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

by Annie Douglass Lima

  “We outnumber them by far, General,” the regent pointed out. “The Alasians have only – what? – eight hundred soldiers left? And if you send your men now, they’ll be back by tomorrow night in any case.”

  “The Alasians have eight hundred fifty, last we heard, sir,” the general corrected him. “And it may take longer to find the prince in Drall than we think. Until we’ve successfully crushed their little surprise attack, it wouldn’t be wise to take any chances. Particularly not with you yourself here in the palace.”

  “Well, I’m not planning on actually being here when they burst in,” the regent scoffed. “Don’t be ridiculous. I’m leaving for safety tomorrow evening, but we’ll have those three battalions here as we discussed, ready to ambush our enemies the moment they show their heads.”

  We’ve got to warn them, Anya thought worriedly. Otherwise Alasia’s last few soldiers will be walking into a trap. If only she could find that old man in the market again, this afternoon, perhaps. Would he be there on a Thursday? It was probably Prince Jaymin and the soldiers’ only hope.

  “I’ve had my people searching the palace for the mouth of this supposed secret tunnel,” the regent went on, “but no luck so far. There are a lot of little locked doors, but I suppose it doesn’t really matter in any case. It has to be somewhere on the ground floor or below, so we’ll have all our men in position where they can leap out of hiding the moment the Alasians show up. We’ll turn their little surprise around on them.”

  He chuckled, obviously well satisfied with his own plan. “But back to what I was saying, General. Surely we don’t need every one of our men for that. Catching Prince Jaymin is a high priority for me. As long as he’s alive, we’re going to keep seeing insurrections and rebellion around the kingdom. I want his head on a pole outside the palace gates so his people will stop hoping he’ll return someday to free them.”

  General Dorralon nodded. “I understand, sir. But the fact remains that it wouldn’t be wise to send any of our soldiers away from Almar before tomorrow night. The enemy may have surprise tactics planned, or they may have managed to recruit more men than we’ve heard about yet. We do have those other two battalions on their way here from Wistra and Senj, but I’d say right now we should keep every fighting man we can get. However, I could dispatch messengers to a company in some other town – Timenka, perhaps – and have them march on Drall instead.”

  “Well, do it quickly, then,” Rampus urged. “I want them there by tonight, or tomorrow morning at the latest. And make sure they start by searching the schools. Drall isn’t very big; there can’t be more than one or two schools there. If he isn’t in school, just have them comb the town. Search every street; every building if need be. We’ll find him one way or another.”

  Anya frowned. This wasn’t going the way she had planned. Not only was the general not going to send any soldiers away from Almar, but there were apparently more troops on their way in to the capital at that very moment. And what was this about Alasian soldiers planning to attack the palace through a secret tunnel? If that was Prince Jaymin’s plan for saving his kingdom, it didn’t seem likely to succeed now.

  Anya chewed her thumbnail worriedly. This must have been what she had overheard Rampus and Almanian talking about the other day. Why, oh why, hadn’t she mentioned it to Tonnis’s friend? Now Prince Jaymin and his army would be ambushed and probably all killed. Tears sprang to Anya’s eyes as she pictured the cloak she had embroidered yesterday drenched with the prince’s blood, his severed head stuck up on a pole for all to see.

  No! she thought in anguish. I can’t let that happen. There has to be a way to prevent it.

  “Some of this information doesn’t quite seem to make sense, sir,” Anya heard the general say from below. “The girl told you that the prince is amassing an army in Drall? That doesn’t fit with what we’ve heard about the soldiers camped in the Southern Woods.”

  “Maybe there are two armies,” Rampus suggested. “The remnants of the original one in the woods, and a new one that he’s recruiting in the town.”

  “So are they both marching on Almar tomorrow?” Dorralon wondered. “Or is he going to try a two-pronged attack and do something different with the other army?”

  “Good question.” Anya could hear the frown in Rampus’s voice. “Where’s Dannel when I need him? Well, I’d better call the girl back and ask her about it. She may know a little more than she’s said yet.”

  Anya was thankful she was up here where no one would find her. I’m not leaving the room this time, she decided. Not until they’ve given up and the general has gone. Otherwise, what would she tell them? She was afraid that if he and the regent cross-examined her now, they would find inconsistencies in her story and realize she had been lying all along. Rampus was in a hurry to have those soldiers sent to Drall, so the two of them probably wouldn’t wait around long if they couldn’t find her right away.

  Anya fidgeted restlessly while Rampus dispatched four men to look for her. The regent and general discussed details about the strength and placement of their troops until eventually the four returned, reporting apologetically that they had been unable to find her. The regent was both puzzled and annoyed, as Anya had known he would be.

  “With your permission, sir, I’ll send for a couple of extra companies to station in strategic areas around Almar just in case,” the general suggested gravely. “Between tomorrow and the next day, whatever military forces the Alasians now have are likely to make their big move, so we must make certain we’re ready to crush them once and for all.”

  Finally the general left, and Anya sat back against the wall up in the secret room with a worried sigh, biting anxiously at her thumbnail once again. Things are getting worse and worse. Perhaps she should have gone down there after all and made up some story that would have convinced them they didn’t need extra troops, or that they needed to send them somewhere else. Now Almar was going to be absolutely swarming with Malornians when the Alasian soldiers arrived. Prince Jaymin and his army would have no chance.

  If only she knew where this secret tunnel was, she could hide in it and warn them when they arrived. But if the regent’s men had been searching unsuccessfully and had found only locked doors, she wouldn’t be likely to have much luck either.

  Well, she would just have to go to the market again and look for the old man. Anya had no idea what the chances were that he would be there again so soon, but it was all she could think to try. Her mind made up, Anya rose to her feet, remembering to close the door behind her this time, and picked up her candle.

  “No Alasians leave the grounds today,” Lieutenant Dwiller informed Anya when she had found him by the stable and made her request. “I know about your little jobs for the regent, but this isn’t a good time. Nor tomorrow, either.”

  “But tomorrow is Tonnis’s day to buy supplies for the clinic,” Anya protested. “He has to go every week, or he’ll start running out of things.”

  “Too bad,” the lieutenant snapped. “We’re keeping security tight for the next couple of days. I’ve already sent one of my men to buy an extra supply of bandages for him, just in case. Everything else will have to wait. Now get back to work.”

  Disappointed, Anya trudged over to the clinic, where Tonnis was not surprised to hear the news. “They’re obviously expecting trouble, because Dwiller told us to prepare what we need for healing wounds and preventing infection. Come and help, and you can tell us what you found out.”

  Anya shared the news with him and Eleya and Wennish while they crumbled up pieces of dried flowery hypericum to be used in poultices.

  “That’s bad,” Wennish agreed when she had finished. “Very bad. But if we can’t warn our soldiers, what can we do?”

  Nothing came to mind. The four of them discussed the situation through the rest of the morning and the afternoon as they prepared the herbs that might be needed and made certain everything was in order in the clinic. But by the time Anya climbed the stairs to bed that nig
ht, they had failed to think up any plan that actually had a chance of saving Prince Jaymin and his army.

  Tomorrow I’ll bring my lunch with me, she decided as she crawled under the covers, so I can stay in the secret room all day. Or at least until I think of a way to help the prince. And if nothing else, she would know exactly what was going on.

  The next morning, Anya hid her knitting needles and a ball of yarn under her coat in case she got bored, and filled the pockets of her dress with two slices of bread and a handful of cold bacon left over from breakfast. Tonnis gave her a little flask of water, just small enough to fit into her coat pocket, and a spare candle.

  “Be sure to come and tell us if you find out anything useful,” Wennish reminded her as she headed out the clinic door. “Especially if there’s anything I can do.”

  Behind his back, Eleya and Tonnis both frowned and shook their heads meaningfully at Anya. She grinned, understanding. Wennish’s wounds had not yet healed completely, and Tonnis had been adamant that he was still not to leave the clinic. Though she knew it frustrated him to be stuck here, she certainly didn’t want him to suffer a relapse, or do something rash and get in trouble.

  The throne room stood empty until mid-morning. Lounging in the secret room, Anya was glad she had brought her knitting and that it didn’t require much light. She decided to make herself a new pair of stockings with a fancy criss-crossing design that Eleya had taught her. It turned out to be harder to follow the pattern in the near-darkness than she had anticipated, but the extra concentration required kept her from getting bored.

  Halfway through the first stocking, she finally heard a servant entering the room below. Peering through the hole, Anya watched him make his way from pillar to pillar lighting the lamps. Shortly afterward half a dozen soldiers strolled in, chatting, to position themselves at their posts. They hastily fell silent and straightened up, standing at attention, as the curtain was drawn aside and Regent Rampus marched grandly down the strip of carpet and seated himself on the throne.

  As Anya watched, Captain Almanian was summoned to speak with him, along with three Malornian officers she hadn’t seen before. But she was disappointed not to learn much new. The regent spoke to the officers about their plans for that night: how many soldiers would hide in the palace; how many more would surround the building in case any Alasian soldiers somehow got through; how many the general was planning to position in different neighborhoods around Almar; how many more were still on their way to the capital from other parts of Alasia. At one point Talifus, haggard and hungry-looking, was shoved in, stumbling, with his wrists tied behind his back. The regent demanded his opinion on the most strategic rooms and hallways for troops to hide in, and then ordered the soldiers to drag the traitor back to the dungeon again.

  Later General Dorralon appeared, reporting that troops from Timenka had arrived in Drall to begin their search for the prince and his army. “It’s too soon to know anything yet, sir, but they’ve been told they’re to send a message the moment there’s anything to report,” Dorralon assured the regent. “You’ll receive word whenever they have news, good or bad.”

  “I’d better,” the regent growled, and Anya chuckled quietly to herself from up above, secure in the knowledge that they would never hear word of Prince Jaymin in that part of the kingdom.

  The morning wore on as she knitted and listened. Eventually the regent left the throne room to attend a luncheon somewhere, and Anya got up to stretch her legs, pacing back and forth down the dark hallway. Her stomach was growling, so she ate most of her bread and bacon, saving a little for later in case she ended up staying past supper time.

  The afternoon dragged by even more slowly, with nothing more remarkable than routine palace business, such as a report from Lieutenant Dwiller about the work habits of the Alasian captives. In spite of her knitting, Anya was growing bored. It had never occurred to her that it would be this hard to sit alone and silent all day. She longed for someone to talk to.

  Her stomach was telling her it was time for supper before anything interesting finally happened. A nervous-looking messenger pushed through the thick curtain and made his way up the red carpet toward the throne.

  “Good evening, Regent,” he greeted the ruler. “My captain sent me to bring you the news from Drall.”

  Below Anya, Rampus sat up straight. “Yes! Tell me, quickly. Have they found Prince Jaymin yet?”

  “Found him, yes, sir. Caught him, not exactly.”

  Anya gasped, her mouth falling open in shock. How could they have found Prince Jaymin? That was impossible! He wasn’t even in Drall.

  Was he?

  “What do you mean, they haven’t caught him?” roared Rampus, leaping to his feet in anger. “They let him escape?”

  “The captain said to send you his sincerest regrets, sir,” the messenger apologized timidly. “They’re still looking. They may even have him by now.”

  “His regrets?” bellowed the regent. “I’ll make him regret this! You tell that man that if he doesn’t bring me Prince Jaymin dead or alive by this time tomorrow, it will be his head on display outside the palace gates! Now tell me what happened.” He dropped back into the throne with an expression like a wild beast waiting for a chance to rip some poor animal to shreds.

  The soldier shifted nervously. “Well, sir, our men searched the two schools, like you said,” he explained, “but somehow a boy escaped from one of them. We think he must have climbed a tree to get over the wall. Two of our soldiers saw him leave, but I’m afraid neither got a close look at his face. There was a second boy who was caught in the act of trying to escape – he was confirmed not to be the prince, but the captain suspects he may have been an accomplice. Later two of our men followed him to see if he would lead them to Prince Jaymin, but somehow they lost track of him in the crowd.”

  “Lost track of him?” the regent spluttered in fury. “What are you all, amateurs? How much skill does it take to catch one little boy in a small town?”

  The messenger shrugged uncomfortably. He clearly was not enjoying his assignment.

  “Well, go on,” the regent demanded. “What then?”

  “The two boys were seen together later, sir,” the soldier continued. “The captain and several of his men actually had them in their grasp, and the captain positively identified the first one as Prince Jaymin. But somehow both boys managed to escape again. He and his men chased them through the town and almost caught them before they disappeared.”

  “Disappeared? Disappeared?” The regent was on his feet again, livid. “What do you mean, ‘disappeared’? This is the boy whom your incompetent colleagues failed to kill on the night of the Invasion. The boy who has somehow managed to stay out of sight for the last month, in spite of the fact that every Malornian in Alasia has been searching for him. And now, thanks to my sources, we finally discover where he’s been hiding, and your people let him slip through your fingers? How hard can it be to kill one twelve-year-old child? How hard can it be?” He was bellowing now, and the soldier cringed before him.

  “I’m sorry, sir. The captain said to assure you we’re doing the best we can,” the man protested. “We knew you’d want an update sooner rather than later, so I rode here as fast as possible to tell you, but it’s not as though we’ve given up. It’s only a matter of time now, sir. They’ve got the town pretty much surrounded, and when I left they were about to start breaking down doors and searching houses. And the captain was planning to send soldiers to all the little farms and villages nearby, just in case the prince did somehow manage to slip out. He won’t stay hidden for long, sir.”

  “He’d better not,” the regent snapped. “I can’t believe you people got so close and still managed to lose him. I’ve never seen such incompetence! Now what about this army he’s supposedly been gathering?”

  “We didn’t see any signs of that, sir,” the soldier told him. “If he has men in Drall, they’re well-disguised or hidden. At any rate, no one was helping the prince excep
t that second boy, so if there is an army, they’re not likely to be much threat to us.”

  “Considering the ineptitude your company showed today, it seems that a single armed enemy could have been a serious threat to the lot of you,” the regent retorted. “But I’ll forgive you if you manage to capture the prince. If not, every last one of you will wish you’d never been born. Now unless you have any good news that you haven’t bothered to deliver yet, get out of my sight!”

  The soldier beat a hasty retreat out of the throne room, and Anya crawled back down the side of the sloped floor and leaned against the wall to think.

  Prince Jaymin really was in Drall! She could hardly believe it. Unknowingly, she had betrayed him and almost caused his death. And maybe he would still be killed. Maybe he already had been by now. Anya bit her lip, blinking back tears. How could she have done this? With her lies, she had endangered the very person she was trying to protect. Her lies that this time had turned out to be the truth.

  Maybe Eleya is right, she thought miserably. Maybe I shouldn’t keep making things up like this. She had convinced herself she had good reasons for her deception, though she knew Father wouldn’t agree. He had always taught her and Arvalon that there were no good reasons for doing bad things. But she was only trying to help Alasia, so didn’t that make it all right?

  Anya wasn’t sure. But she did know one thing: she would never forgive herself if Prince Jaymin died because of her.

  Chapter 17

  When the regent finally left the throne room, Anya made her way back through the passage and out of the closet, feeling stiff and hungry. No one paid her any attention as she climbed down the stairs to the first floor and hurried outside.

  The palace and courtyard were full of unfamiliar soldiers being hustled here and there by tense-looking officers. Preparing for the battle they were expecting that night, obviously. Anya gave them as wide a berth as she could as she slipped into the kitchen to see what she could find to eat.