by Carson Rae
I’ve always wondered about that.
“Perhaps they’ll name him Nicalao,” the general continues, “to honor the martial spirit of the late king.” I barely refrain from rolling my eyes. What if they have a daughter? Then I realize his comment was merely intended to remind the ambassador of Joya d’Arena’s military strength.
Enrico jumps in on cue. “The kingdom will remain stable and strong if— Hector! What in seven hells are you doing here?”
Vicenç appears indifferent to Enrico’s unplanned outburst. After serving three kings, it takes an extraordinary event to rouse him beyond bemused detachment. But the conde is openly furious.
Conde Treviño of Basajuan is a self-aggrandizing man who likes to overspend—thus the problem of Lucio, whom he can neither handle nor dispose of without upsetting the boy’s wealthy father. He seldom leaves Basajuan to come to the capital, and I’m never glad to see him.
Ignoring the conde’s glare, I say to Enrico, “I was summoned, my lord.” I hold up my note.
Enrico snatches it from my hands. “What’s the meaning of this?”
“I don’t know, my lord.”
The general reads over his shoulder. He glances at the Invierno ambassador, who suffers the scrutiny unflinchingly. “Let the boy go, Rico,” the general says after a moment. “We have other things to discuss.”
“And I could use a smoke,” Conde Treviño says. “Let’s talk about that little problem you’re taking care of for me over cigars.”
“Of course,” the lord-commander says. He takes one last glance over his shoulder at me as the general and conde lead him away.
The gem dangling from Vicenç’s nose ring winks in the torchlight as he sits down to work. He pulls reports from a locked drawer and gets busy ticking off numbers and accounts. I approach him. He barely glances up, grumbling, “What now?”
“I’ve been summoned to the king,” I say.
“Well, fetch yourself to him, boy.”
“That’s not proper procedure, and you know it,” I say, unable to keep the anger from my voice. I am not, at the moment, technically a member of the palace household, and security protocol demands that I be escorted.
He doesn’t look up a second time. “If I don’t have a page or squire to spare at the moment for Ambassador Wafting . . . er, Wind and Thunderstorm”—he makes a vague waving gesture—“then I don’t have one for you. So you can stand there all day, or you can obey his summons.”
“Yes, my lord,” I say, and turn to go.
The Invierno ambassador blocks my way.
“Perhaps I could go with the young gentleman,” he says in a fluid, hissing voice. I’m careful not to make eye contact. “It’s important that I speak to the king today. It will only take a moment.”
“I’m terribly sorry, my lord-ambassador,” Vicenç says, “but this is just an errand boy, not even a member of the palace staff. Look at his uniform! I would never embarrass you by sending you without a worthy escort.” To me, he says, “Hurry on, boy.”
I dash past the Guard, who curls his lip at the sight of my recruit uniform, and I leave the ambassador fuming at my back.
The private quarters of the palace are a maze, deliberately so—no assassin or enemy could make their way in quickly—but I know each turn well, and I head left, past the nobles’ quarters, up the stairs, and around the corner to the queen’s chambers.
5
DR. Enzo, the royal physician, is leaving as I arrive. He wipes sweat from his forehead, looking preoccupied, but forces a smile when he notices me. A smile from Enzo is never a good sign.
“What’s wrong?” I ask.
“I should be asking you that,” he says with forced conviviality, his razor-thin mustache twitching. “Aren’t you supposed to be in the barracks? I didn’t expect to see you again until the inevitable training accident. Did you know that training accidents are disfiguring twenty-three percent of the time?”
“The king summoned me.”
“He’s in there.” He rests a hand on my forearm. “Speak quietly,” he says in a low voice. “And do not upset the queen.”
I frown. This is a worse sign.
Inside, Queen Rosaura is propped up in her bed, which has been pushed to the glass doors overlooking the balcony. Before her pregnancy, she spent all day outdoors, in the garden or on horseback, and the enforced bed rest has not sat well with her.
One of her maids, Miria, wipes her forehead. When Miria sees me, she makes quick, tiny adjustments to the queen’s gown so that it lies flawless and smooth. Miria is about thirty years old, a trusted servant who has lived her whole life in the palace. I don’t know much about her except that she is Vicenç’s grandniece and she is married to a soldier, either someone in the Royal Guard or the palace watch.
I notice Alejandro last because he sits shadowed in the corner, gazing at his wife. His arms are crossed pensively, and one hand covers his mouth.
“Hector,” the queen says, smiling warmly as she always does, as if nothing is wrong. Alejandro jumps from his seat, startled by the sound of her voice.
“Your Majesty,” I say, bowing. “You don’t look a day older than when last I saw you.” My face flames, and I wish I could suck the words back. I never know what to say around women.
But she laughs anyway. “You saw me two days ago!” It’s a weak laugh, and I tell myself it’s because it was a weak joke. She glances meaningfully at Alejandro. “Shouldn’t he be with the recruits?”
“I summoned him,” Alejandro says. He strides over and grasps my arm. “Thank you, Hector.”
“I just witnessed an interesting bit of theater,” I say before I forget. “Vicenç and the Quorum Lords were performing for the new Invierne ambassador, making a big deal about your heir.”
Alejandro’s face tightens. “Of course,” he says, glancing at his wife. “An internal war of succession would provide an opportunity that Invierne’s sorcerers could not resist.”
Which is why the young king married and set about producing an heir as soon as his father died.
“It’s just that . . . well, their performance gave away Her Majesty’s exact state of health. Now everyone knows you’ll be here together more often than not for the next several days. In the interest of safety, I don’t think . . .” Too late, I realize I’m criticizing superior officers—Quorum lords, no less—not to mention possibly upsetting the queen. I give Rosaura an apologetic look.
But she still smiles. “I told you,” Rosaura says to Alejandro. “He’s too clever to waste in the Guard.”
“Which is why I summoned him,” Alejandro replies. “Even if, in this instance, he’s probably overthinking things. Allow me to borrow him for a moment, ladies.”
Taking my arm, he pulls me to one side of the chamber, where he angles our bodies away from the queen and Miria.
“I need you to go to Puerto Verde for me,” Alejandro says in a low voice.
Anger boils up in me, combining with exhaustion and hunger, and I can’t stanch the flow of words. “You summoned me away from recruiting day to run errands for you? Like when you were courting half the eligible women of the kingdom?”
“I need you, Hector.”
“You don’t!” My voice is getting too loud. I glance at the queen, who is exchanging an alarmed look with Miria. In a softer voice, I add, “You have a thousand men you could send to Puerto Verde instead of me.”
Alejandro rubs at his chin. He hasn’t been shaved yet today.
“I’ve sent numerous messages through regular channels, and received no response. I had Enrico send members of my Guard, but they also returned without replies. Then, last week I finally sent my own squire. I received word this morning that he was murdered on the highway.”
My stomach clenches. “Raúl is dead?”
“I’ve seen his body.”
He was only thirteen, an eager boy and an excellent horseman. I helped to train him. “A squire bearing his king’s colors should be safe on the road.”
“Precisely,” Alejandro says. “He was murdered in his sleep. It was made to look like the work of a bandit, but the wounds were too clean. Too perfect. Nothing was taken. I have to assume foul play. You’re the only one I can turn to. You are my army of one.”
He has called me that since I came to Brisadulce to be a royal page, for I was the first person he was given charge of who was not merely a servant. “My first command,” he used to joke.
“I’m yours to command, now and always.” Isn’t that what being a Royal Guard is all about anyway? “What do you need me to do?”
He slumps in relief, but he gets straight to the point. “You may remember a certain ring, a ruby as large and red as a cherry, set in a bed of tiny pearls.”
“I remember it,” I say carefully.
I glance at the queen, who gazes out the window with Miria and carefully pretends not to hear us, and I wonder if we ought to be discussing this in private, for the ruby ring was a gift from Alejandro to the beautiful Isadora de Flurendi, one of his paramours—the lady many assumed would be queen, right up until the moment Alejandro announced his betrothal to Rosaura, her older cousin.
The Flurendi family controls several ports, and Alejandro needed an alliance with one branch or the other to solidify his position. Many times as squire, I helped bring Isadora and Alejandro together, the last time only a few nights before his wedding. Honestly, I had not expected their relationship to end, not even after the marriage to Rosaura. But when the royal couple returned from their honeymoon, they walked around the palace in a state of baffled happiness, genuinely in love with each other. I did not observe what happened between them during the early weeks of their marriage, for I spent that time with my brother Felix, aboard his merchant ship. But I know that the only one more surprised and pleased than me was Alejandro.
The king looks over at his wife, and his gaze softens. “We would very much like to have the one who bears that ring with us at court again. Our many letters have gone unanswered. Rosaura misses her and worries about her deeply.”
This doesn’t explain the lengths to which he is going to contact the girl. “May I ask why she is wanted?”
Alejandro’s face flushes red, and he looks ashamed, an expression I never thought possible for him until he married Rosaura. “I cannot tell you, not in advance, in case anything should happen. Go and tell her personally that the queen and I both request the presence of our beloved cousin at court. Collect your answer from her personally.”
“And if I encounter obstacles?”
“Then use your judgment,” Alejandro says. “You’ve always had excellent judgment. I want you to leave without fanfare. And do not wear my colors. Just in case . . .” Just in case the squire’s murder was no coincidence.
An idea hits me. Maybe there’s still a way to preserve my chance at making the Guard. “You must let me take someone along to stand watch while I sleep. Two would be better than one.”
“Not possible,” Alejandro says. Again, that look of shame.
“If I’m murdered like Raúl, your message will never find its recipient.”
Alejandro considers. “You cannot take them with you into her father’s fortress, not to deliver our message or to receive her reply. You may tell them nothing.”
“Agreed,” I say. “I’d like to take two of the other recruits. Their names are Tomás and Marlo—they’re experienced soldiers. You will need to authorize their absences. All our absences.”
“I’ll send two of my Guards with you instead,” he says.
“That would draw more attention to your mission,” I say. “And Guards would never follow my lead. Better if we are all recruits.”
Also, three absent recruits—two of them Enrico’s favorites—will make it harder for the commander to single me out for punishment. He’ll be hard-pressed not to take me back.
Alejandro considers. His gaze switches back and forth between Rosaura and me. Finally, he says, “I don’t think I could bear to lose you too, Hector.” He sounds more tired than I feel, which is saying something.
He’ll lose me someday, if I’m to be a Royal Guard. It’s what we sign up for. But I hold my tongue on that count.
“I’ll draft the order, and you can leave immediately,” he says. “Come with me.”
“Let him stay and keep us company in your absence, love,” the queen says from across the room. She has, of course, been listening the whole time, which doesn’t seem to bother Alejandro one bit. Perhaps being truly in love means not having secrets from each other.
Alejandro nods, worry etched on his features. To me, he says, “I’ll return in a moment.”
I go to the queen.
6
“PREGNANCY suits you, Your Majesty,” I say to her, and then wince at yet another awkward compliment.
It’s a stretch. She was beautiful when she first became pregnant, glowing like the dawn, as happy as the song of a lark. But as the months have passed, it has worn her down. She still smiles with unrelenting cheer, but there is a heaviness to her, as though she has borne a painful wound for a long time.
“Thank you,” she says. “But you are a terrible liar, and I think you always will be.”
I start to protest, but she rests her hand on my wrist, and I feel how clammy her skin is. I say lightly, “My incapacity for dishonesty troubles you?”
I mean it as a joke, but she nods. “If you want to serve your king well, then you must learn not to speak at all. It may be the only thing that will prevent you from revealing your secrets.”
“I can keep—”
She interrupts my protest with a deep frown.
One does not ignore one’s queen’s admonition. I pause, and then, finally—wisely, I hope—nod wordlessly.
“Quickly, now, before you go, I must tell you a secret,” the queen says. “I must know first if you have the will to stay silent about it, because it could mean your life—or Alejandro’s—if you do not.”
“I’ll not say a word,” I promise earnestly.
She removes her hand from my arm and places it on her belly. “My pregnancy does not go well. The child inside me is weak. Doctor Enzo says my own life is in danger.”
With those words, something inside me shrivels. Everything suddenly makes sense: Dr. Enzo’s false cheer, Alejandro’s worry, the queen’s pallor. I glance up at Miria, hoping for a denial, but I see my own anguish mirrored in her face.
“Can’t Doctor Enzo do something?”
“He is doing everything he can, and it may yet turn out well. Many difficult pregnancies do. But I wish to have my beloved cousin Isadora at my side in this time of distress.”
Of the two monarchs, Rosaura is the better strategist—we all know it. She is older than Alejandro, wiser. She understands politics and power and secret deals better than Alejandro ever will. And I am not fool enough to believe they’re going to all this trouble to bring in a new lady-in-waiting.
“Brisadulce faces many dangers,” she continues. “Invierne is asking for port privileges, maybe to build a navy. They will attack again in force; if not this year, then soon. But Alejandro also faces danger from within. Many who were loyal to his father do not respect him yet.”
“They’ll learn—”
“Remember what I told you about being a bad liar?”
In this moment, if I could resolve never to speak again, I would. Because I know she is right.
“We don’t know who killed Raúl. I’d be surprised if anyone knew why my husband is sending messages to Lord Solvaño at the Fortress of Wind. Perhaps disrupting the king, exposing his weaknesses, is motivation enough.”
Isadora. The last detail clicks. Alejandro and Rosaura want Isadora at court, because if Rosaura dies, Alejandro can marry her immediately and keep strong ties to the Flurendi family.
Rosaura nods as if she can read my thoughts. “I know Isadora and Alejandro were . . . fond of each other. It would be a good match.”
I don’t know what to say. The pity on my face m
ust be apparent, because finally her serene composure dies, and her face turns hard, her mouth set with frown lines. “The king must have a wife who can provide an heir. If Alejandro dies without one, I count at least four powerful condes who would claim distant ties to the throne. An ambitious man could even convince himself it was the right thing to do, that fighting for the throne would make the kingdom stronger. There would be civil war. And Invierne stands ready to sweep in and clean up the pieces.”
“You think someone has an eye on the throne,” I whisper. “Who?”
She smiles and shrugs. “Does it matter? Alejandro will be just as dead.”
She suspects someone; I can see it in her face.
“Alejandro has asked you to find her, yes?” she says.
You may remember a certain ring, with a ruby as large and red as a cherry. “Yes.”
“When you speak to her, let her know that she is dear to me and that I want her happiness and position assured even before my own.”
“I will,” I promise. What must it be like, I wonder, to orchestrate a potential marriage for her own husband?
“You may find it harder to deliver your message than Alejandro indicates. My uncle, Isadora’s father, is very devout and cloistered, and he rules his keep with iron control. Isadora has not been seen at public functions since she returned home after the royal wedding. There are concerns that her father, having intercepted our letters to her, is keeping her in isolation.”
“But why?”
“Perhaps he has convinced himself it is the right thing to do. No one sets out to do evil, you know. We just do our best and let history judge.”
History. As if her decisions are already in the past and she is already gone. The lump in my throat vies with the knot in my chest. This situation requires delicacy. It should be attended to by a diplomat, someone wiser in the ways of court and experienced in intrigue.
Rosaura’s expression turns sympathetic. “I’m sending Miria with you. She’ll be able to go places in the fortress that you can’t go.”
“Into the women’s quarters,” I suggest.