Ally of the Crown

by Melissa McShane

  Holt made them stop some fifty yards from the closest building. Sebastian and Fiona waited while he crept up to it and slinked around its weathered sides, dark with rain. “So if he wasn’t always a manservant, why did your parents hire him as one?” Fiona whispered. They weren’t anywhere close to where anyone could hear them, but the chill in the air and the darkness in the sky made her feel inclined to quiet.

  “He did a service for my father,” Sebastian said in the same low voice. “Something not entirely legal, I gather. On a whim, my father hired him as a footman—heaven only knows why he thought that was a good idea. My mother likes them to be a matched set. So when she complained about him ruining her aesthetic, he assigned Holt to me. Something about taking on whatever my exclusive, expensive school might throw my way, as if assassins and thieves might infiltrate it. It was a good choice, but probably not for the reasons my father believed.”

  Holt had disappeared beyond the building, which was windowless and had the same steeply-sloped roof every other farm building Fiona had seen possessed. “What, you never had his help sneaking out at night?”

  “No, but I honed my own skills sneaking out past him, or trying to. Though he did teach me to pick locks. I’m not very good. He never showed me how to pick pockets, which I thought would have been much more useful—there, he’s coming back.”

  Holt was remarkably silent for such a tall man, and made almost no silhouette against the darkness. “It is a storage shed,” he said, “and there is room, barely, for all six of us.”

  “Thank heaven. I’m about dead on my feet,” Sebastian said.

  They led the horses around to the front of the shed, which had a single large door that creaked open to reveal a warm, cavernous interior. Shed was probably the wrong word for it, though “barn” didn’t quite fit either; it was a single large room with no loft, packed with pallets on which rested burlap sacks stacked twenty high. It smelled dusty, and floury, and Holt patted one of the sacks and said, “Wheat.”

  Sebastian found an empty burlap sack and began rubbing his horse down. “I wish we had food for them,” he said. “Or food for us. All this wheat, and it does none of us any good.”

  Mittens nuzzled Fiona’s arm as she followed Sebastian’s example. “I know,” she murmured to the horse, “in the morning we’ll find you something. I want to change into something less filthy,” she announced to the room.

  “There’s space beyond the pallets where you can have some privacy,” Sebastian said, “and I think we can sleep on the sacks.”

  Never had any bed looked so welcoming. Fiona took her bag into a corner and rapidly put on her own clothes, kicking the dirty temple clothes into a corner. Then she changed her mind and folded them neatly into her bag. They might come in handy, though she couldn’t imagine how.

  She tossed the little sack in one hand, feeling the ceramic tokens shift, then put it and the scroll case into her bag. Speaking of things she didn’t know what they were for. It worried her somewhat, carrying around this thing that had been hidden so carefully away and had such an effect on people. Even the young thief had been afraid of it. And the guard had drawn some kind of conclusion about her before running away—

  She cursed, loudly, then kicked her bag in frustration. “What? What’s wrong?” Sebastian exclaimed.

  “That guard is going to tell them we have these tokens.”

  “So?”

  “So they’re never going to stop chasing us.”

  Sebastian came around the corner, buttoning his shirt. “Or they’ll leave us alone because they’re afraid of what it might mean that we have them.”

  Fiona let out a short laugh. “They’re going to be mightily confused, in any case. They know only that we were in the foreign trade office and that we have the tokens. But Gizane had them hidden in her desk, which, by the way, I don’t remember closing. What do you think the odds are that the tokens were supposed to be there? I bet Gizane stole them first. So they’re going to start asking a lot of questions.”

  “None of which have anything to do with us.”

  “If we’re lucky, they’ll turn their attention on Gizane.”

  “Probably. But I think you’re right that they won’t stop chasing us, just in case.” He gestured to the sacks. “Sit there.”

  “Why?”

  “I want to look at your foot. It should be washed and bound up properly.”

  Fiona sat and extended her foot to him. He took it gently in one hand and used his little light Device to examine it. “It’s not a deep cut, but I’m sure it’s painful. Holt, do we have water?”

  “I drew some from the well in the farmyard,” Holt said. He had a bucket in one hand and a length of cloth in the other. “If you’ll allow me, sir?”

  Sebastian gave way to Holt, who swabbed her foot gently enough that she didn’t do more than wince at his touch. He dried her foot and wrapped it tightly in the clean cloth, tying it off around her ankle. “That should do for now,” he said. “We can thank heaven you did not require stitches.”

  “Thank you, Holt.”

  “It was my pleasure, Miss Cooper. Now, I suggest we all try to sleep. We will have to leave here before first light.” He disappeared with the bucket. Fiona stood and put her weight on the injured foot. It throbbed, but felt less painful.

  Sebastian leaned against one of the tall pallets of wheat sacks. “Still glad you came along?”

  He was a dim shape in the darkness, but she could see him smile. “Surprisingly, yes,” she said, and his smile broadened.

  “Dare I hope it’s the company you enjoy?” he went on.

  “Sebastian—”

  “Don’t say anything else.” She felt the touch of his hand where it gripped hers briefly, then released her. “We’re friends first, Fiona. Remember that. Just—I’m not going to stop hoping for more.” Lightly, he caressed her cheek, and then he was gone, leaving her gaping and her heart racing.

  She closed her eyes and leaned against the stack. The musty, dry smell of wheat filled her nostrils, and she rested her forehead against the rough burlap and sighed. Roderick had been like this at the beginning—persistent, gentle, inexorable. And every bit as wrong as Sebastian was, though for different reasons.

  She tossed her bag atop some of the lower piles of sacks and climbed up after it. The piles were solid and heavy and made for a good, if lumpy, bed. She heard Sebastian and Holt settling themselves nearby and thought about suggesting they set a watch, but the moment she lay down she felt all her muscles relaxing despite the hardness of the makeshift bed and realized she was too tired to worry overmuch about the slim possibility that someone might come out there during the night.

  Wearily, she went through her evening routine, terrifyingly conscious of how flammable wheat dust was. She hoped she wasn’t tired enough to sleep too deeply, or Sebastian would find out first-hand how frightening her magic was.

  She tucked her bag under her head, then had to shift it because something inside was digging into the base of her neck. Her journal. She hadn’t had access to it since they reached the temple, and now was a completely inappropriate time to use it, but she found herself wishing she could write down some of what troubled her now.

  Dear Diary, she thought, we’re being chased by men who believe we’ve stolen something terrifying, this pallet of wheat sacks is hard and lumpy, and someone’s romantically interested in me for the first time in nearly ten years. I realize I wanted a change, but I didn’t know this was it. And to be honest, I’m not sure I’d ask for something different if I had the chance.

  She fell asleep mid-thought, wishing she’d kissed Sebastian back.

  19

  A hand shook her gently awake. “Miss Cooper,” Holt said, “we should be on our way.”

  Fiona sat up quickly, shaking wheat dust off her clothes. “What time is it?”

  “Not sure,” Sebastian said. “My watch was ruined by the river. But it’s well before dawn. I don’t know how early these farmers wake, but
I don’t want to take any chances.”

  They saddled the horses, who didn’t seem bothered by the early morning, and led them one by one out of the shed. The sky had cleared, and the setting moon cast a dim glow over the farmyard. Smaller buildings of weathered board and tiled roofs lay scattered here and there, most of them windowless, a few with the same wide doors as their ersatz inn. There was a stable to the right of the main house, both of which were dark and silent. To the left was a chicken coop. Fiona heard the mutterings of the hens as they drowsed in their nests. The sound made her hungry. “I wish we could cook eggs,” she said as she prepared to mount Mittens.

  “Or hens,” Sebastian said.

  “I’d settle for eggs.”

  “Leave it to me,” Holt said, handing his horse’s reins to Sebastian.

  “Holt, I wasn’t serious.”

  “There are other foods on this farm we can eat. Go ahead, and I will catch up to you in due time.” Holt nodded at Fiona and slunk away in the direction of the farmhouse.

  Sebastian looked at Fiona. “He’s going to get caught,” Fiona said.

  “Possibly, but I’m more worried about slowing down. Still, there’s nothing I can do to change his mind once he’s made it up. Let’s just do as he says. Sweet heaven, I wish the world would run as I want for once.”

  They picked up the road almost immediately. It was muddy, and the horses slogged through it with none of their usual cheerfulness. Fiona patted Mittens’ neck and wished she had some way to reassure the animal that things would improve. She didn’t urge her on when Mittens stopped to graze in the tall grass by the road. The poor horse must be as hungry as she was, maybe hungrier.

  “He’s coming,” Sebastian said, and Fiona looked back to see Holt loping along the verge, his arms full of something. When he came near, she saw it was a large burlap sack, bulging and lumpy.

  “Enough for now,” he said, and dug into it. He held out a red, ripe tomato the size of Fiona’s fist. “To sustain us until we are across the border. Though if we are to stay with the road, I think it is no more unsafe to buy from the roadside stands than it is simply to pass them by.”

  Sebastian took a handful of carrots and saluted Holt with them. “I’ve never seen anything more delicious,” he said, and bit down hard, ignoring the dirt that lingered on the vegetable.

  Fiona took a bite of tomato as if it were an apple, then swiped away the rosy juice that spilled out of it. “Agreed,” she said.

  They rode on, eating tomatoes and carrots and handfuls of shelled almonds from a couple of smaller sacks. The sun rose, turning the world golden, and brought with it the songs of a hundred tiny black birds that swooped past overhead, their wings making a rushing sound like wind through treetops. The road wound through the verdant hills, and from somewhere in the distance came the smell of burning wood, a warm, bitter smell that enhanced the bright greenness of the hills. Fiona wiped her mouth with her sleeve. It was easy to forget, on a day like this, that they were being chased.

  The reminder stung Fiona out of her relaxed state. She’d been so tired the night before. “Holt!” she said. “Do you have the blackmail?”

  Sebastian cursed. “I can’t believe I forgot,” he said. “Everything I was carrying got washed away by the river. Please say you’ve got it.”

  Holt pulled up his horse and turned around to rummage in his bag. “I have what I was given,” he said. “Whether that is what we seek, I do not know.”

  He withdrew two scroll cases, a flat leather portfolio, and a stack of folders tied with black ribbon, and handed them to Sebastian. “Do we have time for this?” Fiona said, removing the scroll case from inside her bag.

  “It won’t take long.” Sebastian handed her the folders. “Untie that, would you?” He worked his fingernails into the cap of the first scroll case and wiggled it. Fiona picked at the knot until it loosened, then handed the folders back to Holt.

  The scroll case she’d carried with her until she’d forgotten it was there was waterproofed leather, sealed at both ends with blobs of red wax unmarked by sign and shield, or whatever Veriboldans used to signify their noble ranks. She chipped away at one blob with her fingernails until it cracked and fell apart into a dozen shards. Beneath it, the cap was plugged into the case as firmly as a cork in a wine bottle. Fiona worked at it until finally she coaxed it out and shook free the last clinging remnants of the seal, wiping her hand on her trousers.

  She tipped the contents into her hand. There were three sheets of expensive paper with a thick texture rolled up inside, two of them faintly blue-tinged, the other creamy white. All of them were barely water-spotted despite their submersion in the Kepa River. Fiona unrolled all three into a thin sheaf. Beside her, Sebastian cursed again and thrust a page back into his scroll case. “Not that one,” he said.

  The paper on top, the white one, was covered in a scrawling handwriting, difficult to read, but Fiona had no trouble identifying it as a hunter’s affidavit. Hunters were supposed to procure proof that the people they captured had inherent magic and had used it against others, though this almost never stopped them from enacting vigilante justice against anyone even suspected of it. This one was signed and countersigned, but not stamped, meaning the hunter had identified a target but not yet brought that person in for trial.

  She skipped back to the top of the page and began puzzling out its contents. The hunter’s credentials, his evidence, the name of the accused… It brought her to a stop, unable to read further. She’d found what Sebastian was looking for. It couldn’t be anything else.

  She read the name again, her stunned brain insisting it was impossible. She gripped the paper in suddenly nerveless fingers. Oh, how Sebastian had deceived her. You might care if you knew who my parents were. He was so right.

  “The documents in these folders are in Veriboldan,” Holt said. “Miss Cooper?”

  Sebastian looked up. “That’s probably not it, but maybe you shouldn’t read those. I don’t want you to…is something wrong, Fiona?”

  Fiona swallowed to moisten her dry throat. “This is a hunter’s affidavit swearing to the existence of a man whose inherent magic is to manipulate the minds of others to make them do his bidding. To make them believe it’s what they want. The hunter lists times and places this man has used his magic on people. I don’t know how he can prove something like that, but it doesn’t matter, he has all the right signatures.” She looked at Sebastian. Surely it just her imagination that he seemed to be a thousand feet away. “The man he accuses is Douglas North.”

  Sebastian’s eyes widened. Then his expression changed to one of wary uncertainty. “Fiona, I can explain.”

  “You don’t have to,” Fiona said. “This is what you were looking for, isn’t it? You’re Prince Sebastian North. Douglas North is your scandal-ridden younger brother. And this is one hell of a scandal.”

  Holt gently took the documents from her. Fiona thought about fighting him for them, then realized she didn’t care. The memory of Sebastian kissing her flashed past her inner eye, and she wished she could lash Mittens into a gallop and ride for the border, leaving the men behind forever.

  “These other pages are worse,” Holt said, turning over the blue-tinged sheets, which were written on front and back. “A copy of a death certificate, and a testimony by a doctor whose name I do not recognize. Taken together, they paint a picture that sickens me. The death certificate is that of one Melanie Tippets, named in the affidavit as one of Prince Douglas’s victims, and the testimony avows that Miss Tippets was, despite appearances, murdered. The implication is that Prince Douglas used his inherent magic on the young woman, for what purpose it does not say, then either murdered her himself or caused her to be killed to prevent her revealing his actions.”

  Sebastian looked sick. “He can’t have. Doug is an idiot, true, but he’s not evil.”

  “I fear it does not matter whether it is true or not,” Holt said, letting the pages roll back together. “This is evidence strong enough
to convict him. Even without Miss Tippets’ death, the knowledge that the North family is tainted by inherent magic will lose Queen Genevieve the Crown.”

  “No wonder Mother didn’t want me to know what Doug had done,” Sebastian said faintly. “She must have known…he can’t be allowed to get away with murder, no matter what his reasons.”

  “But it will destroy your family if he’s publicly tried,” Fiona said. There, she’d sounded calm and rational. He couldn’t hear the tiny voice shrieking inside her head to run, forget the four thousand guilders and leave him in her dust.

  “There has to be something Mother can do.” Sebastian looked at Fiona more closely, appeared about to say something, then shook his head. “Let’s move on,” he said. “We have to return to Aurilien as quickly as possible.”

  “Can’t you just destroy the evidence?” Fiona said.

  “Mother insisted I return with it. I don’t know why. She might want the reassurance of destroying it herself.” Sebastian gathered the rest of Gizane’s documents and shoved them roughly into the saddlebags. He glanced at Holt, hesitated, and said, “Would you ride ahead and…I don’t know. Just…give us some privacy, please?”

  Holt nodded and spurred his horse onward. “Fiona, let me explain,” Sebastian said.

  “Explain what?” Fiona said. Her voice shook with anger. “I already knew you were above my station. I just didn’t know how far. And you were so careful not to let me know.”

  “That’s not how it went. I couldn’t tell you at first because you were a total stranger and it wasn’t my secret to reveal.”

  “So when were you going to tell me? When you paid me off? And I’d almost forgotten this was a business transaction.”

  Sebastian swore explosively. “Look, I know you’re angry, and you deserve to be—”

  “Thank you for your permission, your Highness.”

  “I didn’t have a choice! I swore I’d keep the family name out of it. By the time I knew I could trust you, it was too late to simply blurt it out. I’ve been trying to figure out how to tell you the truth for the last three days. I’m sorry you learned about it this way.”