In the Enemy's Service (Annals of Alasia Book 2)

by Annie Douglass Lima

  And even if the enemy could somehow be driven out, Tonnis thought in despair, what would become of the kingdom? Three hundred years ago, an Alasian king and queen and their three children had been assassinated by an ambitious Council member, who, along with his allies, had in turn been killed by palace guards in the ensuing battle. After that, the kingdom had been thrown into chaos, distant relatives of the royal family vying with remaining Council members and factions of the military for power. There had been a violent five-year civil war, which had finally ended when a charismatic colonel by the name of Orvin had taken charge of the army after the general was killed in battle. The new General Orvin had united the military, and, at his supporters’ urging, later declared himself king. Under his leadership, stability had eventually returned to the kingdom, but it had taken nearly a decade before all the protests had been quieted and most of Alasia had finally accepted their new leader. King Orvin’s descendants had been ruling ever since.

  Was that what would happen now, Tonnis wondered? Civil war? Or would Malorn simply tighten its grasp and extend its borders until Alasia as they knew it no longer existed? Either way, the future looked grim.

  “That’s enough,” Almanian barked, cutting into his thoughts, and murmurs and sobs were stifled as the captain swept his stern gaze over the distressed Alasians. “We’ve taken too much time over this already. We all have work to do.” He turned and gestured to one of the other soldiers, a dark-haired man with green sleeve stripes on his uniform jacket, who stepped forward to stand beside him. “This is Lieutenant Lasden. He will be overseeing your work and assigning specific tasks as necessary. Should you have any questions about what is expected of you, address them to him.” He turned to the other man. “I’ll be in my new office, Lieutenant. Get them started, and I’ll expect a report from you at noon.”

  “Yes, sir.” Lasden saluted as Captain Almanian turned on his heel and strode away around the corner.

  “First of all,” the lieutenant began when the captain had left, “I want all of you to tell me your names. If I am to supervise your work, I need to know how to address you.”

  One by one they introduced themselves, but Tonnis wondered if this man would really remember them all. When they had finished, the officer nodded to the three cooks. “All right. Lutian, Thessa, and Tirrimi, off you go to the kitchen as Captain Almanian ordered. Phenniel is expecting you.” He gestured to one of the other soldiers waiting nearby. “Corporal, you’ll accompany them and keep an eye on their work. The rest of you, go and get started in the barracks.” He waved his arm and three more soldiers began to herd the little group toward the barracks door.

  As they were about to enter, Lasden gestured for Tonnis and Eleya to remain behind. They waited outside, shivering in the light rain while the others filed in, and then the lieutenant turned to them again. “I understand the two of you treated a number of our men this morning.”

  “Yes, sir,” Tonnis admitted.

  “Tell me about their injuries. How serious are they? Will all the men recover?”

  Tonnis and Eleya glanced at each other, mentally reviewing their work of the last few hours. “Ten had fairly superficial injuries,” Eleya replied, having reached the total a moment before he had. “We bandaged them up and they should be fine. Seven had more serious injuries that needed stitches – multiple injuries, in some cases. They’ll have to take it easy for a few days, but they’ll probably be all right. Three of those are unable to walk without assistance and are in bed in the clinic right now.” She hesitated and looked at Tonnis.

  “And there’s one more with very serious injuries,” he finished, thinking of their first patient. Remembering the captain’s warning, he wondered uneasily what would happen to them if the man died. He glanced anxiously up at the lieutenant, who was taller than he was by several inches. “Sir, we did all we could for him, but he had lost a lot of blood before we could even start.” Best to be completely honest from the beginning. “I’m not certain if he’ll make it, sir.”

  Lieutenant Lasden frowned and turned to Sergeant Morris, who was waiting nearby. “Who is it?”

  “Private Melquien, sir.”

  “And they really did all they could?”

  Morriss shrugged. “As far as I could tell. That is, when they finally bothered to get out of bed and get down there.”

  Tonnis and Eleya both opened their mouths to protest, but the lieutenant cut them off with a wave. “They were drugged, Sergeant. What do you expect?”

  So I was right. It must have been Phenniel. Perhaps he put something in everyone’s food or drink at the banquet last night. Tonnis glanced at his wife and saw her nodding grimly as the pieces fell into place.

  Lieutenant Lasden turned back to Tonnis. “Take me to see the patients. And then Eleya can stay and tend them while you go to work in the barracks.”

  Tonnis tried not to look at the bodies as they rounded the corner. Three hundred, maybe more, he estimated with a shudder. The clinic, a small building a little ways from the castle wall, stood open like a refuge from the death and horror all around. It was a relief to enter the quiet front room and smell the familiar healing herbs lined up in their glass jars across the high shelves behind the desk.

  They showed Lasden the patient rooms down the hall, and he stepped into each one to speak to the injured men. If he had been Alasian and not a Malornian butcher who had just helped to slaughter hundreds of innocent people, Tonnis would have admired him as an officer. He spoke encouragingly to the men in their beds, asked how they were feeling, assured them they would receive the best care possible, and urged them to ask for anything they needed.

  The first man was barely conscious, nearly as pale as the sheets he lay between. He didn’t seem to recognize the lieutenant and didn’t speak beyond a faint moan when Eleya opened the curtains to let in the morning light. Looking down at him, mixed feelings struggled in Tonnis’s mind. Ordinarily the sight of anyone suffering filled him with sympathy and the instinctive desire to help however he could. But this man deserved what he was going through. He had murdered people, perhaps even the king himself. He was an enemy, a villain. But here he lay helpless and in pain, and Tonnis found it difficult to see him as anything but a patient in need of care.

  What’s wrong with me? he asked himself in frustration. He ought to hate these people. And he did; at least, he hated what they had done. It occurred to him how easy it would be to end this soldier’s life when no one was looking. But Tonnis knew he could never do that, even without the captain’s threat. It was his job to protect life, not to end it. In this clinic, a wounded man was a wounded man, and he would care for them all. He had to. Right or wrong, it was who he was.

  “You’ll get the patients something to eat from the dining hall as soon as the cooks have breakfast ready, and then stay here to tend them,” Lasden told Eleya back in the hallway. “I’ll send one of my men to watch over your work. Tonnis, back to the barracks with me.”

  Outside, Tonnis paused, his eyes drawn to the motionless figures lying on the wet cobblestones. They were no more still and pale than the man in the bed inside. What if…?

  “Sir,” he ventured, unable to take his eyes off of them. Was it even worth asking? Would he get in trouble for asking? But he had to try. He drew a deep breath. “Sir – I’m not questioning my orders, but I’d like to ask permission to check the bodies. It’s possible a few of them may still be alive.”

  Sergeant Morriss, who had been waiting outside by the wall, sheltered from the rain by the roof’s overhang, laughed contemptuously. “Check them, why? So we can finish them off? You don’t honestly think we’d let you treat their wounds and nurse them back to health, do you? We wanted them dead for a reason.”

  Tonnis ignored him, eyes on the lieutenant, who he knew would make the final decision. The man hesitated, as though weighing the pros and cons, and then he nodded. “Permission granted. No reason why not, Sergeant,” he added almost apologetically as Tonnis bent over the first body. �
�Nobody who could have survived would be in any shape to do us harm. If any of them recover, we’ll just add them to the work force.”

  Blood had never bothered Tonnis before. He saw plenty of it in his line of work. He had encountered death before, too, but not on this scale. This was different – this was a war zone. He shuffled from one body to the next, kneeling by each to check for a pulse, listening for breathing even when he could see at a glance that they would never breathe again. He tried not to look too closely into their faces, but it was impossible not to recognize them, despite the often disfiguring wounds. He knew all of them, had seen them around the palace and grounds nearly every day. This man had come into the clinic last week asking for medicine to soothe a sore throat. These two had sat across from Tonnis at lunch just yesterday and had spent twenty minutes in an animated debate about the best way to serve shrimp. That one over there had a keen sense of humor and never failed to come up with something witty to make those around him roar with laughter. And none of them had a pulse.

  Fighting back his grief and growing despair, Tonnis scooted from body to body, his hope fading a little more with each one. There had to be a survivor or two. There had to be. Surrounded by this sea of death, one living body would have been an island of hope, something to cling to, a purpose for his continued existence in the new Malornian Alasia, whatever that was going to look like.

  And then he found what he had been dreading most to see. Tonnis choked back a low cry, half groan, half sob, as he stopped before the body that, of all the bodies, least belonged out here in the rain on the cold ground. Though he had known he would come to it eventually, it was no less a shock when he did. Tonnis dropped to his knees, filled with anguish at the sight of his king, his friend, lying motionless on the puddly cobblestones.

  Tonnis’s throat constricted so that he could hardly breathe. With shaking hands he reached out and took King Jaymin’s hand in his – a cold, still hand, looking pale and bare with the rings stripped off, rings that doubtless lined some Malornian pocket now.

  Tonnis had known King Jaymin III for nearly fifteen years, ever since he had taken the job under Dal here at the palace. He had gotten acquainted with the monarch, at first through the king’s occasional visits to the clinic for this or that, and later through more casual social encounters. He wasn’t sure exactly why the king of Alasia had originally taken a liking to him, but he had, and the two of them had become friends. Tonnis had never dreamed he would someday be kneeling in a pool of his friend’s blood, feeling for a nonexistent pulse in his cold wrist while enemies took control of the kingdom.

  “You, doctor,” snapped Morriss from just behind him. “You’re wasting time. You asked permission to check the bodies, not stop and stare at them. Get moving.”

  “Give him a moment, Sergeant,” objected the lieutenant, still watching from over by the clinic. “It’s his king, for goodness’ sake.”

  Grumbling under his breath, the sergeant backed away. Tonnis realized that there were tears trickling down his cheeks, mingling with the raindrops, but he didn’t care if the Malornians saw. Nothing mattered anymore. What would become of Alasia without King Jaymin? Or Queen Esarelle, or the young Prince Jaymin?

  Speaking of them, where were their bodies? Tonnis lifted his head and saw the queen lying just beyond her husband. He had never seen her with her hair loose before, without jewelry, let alone in her nightgown. Tonnis couldn’t bear the sight of her lying like that on the hard ground out here in the courtyard for unfriendly eyes to leer at. Impulsively, he pulled off his coat and laid it over her motionless form as one last act of respect.

  Shivering in the cold, tears still sliding down his face, he turned to look for the prince, but his body was not in sight. Tonnis knew Prince Jaymin’s room was down the hall and around the corner from his parents’, so he had probably been dragged out separately and laid somewhere else.

  Bowing his head, Tonnis took a deep breath. There was still a chance, however small, that one of the others could be clinging to life. He had to move on. Gently he reached out and closed the royal couple’s eyes, blinking more tears back from his own as he stood up to move past them.

  To his astonishment and joy, in the very next wrist he touched, there fluttered a faint pulse. Tonnis’s jaw dropped as he placed his fingers on the guard’s neck to be sure. Yes, this one’s heart was still beating. His own heart thudding in sudden excitement and hope, Tonnis slid his hands under the unconscious man’s body to try to lift it, but it was too heavy for him. It wouldn’t be a good idea to drag him across the courtyard in his condition, but what else was there to do? There were no Alasians around to help, not that they would be allowed to anyway, and he couldn’t exactly ask a soldier for assistance. Tonnis seized the man under the armpits and began backing slowly toward the clinic, peering over his shoulder with every step to keep from tripping over corpses. The way the wounded guard’s body dragged roughly over the cobblestones set his teeth on edge. He was probably worsening the man’s injuries with every step.

  Behind him, the lieutenant barked an order, and Sergeant Morriss reluctantly shuffled forward. Scowling at Tonnis out of the officer’s sight and grumbling under his breath again, the sergeant picked up the unconscious man’s legs. Together, the two of them carried him into the clinic, through the front room, past the back room, and down the hallway to an empty bed in one of the patient rooms.

  Eleya, who had just walked in with a tray of food, hurried over to see. She took one look at the injured guard on the bed, his wounds already staining the blanket red, and scurried out to fetch the necessary supplies.

  “You’ll have to care for him for now,” Tonnis called over his shoulder, hurrying out again. “I’m going to look for more.” Having found one living man among the carnage, he was all the more eager to search for others.

  In the end he found three, all members of the palace guard. None was conscious and all looked as though each weak breath could be their last. What he did not find, to his surprise, was Prince Jaymin’s body. Not that it mattered. He knew that wherever the young prince was lying, the Malornians would have made absolutely certain he was dead. But Tonnis had living patients to tend, and he couldn’t waste any time thinking of anything else.

  He was surprised when Lieutenant Lasden changed his mind and allowed him to spend the rest of the morning in the clinic along with Eleya. While the other prisoners cleaned out the barracks, occasionally walking past the windows with armloads of bloody sheets and blankets, he and his wife fought for the lives of their patients – especially the three who had come to represent hope for Alasia’s future.

  On his way out to fetch a quick lunch for himself and Eleya a good hour after noon, Tonnis stopped short at the sight of the activity at the other end of the courtyard, outside the stable. The Malornians had hitched up a team of four horses to an open carriage, but they had altered the carriage’s interior. He saw that they had removed the seats and instead attached a sort of platform made of boards, the front end raised like a ramp so that anything on it would have to be tied down to keep from sliding off the back of the carriage.

  And there was something tied to the platform. Three somethings. Though he knew he could get in trouble for going anywhere but exactly where he was supposed to, Tonnis found his feet carrying him across the damp cobblestones toward the little bustle of activity. He didn’t want to believe it, to accept it. But he had to get a closer look.

  A dozen soldiers busy with the horses and ropes and fastenings saw him coming. Though he couldn’t hear their conversation from this distance, he could tell from their looks and gestures that two of them were about to come scold him, to drive him back to the work he was meant to be doing. But one man, whom he recognized as Captain Almanian, shook his head and held out an arm to stop them. The captain said something that must have made sense, because the others nodded their heads, and all twelve paused in what they were doing to watch Tonnis approach.

  But apparently he wasn’t going to be allo
wed to get too near. When he was about twenty feet from the carriage, one of the soldiers stepped forward, a hand reaching warningly for his sword hilt. “That’s close enough, Alasian.”

  Tonnis stopped and stared at the three figures strapped to the tilted platform. There was King Jaymin’s limp body, fully dressed now in formal robes, a generous amount of extra blood splashed on his velvet clothes as though to make certain anyone who saw him from a distance would realize he was dead. Tonnis swallowed, hoping no one new had been killed to provide that blood. And there was the queen, garbed in an elegant gown, also doused with extra blood. Seeing them there, arranged on display on the platform, brought a feeling of sickening rage rising in Tonnis’s chest. Who had dared to lay hands on them after they were dead, to undress and dress them again like dolls? Whose idea had it been to set them out on display like this, obviously in preparation for a trip through Almar to show the public? How could even enemies of their kingdom desecrate the bodies of the king and queen like that?

  Tonnis stuffed his clenched fists into his pockets before he did anything rash, reminding himself that there were twelve armed men watching him. Swallowing down his anger, he turned his gaze to the child’s body propped limply up on the platform between the other two. Drenched in blood as they were, it belonged to a young boy, about twelve years of age, tall, with brown hair. A boy dressed in the tan breeches, blue tunic with silver buttons, and velvet fur-lined coat that Tonnis had often seen Prince Jaymin wear.