that he’s lost to us. That he’ll have his revenge, in ways both great and petty. That he means to burn us.” Wardin met Erietta’s eyes at last, his own gone to stone. “Let him try. I certainly mean to burn him.”
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Forsaken Kingdom (The Last Prince Book 1) Page 31