The King's Man

by Christopher G. Nuttall

  She let out a breath. “You sided with Louise. Not because you slept with her, but because you agreed with her. You think, deep inside, that she’s right. You let your feelings blind you. You told yourself that you weren’t, but you were. You took a serious risk to prove her innocence. You sided with her, without admitting it to yourself, because you thought she was in the right. Didn’t you?

  I had no time to answer before she went on.

  “But you cannot let yourself be blinded by your feelings. You cannot let your sympathy for Louise blind you. You cannot let your hatred of the aristos blind you. You have to step back and look at the world dispassionately. That’s what we’re expected to do. People have to trust that we’ll render objective judgement. If they lose that faith, they won’t trust us any longer. Why should they?”

  I clenched my fists. “Did the people who had their businesses ruined because Magus Court passed legislation to clarify the issues deserve it?”

  “No,” Caroline said. “But just because someone is part of your tribe doesn’t mean they’re a wonderful person.”

  She shook her head. “You know it’s true. It’s easy to side with our own people. It’s never easy to believe that someone from our family, from our community, is a monster in human form. Or merely an asshole. But that doesn’t make it untrue. You had the same lessons I did. You know it to be true.”

  “Fuck,” I said. I didn’t know how to feel. “I didn’t know.”

  “I was surprised you didn’t notice,” Caroline said. “The Alderman Curse is an aristocratic spell.”

  “Which doesn’t get taught to commoners,” I snarled.

  “You might be surprised,” Caroline said. “Really.”

  I forced myself to take a step back, controlling myself. If Caroline was an aristo ... she’d saved my life, time and time again. And I’d saved hers ... I’d cut off my wrist to save her life. And ... my head spun. If I’d known her as a young girl, would I have liked her? I’d met Alana when we’d both been twelve. Would I have liked Caroline when she’d been twelve? I gritted my teeth, unwilling to admit - even to myself - that I’d made a complete fool of myself. Caroline was right. I’d allowed my hatred to blind me.

  “I’m an idiot,” I muttered.

  “Not an idiot,” Caroline corrected. “Just unformed. And immature.”

  I glared. “Didn't you do some idiotic things when you were a child?”

  “Yes,” Caroline said. “But I’m not a child any longer. And neither are you.”

  She took a breath. “We need to put this behind us and move on,” she said. “Please.”

  I studied her for a long moment. Who was her father? Would I recognise the name? Or was he someone who ... I told myself, firmly, that it didn’t matter. Caroline had more than proved herself since I’d known her. I wasn’t going to ask. She could keep it to herself as long as she wished.

  “I’ll try,” I promised. “And I’m sorry.”

  “Me too,” Caroline said. “We should have had this discussion earlier.”

  I sat down, tacitly changing the subject. “There’s no way we’ll get anything out of our prisoner,” I told her. “Magistra Loanda insisted there was no cure.”

  “She might be right,” Caroline said. “There are plenty of spells to cure wounds, but they’re a little pointless if the victim is already dead. And without a bigger sample of potion, they might not be able to devise a countermeasure.”

  I nodded. “And so we’re sunk,” I said. “We can’t ransack House Aguirre and House Rubén to catch the plotters.”

  “If they’re from House Aguirre and House Rubén,” Caroline pointed out. “They could be from any of the Great Houses. There are hundreds of aristocrats who have no power and no hope of getting it. Why do you think I didn’t want to stay?”

  “I never thought about it,” I said. I’d wanted a challenge. I’d assumed Caroline was just the same. “We could take the prisoner to Lord Dirac. If he recognises him ...”

  “He’ll throw us both in jail,” Caroline said. “And we couldn’t be sure he’d try to identify the assassin.”

  “Perhaps we should sit down and read the society pages,” I said, sourly. “We could see if anyone’s dropped out of sight recently.”

  “Only if we’re desperate.” Caroline grimaced. “Ninety percent of what you read in the society pages is made up of whole cloth. It’s practically all nonsense. What little truth they manage to get right is buried under a mountain of bovine faecal matter. No one cares, either. They just want to pretend they’re in the know.”

  “You make it sound so charming,” I said. “People spread rumours in Water Shallot too.”

  “Quite,” Caroline said. She winked. “See? We’re just like you.”

  “Except you have more money,” I said. I didn’t want to ask, but I saw no choice. “Do you think your father could help?”

  “I doubt it,” Caroline said. I heard a twinge of bitterness in her voice. “He’s got too many other problems right now.”

  I nodded. “Sorry.”

  Caroline shook her head. “I don’t see any other option ...”

  I stared at the confinement circle for a long moment. “People come up with new potions and counter-potions all the time, right?”

  “Yeah.” Caroline looked at me. “What do you have in mind?”

  “We know someone in Louise’s inner circle is a spy,” I said. “And it practically has to be one of the leaders. They’re the only ones who didn’t have their brains scrambled by the wards. That person betrayed her. He must have told the assassin where to find her. Right?”

  “Yeah,” Caroline said, again. “Unless they got very lucky and shadowed us to the inn ...”

  “I don’t think so,” I said. “The assassin could have caught us earlier, if he’d known where to look.”

  I smiled, feeling the plan come together. “Louse tells her inner circle that we managed to counter the potion. Perhaps I threw him into stasis quickly enough to keep him from swallowing a permanent dose. The assassin is a bit confused, but his memories are intact; we’re holding him prisoner until we can use him as a bargaining chip. Magus Court wants him, so we can use him.”

  “I’m sure that’ll surprise Magus Court,” Caroline said, dryly. “What do you have in mind?”

  “The assassin had to know his superiors,” I said. “If he’s an aristo himself, he probably knows far too much for their peace of mind. They’ll want him back, quickly, before he can spill the beans to Magus Court. They’d probably also want to know what happened when he drank only a small dose of potion. Their Potions Master might want to vary the recipe.”

  “You think they’ll come for him,” Caroline said. “And then what?”

  I took a breath. “I take his place and let them take me,” I said. “You follow at a discreet distance.”

  Caroline met my eyes. “Do you know how many things could go spectacularly wrong?”

  “Yeah,” I said. “I know.”

  “Hah.” Caroline snorted, rudely. “What’s to stop them hurling an infernal device into the room and blowing you into the next world?”

  “They’ll need to know what we know,” I said. I smiled, feeling slightly more confident. “The only way they’ll know what we know is by interrogating their assassin. If they blow me up, they won’t know what we know.”

  “Which is nothing,” Caroline said, coldly. “They’ll lose nothing by killing you.”

  “They won’t know that,” I reminded her. “Whatever they’re doing ... they cannot afford to be noticed. Not now. If Magus Court finds out about them, they’re screwed. They need to know what we might have learnt, and what we’ve done with the knowledge, or they might as well pull up stakes and flee the city. There’s no point in sticking around when their plan is heading for disaster.”

  “I don’t like it,” Caroline said. “Once they realise they’ve caught the wrong person, they’ll kill you.”

  “I have faith in you,” I said. “And I do have m
y own small powers.”

  “You could barely handle a single assassin,” Caroline snapped. “What happens if you run into two of them?”

  I met her eyes. “Do you have a better idea?”

  “... No.” Caroline glared. “But this is madness.”

  “I can’t think of anything else,” I said. “And we’re running out of time.”

  Caroline crossed her arms under her breasts. “We’ll make the preparations,” she said. “And if we come up with something else, while we’re doing it, we’ll do that instead.”

  I nodded. “Let me get a shower first,” I said. I started to undress, then stopped. “What were you and Louise doing while you waited for me?”

  “Talking about you.” Caroline smirked. I thought she was joking. “You were such a little brat when you were at school.”

  “I was not,” I protested. “She didn’t know me that well!”

  “Well enough.” Caroline’s smirk grew wider. “She had a lot of interesting things to say.”

  I snorted as I stripped off my stained tunic, turned it into ash and dumped the remnants in the bin. “We’re going to need new clothes, sooner rather than later.”

  “Next time, perhaps you should just run,” Caroline said. “Why did they arrest you?”

  I sighed. “Either Rebecca or the loan shark must have filed a complaint,” I said. “And they put me right at the top of the wanted list.”

  “You weren’t very nice to Rebecca,” Caroline said. “Were you?”

  “Neither were you,” I countered.

  “No,” Caroline agreed. “But you were worse.”

  I felt a twinge of guilt as I grabbed my towel and headed for the shower. Rebecca ... I kicked myself, mentally. I’d seen her as a sell-out, as someone from Water Shallot who’d taken the offer of patronage instead of working her way to the top. But ... she made potions for the poor, people who could never have afforded them if they were sold at regular prices. She was a better person than me. I promised myself, silently, that I’d apologise to her after the terrorists were in prison and the whole affair was over. Caroline was right. I’d been a total prat. Worse, I’d allowed my feelings to blind me.

  The water darkened as it washed the muck from my skin. It smelt thoroughly unpleasant. I wondered why neither Caroline nor Louise had mentioned it as I scrubbed vigorously, then towelled down. A new tunic awaited me as I opened the door. I shot Caroline a grateful look as I pulled it on. She hadn’t needed to fetch it for me.

  “I’m still thinking about other plans,” Caroline said, as we started to draw blood from our prisoner. “We could do a blood test. See who he might be related to.”

  I grimaced. “How many people do you know who’d let us play with their blood?”

  Caroline scowled. “Point taken.”

  Akin might, I thought. He might listen to me, at least, if I tried to convince him to give us a blood sample. But no one else would.

  I put the assassin’s blood in the base potion, then keyed it to the spellbinder. We couldn’t have the effects failing ahead of time. An Object of Power would have made it so much easier, but ... I doubted Caitlyn Aguirre would make one for us in a hurry. She was probably working to upgrade her family’s defences. I wondered if I should envy or pity her. Her gift made her important, but it brought too many weaknesses for my peace of mind. I wouldn’t want to be her.

  There was a knock on the door. Caroline opened it. Louise stepped into the room, looking tired. She’d changed clothes, donning a dress and scarf that made her look several years older. She was carrying a cloth bag of food. I felt my mouth begin to water. I hadn’t eaten much since breakfast.

  “The raids have restarted,” she said. “Two of my comrades have been scooped up.”

  “Crap,” I said. “Has there been any word about your family?”

  “Nothing.” Louise passed Caroline the food, then sagged against the wall. “Their captors haven’t tried to use them as leverage, not yet. It doesn’t make sense.”

  “It does,” I said. “But that doesn’t matter right now. We have a plan.”

  “A very dangerous plan,” Caroline said, curtly. “And it needs your help.”

  “We have to move fast,” Louise said. “The protest march will be starting tomorrow morning.”

  I cursed. “You can’t hold it back?”

  “No.” Louise shook her head, then recovered the bag and produced a small array of sandwiches. “It was all I could do to keep it from happening today. The mood on the streets is vile. There were dozens of people screaming and shouting for violence. I’m not sure we can keep the protest march from turning into a nightmare.”

  “Particularly if someone decides to make matters worse,” I said. There were hundreds of violent men in Water Shallot. They wouldn’t need much prompting to turn the march into a bloody nightmare. The City Guard would have all the excuse it needed to crush the marchers by force. “We need to move. Fast.”

  Louise nodded as she passed me a sandwich. “I quite agree,” she said. “What do you have in mind?”

  Caroline leaned forward. “When’s your next meeting with your ... comrades?”

  “Tonight.” Louise smiled. “The location is going to be a secret until the last possible moment. I don’t want word getting out too soon.”

  “Good,” Caroline said. “I’m glad to hear you’re taking security seriously.”

  “John and Hammond have been arrested,” Louise said. “I don’t think either of them were known to the guardsmen until now. Someone not only betrayed them, they revealed their homes and families. They’ve all been arrested.”

  The anger in her voice didn’t surprise me. We’d both been to Jude’s. The lowest of the low amongst the students had always been the tattletale. The person who pretended to be a friend, while ratting you out to the upperclassmen or the tutors. To accuse someone of betrayal was to start a fight. No one could let that pass. But here ... Louise had good reason to be angry. She didn’t even know who to blame!

  “I have a plan,” I said. “But I need your help.”

  “Of course,” Louise said. She gave me a faint smile. “What do you want?”

  I told her.

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  I felt ... dull.

  My body felt heavy, too tired to move. I knew it was a side-effect of the potion, a side-effect I could push away with a simple charm, but it was surprisingly hard to resist. I lay on the bed, staring up at the ceiling and telling myself the plan was going to work. It had to. The protest march was due to start tomorrow morning and if we didn’t catch the terrorists ... I shuddered. Anything could happen. Louise had organised stewards for the march, but I doubted they could keep the crowd under control. Water Shallot hadn’t been so angry since King Rufus had signed a fishing treaty with North Cairnbulg. The riots had lasted weeks.

  I kept my mind focused as the seconds ticked away. The socialist safehouse had been largely abandoned, if only because it was known to the entire leadership. I hoped they wouldn’t see anything suspicious in Louise using it as a makeshift prison. The spy - whoever he was - had had plenty of time to report to his masters. I went through everything Louise had told me about the leadership, but couldn’t pick a possible suspect out of the crowd. It wasn’t a surprise. No spy ever born had spy on his resume.

  The seconds started to feel like hours. I was dimly aware of the darkness outside starting to shade to light. The sun was coming up, peeking over the distant mountains and beaming rays of light into the city. Worry gnawed at my mind. Had our plan misfired? Or had we simply missed our chance? The mystery terrorists and their backers might have already fled, their work done. Or they might have calculated that the potion would have worked perfectly, even if their assassin was frozen in his tracks. I didn’t think they could afford to take the risk, but I could be wrong.

  My body felt even heavier as dawn broke over the city. Caroline and I had done everything we could to give me a fighting chance, but it was starting to feel like we�
��d wasted our time. The terrorists couldn’t come looking for me in broad daylight. They were much more likely to hurl an infernal device into the building or simply toss a vapour bottle crammed with poison into the room. It was funny how the plan no longer seemed like a brilliant idea. I’d thought it was wonderful, until I’d found myself trying to carry it out.

  A rustle ran through the air. I tensed, wondering if the terrorists were finally here. It was dawn. The guards would be at their lowest ebb. The citizens outside the walls would be trying to get a few more minutes of sleep before they woke and began their day. Sir Muldoon had told me that dawn was often the best time to mount an attack, although he’d added a warning that most armies knew it and prepared accordingly. Louise’s people didn’t seem to be quite so well trained. I wondered, as the sound of faint footsteps grew louder, if they knew what they were doing. It was easy to claim to be great until one was actually put to the test.

  They’ll be used to violence, if nothing else, I told myself. They grew up in Water Shallot.

  The door opened, so quietly I knew they had to be using silencing charms. I lay there, silently praying to my ancestors that they wouldn’t test the glamour surrounding me. They had to believe I was their assassin or ... I didn’t dare brace myself, even as I felt them approach. One man ... no, two. They might have come to take me home or ... they might stick a poisoned blade in me and run. I hoped Caroline was ready to intervene, if they did look like they were trying to kill me. I wasn’t in any state for a fight.

  A figure crossed my line of sight. I stayed as still as I could. He was a tall man, dressed in a black outfit charmed to be hard to see. I’d seen invisibility cloaks, back at Haddon Hall, but this was different. I was impressed. The man could walk through a crowd and no one would notice, as long as he was careful not to attract attention. The spells reminded me of the ones on my ring. People wouldn’t notice as long as their attention wasn’t drawn to it.

  The figure looked down at me for a moment, then cast a simple levitation charm. I floated into the air and hovered an inch or two above the bed. The figure caught me, pulled me over his shoulder and turned to the door. I caught a glimpse of a second figure as I was carried out of the room, down the stairs and through the entrance hall. The guards lay on the floor, unmoving. I felt a pang of guilt. It was hard - impossible - to tell if they were dead, or merely stunned. If they were dead ...