Rielle needed help. And he was it.
Chapter 3
The door opened. “Dinner is ready, Your Majesty.”
Jon looked up from his desk. The small-statured woman’s chestnut gaze shifted away from his own. “Thank you.”
“And a dove for you.” She approached with quiet, hesitant steps and held out the sealed parchment.
He accepted it. The Principal Secretary’s wax seal was unbroken. Brennan. “My thanks.”
“I live to serve, Your Majesty.” The servant bowed, then walked backward three steps, rearranged her fawn-colored braid over her shoulder, and departed.
Live to serve. So do I. He stared at the door, running his thumb over the wax seal. Good news or bad?
If Rielle weren’t alive, he wouldn’t be getting a message from Brennan, but news of a massacre… by werewolf.
She was alive.
He tore open the message.
The ship was bound for Harifa. Setting sail today.
He sat up. Harifa, Sonbahar.
Rielle was just across the Bay of Amar. Taken—by Shadow of the Crag Company, if Olivia’s theory was correct—but what had happened to her? A prisoner? A hostage? A slave?
With no description of Shadow, information was painfully scarce.
He reached for the Laurentine signet ring, which she had given him on the eve of battle. Nobles were ransomed, and Rielle would alert any captor to her value.
He’d give anything to see her safe.
But there’d been no ransom note. There’d been ample time to contact—well, anyone. Post from Sonbahar for most of Emaurria went through Courdeval, and there’d been nothing. He’d sent countless knights in search of her, and the Order had sent paladins, and they’d reported back nothing about her, nor rumors of anyone like her. She wasn’t being held for ransom.
Pain radiated from his clenched jaw.
He rose, scraping the chair against the heavy-pile rug. He grasped the note and shoved it into his pocket. If anyone had hurt Rielle, there would be—
Blood. Fingernails bit into his palms and drew blood. He rubbed his hands against his black wool trousers.
He would go to the docks and make inquiries. He couldn’t just trust Rielle to Brennan’s care; he had to find out what had happened to her himself.
He stormed out of his study toward the hall. At his door, he uncurled rigid fingers and breathed deep.
Two paladin guards stood to attention outside, brought their right hands to their hearts in salute, and bowed. “Your Majesty,” they acknowledged in unison.
He turned to one of his guards, Sir Raoul, immediately recognizable by the scar stretching from his forehead across his nose to his cheek, a paladin ten or so years his senior. He’d always lived the job, with little interest in anything else. “Send for the dockmaster’s list of departures for Sonbahar today. Immediately.”
“Yes, Your Majesty,” Raoul replied as Jon strode back into his quarters.
He traversed the vast quarters to enter the privy wardrobe, where his clothes, armor, and treasure—such as it was—were stored. His armor, clean and maintained since the Battle for Courdeval, shone dimly in the afternoon sunlight.
Although made of arcanir, it no longer bore arcanir’s signature sage tint but the dark gray Helene Forgeron had achieved in Bournand. The coat of arms, once the Order’s Terran moon, had been changed to the Emaurrian coat of arms—a winged serpent clutching a laurel leaf and a rose curled around a four-paneled shield of white and black flanking an ivy leaf.
Once standard issue for a paladin swordsman, this armor would never blend in now when he went into the city.
But who would dare stop him? Could a man be king and yet unable to walk his own kingdom?
He threw on his arming jacket and hose, fingers stiff with nerves, and hastily donned his armor. Blessed Terra, it felt like coming home, wearing it again. As he put on his knuckle-dusters, light footsteps neared.
Eloi, his young shaggy-haired clerk, bowed and held out a roll of parchment. “A list of today’s departures, Your Majesty.”
“Thank you.” He grabbed the offered list and scanned it for ships departing for Harifa. One—and within the hour. The Mirage. He needed to get to the docks. Now. No time to think—or he would think himself out of it. “That will be all.”
Another bow, and he was alone again. He made quick work of the rest of his armor, fastened his sword belt with Faithkeeper and his dagger. No time for supplies—he’d have to buy some at the docks. He grabbed his belt pouch, donned his helm and cloak, and headed for the door.
On his way out, he paused. As much as he wanted to, he couldn’t leave without telling anyone. A missing king could cause a state of emergency, instability—
“Wait an hour,” he said to Raoul and his fellow paladin, Florian, “and then tell the Lord Chancellor he’s regent until I return.” Did it sound as ridiculous to them as it did to him?
Face set to a permanently blank expression, Raoul looked to Florian with tight eyes.
Florian grimaced. “Your Majesty—” A well-timed objection.
“With all due respect,” Raoul said grimly, his blue eyes icy, “our orders are to guard you at all times.”
And their orders came from Paladin Grand Cordon Raphaël Guérin. Bureaucratic inefficiency indeed. Jon didn’t have command of his own guards.
He exhaled slowly, letting his temper cool. “Then guard me as I make my way to the docks.” He would worry about losing them in the crowds nearer the docks. “You will not be disobeying your orders.”
A compromise.
Both guards raised their right hands to their hearts and bowed. “Majesty.”
Flanked by the two paladins, he lowered the visor on his helm and headed for the stables. At least so covered, he didn’t have to make eye contact with anyone, only nods of acknowledgment to bows and salutes.
Being king…
The whole experience still lacked tactile fabric; it was a phantom of reality in which he couldn’t recall how he’d arrived.
And while he spent days in paperwork, learning from his collection of tutors on every subject from force magic to dancing to seduction—Terra have mercy—casting his eye over every corner of Emaurria’s map and beyond, acknowledging bows and salutes, exchanging niceties—
While he did all that, Rielle suffered somewhere, abandoned by the very last person who should ever abandon her, the man who loved her, who wanted to spend his life eliciting that sweep of heartening brightness across her face.
He’d failed her, failed her when she’d most needed him.
No more.
In the stable, he went to his white destrier’s stall, but when he began to saddle the stallion, stable boys rushed in to take over. And within moments, he headed not for Trèstellan’s Royal Gate but for the Noble Gate. Noblemen came and went with their guards regularly, and he, eschewing the fanfare of royalty, might pass for one of them, if fortune were fair.
Bows and salutations fluttered with increasing frequency the nearer he rode to the gate, and even in the dense commotion at its center, he was recognized.
No matter. As he swept down into the city through the Azalée District toward the innumerable cascades of red roofs, fewer heads bobbed, fewer backs bent, until he mingled among the masses of travelers, vendors, foreigners, courtiers, nobles, warriors—a mere drop in a churning sea.
The open air at the crown of the capital had condensed to narrow streets, corridors walled by edifices in cruelly cheery coastal hues of sand, sunshine, and sunset with high arched doorways, guarded by unlit lanterns. Stilted elegance in script adorned signboards at Courdeval’s higher elevations but gave way past the Triumphal Arch to comfortable straightforwardness and practicality deeper and lower into the city.
At the end of the lane, naught but sky and greenery awaited, shouldered between endless buildings in parallel that disappeared over the horizon downhill.
From beneath the relative anonymity of his closed helm, Jon assesse
d the faces of those who turned to him. Thieves, pickpockets, scoundrels, and the like. The narrowing roads offered less and less room to maneuver, with only rare alleyways for relief—dark alleyways. His mind calculated threat and evaluated the terrain unbidden. When he glanced toward his guards, they appeared to be doing the same, hands in uneasy vigil near hilts.
He’d overburdened his two guards. But they’d only have to waste time on him for another half hour, and then he’d be gone.
They made their way lower into the city until the docks came into view, tall ships dotting the Bay of Amar and lining the pier. Beyond the infinite stretch of blue, somewhere, Rielle needed help. She needed him.
It was time to lose his guards.
“Majesty.” Raoul tipped his head toward the way they had come.
Jon followed the path with his eyes. A banner and palace colors of deep blue and white. So much for a king being able to walk his kingdom.
The crown was an illusion of power.
“It’s just a more elegant chain,” he muttered under his breath. And someone from the palace was here to give it a yank. There was no time to lose his guards.
He turned to Raoul and raised the visor on his helm. “You know what business has brought me here.”
Raoul’s face shadowed beneath his scar. “I…”
The palace host drew nearer, a squad of paladins and the Constable of Emaurria himself at the head, Torrance Auvray Marcel, former paladin and Jon’s former master.
Tor. As Constable of Emaurria, he was the highest officer of the military, second only to Jon himself.
No time. He urged his horse toward the ships, scanning their names as far as he could read. He just needed to find the Mirage and embark—
“Come,” Raoul beckoned to Florian. “We serve.”
Florian gave an emphatic nod of his curly-haired head, his brow creased.
Jon could have smiled at their support, but it’d be premature; he hadn’t found the Mirage yet. Courdevallans cleared the way, space enough for their horses to get through.
“Make way!” Raoul bellowed, pulling his horse up to Jon.
Jon gave him an appreciative look.
“Close crowds are a potential threat.” Raoul surveyed the area.
The Mirage. It was just off the coast, a carrack, brilliant and bright, its two square-rigged masts, lateen-rigged mizzenmast, and spars in stark relief, its sails full.
It had departed already.
He shuddered. No.
“The Constable of Emaurria!” someone called, a distant voice, clearing a path for Tor and the other riders.
Faster. Jon pushed his horse as fast as he dared in the crowd along the docks, past one berth after another, flanked by voices breaking the crowd. I need to make it to Sonbahar.
Unneeded. Outclassed. Abandoning duty. He shook off his doubts with every set of hoof beats, unwilling to entertain their reason. A decision of the heart couldn’t be measured on an abacus.
He closed on the Mirage’s berth. He rode to the end of the pier, staring out into the bay.
The carrack bobbed off the coast.
He glared at the faraway ship while his horse hoofed the pier. The distant voices of Tor and his host drew nearer and nearer.
Damn it!
He squeezed his eyes shut and pinched the bridge of his nose. He could leave the palace, ride to the docks, win over his guards, and lead his former master and a squad of paladins on a chase, but he couldn’t force a ship back into port.
A quiet settled. Raoul and Florian closed ranks between him and Tor.
“Move aside,” Tor’s booming voice commanded.
“Orders, Your Majesty?” Raoul asked.
A bold move to defy Torrance Auvray Marcel. But Jon wouldn’t leave Raoul to fight a battle not his own.
“Do as he says.” Jon turned his horse to face Tor as Raoul and Florian stood down. The paladins behind his Constable of Emaurria sat poised for—
Jon drew in a bitter breath. “Here to stop me?”
Tor’s fists tightened around the reins, his hazel eyes hard. Despite no longer being a paladin, Tor had continued to keep his dark-brown hair short and his face clean-shaven, although he now wore the trappings of nobility.
Any elegance lent by his attire was tempered by the dark circles under his eyes, deeper than they’d ever been when he’d commanded paladins. But he now guided an entire kingdom’s military.
“I’m here to protect you,” Tor said, meeting his eyes squarely, sincerely, with that same fatherly concern as always. “As I always have. What are you doing?”
Jon kept his voice low. “Rielle’s in Sonbahar. Alive. No ransom.”
Tor glanced away, lips pressed tight, and closed his eyes as he let out a long sigh. “I know you feel—”
“Don’t tell me how I feel.”
“Yes, Favrielle needs you. But she is one person, one person my nephew is already tracking.” Tor met his eyes.
Jon looked away. It had been fifty-one days since Spiritseve. Fifty-one days since Rielle had disappeared from the shores of Emaurria. The kingdom didn’t care that the love of his life was in peril; it needed and needed and needed—and it took and took and took. And he’d allowed the Grands to convince him to place the country’s needs above his own need to rescue Rielle.
And they were right.
He had no hope of tracking her, not like Brennan did, with his superior senses. The paladin in him knew that, knew his own strengths and weaknesses, and that worrying here would do nothing. Out in the field, worry crippled a man, endangered the mission, made him a liability instead of an asset. Like he was being now.
Concrete intelligence—knowing Rielle was in Sonbahar—deceived him into feeling capable of finding her. Deceived. He closed his eyes and sighed.
Brennan would find Rielle; she would return; and he had to trust that and perform his duty here.
“What about the rest of your people?”
He didn’t need Tor to remind him.
“Look at them.” Tor urged his horse forward, close enough to limit who was in earshot, too close—Raoul and Florian moved in defensively.
I can’t.
“Look at them!” Tor urged, his voice low but firm.
Jon raised his eyes to Tor’s and then looked around. A whispering crowd had gathered, ringing their group. A shoeless boy of no more than six stood nearby. Emaciated. So poor, he didn’t even see the king.
I’ve blinded myself. Jon bit the inside of his mouth. It is I who haven’t been seeing them.
“Who will lead them while you’re off endangering yourself and selfishly trying to do what’s already being done?” Tor asked quietly. “Do you consider Brennan incapable?”
Brennan was many things. But not incapable. Jon looked away.
“Emaurrian arms will save her, but you need them to be yours. And for that selfishness, you are willing to abandon an entire kingdom that needs you.”
A shudder cut down Jon’s back. Selfish.
He’d known it, deep down, and ignored it.
He took in the sight of those around him—the emaciated boy, the many others like him, the dock workers who had so few ships to tend, the thieves who had less and less to steal.
He glared out at the Mirage, still at sea. Too late. He’d been too late. Worrying was crippling inaction, and he had his duty. It was time to devote himself to it entirely, to the exclusion of all else. Focus on the mission before him now. Protecting the kingdom.
“Majesty?” Raoul asked, but the word rippled through the crowd, spreading far and wide, and rolled back louder, more urgently, until the whole crowd chanted the word.
The Order of Terra would find the person responsible for the regicide, and Brennan would find Rielle, Jon knew that, and his own presence was… unnecessary, no matter how badly he wanted to be there to find Rielle.
But Brennan couldn’t take his place as king—nor could anyone. The Emaurrian people needed the stability of the Faralle dynasty, and he, a bastard
and former paladin, was all there was.
He couldn’t just leave. He would never be able to just leave. Ever again.
“Terra’s blessings upon you, Your Majesty!” a voice rang out.
“Divine keep you, Your Majesty!” The crowd closed in, arms outstretched in need, open and begging.
His hand immediately went to his belt, and he took off his coin purse and handed it to one of Tor’s paladins, maintaining eye contact. “See that its contents are distributed to these people fairly.”
The paladin hesitated, but at last nodded. “As you command, Your Majesty.”
The cacophony of cheers and shouts grew louder, but Jon raised a hand and waited until it quieted. “Good people of Courdeval, I see you.”
All eyes fixed upon him.
“I am of you, raised in a monastery, naught to my name but hunger for something more”—he scanned the crowd, a few faces downturned—“and Emaurrian vigor in my blood.”
Cheers erupted from the crowd, all faces to him once more.
“I am your king, and I see you.” He let his gaze rest on the young boy for a moment. “Tonight, the palace will see you well fed and clothed, on my word.”
A roar rose up from the crowd, booming, humming through his chest, spooking a few of the horses.
“Long live King Jonathan!”
“The Generous!”
“The Vigorous!”
He suppressed a smile.
The state of affairs in Courdeval had improved since the siege, and while the epithets brought a smile to his face, he had no right to any of them until the city and the kingdom could breathe again.
He raised a hand for the crowd to quiet, and it did, just barely. “A night’s meal and clothes on your back are a blessing, but too few ships make berth at these docks—”
Shouts of agreement.
“—and I will see many more here with enough paying work to keep your families fed and warm not just for one night, but every night. We will have safe lands again, if I have to fight every last new beast or creature myself.”
The crowd grew wild, and paladins swooped in to close ranks.
Tor glared at him, his brow creased. “We need to return to the palace, Your Majesty.”
By Dark Deeds (Blade and Rose Book 2) Page 3
