by Andra Leigh
No, she kept walking, huddling further into her hood, shrinking her face away from the shuttered windows of the houses and shops she passed. It had been three nights since she had left the palace and the guards she saw were on high alert. News of her disappearance was obviously circulating the cities, but since she couldn’t very well walk up to a guard and ask what they were saying, she didn’t know what was being said as the reason why.
Fortunately, even here in the Northern Cities, without parade or announcement, she was no more the Gentle Reigness than the peddler she’d left behind to flog his wares. She would only be recognised if someone stopped her and studied her face.
She had stayed at different inns and taverns each night, bribing street scamps to book her in under a false name. Two out of the three places had been searched by guards, looking for her, though their entrances had not been subtle so she’d had plenty of time to avoid them. The biggest problem was that none of the rooms had had the same allure as the palace. They weren’t spacious, the surfaces definitely didn’t gleam and all the attendants appeared to do the least amount of work possible to retain their jobs.
She felt dirty and sticky and had not found a single morsel of food up to standard since leaving the palace.
Focusing back on her current location she ducked under an awning, passed two cats fighting over a scrap of meat and continued on. She was only a few minutes from her destination. There was a chance she was walking into a trap filled with a unit of guards but she suspected the intrigue and strangeness of the situation would be enough to keep her safe.
Reaching her mother’s old family home, she glanced around for any sign of a patrol or lookout. Nothing. The remaining members of her mother’s family had moved out of Trelyes a few years ago and the home had been left vacant. She had visited it a few times as a child, but never with the Reigner. He didn’t care for tea and talk with the parents of his wife, so they had always done it without his knowledge. If he was offering suggestions on where to find her, the house she was entering now wouldn’t even cross his mind.
The air inside was thick and stale. Scrunching up her nose she moved further into the house. The sitting room had minimal furniture left in it, all covered in dusty sheets and while guards didn’t jump out from behind any of them to surprise her, it wasn’t completely vacant either.
Tylan DirTarne leant against the far wall, the letter she had given the nervous maid to deliver in his hands.
He’d looked up at her entrance, taking in her appearance with calm indifference.
“What the Bloods is going on?” he asked, his smooth voice sounding almost bored. “You realise people are saying you were kidnapped?”
“Who would want to kidnap me?” Acanthea frowned, thinking of all the Reigner’s enemies and wondering which one would be daring enough to try to kidnap her.
“Plenty of folk,” Tylan said seriously. Then added, “Just none who know you.”
Her lips pinched together but she didn’t say anything.
Examining his nails, he continued. “And that banquet was filled with people who would do anything to gain a notch over the Reigner.”
She planted her hands on her hips. “I didn’t go missing at the Banquet.”
“Technically you did.” Tylan pushed off the wall, stirring the stale air with his hand. “One second you were there, the next gone.”
She wanted to argue the same of him, but she knew what – or who – had taken up his time.
“People saw me the next day – the Reigner saw me the next day.”
Tylan laughed his glossy laugh. “You think that’s enough to stop people making up their own minds on the matter? Besides, between announcing the kidnapping of the Gentle Reigness at the Banquet and admitting his own daughter ran away,” he seesawed his hands as if weighing invisible objects, “which do you think the Reigner is supporting?”
“Of course,” she muttered.
Lifting up the corner of a sheet covering a chair Tylan gave it a flick, sending dust flying everywhere and dropped it on the floor. After giving the cushion a showy brush with the back of his hand he settled himself on the seat, crooked a finger and propped his chin up on it. Only then did he continue with their conversation.
“It’s a great way to gain support for the Posts from the common person – something that isn’t easy, given the general opinion of guards – and it makes the Reigner look like a human-being. A father, heartbroken over the cruel kidnapping of his own daughter. The people sympathise. The more he pushes for sympathy the more he can bend their wills without them even noticing.”
There was no way Acanthea was joining Tylan in sitting on the musty furniture, so she planted herself in the middle of the space, arms crossed over her chest.
“Is he looking for me?” she demanded.
“What?”
“Well, you’re right it’s a great opportunity. So are the guards being ordered to scour the cities for me to bring me home safe, or to draw attention to my disappearance for the benefit of the Reigner?”
Tylan considered this for a moment. “I suspect the orders may have been carefully worded, yes.” Crossing one leg over the other, he studied her with intrigue shining in his eyes. “So, Gentle Reigness… why’d you send for me?”
“Because on some level I trust you,” Acanthea shrugged. “And I need you to help me get some information.”
A wicked smile played across his face. “The kind of information I need to sleep with some married women for?”
“No.”
“How dreary,” he pouted. “Miss Astrill said you –”
“Who?”
“The maid… that gave me this.” Tylan waved the letter still in his hand at her.
“Oh.”
He raised an eyebrow at her. “You didn’t know her name?”
“I only knew her a day.”
“Yes,” he agreed with a smirk. “A somewhat remarkable day in which you ran away from the palace.”
“Exactly. I had other things on my mind.”
Tylan gave a small shake of his head. “Sometimes I wonder why you want to be Lady Reigness.”
“Excuse me?”
Mistaking her tone, he queried, “You don’t want to be Lady Reigness?”
“How should I know?” she huffed at the absurd turn in their conversation. “That’s not a factor in the matter. That’s just… my future.”
“Well it also might not be a factor now you’ve run away.”
Acanthea blinked back her surprise. “I hadn’t thought of that,” she muttered.
“What,” Tylan swept his arms wide, “that you may be de-reigned if you ran away? You’re so odd, Gentle Reigness. Or should I just call you Acanthea now?”
“Well, why should it have been something I thought of? It’s never been a ‘maybe’ thing before. Becoming the Lady Reigness had always just been a fact.”
“Then I guess now would be a good time to figure out if it’s even something you want.”
“Why? It’s not supposed to be about what I want or don’t want.”
“I don’t understand. You stand up for yourself in every other aspect of your life. Yet you refuse to look at this as a choice.”
“Choice? Wha… It’s not a…” She didn’t understand anything he was saying. He was using words that had nothing to do with being the Reigness. Being the Gentle Reigness had never been a choice, it was her life. Just as becoming the Lady Reigness had always been her future. Impatient, she waved her hand at him. “You’re not making sense. It’s a fact. Facts can’t be changed or given opinions to… Can we move on?”
“One more question,” he said. “Do you think your father should be Reigner?”
“Should... it’s a fa–”
“Fact. Right. But do you think he’s a good Reigner or that he should be de-reigned?”
Why didn’t he understand the matter had nothing to do with her personal opinion? “I think unless he is de-reigned, he’s the Reigner and that’s just the way it is,
” she said, making it clear they were finished with the subject.
“Oh yeah, you’re not going to stick out in the cities at all with that view on things…”
Acanthea tapped a foot on the floor. “Are you going to help me or –”
“Or what?” Tylan interrupted. “Go on, threaten to throw me in the cells for a night. Get the guards to cart me off. Oh wait, you have no guards. You have no cells, Acanthea.”
“I was just going to say ‘or not’,” she lied.
“Of course you were. And you already know I’ll help. You’ve piqued my interest and I enjoy playing my interests out until I get bored with them.”
“I almost hope this is one you get bored with quickly,” Acanthea confessed.
That made Tylan tilt his head, eyes widening with curiosity. “I sense potential.”
“And I sense you enjoy gossip too much. There is a family I require you to get some information about.”
“Why can’t you do it? You suddenly have a lot of free time. Or have you decided to take up an art? Perhaps pottery?”
She rolled her eyes. “For some unbeknown reason people actually seem to like you.”
“– It has to do with my natural charm and very straight teeth –”
“They enjoy divulging secrets to you. And you’re being trained for Half-Post command. You have contacts that I would rather not have – well – contact with.”
“Intimacy issues?”
“Do you intend on taking this seriously at any point?”
“No,” he answered simply. “So, what is the name of this family I am to dig up information on?”
“Eddwist.”
Tylan frowned. “Your maid?”
“Wait, you knew her name? Was I the only one who – never mind. Yes, that Eddwist family. More specifically, Cathrainra’s son.”
“First name?”
Narrowing her eyes, she focused off into the corner of the room, thinking.
Tylan gave an amused laugh. “Of course, you don’t remember.”
“No, no.” She lifted a hand in protest. “This time, I’m almost certain I haven’t been told his first name.”
“And I imagine you didn’t ask. Other than a family name and the first name of the Mother, is there anything else that might help in this search? Getting information is somewhat more challenging if I don’t know where to begin.”
Acanthea shook her head. “I don’t even know where Cathrainra lived before becoming my maid.”
“Here’s a concept that may be a bit beyond you, why don’t we ask her?”
A cold numbness swept through her and she heard herself reply, “She’s dead.”
“Ah.” Tylan rubbed his jaw. “Yes, that’s somewhat inconvenient. So what’s with the son? Why do you want information on him?”
“Before Cathrainra – before, um… Before I left the palace I was told that the boy was –” She paused mid-sentence, a new concern creeping into her mind.
“A few days without tutors and your communication skills just vanish,” Tylan said.
She fixed him with a piercing stare. “Your father is the Reigner’s only friend, you’re being trained to take Half-Post command and let’s not pretend you abide by the law all of the time.”
If Tylan had any idea of what she was suggesting he may be a part of, he seemed unfazed.
“You forgot the part about my very straight teeth. Although, given how much you normally retain about people in your life, I should possibly be honoured you even know my name…”
“What do you know of children being taken?” she demanded.
For the first time since she had walked into the house the man before her looked completely confused.
“What children…being taken…where?”
Unable to stay still any longer she began pacing back and forth in a short line before him. He sounded sincere in his utter bewilderment. But that didn’t change the fact that his life was steeped in opportunities to have become a confidant in the kidnapping scheme she wasn’t certain was even real. Although she could say the same of her life, yet she had been told nothing. Perhaps it was due to the blatant lack of niceties shared between her and the Reigner, or that they were still years – even decades – away from any potential switch in reign and therefore, she was far from being privy to all the secrets of the Realm. Some Gentle Reigners and Reigness’ of the past may have been raised from an early age in preparation for taking over reign of Rylock, but the Reigner had always ensured there had been a line between teachings of the Gentle Reigness and learning the way of the Lady Reigness. There would be no early passing of the reign by Lord Reigner Nayton Dyreves. He would only de-reign when he was dead. And limiting Acanthea’s familiarity to the job had been a way to control just that. Tylan was considered her future husband and, by marriage, the next Reigner. Would the current Reigner allow him the knowledge of something that could potentially upset that control?
After another moment of striding across her short path, she decided she had no option but to trust Tylan.
“Apparently there are children being stolen.”
Tylan raised an eyebrow. “Who would want to take children? Spiteful little beggars, all of them.”
“I don’t know why. Cathrainra was…vague when we spoke. She said they were special in some way. That it’s still in the blood.” She waved her hand absently at the senseless idea.
“What’s in the blood?”
“I don’t know. She was raving. I don’t know how much of what she said can be trusted. But the day after she told me children were being taken – what were her words? – ‘not just to die’, she ended up in a grave. That tells me there’s something to be discovered and I think this son of hers is the place to start.”
Tylan shifted in his seat, leaning into one of the cushioned armrests. “Forgive me while I attempt to keep up with what you’re not saying. If I pretend to believe that you would care enough about the death of your maid to start the search for the subject of her unfounded babbling, I would find your decision to run away from the palace a strange way to begin to accomplish this. I query, why not ask the Reigner if any rumours of kidnapping had passed his ears, unless – of course – you have reason to believe the Reigner to have something to do with it.”
He knew he had guessed right the moment he said it and Acanthea didn’t try to deny it. She didn’t like the way he’d just discredited everything she had done in the last few days and the reasons behind them. He was accusing her of being a rash child, eager to fabricate a conspiracy out of an insane woman’s speech. But Cathrainra wasn’t mad, she reminded herself. A little strange in their final meeting, yes, but never insane. Acanthea had dug up the corpse of the only parent in her life for the last nine years. She had looked into Cathrainra’s lifeless stare and remembered she’d had a son. A son supposedly taken by the Reigner. Yet Cathrainra cared for and perhaps even loved Acanthea, the true child of that Reigner, as if she were her own. If there was ever a reason to run away from the palace and the Reigner, it would be to honour the woman who raised her and disobey the man who hadn’t.
“I have reason to suspect him, yes. But I can’t confront him with just a suspicion. As the son of Full-Post Commander, have you heard anything that could confirm these rumours of kidnapping?”
“Talk to anyone in the cities, above or below the river, and they’ll tell you a story of some poor missing person they knew or have been told about. Disappearances aren’t uncommon in Rylock. The opposite, in fact. Women go missing because they attract the attention of greedy men. Families vanish after taking coin from a lender they can’t pay back. Some,” he gestured to her, “run away of their own accord.”
Acanthea strummed her fingers on her thigh. “You’re saying it’s a hopeless quest.”
“I’m saying you should bow to my superior talents and skills when I find something. I have a name. That should be enough direction to narrow the search even though you’ve barely divulged to me anything about what is happening.�
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“Yet I’ve told you everything I know,” she sniped back.
“Then I suppose there’s little reason to continue with our meeting.” Tylan was standing up, smoothing down his pleated shirt front. “Unless you’ve become interested in idle chatter now that you’ve ventured into the common land. I have a wonderful joke about the inflation of seedling prices and in which part of his body the Reigner seems to be planting and growing these rises, if you wish to talk of gardening.”
Acanthea scowled. “Too much of this conversation has already been idle.”
Tylan shrugged. “Your loss. I’d say stay here for the night, but the Posts are moving on to searching family dwellings and travelling wagons, so I’ll have a guard get you a room at an inn I know. It won’t live up to your palace standards, but it’s clean, good food and the people there don’t tend to ask questions.”
She narrowed her eyes at him again.
“What? Do you not trust me? You’re welcome to find your own accommodation, but the more I know about your location the easier it’ll be to relay any information I may discover.”
“What about the guard, won’t he find it suspicious, getting a room because you tell him to? People know we’re… acquainted.”
“No, I get him to get me rooms all the time. He’ll just think it’s for me.” He wiggled his eyebrows, leaving no doubt in her mind as to what the rooms were used for.
“Fine,” she said, offering the word as a farewell to the young man.
But Tylan wasn’t finished. Heading for the sitting room door he called back to her, “Reigness, after everything you’ve just told me, how can you still offer no opinion on whether your father is a fair Reigner or not?”
Then he was gone.
CHAPTER NINE
Falling Inn to Dreams
• Eliscity •
Eliscity was following the sound of hammering.
It led her down the spiral staircase, across the Playground and into the antechamber on the way to the water tunnels. Jinx and the Triplets had the metal door to the lowest level open and were working on the original wooden door that had been hidden behind it. Several of the old panels, splintered and pummelled, had been pulled off and were lying next to Jinx’s feet. Fresh panels were being nailed across the hole in the door.