“I should make a comment about you skipping out on the laundry,” she said, this time approaching him, “but instead I think I’ll just do this.”
He grinned as he leaned down to meet her lips. “Samuel’s going to think this is all we ever do.”
“I’m all right with that,” she said when they were finished.
Catching her hand with his free one, he looked deep into her green eyes. “Me too, Mia.”
* * *
Thomas paused outside the door to Tobias’ sitting room, debating whether it was safe to interrupt – he couldn’t hear any voices.
After only a few seconds, Samuel settled the question by letting out an ear-splitting wail, bringing Quinn to the door immediately.
“I think he can smell you,” he said as she took the baby. Samuel quieted immediately once he was in her arms.
“Yeah, I think so.” She smiled, though underneath that he could see how worried she was. “You can come in, Thomas. I was actually alone for a minute.”
“Where’s Marcus?” he asked, following her as she carried Samuel over to a couch.
“He went to go see if any more birds have returned with messages.”
“Do you need me to do anything?”
“You’re keeping an eye on Linnea, right? She won’t let me anywhere near her.”
“I know. She and Will both made me promise to wash my hands and face before so much as talking to you or Samuel – don’t worry, I did. Changed my shirt, too.”
“Thanks.”
He nodded, looking around the room at the maps and books laid out on every flat surface. “Finally learning the geography of your kingdom?”
“I had to start sometime, right?”
He chuckled. Back at the castle, an entire wall of Quinn and William’s sitting room was covered with enormous canvas maps of both Eirentheos and Philotheum. She’d asked for them even before her coronation.
“This area was actually quite interesting,” she said, pointing to a space on a map stretched over a low table.
Thomas leaned down to look, mentally calculating directions. He glanced out the window, then back at the map, and then up at Quinn. “That’s where we are, right?”
She nodded. “Kind of close to this little village here.” She pointed to a spot that showed a small body of water, and bore a name he couldn’t quite read. A huge chunk of the map surrounding it was blank. “That’s all forest,” she said.
“Tobias likes his privacy, huh?”
She nodded. “The map I have at the castle shows nothing in this region at all.”
“That isn’t actually all that surprising. There are probably a few villages like that in Eirentheos, too.”
“Marcus said that, too. It’s still hard for me to wrap my brain around a world without satellite imaging.”
“I didn’t spend enough time in your world for that to even sound like real words, Quinn.”
She chuckled.
“I don’t know if you’re worried about why Tobias would be out here like this … I see why you’re concerned, but … he hasn’t killed us yet.”
“It’s not that. Not that I don’t still have questions about him, but they’re not my most pressing ones. It’s this village – Valderwood. Marcus said that some of the people there aren’t overly friendly toward the royal family. Many of them moved out here to get away from the authority of the capital – they even have their own soldiers.”
“In all fairness, if I was living under Hector’s reign, I might have joined them. I’m not bad with a sword either, you know.”
“I know.” She sighed. “I don’t even know how they feel about my taking over the crown, if anyone trusts me, or if it’s more people who want me arrested or dead. It’s just another complication.”
“Well, at least you have something new to add to your map. Geography is good.”
“Yeah… now if I could just get a handle on the history... Everything I learn leads me to ten other pieces of information that might have been helpful.”
“You’re doing great you know.”
“Uh-huh… Running away from the castle and allowing a usurper to take control of my kingdom is fantastic leadership. Someday, Nathaniel’s going to finally slip with the secret that I was actually my father’s second-born child.”
“Hmmm… How much older than you is Zander exactly?”
“Not funny, Thomas!”
“Yes, it kind of is.” He laughed at the face she was making. “Okay, so maybe it isn’t – but the only reason it isn’t is because at this point I don’t think it would shock me.”
She shook her head like she was trying to send that thought flying across the room. “Maybe I am following my father’s example anyway – running away from the fight just to save my own skin.”
“Yeah?” He perched on the arm of an overstuffed chair. “Now that you’re out of imminent danger and can think, are you planning on taking yourself and the true heir to another world and forgetting all of this ever happened?”
“No.”
“See? Totally different. Relax. Even if you did give up your castle for a bit, you can still die for your kingdom.”
“Especially now that I gave up my castle and came to the middle of nowhere next to a town with a militia that might hate me.”
“Exactly.”
She chuckled as she ran her fingers through Samuel’s downy black hair. “You always know what to say to make me feel better, Thomas.”
“It’s my job. Besides, you’re not dying for this kingdom without taking me with you.”
“Unless pimaeum gets to all of us first.”
“And there’s my sister – full of optimism, as usual.”
“Your Majesty?” Marcus’ voice called from the doorway.
“It’s fine, Marcus. Thomas and I were just chatting. Is there any news?”
“Yes. Another message from Stephen … and one from Nathaniel.”
Thomas knew his own expression must match the alarm in hers.
“Is everything all right?”
“Nathaniel is fine – and so are the guards with him. They’ve come across a whole encampment of soldiers.” He held a folded piece of paper out to her.
Thomas had to sit on his hands to keep from snatching the paper or reading over her shoulder. “Do you want me to leave?” he forced himself to ask.
She shook her head, looking up from the paper with an awed expression. “Nearly fifty guards, from both the castle and the city.”
“Where?” Thomas asked.
“It doesn’t say.” She held up the note. “I think Nathaniel is being extra safe not sending that information. A number of the men were injured in the battle.”
Thomas closed his eyes. “So there was a battle, then?”
“That’s what all of this is sounding like. Something happened. This says he’ll try to get more details and send them later, but he’s doing what he can for the men now. Did he send something as well?”
“Yes.” Marcus pulled a vial from his pocket; Thomas could see some kind of powder through the brown glass – one of William’s medicines, no doubt.
“He says that should be enough for everyone here – they might not attempt coming back and giving away our position.” She looked at Marcus. “Did they have enough supplies with them to be safe in this weather?”
“They made it to the carriage, Quinn,” Thomas said. “There was plenty there, and Nathaniel knows what he’s doing.” He squeezed her shoulder.
“Okay, then we’d better get this to William.”
~ Twenty ~
Allowed
“DO YOU KNOW HOW to start a fire?” Nathaniel asked.
Zander nodded. “I’'m getting better.”
“Good. I’m going to need a fire over here for boiling water.” He pointed at a clear spot on the ground, close to the tent the guards had set up as a makeshift hospital. “Maybe after, you can check to make sure all the medical supplies are unloaded?"
“Sure.”
Having a task he could handle felt better than watching the flurry of activity around him and trying to jump in. Finding a pile of rocks to build a fire circle was harder than he expected. The soldiers working tirelessly to build a safe haven here had cleared rocks along with the snow between shelters.
The campsite was impressive for having been set up so hastily in the wake of a blizzard – and with so few necessities.
On their way here with the carriage, Rhys had told them about the scarcity here. Most of the men, fleeing from the confusion of the castle and the city, had brought only what they could grab in haste. The medical tent was the only real shelter – the uninjured men had spent the stormy nights huddled around fires in caves dug from the snowbanks and under whatever blankets and extra coats they could find.
He looked around in amazement as he worked to coax a flame from the damp wood, wondering what he’d gotten himself into agreeing to be a guard. Surely, he’d have been the first to die out here in a situation like this one. Or two months – moons, whatever – ago, he would have. Now… well, he’d probably still have been one of the guards being carried into the medical tent with frostbite.
Even for the experienced soldiers here, though, the conditions were dire. Ethan and James had already pulled every bit of fabric they could from the carriage and were helping to set up more shelters and fires.
As soon as Zander had a bucket of fresh snow sitting in the crackling flames, he went to find Nathaniel.
“Did you send a message to Quinn?” he asked, as soon as he managed to corner Nathaniel in a quiet spot.
“Yes.”
“Did you tell her what it’s like here?”
“I told her we’d come across these soldiers, yes, but it isn’t safe to exchange a lot of information right now.”
The words sounded logical; he couldn’t argue with the idea. They didn’t know many of these guards, and protecting Quinn and Samuel was the most important thing – but there was something he didn’t like about it. He couldn’t put the feeling into words, though, so he started trying to unpack and organize supplies.
“Sir Zander?” The voice was familiar, but he couldn’t place it until he turned around to see the man standing there. He was a guard in the castle – Kenneth? He thought that was right. Zander had talked to him a few times during his training, and once Kenneth had invited him to a crumple game among the guards, though Zander hadn’t gone. “Is that you?”
“Yes, it’s me.”
“Oh, thank the Maker! I was looking for you – are you all right?”
“Me?” He looked at the ragged bandage wound around Kenneth’s left arm. It might have once been white, but was now brown and gray, the fraying edges revealing dark shades of purple and red underneath. “I’m fine. What happened to you?”
“It’s not too serious, just a cut.”
That wasn’t the whole story; Zander could tell by the way he moved that there were other injuries hidden by his shirt and green cloak – a cloak he’d been wearing even as he laid on one of the pallets in the tent. All of his clothes were disheveled, and his face was flushed and shining. “From what?”
“A sword. I’ll be all right.”
“I hope the other guy looks worse.”
“He does. Much.”
“Were you in the battle?”
“I suppose you could call it that. I was on duty the night of the invasion, patrolling in the front hall when I heard the shouting. Someone at the northern gate had let them in – at least sixty men. My father ran past me, yelling at me to help stop them as they came in, but I was so worried about the queen and her family, I went upstairs instead. I didn’t know they were already gone.”
Raw, hot shame flooded through Zander, curling in sick waves through his chest and into his limbs. He’d been far away and safe by then. “And then what happened?”
Kenneth shook his head. “I don’t know how they did it, exactly, but they must have sent someone in first to take the king and queen. Three soldiers, actually. Some of their best ones, I’m sure, but they were anticipating a sleeping family trying to protect an infant – not trained guards willing to take chances.”
“What kind of chances?” The longer he talked to Kenneth, the more Zander noticed the way he held himself a little too stiffly, how sometimes just talking made him almost wince.
“After I was certain the family wasn’t in the room, I put the end of a broom into the embers of the fire and used it as a weapon to disarm the soldier who seemed the strongest – and then I used my sword.”
“Did you kill him?”
“Yes. Another was badly injured, and his friend took him and fled the fire once I lit the bedding and the rugs.”
By this point, their conversation had drawn Nathaniel’s attention.
“Who was with you?”
“Felix Bosch.”
“And he…?”
Kenneth shook his head; the slow motion back and forth pulled Zander’s stomach right along with it. “I tried to get him out of there, but he was already… It was a bad idea staying in the room as long as I did.” He glanced down toward the right side of his body. “I was just lucky the intruders don’t know all the exits from that wing of the castle.”
“Has anyone looked at your injuries?” Nathaniel asked.
“Just my friend Ellis. I don’t think he appreciated the view, though. We haven’t had any healers here – some of the men know a little, but not enough to do anything.”
Nathaniel flew into action immediately, his hand stretching toward Kenneth’s forehead immediately – Zander could tell by the hard set of Nathaniel’s jaw that he didn’t like his findings. Somehow, in the next instant, Kenneth lay on the pallet again as Nathaniel pulled back his cloak and began unbuttoning his shirt.
Zander retrieved Nathaniel’s bag from the other side of the tent without being asked. “What else do you need?”
“Everything.” Nathaniel didn’t take his eyes from what he was doing for even a second as he lifted Kenneth’s shirt, revealing hot, red blisters underneath. Zander was grateful for a strong stomach. “Did you bring all the supplies out of the carriage?”
“Yes.”
“Okay, I’m going to need some of that water you boiled, as much pain medicine as you can find, valoris seed…”
Zander stared at him. “You need more help than me. I don’t even know what valoris seed looks like!”
“We have to make do with what we have here, Sir Zander. I can tell you what I need; it’s easy enough.”
The veiled reminder of his duty to Quinn was meant to keep him quiet, to stop even considering divulging the fact he knew the location of the royal family – but Nathaniel’s words had the opposite effect. What he felt instead was a surge of defiant indignation – at least as much on Quinn’s behalf as his own.
In any other situation, Nathaniel would have had his priorities in order; his actions when they’d first met the soldiers on the trail told Zander that much. Right now, though, he wasn’t acting as a prince of his kingdom, or even as a healer who would do everything in his power to provide the best help for these men. Right now, his actions spoke only “overprotective uncle.”
But however noble that might be – however much Zander understood the instinct to protect Quinn – the decision didn’t belong to Nathaniel.
For the next fifteen minutes, he hauled over every supply Nathaniel asked for. He dug through crates and boxes, asked questions, and learned vocabulary he’d never intended to need. And the whole time, he thought about what to do.
Once Zander had finally given Nathaniel everything he needed, he mumbled an – honest – excuse about not wanting to watch whatever was about to happen and he escaped the tent.
He didn’t stop to second guess himself, or to chance an encounter that might compel him to explain.
The horses were all tied up close together in a small clearing near the icy stream. In the hurry to investigate the encampment and provide
assistance to the wounded soldiers, nobody had bothered to unsaddle them. Zander paused for only a moment to check Ember’s saddlebags for anything that might be of use at the camp, but the only thing left in them was a half-full canteen and, in a special pocket where he always kept it, one of the notebooks Quinn had given him once when he’d mentioned missing having a place to write down his thoughts.
For only a second, the notebook gave him pause as he remembered the story of Quinn being kidnapped from an emergency encampment. Although his heart pounded in his hurry to leave, he was rational enough to realize the danger it might cause to have people worrying about him. At least paper was the solution to one of his problems.
His breath felt heavy and tight in his chest as he rode around the outside of the camp, tracing the route they’d traveled coming here from the trail, only this time in reverse. With every step he expected someone to appear through the trees to stop him – though he didn’t even know what he would do if someone did. Could they stop him? He wasn’t afraid of any of the guards here; if he had been, he wouldn’t be on his horse right now.
It didn’t happen anyway. He stayed just far enough away from the shelters and activity to avoid notice, and after a few minutes, the road that had brought them here stretched before him. Without another second of hesitation, he headed back in the direction of Tobias’ house.
He’d been riding for over an hour and could tell he was getting closer to Tobias’ when he heard it – the heavy pounding of a horse’s hooves behind him on the snowy trail. Maybe more than one horse. There was only one way to find out.
Bringing Ember to a halt, he pulled his sword all the way out of its sheath, holding it ready as he brought his horse slowly around.
What he saw nearly made him drop the weapon into the snow.
He didn’t know much about horses, even after all the time he’d spent around them here, but he knew he’d never seen that breed in Deusterros. He knew because he would have recognized the massive beast – not from a personal encounter, but from beer commercials back in his world.
The rider he had seen here. Now that he thought about it, the man would have been a nice touch in one of those commercials. One of the holiday ones, maybe.
Leaves of Revolution Page 17