by Sever Bronny
Augum swallowed and set to rinsing his hands. “I’m sorry, I’m not helping, am I?” He dried his hands and returned the washbasin and cloth to the footman.
Bridget sat with a vacant stare in what Augum translated as stewing in guilt, self-recrimination and shame, something quite familiar to him. He would have given her a good brotherly hug were it not for all those critical eyes watching their every move.
“Screw it,” Augum muttered and drew Bridget in anyway. “It’ll be fine,” he whispered as she sniffed hard into his shoulder. “It’ll be fine …” He ignored the nobles elbowing each other to look over, the hissing, the giggling, the black looks of disapproval at the young man who had made a Black Slight upon the king’s honor on his coronation.
Bridget, body trembling, had evidently been far more affected by events than he had realized. He wondered if it had something to do with what she had admitted to Leera.
“I just want to go home,” Bridget blubbered, sounding so very unlike herself indeed.
“Soon,” Augum whispered, squeezing her once more. “Soon.” It was difficult seeing her so hurt and fragile. He felt like he had let her down.
He held her until she had stopped sniffling. She dabbed at her eyes with a cloth and glanced up, chin firm and straight.
“There’s the Bridget we know,” Augum told Leera, winning a grin from her. “Proud and strong.”
“And ready to kill,” Leera said, adding in a whisper, “I’ll console her some more later.” Then she glanced over to Brandon and gave him a black look of her own.
Brandon quickly looked away, indicating he had been watching. Fool. Stupid, daft fool. What was he thinking?
“I told him he was handsome,” Bridget blurted.
Augum refocused on her, trying to work out what she was talking about. “Sorry—?”
“Brandon … Brandon once asked me if I thought Eric was handsome.”
“Why did he do that?”
Bridget shrugged. “It was after that piece in the Youth Herald going on about how Brandon’s standing was far beneath mine and that I belonged with someone dignified like Eric Southguard.”
Gods, Augum had completely forgotten about that. “But that was almost a year ago! And wasn’t it buried under a mountain of other gossip?” When she did not reply, he plowed on. “You remember those ridiculous stories. Heck, Cry wrote half of them!” Not quite true, but still. Brandon had bullied Cry, and thus Cry had taken revenge with the quill, as he used to write for the Youth Herald before switching to the Academy Herald. But that had resulted in more bullying, creating a vicious cycle. It was too bad Augum had been too self-absorbed to notice.
Bridget kept drawing an oval around the smallest water stain. “I told him he was being extremely immature. But I think it got to his head anyway.”
“He also feels overshadowed by us,” Augum added. “But that doesn’t give him the right to treat you like that.”
Bridget opened her mouth as if to say something more, but she closed it and watched as a servant girl poured red wine into a finely cut crystal goblet. Bridget stared at it.
“Don’t tell us you’re taking up drinking,” Leera chirped.
This, of all things, caused Bridget to snort. She glanced up at the girl. “Please replace that with water. And I apologize for my behavior earlier. It was … inexcusable.”
The girl leaned in and whispered, “Please do not apologize to me, Your Highness. I know what you have been through and what you have sacrificed. And I know the kinds of games they play here. And … and I have been treated far worse.” The girl curtsied. “May the Unnameables bless you, Your Highness,” and took the goblet away.
“Thank you, you are so very kind,” Bridget mumbled as her distant look returned.
There is definitely more to it all, Augum thought, watching her. Man and woman stuff, no doubt. But he did not press. Bridget would tell him in due time if she wanted him to know.
Courses came and went. The trio ate sparingly and drank nothing except water. They broke bread, made toasts when custom demanded and endured the speeches of the nobles. Amazingly, no one uttered a word about the Lord High Disciple. It was as if the king expected everybody to fall in line with the new faith—not that the old faith had been particularly vociferous. Solian worship of the Unnameables was quiet and humble. There was no loud preaching, only a general acceptance of the central tenets. That humility now seemed ripe for plunder …
Augum knew it was only a matter of time before his Black Slight was brought to bear. The hour of the Forgiving Ceremony rapidly approached. He hoped Jez and the others returned soon, for he needed a historical precedent to win back his and the castle’s honor, or who knew what would happen. The king could conceivably reclaim the land by sheer dictum. Augum suspected the only thing preventing him from doing so was the trio’s heroic reputation … or what remained of it. He doubted the king thought they would be helpful in any meaningful way against the threat to the south, for Augum’s castle had few trained men-at-arms, let alone warlocks. Unless, of course, he truly believed the scions were hidden in the castle.
Those had been more failings of his—not enlisting enough men and not having someone train new blood. It was all stuff he would eventually have to get around to, but between cramming studies and the daily responsibilities, it had gotten lost in the shuffle.
Augum looked on as nobles and men of office fought like penned hens to curry favor with the rooster king. Old men accustomed to having things done for them all their lives elbowed each other while vying for who got to serve the latest dish to the king, or who got to make the next toast, or who got to present him with the next gift—and of gifts there were many, from sculpted bronze figurines to paintings to enchanted blades to mechanical contraptions in the form of dolls that spoke.
“I should present our gift,” Augum said, realizing he hadn’t taken the time to figure out how it worked.
“Don’t look so panicked,” Bridget said, digging into her satchel and pulling out a bejeweled metal egg. “Jez showed me how it works. Here.” She fumbled with it. “It’s a puzzle. See, these are wings, and this is a beak …” She soon finished, revealing a small metal bird studded with glinting jewels. “Once you solve it, you say, ‘Magiato flata.’ ” They watched as its wings flapped a few times and the beak opened to emit a small chirp before falling silent again. “Neat, eh?”
“Quite,” Augum said, accepting the bird and playing with it, though he wondered if it was a worthy royal gift. He returned it to its egg state and practiced working it back into a bird.
“Where would I be without my sister,” Augum muttered once he had figured out the contraption.
“Lost and dying in some desert,” Leera sniped from beside him. “Or booted out of the academy. Or begging on the streets after hitting your ceiling. What? Don’t look at me like that. We both might have ended up that way.” She nodded at the egg. “And neat gift. Though I doubt it’ll erase a Black Slight. Just be sure you don’t make things worse.”
“I’m not a complete dunce,” he said. Gods, he had to be really messing things up for Jez and now Leera to remind him not to make it worse.
He stood. “Wish me luck.”
They did so, and he went to line up with the other gift-giving hopefuls. Cry, who seemed to have been waiting for him, lined up right behind him.
“They’re gathering outside our castle,” Augum said to him without turning around.
“Sorry?”
“People are gathering, begging for divine favors. Eternal life. Impossible healing. Some are getting angry. Thought you should know.”
After a long pause, Cry said, “I looked into the Von Edgeworth situation.”
Augum pressed his fingernails into his hands. Fine, don’t own up to causing all that trouble. He still did not turn around and only gave the slightest nod. For Cry to have waited around like that, whatever information he had to tell him must have been sensitive. He would certainly hear him out.
�
�What I am about to tell you I tell you because I find it interesting,” Cry began in a quiet voice. “Not because I feel like I owe you anything. Anyway, Zigmund, the last Von Edgeworth had a kid out of wedlock. The mother died of sickness in the war. That’s all I dug up. So yes, it is possible there’s a Von Edgeworth out there seeking revenge.”
Augum nodded. He turned his head to press for more details, but Cry had already gone, replaced by a swaying drunken noble with a triple chin.
“Looky here, it’s His Uppity Royal Highness,” the man wheezed. “Gettin’ ready to make another Black Slight, boy? Reckon you don’t need that head of yours, eh? They’ll be singin’ all sorts o’ new songs about ye then.” The man succumbed into coughing laughter.
Augum rubbed his forehead and sighed. Great, even the nobles were feeling bold enough to lob a few shots at him. He chose to ignore the drunk man and thought over what Cry had told him. Unfortunately, he quickly realized there was likely a slew of children born out of wedlock with mothers who had died of one sickness or another.
The line crept along until one noble remained ahead of Augum. He practiced playing with the bird while pondering the scant information Cry had presented him. He was confident the Southguards had something to do with the assassins. Was the Von Edgeworth the link? There certainly was plenty of motive.
The same two clues rolled around in his brain. Kid out of wedlock. Mother died from sickness. Kid out of wedlock. Mother died of sickness.
The noble ahead of Augum strode forward, knelt before the king’s table, and presented a case of fine Canterran wine.
Wait, there was something else buried in what Cry had said. The mother had died of sickness in the war. Out of wedlock, sickness, war. His tired brain turned these clues around over and over as he tossed the bird from hand to hand. Gods, how he needed a good sleep …
“They’re calling you, Yer Highness—” the drunk behind him slurred, shoving him and causing him to drop the bird. It crashed on the ground and broke into several pieces, much to the amusement of those watching.
Augum’s blood flash-boiled. He wanted to snatch the noble by the collar, shove his face into the wreckage and lion-roar at him with an amplified voice to look at what the damn fool had done. But unsanctioned arcanery at a royal event would be instant grounds for arrest. Not to mention the scandal of it.
“Next! Next, I say!” the harker shouted.
No, he had to comport himself and recover. He had to stop playing the idiot.
Augum hurriedly placed his hands above the jumble of broken parts. “Apreyo,” he said, and shepherded the jewels and metal bits back into place, good as new. He picked it up and strode to stand before the king.
“His Highness Prince Augum Arinthian Stone, Lord of Castle Arinthian and Hero of the Resistance,” a tabard-wearing harker announced soberly.
Augum dropped to one knee before the king’s table, determined to redeem some of his honor.
“A gift I bring His Royal Highness,” Augum said as the crowd quieted.
“A gift?” King Rupert said with a chortle. But then he followed tradition and added, “Do show the splendors of thine house, Great Vassal.” That all-too-familiar mocking twist again.
Augum presented the odd-looking contraption, its jewels glinting in the candlelight.
“What, pray tell, is that ugly thing?” the weasel Lord High Steward asked in a theatrical voice. “The prince has brought His Highness a chicken’s egg!” The hall descended into chuckles.
“Allow me to show His Highness,” Augum said as evenly as he could. He began folding the contraption into a bird which he triumphantly held aloft upon completion. Just as the steward was about to make another jest, Augum firmly said, “But wait, Your Majesty! Magiato flata!”
Except nothing happened.
“Err … magiato flata!”
Still, nothing happened.
Old Rupert was the first to wheeze with laughter, which quickly led to an entire hall filling with mirth at Augum’s expense, sending waves of humiliation cascading through his body. He frantically messed with the bird, turning the wings this way and that, while repeating the trigger words … all to no avail.
And then he realized what had happened. When the bird had fallen, it had broken the enchantment as well. His Repair had fixed the physical portions of the bird, but not the enchantment. That type of repair could only be accomplished with the 11th degree spell Greater Repair. But even if Augum had known that spell, it would be illegal for him to cast it as it was more than two degrees beyond his own degree.
Augum rose, broken bird in hand, and glanced around at all the howling faces. With every laugh, he saw everything he and the girls had worked so hard for getting stripped away, layer by layer, like a cheap enchantment. When he looked at Bridget and Leera, their eyes were in their laps. Perhaps it was from disappointment, or shame, or sorrow.
“I’m sorry,” he murmured to them, though they surely could not hear him over the naked roaring laughter.
Augum glanced back at the royal table. Iron Byron was pig red with laughter. The Grizzly was the only one among the high council not laughing. He looked on with a downcast—even sorrowful—expression. As for Eric, for some reason, he too was not laughing, but rather staring at his plate. Perhaps he saw a bit of himself in the humiliation. Brandon, standing behind Katrina, had a hand over his eyes, while Katrina sat with the strangest expression, a look of sheer, wide-eyed, open-mouthed pleasure. Katrina, one of the darlings of the academy, who had only ever taken offense once, when Eric—
Suddenly the memory of a certain conversation smashed into him like a charging bull.
You and I have something in common.
Oh?
We are both orphans. Mother died of consumption only a couple years ago. Father loved her very much. He was so stricken with grief that the idea of honor in battle consumed him. He was killed in the war.
And she had given the game away when Eric had used an old proverb as an attempt at humor—bastards brewing a conspiracy—telling him never to use the word bastard, even in jest. Further, when Augum asked her if the Lord of the Legion had murdered her father, she had not replied. Augum had assumed that meant the Lord of the Legion indeed had, yet it had not been so. Mrs. Stone had vanquished her father and her grandfather, and Katrina hadn’t replied as it would have tipped her hand!
Katrina Southguard … was Katrina Von Edgeworth.
Revelations
Augum had not even awaited the king’s traditional verdict of acceptance. He had drifted back to his seat amidst swells of laughter, broken bird clutched in hand. But that laughter paled against what he had deduced. Katrina Southguard was the daughter of Zigmund Von Edgeworth. And she had sworn to avenge her father and grandfather … by claiming Castle Arinthian for herself. The pieces slotted into place. She had only joined the academy that term. Few knew about her, but she had quickly gained clout among the students. And she had been studying Augum from a distance, testing his weaknesses, always near, learning, absorbing. The sweet, innocent looks he remembered her giving him turned cunning and clever. Her casualness and offhanded manner now seemed calculated and deliberate. Every gesture had been a nuanced form of manipulation, some fishing expedition to learn more about him.
As the laughter petered out, Augum sat back down, taking a measure of dignified comfort in doing it gracefully. He allowed the broken bird to fall from his hand onto the floor and numbly placed a cloth over his shoulder in preparation for the next course. The king, in his boar-like mirth, had overlooked Augum’s slight of not waiting for the verdict. Instead, he was receiving the drunken noble, who renewed the laughter by tripping and falling face first into the pile of presents.
Katrina was laughing along with the others, a hand covering her mouth. But her eyes flicked to the trio now and then. Even in that moment, she was watching, studying, biding her time …
As he watched her adjust her spectacles, leaving them on the very tip of her nose where they were useless, it
occurred to him that they were fake. And the more he studied her, the more he was certain he was right. They were part of the person she wanted to project: innocent, bubbly, intelligent, but easygoing. Cute, even. Cute, but calculating. And Augum now saw right through the act. She was using her powers in the dramatic arts to fabricate a false image.
“What happened? Why didn’t the bird work?” Leera asked softly, interrupting his thoughts. Her eyes were glazed and she kept shaking her head in confusion.
“Its enchantment broke when I dropped it,” he replied dully.
“Ah.” She scratched at her temple as she frowned. “Right. That drunk shoved you. Bastard …”
“Bastard,” Augum repeated in a murmur. He looked at his girlfriend. The cuff of her strawberry-red dress had a small sauce stain. He removed the cloth from his shoulder, placed a corner of it in a bowl of lemon water, gently took her arm, and dabbed at the stain. She gazed at him as he methodically worked the sleeve. When he looked up, her eyes were spring brooks reflecting the rays of a dying sun. He leaned in and gently kissed her lips, not caring what the damn nobles thought, for clarity was returning to him. In the war, he had defended the castle from a horde of rampaging undead and powerful necromancers. But spells were useless against royalty as the arena they fought in used weapons like guile, decorum, bribery and backstabbing. Yet he had to defend the castle. He only hoped Jez and the others dug up a precedent for him.
Augum drew Leera closer and whispered in her ear, “Katrina Southguard is really Katrina Von Edgeworth.”
Her eyes widened as he drew away. He gave a slow and serious nod, telling her it was indeed true and that he was not jesting and that he had not lost his mind.
Someone else was presenting a gift, for the drunken noble had ignominiously been dragged away and the laughter had, at long last, died down. But the damage to the trio’s honor and reputation had been done. Not that it mattered. A plot was afoot, and they had to focus on defending themselves.
