A Draw of Kings

by Patrick W. Carr

  “Well?” the duke demanded.

  The readers eyed each other, hesitating. The Soede spoke first. “Any cast from wood has a possibility of error, Your Grace, but it appears that Earl Stone is telling the truth.”

  Martin nodded affirmation. “I was there, Your Grace. One of the Merakhi guards killed your son for a perceived insult to the ilhotep.”

  Dane moved to stand between Martin and the duke. “Your Grace, it hardly matters how your son died. To a man, these three are against you. The peasant boy stole the princess from your son. Had she not followed him to Merakh, your son would still be alive.”

  The duke nodded. “Yes. They have much to answer for.”

  For a moment, palpable relief flooded across Dane’s features.

  The door to the audience chamber opened and a soldier in blue, a captain, hustled toward the duke. He stopped just short of the guards, who stood regarding him as if he might be a threat, and went to one knee.

  Weir snapped when the man did not speak. “What?”

  The captain, head bared, kept his eyes on the carpet. “Your Grace, the palace guards report the princess has been taken.”

  Weir threw curses toward the officer, punctuating them with slashes of his sword. “Impossible. Bring me those witless dolts who allowed her escape.”

  The captain licked his lips. “I cannot, Your Grace. They were found inside her apartments, dead.”

  The duke’s gaze darted around the chamber as if he suspected the marble busts and statues of conspiring against him. “He’s penetrated the palace.”

  Martin smiled, his eyes radiant with savage joy.

  Weir snapped his fingers at his readers. “Find the pretender.”

  His brother stepped forward, one hand reaching as if to offer comfort, but his hand shook and the gesture appeared fearful. “Might it not be best to enlist the conclave in this?”

  The duke’s head jerked in denial. “No. Not until I am assured there are no traitors remaining. One false reader could cost us days.” He turned to the two men with their blanks spread before them. “You will work until he is found. Success brings reward. Failure . . .” He didn’t bother to finish.

  “What of these, Your Grace?” Dane asked, pointing toward Errol, his eyes hungry. “Would it not be best to dispose of them now that your victory is at hand?”

  Again Weir shook his head. “Your zeal becomes you, Benefice Dane, but men are a resource, like oxen or horses. In time we may do without the priest and the reader, but the peasant has services to render to us.” He gave a careless wave. “Put them beneath the watch.”

  His gaze lashed at them all. “Men loyal to me will be posted outside your door. If I fall, you will die.”

  Adora made her way to the poor quarter and Healer Norv’s shop. The streets held fewer people than she remembered, and more guards. Many of them wore blue, and when those who didn’t crossed paths with those who did, they gave way. She followed their lead, keeping her head down and her hair tucked into the dingy cloak she wore. Taverns and shops threw yellow puddles of light into the street, beckoning with promises of warmth and laughter she spurned. When strangers approached, she put her hand on the pommel of her sword. Better if everyone assumed her to be a man.

  When she arrived at her destination, a low-slung building with a healer’s sign of the sheaf and pestle over the entrance, she nearly sobbed with relief. The thick door rattled in its frame with each strike from her clenched fist. Norv lived above his shop; the healer never turned anyone away.

  Steps sounded from within, but instead of welcoming her, the door creaked open less than a handsbreadth before it stopped. Norv’s disheveled face filled the crack.

  “What’s your business? I don’t see people after dusk.”

  Adora rushed forward to put her face in the dim light of Norv’s lamp. “Healer, it’s me.”

  His eyes squinted beneath grizzled brows that were whiter than she remembered. “I require a name, lad. State your illness and go away until tomorrow. I’m old.”

  She reached back to free her hair from the confines of her clothing. “I’m not a lad. It’s me—Dorrie.”

  With an oath, the healer thrust open the door and yanked her inside. Swearing under his breath, he slammed it shut again and barred it. “Are you daft, Highness, running the poor quarter after dark with the duke’s men busting the skull of anyone who looks at ’em crossways?”

  Adora reeled, put out a hand against a nearby table to steady herself. “How long have you known who I am?”

  Norv gave an exasperated sigh. “Do you think you can be a healer if you’ve got mush for brains, lass? I suspected the second time you came. I had Denny follow you to make certain.”

  She shook her head in disbelief. “You never said anything.”

  “Ha, and lose my best assistant? After you started working here, Rodran started to take notice of things in the poor quarter.” He dipped his head, eyes closed. “I don’t think Duke Weir likes them that live here. The place is worse than it ever was. I don’t much care for our next king.”

  “He’s not going to be king.”

  The healer grew still. “I’m supposed to turn you in to the guard for saying such a thing, Princess. The duke issued the edict himself just after your uncle died.”

  Adora stepped back in case she needed room. What had happened to him? “If you’re too scared to stand up to the duke, then say so and I’ll leave. There must be a man on this island somewhere.”

  Norv’s face softened until she recognized him once more. He turned to address the shadows at the back of the room. “Is that enough for you? It’s the princess, for Deas’s sake.”

  Out of the blackness that shrouded the rear of Norv’s shop stepped a god. Thick blond hair cascaded to shoulders broad enough to grace a blacksmith, yet he moved with the grace of one born to the saddle. When he smiled in greeting, his blue eyes caught and amplified the light of Norv’s lamp until they twinkled. Then he knelt.

  Liam.

  But he had changed. He rose from the floor like a lion rising from rest. The innocence of the village youth had been quenched and tempered into something more, the open look once in his face gone, replaced by a gaze that bored into her, weighing, measuring. She caught herself on the verge of bowing, as if in recognition of his nobility. Instead, she bent from the waist, deeper than his station required, but no less than her heart demanded. “Captain Liam.”

  “Your Highness, if you’ll accompany me, I’ll take you to a place of greater safety.” He shrugged as if in apology. “I would have said ‘someplace safe,’ but Weir’s men have begun searching the poor quarter of late, so there is no place safe, and we dare not risk attack until reinforcements come from the mainland garrisons.”

  Liam clasped hands with Norv, then led Adora through the back of the shop. The alley stank of rotting food and other smells she didn’t want to think about. Unexpected turns down narrow ways and back onto broad streets in decline brought them to the rear of a large inn. Raucous laughter told her the sort of establishment they’d entered. They passed through a dirty kitchen staffed by heavy men in greasy aprons to a common room lit by dirty lamplight.

  Men with hard faces and harder eyes watched them pass between rough trestle tables blackened with age. Liam nodded absently to them as he passed, oblivious to the threat of violence in the way they leaned forward in their chairs or in the way they kept their hands close to weapons.

  The muscles in her back clenched. Where had he brought her? Duke Weir wanted to use her as a pawn to secure his grip on the throne. Did Liam intend to as well?

  His boots thumped against the boards like a drummer’s call to war. He opened a door and motioned her inside.

  6

  A Door Opens

  MORE DINGY LAMPLIGHT greeted her, reflecting back from walls that had faded to various shades of dirt. A crowd of men stepped forward as Liam moved in behind, locking the door. The first, his face dominated by a nose that had been broken more than once, rush
ed forward. Callused hands grabbed her, pulled her forward.

  “Deas alive, girl, how did you escape?”

  She gasped in Rale’s embrace, her ribs protesting. Before she could answer, another man with hair like snow, quiet and still as the land in winter, put a hand on Rale’s shoulder. “I think she’ll answer better if she can breathe,” Merodach said.

  Rale released her, his face flushing, and stepped back.

  It was too much—the beatings, the lack of food, her flight, all conspired against her. She tottered, but Rale caught her, putting her in a chair while he muttered something to a watchman who left by a side door. A moment later Rokha entered, her eyes sharp.

  She snapped her fingers. “Stand back. The air in here is close enough without everyone crowding her.”

  Rokha’s gaze darkened as she surveyed the bruises on her face. With a healer’s touch she pulled Adora’s arm from beneath her cloak and pushed back the sleeve. Purple bruises surrounded red spots where Sevra’s boots had found their mark. Fingers probed the cut on Adora’s shoulder.

  “Who did this to you?”

  The answer could wait. “Could I have something to eat, and maybe some ale?”

  Liam disappeared out the front door, his place taken by Merodach.

  Adora nodded her thanks. “Sevra, Duke Weir’s daughter, felt the need to demonstrate her grief over her brother’s death.” She rubbed a particularly large knot on one thigh. “She has a penchant for sharp-toed boots.”

  Rokha gave a sharp nod, almost a jerk, and brought forth a jar of salve from the healer’s kit she kept with her. Smells of lemongrass and mint battled the less savory odors in the room.

  “To what end, Highness?” Rale asked.

  Adora shrugged, regretted the gesture. “Duke Weir’s wife is dead. He intended to force me to marry him to replace the heir he lost.” She did not mention Weir’s search for her uncle’s nuntius or Turing’s cryptic message.

  Rokha shifted her chair, moved her attention to Adora’s other arm.

  Then she stopped and with a lunge pulled Adora’s sword from its sheath and held it up for the men clustered behind her to see.

  Rale touched a finger to the sticky wetness on the point. “You drew blood?”

  Adora nodded.

  Rokha’s smile burst forth, savage, exultant. Careless of the hurts she’d tended just moments before, she threw herself forward to pull Adora into a hug as fierce and savage as Rale’s had been. “Oh, my sister! I’m so proud.”

  When they parted, Adora saw unshed tears in Rokha’s eyes.

  “Did you mark or kill?” Rokha asked.

  She grew light-headed with the memory. “Kill. Two of Weir’s guards.”

  Rokha kissed her, eyes brimming. “Now you are worthy of him. Let no one say you are not.”

  Rokha’s regard was too much. Sobs locked away behind her imperial reserve broke loose, and Adora clutched her friend as tears washed her face. When she parted, she found the men in the room, hard men who bore the price of their service on their bodies and faces, gazing at her in pride. Then she noticed the strip of black cloth around Rokha’s arm.

  She touched it, her fingers sliding along the sturdy weave. “Something new comes. Since when did the watch allow women?”

  Rale exchanged a look with Merodach before he answered. “It’s honorary at this point, but the way will be open to her if she wants to challenge.”

  Merodach cleared his throat, a hint of disapproval and challenge in his voice. “She will still have to defeat a majority to qualify.”

  Rokha’s eyes flashed with her smile. “Would I have it any other way?”

  Adora nodded with pride. “No, but how did you escape the duke’s men in the harbor?”

  “They didn’t think to put a guard on board Tek’s ship,” Rale said. “We slipped over the rail after dark and swam to shore.” A rueful grin pulled his mouth to one side under his broad nose. “It took some of us longer than others. When Solis Karele and I finally made it to the beach, Rokha and Merodach were fighting a handful of Weir’s men. They held them off until we managed to wade out of the surf.” He shivered. “The water almost took us.” Karele nodded from where he sat at the table.

  A coded knock came from the door behind. Merodach drew his sword and cracked the door for a moment before stepping back to allow Liam to reenter bearing a mug and a plate. “It’s not equal to palace fare,” he said. “Watchmen aren’t very good cooks, but it’s edible.”

  Realization clicked into place. “The men in the kitchen?”

  Liam nodded. “And the men in the common room as well. Outside of the palace, this is the most heavily guarded location in the kingdom.” He placed the food in front of her and stepped back. “If you will permit me, Highness, I will explain while you eat.

  “Weir took control of the isle and the city the day after your uncle died,” Liam said. “He’d been bringing his men to the island for months, but never in the open and never so many that people would notice. Before we could muster a defense, the palace compound was in his control. Those of the watch who did not escape were either killed or imprisoned, along with every benefice and reader Benefice Weir saw as a potential threat.”

  “Yet much was denied him,” Rale said.

  For some reason, this remark brought color to Liam’s cheeks, as if he were embarrassed. His hand waved Rale’s observation away. A knock at the far door interrupted him, and the watchman closest to it cracked it, before bowing two men into the room.

  Bertrand Canon, archbenefice of the church, and Enoch Sten, first reader of the conclave, entered. Both acknowledged Liam before taking turns to embrace her. She inhaled, drinking in the smell of the two men who’d been fixtures of security her entire life. The archbenefice smelled of incense and wine while Primus Sten wore scents of wood.

  She let go with regret. “If Weir controls the Judica and the conclave and most are in prison, how did you escape?”

  The archbenefice spoke first. “Captain Liam brought the watchmen under his command to our quarters as soon as he heard Weir was taking the city.” His eyes shone with pride. “He has the instincts of a tactician. It was almost as if he knew they were coming.”

  She checked the room once more. All these men were known to her. “Duke Weir has Errol, Your Excellency, and Martin and Luis as well.”

  Primus Sten nodded assent, his face grave. “We know.”

  “I’ve sent messengers to the mainland,” Liam said. “As soon as we get reinforcements from the nearest garrisons, we’ll be able to take back the city.”

  “How long ago did you send word?” Adora asked.

  Liam bit his lower lip. “Five days.”

  A stab of ice shot through her belly. Five days? The messengers would barely have had time to reach their destinations, and one man could travel far faster than a full company. For the return they would still have to cross the strait, with the duke’s ships crowding the harbor until their masts resembled a forest.

  And the duke had readers.

  Oh, Errol.

  She shook her head. “We can’t wait that long. We must rescue them.”

  “We don’t have any choice, Highness. The duke’s men outnumber us three to one.”

  She wrung her hands as if she could pull courage from them. “Don’t you understand? Duke Weir doesn’t trust anyone. The only thing keeping him in check is his fear of betrayal. He’s using Errol to verify lots. Once he’s tested the readers in the Judica, he’ll move. There won’t be anything to stop him.”

  Liam shook his head, suddenly wary. “You’ll have to trust me, Highness. They will not find us here, and Aurae can block the readers. I won’t risk a fight we cannot win. They would strike us down before we could breach the compound.”

  Her eyes found Karele. Oh, Deas. He was right. If Aurae blinded the readers, they would have all the time they needed. She wrapped her arms around her shoulders and hugged herself. But what about Errol? She couldn’t imagine him working for the duke willingly.
He would have to be coerced.

  Her hands bumped against the hard outline of the key to the garden gate. She snatched it from her cloak pocket, held it up by its string for them to see. “What if you could win? We can enter the palace grounds without their knowledge. There’s a door in the wall hidden by ivy. It leads to a concealed gate in the palace garden.”

  Rale’s eyes lit with possibilities, yet his voice carried caution. “The task will be getting enough men into the compound to hold it until Weir can be taken.” His gaze slid from Adora to Liam.

  Liam reached forward to take the key, but she tucked it away into her pocket.

  He bowed from the neck in acquiescence, his face open, intent, as if listening, before nodding. A wash of tears tracked the dirt on her cheeks as Liam gave her a chaste embrace, his massive chest and shoulders dwarfing her. “We will find him, Your Highness. It’s time the kingdom began to discharge its debts to Errol Stone.” He listened as she explained the door’s location and then turned to Rale. “Can it be done tonight?”

  Rale shook his head. “Tomorrow provides a better chance of success. The night is half gone already.” He shrugged. “And we’ll need Captains Cruk and Reynald to assist. Their knowledge of the palace compound exceeds mine.”

  Primus Sten pulled a block of pine from his robe, tossed it from one wrinkled hand to the other. “And that will give me the opportunity to tell you exactly where the duke is holding them. You need not waste time searching.”

  Liam nodded his thanks. Disappointment at the delay etched his face, but determination as well. “Highness, one of our number will show you to rooms where you may rest.”

  Adora looked at the band of black cloth around Rokha’s arm. Naaman Ru’s daughter would never suffer to be left behind. She vowed she wouldn’t be either.

  The men filed out, some speaking half-muttered words of encouragement or welcome, the rest nodding, their faces showing the confusion of those whom words had failed. Rokha shouldered her bag, extended a hand to help Adora to her feet. “My room is upstairs. The bed is creaky, but it’s large enough for both of us.”