Sons of the Falcon (The Falcons Saga)

by Ellyn, Court

  “Geese are fine,” Carah said. “They chase me in the bailey. They scare me. You can eat the mean ol’ geese, Da.”

  Kelyn chuckled. “So gracious of you, lady.”

  ~~~~

  Chess was harder than his War Games. Kethlyn wasn’t sure he liked chess. Uncertain, he started to shift a pawn forward a space, but the prince’s grin convinced him the move was foolish. Kethlyn withdrew his finger, tried to see the play that Valryk saw, but decided it was hopeless. He moved the pawn forward anyway.

  Valryk’s shaddra swept in from the flank and captured it.

  “Well done, Highness,” lauded one of his bodyguards.

  Kethlyn glowered at the man. Two guards watched the game’s progress. Two stood to each side of the parlor windows. Two more flanked the doors. They were all on Valryk’s side, no mistake. Kethlyn didn’t like feeling outnumbered. He knocked over his king.

  The prince gasped. “You can’t do that!”

  “Can, too. I surrender.”

  “We just started. You have to play until I win.”

  Kethlyn sank back in his chair, arms crossed. He’d rather be down in the Great Hall, forced to listen to the boring talk of grownups than stuck in here staring at a chessboard and his bossy cousin. “Is there something to eat?” The cooks had sent Kethlyn and Carah a large breakfast in the nursery, but the prince’s summons arrived before Kethlyn could finish it. Anything left from the prince’s own breakfast had been swept away.

  “How should I know?” Valryk retorted. “Sit your king up again. Play for real.”

  “I’m hungry. Let’s go raid the kitchens.”

  Valryk’s fingers froze around the head of his victorious shaddra. “Raid?” His glance slid from one guard to the next.

  “You’re to stay here, Highness,” one of them said. “Queen’s orders.”

  “Then you go get us something to eat,” he demanded, angry.

  The guard lowered a tolerant smile. “I’ll send for a footman, if it please Your Highness.”

  “It does! Go!” As soon as the guard strode off for the bell rope, Valryk whispered, “Let’s raid. That way.” He slipped out of his chair and dashed off toward the servants’ door before the second guard could catch him. Kethlyn ducked a grasping hand, rolled out of his chair, and ran after his cousin. They scrambled for the latch on the hidden door, but the two guards near the windows sprang after them and pressed the servants’ door shut. “Mother’s room!” Valryk shouted.

  An arm swept Kethlyn off the floor. He bit down hard on the muscled forearm. The guard yowled and dropped him, swung a foot into Kethlyn’s arse and boosted him after the prince.

  Valryk hooted a war cry as they slammed the queen’s side door and turned the lock. They had only seconds before the guards ran to the corridor and around to the chamber’s main door. Kethlyn found the knob set in the plaster molding, and soon the boys were bounding down the narrow servants’ stairs hidden in the walls. A maid climbing to change the queen’s sheets barely jumped out of their way in time. Crisp sheets tumbled from her arms and down the stairs.

  Footmen and scullery maids bustled about the kitchen’s long preparation tables. Squires waited on hand to take trays of delicate delights and flasks of wine into the Great Hall. The ovens blazed and roasting meat turned on spits. It took two undercooks to remove the large tray of meat pies from the ovens and set it on a cooling rack.

  The two boys crouched in the doorway to the buttery, gawking at the wealth of food and the armada of servants. Maids hurried past, sparing them little more than cursory glances and brief frowns. “How will we raid the food now?” asked Valryk. “There are too many watching.”

  Tongue poking out the corner of his mouth, Kethlyn calculated his route. True, he’d never raided the kitchen when it was this busy, but trying was better than returning to the chessboard. “Follow me,” he whispered and bolted from the buttery. On the edge of the nearest table, trays of muffins and other confections waited for the decorative touch of icing and glazes. Kethlyn swiped up half a dozen in his arms, sent a dozen more rolling and skittering across the table, and, hardly pausing, sped past a shrieking cook who wielded a wooden spoon. Valryk’s triumphant war cry rose just behind him, followed by an outraged bellow, “Your Highness! Bring those back!”

  Scullery maids and squires leapt from their path, mouths hanging open. Kethlyn shrieked his own wild cry as he fled past the ovens and dived into the corridor beyond. He stopped long enough to glance back for his cousin. Valryk stood in the doorway, stuffing little cakes into his mouth.

  “What are you doing?” Kethlyn cried, panic pitching his voice. Nelda, the head cook, ordered a pair of squires after the thieves. “When you raid the kitchen, you can’t eat here. We’ll get caught. Hurry!”

  Valryk saw the pursuing squires and ran after Kethlyn, arms hugging the rest of his booty. The twists and turns brought them past Etivva’s quarters and her candlelit shrine to the Mother-Father, then on to the ledger room. Kethlyn kicked the door shut and snicked the lock. The squires hammered on the door and cursed the raiders, but they needed a battering ram to break through that door of ancient andyr planks. Victory. “Ilwyyyyythe!” Kethlyn bellowed at the ceiling.

  “Bramoraaaaaan!” cried Valryk. “I can’t believe we got away! Did you see? That fat cook almost caught me! Then she saw who I was and squeaked and let go.”

  Smug and breathless, they climbed the spiral stair to the library, nibbling on their loot as they went. At a table littered with last week’s math lessons, they finished off every cake and muffin, then sat back groaning. “We have to try again tomorrow,” Valryk said, “and paint our faces first.”

  “Da will probably find out and throw us in the dungeon.” Kethlyn was only half-serious. He might earn a stinging backside for the raid, but it was worth it.

  Valryk sat up straighter. “Ilswythe has a dungeon? I’ll bet Bramoran’s dungeon is scarier than your dungeon.”

  “I’ll bet it’s not! Just because you’re the prince doesn’t mean you have the scariest dungeon.”

  “Prove it!”

  Kethlyn scrambled out of his chair, and though their bellies were stuffed with sweets, the boys raced through the corridors, mostly empty except for handmaids and valets, who didn’t dare stop them. Downstairs, the doors to the Great Hall were shut. Muffled arguments rumbled inside. Yorin, the head steward, stood at his post outside the door, handing off orders to this squire or that footman. Spotting the boys creeping along the corridor, he called, “Highness? M’ lord? Where are you supposed to be?”

  “Run for it!” Kethlyn shouted. He and Valryk fled out the great bronze doors to the courtyard, dodged a pair of sentries, and stopped only when they entered the shadow under the gatehouse.

  “Can I help you?” The sentry in charge of the portcullis peered from the guardroom. “Oh, it’s the young War Commander, is it? And the king, I assume.”

  “That’s right,” Valryk said, raising his nose and propping his fists on his hips.

  “Well, beat it, both of you. I’m already on report for getting distracted from me duty. That Captain Lissah is a downright … well, never you mind.”

  Another soldier of the garrison barged into the guardroom. His cerulean tabard was askew, and his fingers fumbled with the buckle of his helm. “Damn that woman,” he growled. “I haven’t slept since yesterday morning, and I just got slapped with another watch.”

  “You’re telling me,” the other said. “I been posted here twice since midnight.”

  “We won’t bother you, soldier,” Kethlyn said. Neither paid any attention as he swiped a lamp from a hook on the wall and tucked it behind his back. “You’re doing a fine job. Carry on.” He backed from the guardroom, beckoning Valryk to follow. The two sentries were deep in their complaints when the boys slid back the bolt on the dungeon door and slipped into the darkness beyond.

  For a long time, neither moved. The void ahead stank of mildew and rotting straw and other things that belonged in the mi
ddens.

  “Are there prisoners down there?” asked Valryk, voice small and echoing and close to Kethlyn’s ear.

  “Not right now, but there’s ghosts. Captain Maegeth says so.”

  “Really? Whose?”

  “The ghosts of elves, she says.” He tried to remember how Maegeth phrased it. “A thousand years ago, hundreds of elves were put down there. They were tortured and left to die, and now their ghosts haunt the cells.”

  “Let’s go see. Light the lamp.”

  The striker hung from the lamp on a slender chain. Kethlyn wasn’t used to lighting his own lamps, and in complete darkness it took him a long time to make a spark. Valryk fussed and tried to tell him how it was done, but wouldn’t try himself. When the wick finally caught, Kethlyn turned it up high and raised it over his head. The light revealed the long stairway gently curving down into the abyss.

  “Well? Go on,” Valryk ordered.

  Kethlyn had only been to the bottom of the stairs once, but that was with Captain Maegeth and his platoon, and they had all been armed. “You go first!”

  “You have the light, stupid.”

  “Don’t call me stupid! We’ll go together.” Kethlyn waited until the prince started to take the first step down, then he did the same. Making sure neither fell back or pushed the other forward, they worked their way to the bottom. The guard’s desk was empty, the torch brackets dark, the cell doors open. Something moved beyond the lamp’s circle of light.

  “What was that?” Valryk’s whisper quivered, and he huddled so close to his cousin that their shoulders touched.

  “It was just a rat.” ‘Just’ made him feel a little braver.

  “I don’t hear any ghosts. Do you?”

  Should Kethlyn tell him that Captain Maegeth’s stories were only meant to scare kids? He did have a bet to win, however, so he kept his mouth shut. “You know what we oughta do? We oughta catch one of those rats and put it in my sister’s bed.” Kethlyn giggled at his own impish plan.

  “I’m not touching a dirty ol’ rat. You do it.”

  Kethlyn started down the long corridor between the cells, holding the lamp low, but the rats were quick. They scuttled away, squeaking and dragging their fat gray tails just out of reach. Kethlyn dived for one, skidding on his knees in the moldy rushes, but it turned suddenly, fleeing into the nearest cell.

  “There it goes!” Valryk pointed the way. “Get it, get it!”

  Kethlyn darted into the cell, glimpsed the rat scrambling for the shadows behind the door. He shoved the lamp into Valyrk’s hands, swung the cell door shut, and dived onto the rat. It squealed, but he held on tight and lifted it triumphantly by its tail. What a glorious day this had been! A successful kitchen raid and a prize to torment his sister with. He swung the rat into the lamplight for inspection, and Valryk edged away, mouth twisted in disgust. “Let’s get out of here.” He found the door handle and tugged. Grunting, he tugged again. “It’s locked!”

  “No, it isn’t,” Kethlyn said, panic a lump in his throat. “A guard needs a key. It’s just stuck.” He dropped his rat and tried the door himself. It didn’t budge. “Help me.”

  They both grabbed the handle and leant back with all their weight. Valryk let go and started jumping around in circles. “It’s locked! You stupid, you locked us in!”

  “It wasn’t me, I don’t have the key.”

  “The ghosts! They locked us in.”

  “There’s no ghosts down here, not really, big baby.”

  “How’d it get locked then?”

  Kethlyn couldn’t reason that one out. Maybe Captain Maegeth had been telling the truth after all. “She says the ghosts glow blue and suck the blood out of children because they want to be alive again, but it doesn’t work. They go hunting for somebody else instead.”

  Valryk threw his hands over his ears and clamped his eyes shut. “No! Shut up!”

  Kethlyn turned slowly, holding out the lamp, looking for bones or glowing faces, he knew not what. Except for he and his cousin, the cell was empty. Rusty chains and open shackles dangled against the far wall. Was one of them swaying ever so slightly?

  “Look! There’s a window.” Valryk pointed at the peephole high on the door. “I’ll climb on your shoulders. We can scream for help.”

  The boys took turns screaming through the peephole, but no one came. Valryk finally slumped down against the wall, laid his forehead on his knees, and sobbed. Kethlyn decided that until Captain Maegeth arrested silver thieves or poachers, no one would venture into the dungeon to find them. That might be days away, weeks even. He resorted to kicking the door. It made a satisfying clunking sound, but no one heard that either. When his toes throbbed, he sat down next to his cousin and watched the lamplight flicker.

  He didn’t remember falling asleep. When he woke, Valryk lay curled up with his back to the wall, shivering. The wick, turned up as high as it would go, put off scarcely any light. He shook the lamp. The oil was gone. Slowly, the yellow flame dwindled to blue, then went out. Teeth chattering, Kethlyn tossed down the lamp and pressed himself against the wall. Something with sharp little claws scuttled across his hand. He screamed.

  A dull glow shined through the peephole and painted an orange square on the far wall. The square swept right to left, then back again. Kethlyn woke in time to see it vanish. He sat up in a hurry. Ghosts!

  Voices murmured beyond the door. Then one said, “No sign of them, m’ lord.”

  Kethlyn shook his cousin awake, then raised his face toward the peephole and cried out with all his might. Keys jangled, the cell door knocked the boys aside, and torchlight stabbed their eyes. A pair of strong arms swept Kethlyn up and squeezed the air out of him. “What are doing down here?” Da. Kethlyn wilted and broke into sobs. “The whole castle is searching. We thought you’d been taken. Highness, your mother is sick with worry. Run to her. And you, young man…” Da didn’t finish the threat, just hugged Kethlyn tighter and carried him out of the darkness.

  ~~~~

  A few days after the crowds of highborns and guards, baggage trains and servants departed for home, Rhoslyn was enjoying the quiet in her study. She had a long letter to craft to Aunt Halayn, informing her of the decisions reached this year at Assembly and what actions she was to take in response. Rhoslyn suspected that her aunt didn’t mind the warm seasons she spent at Windhaven alone. Speaking with the duchess’s mouth and acting with her hands, Halayn had the chance to reign supreme, for a few months at least. In truth, Rhoslyn was grateful to have a competent and cunning substitute occupying the ducal throne in her absence, even if the arguments were usually bitter and prolonged upon her return every winter. So be it.

  In the corner by the door, Carah sat at a miniature desk, making important notes and scribbles with wax colors on cheap brown paper. While Kethlyn bent over his studies in the library or watched his father drill his garrison, Carah helped the duchess. She was, in fact, the official letter opener and wax stamper of Ilswythe, and Rhoslyn was certain her daughter would learn to dictate business letters before she could count to one hundred.

  Rhoslyn dipped her quill and wrote, “The taxes on silk are to be raised one percent and the revenue…” Pausing, she frowned at the dull, frayed end of her quill, then rummaged through the desk drawers for the sharpening blade.

  Carah jumped up from her desk, announcing, “Look, Mum, what I drew.” She spread her paper over the letters and minutes of the Assembly.

  Rhoslyn cast a smile at the torrent of blue, red, and black scribbles, then continued sharpening her quill. “Tell me all about it.”

  “This is Da and you and Kethlyn, and this is Mount Drenéleth and the four falcons.” Carah tilted her head, troubled. “Do you think they like me for letting them go?”

  Rhoslyn grinned. “I should think they like you very much, indeed.” She glanced at the black-and-yellow bumps that represented the falcons awing, and the sharpening blade slipped. Rhoslyn gasped, and blood dripped onto the picture. “Oh, sweetling, I’m sorry,
we’ll clean it up.”

  But Carah no longer cared about the drawing. “I didn’t mean to, Mummy! I’m sorry.”

  “It isn’t your fault, love,” Rhoslyn said, drawing her close. “Mummy’s clumsy, that’s all. I wasn’t being careful.” She held out her finger. “See? It’s just a little cut. I’m all right.”

  Carah inspected the bead of blood welling from the tiny line as grievously as if it were a severed limb. Then she wrapped her hand around her mother’s finger. Rhoslyn’s spine jolted upright as a spark of energy lashed through her. She tried to pry her finger away, but Carah held on with terrifying strength and unbreakable focus. “Carah, let go!” Her daughter didn’t hear her. A stinging, tingling sensation pulsed in Rhoslyn’s fingertip, as if a bug’s spiky legs waltzed there.

  Carah’s eyes fluttered shut, and a knot of effort hardened between her dark eyebrows. A thin film of sweat glistened across the bridge of her nose, and her little body trembled. When she released her mother, the trembling increased. Carah’s teeth chattered and her eyes rolled back in her head and she collapsed to the rug, convulsing.

  Rhoslyn dropped down beside her, shrieking her daughter’s name. The convulsions stopped as suddenly as they had begun, and Carah lay limp and clammy and unconscious. Rhoslyn scooped her up and ran into the corridor. Where was she to go? What to do? “Kelyn!” she screamed. “Alovi!” The household staff appeared from corridors and parlors but looked on, helpless. Rhoslyn ran into a dead-end hallway and sank to the floor, wailing and holding her daughter fiercely. “Help me! Oh, Kieryn, help me.”

  ~~~~

  Rhoslyn held her daughter’s hand for a day and a night. Pale and unresponsive and, oh, so small in her little bed, Carah seemed to fade. It was as if she were seeping through unseen cracks into another world, a breath at a time. Every hour or so, Rhoslyn tried to dribble water or broth down her throat. She swallowed out of reflex alone. The rest of the time, Rhoslyn whispered her favorite stories or sang lullabies or pleaded. To no avail.