“Yes, she does. As does the King.”
“She has a great deal of guards. I’m sure the King has at least as many if not more.”
“What’s your question, Jeffrey?”
“The Prince has one night guard and a day guard in training. There’s no one guarding his apartments; not if he’s not in them. The palace guards don’t go there. The armour difference between myself and the King or Queensguard is considerable. Why all those differences?” Jeffrey asked, his brow furrowed.
“You’re quite perceptive,” the marshal noted, appraising Jeffrey. “Why do you think?”
“That’s the thing, I can’t work it out. As heir, guarding the Prince should be as important as guarding the King and Queen themselves. If something happened to him, the future of the empire would be at stake.”
“And who do you think would have an interest in that?” The marshal asked with a raised eyebrow.
“You’re saying...” Jeffrey trailed off, a worried expression marred his face.
“We’re at court, Jeffrey. Everything that happens here is somehow political.”
“I’ve never understood nor liked politics. It’s backstabbing and scheming to achieve your own goals at the cost of others.”
“Many would agree with you. But here at court, it would not be wise to repeat your words.”
“Is he in danger?” Jeffrey’s eyebrows pulled together in question.
“More than you know.”
“But not in form of blades...”
“Quite right.”
“Why does the Queen have her own guard?”
“Much of the current practices were set by previous Kings and Queens. I believe some of our previous Queens felt safer with their guards being under their own control rather than the King’s. It has not been changed again.”
“And the Crownsguards you train?” Jeffrey asked with narrowed eyes.
“Many are sent away as soon as their training is complete.”
“On missions?”
“On assignments of some kind, yes. Let’s return to your training now.”
Jeffrey tried to focus on what the marshal told him, but at the back of his mind, the questions continued. Why didn’t more Crownsguard get assigned to the Prince if he faced danger? And what danger? From whom?
Chapter 5
The third day of Jeffrey’s guard duty arrived and once again Hendrick passed on the Prince’s request to see Jeffrey. When Jeffrey walked in, the Prince sat at a table, dressed in a loose shirt and trousers, sipping from a cup of tea. The breakfast tray in front of him filled with bread and pastries, fruits, cheeses, meats, and more.
“Your Highness.” Jeffrey bowed slightly, keeping his gaze averted to make it easier to ignore the tempting sight before him. The Prince’s half undone shirt exposed pale flesh beneath, a collarbone just visible.
“Good morning. We didn’t have the best start before and I was hoping we could forget what happened and try again. I can offer coffee today.” He gestured at a pot standing on the table. Jeffrey looked around nervously. “Please sit down, just for a few minutes.”
Jeffrey sighed but eventually sat down, adjusting his sword as he did. He sat on the very edge of the seat, unable to quite relax around the Prince. Proximity did not ease the sensations sparking in Jeffrey.
“Help yourself to anything you like,” the Prince gestured at the tray on the table.
Jeffrey poured himself a cup of coffee, drinking it without adding sugar or milk and ignoring the food altogether. “Thank you, Your Highness. This coffee is great.” Jeffrey’s voice was stiff.
“I’m glad you like it. I prefer tea myself. Coffee just seems too bitter,” the Prince said conversationally.
Jeffrey nodded and smiled awkwardly.
The Prince sighed. “We’re going to be spending a lot of time around each other. I can see how uncomfortable you are around me. Why is that? What can I do to change it?”
“I apologise, Your Highness.” Jeffrey bowed his head, his mind spinning. Every day in the Prince’s service posed a risk, yet he couldn’t just leave. He had to find a way to manage, find an excuse. “I mean no offence in my behaviour. It’s not... it’s everything. The palace, the protocols. I’m only a soldier, Your Highness. I’m used to simpler ways.”
“You didn’t come here to work at the palace?”
“No, Your Highness.” Jeffrey watched as delicate pale hands buttered a slice of bread before adding meat and cheese.
“Why then?” The Prince’s brow furrowed in question. He took a bite of bread, crumbs falling to the floor.
“You may not like what you hear,” Jeffrey replied, his head cocked to the side.
“That only makes me want to hear it more.” The Prince leaned back and lifted one leg, ankle resting on the opposite thigh.
“My commander sent me here, as form of punishment. I believe he felt I had disobeyed him one time too many and when no other punishment worked, well... I think he liked the idea of being rid of me. Though, he did sell it to me as an opportunity to train with an elite guard.”
“I had heard you had a tendency to be less obedient to your commanders than would generally be expected.”
“You had?” Jeffrey’s eyes narrowed.
“I do tend to be told about my new guards before they start duty. In case I object.”
“Oh,” Jeffrey said, a flood of thoughts entering his mind. The Prince had known his history and not objected to his assignment. He had known Jeffrey’s name every time he called him alfio. The mix of emotions he’d been carrying around the past few days started brewing again, bubbling dangerously.
“How did you earn your punishments?”
“I’d rather not talk about that, Your Highness. I imagine you know already or you can read my records if you so wish.”
“Hmm. Alright, not today. I’m quite intrigued though. You must have earned many to be effectively exiled.” Having finished his bread, the Prince selected a piece of fruit, bringing it to his mouth with two fingers.
Jeffrey gave a wry smile but remained silent, drinking his coffee. The sight of the Prince licking his fingers clean was disturbingly distracting. It didn’t ease the tension in him.
“Well, at least the elite guard worked out, now that you’re a Crownsguard.” Jeffrey still remained silent. “That’s not what you were expecting.”
“No, Your Highness.”
“Crownguards are expected to serve as guards in the palace, whether general or with a specific charge to look after. But they do go on specialised missions when there is need. We’ve had peace for a long time though, reducing the need for such missions.”
“Peace,” Jeffrey snorted before he could stop himself.
“You disagree?” The Prince frowned.
“There’s peace in the capital for sure, much of the central provinces too. Go to the more remote regions or the edges of the realm, especially the west and you’ll see something quite different.”
“It’s not exactly easy for me to travel to any part of the realm. But I’m told the fighting is only minor skirmishes.”
“In the grand scheme of the realm, they may be. To those on the front line, it’s a daily struggle to survive regardless. But we’re only peasants to your kind, easily dispensable, only of value to the extent that we further your causes, right? So, by all means, keep calling them minor skirmishes.” Jeffrey sat the now empty cup down hard on the table and stood up. “May I please return to my post, Your Highness?”
“You may not,” the Prince retorted, voice hard. “You’ve formed an opinion about me even before you met me. Now you judge me harshly, yet you know nothing about me. The daily battles I face to try and stop the fighting. I am not yet King and yet every day I work to make this realm safer. I value every single person living under my father’s care and I do what I can for every one of them.”
Jeffrey saw the Prince’s hands trembling, his grip on his cup had tightened to the point that his knuckles turned white and he sa
t it down on the table overly cautiously. “Get out.”
Jeffrey did not need to be told again, his hurried footsteps had him out the door in moments. Leaning against the wall, his body trembled in anger and frustration. Being around nobles always set his teeth on edge now, after too many encounters with arrogant and pretentious men trying to lead soldiers when they didn't know the first thing about fighting, but somehow it got worse around the Prince. The words had tumbled out of Jeffrey without thought, without a filter, he hadn’t been able to help it. Hadn’t even realised what he was doing until it was too late.
He ran a hand over his face in agitation. Would the Prince want him punished for speaking out the way he had done?
Or could he use this somehow? Being in the Prince’s service meant being around nobles every day. It would only be a matter of time before one of them recognised Jeffrey and gave him away. He had to find a way to get reassigned. Maybe if he could make the Prince dislike him enough, he’d want a different guard and sent Jeffrey away.
Then there were the things the Prince had said. That he worked to stop the fighting. Jeffrey had seen little evidence of it but then he was not privy to the contents of the conversations that happened in the Prince’s study. He did remember Lord Lucretius arriving the previous day, the messenger that arrived in the afternoon, spending hours with the Prince and his advisor. Was it enough to believe him? But if he worked to help the people, how was it he was so cruel to the servants?
It didn’t matter. He’d find a way to get assigned elsewhere. He had to.
***
Time passed slowly when Jeffrey stood on his own. The Prince’s apartments faced west, and the corridor Jeffrey stood in faced east into a small courtyard. In the morning he could track the sun’s path by the shadows cast on the floor, in the afternoons he didn’t typically see much sun. Used to spending his days outside, whether training in a yard or fighting in the fields, being stuck indoors was difficult for Jeffrey. If the windows would at least face the gardens it would be easier.
The Prince’s advisor arrived at some point, stopping to chat.
“Day three is it?” He gave a friendly smile. “How are you finding it?”
Jeffrey raised an eyebrow. “Tedious,” he couldn’t stop himself from saying.
Ignacio laughed, giving Jeffrey pleasant shivers. “Is he that bad?”
“I’m not used to standing around indoors, my Lord.”
“Hmm, I guess there is a lot of that.” Ignacio looked towards the windows and nodded in sympathy. “He’ll be going away to the south soon. Either you’ll get some time off or some more time spent outside.”
“I shall look forward to it, my Lord.” Jeffrey gave a little whisk of a smile. “Will you be joining the Prince?”
“Yes, we always go. Every year,” Ignacio said wistfully, his gaze fixed in the distance.
“You seem to have fond memories of it.”
“You have no idea,” he grinned at Jeffrey. “It’d be nice to have you there this year. I must talk to him about it.”
Jeffrey grinned back, the idea of spending a journey to any place with the Prince’s advisor was quite pleasant, he was so easy to talk to. Then again, the idea of spending time in a car with the Prince on the other hand, was considerably less enticing.
Time continued to pass without Jeffrey’s awareness of how much or little went by. The Prince and his advisor reappeared at length, the Prince pausing on the threshold for a moment, watching Jeffrey.
“Your Highness,” Jeffrey said, bowing slightly, his tone formal.
The Prince nodded, then turned swiftly and walked away. Ignacio looked at Jeffrey with a friendly smile and winked at him. Jeffrey smiled back, then followed the two.
As it turned out, they were headed for the training grounds once again. Ignacio and the Prince talking quietly as they walked. When they got there, the marshal awaited them. He and the Prince headed into another room again, leaving Jeffrey and Ignacio behind. Jeffrey would have liked to be able to witness the Prince’s skill, but clearly, that would not be happening anytime soon.
“No one gets to watch the Prince fighting, only his tutor.” Ignacio’s words pulled Jeffrey out of his thoughts.
“Why not?” Jeffrey asked.
“King’s orders,” Ignacio explained. “If no one knows how good he is, it prevents people observing potential weakness that could be exploited in a fight. It also makes his skills somewhat legendary.”
“Or he’s actually utterly incapable and has to hide it from everyone,” Jeffrey replied only half-jokingly.
Ignacio laughed. “I admire your honesty, Jeffrey. Keep it up.” With that, he left.
Only when he was alone again did Jeffrey realised his informal way of address, the casual way they had spoken. He felt oddly at ease around Ignacio, and there had been no complaint or distaste. It was so unusual for a noble.
With the Prince engaged with the marshal, whose skill truly was legendary and based on many observed fights rather than secrecy, it meant that the Prince was safer with him than he would be with anyone else in the Empire. Considering the man practised against the most skilled fighter the Empire had, Jeffrey suspected there was some truth to the stories of the Prince’s skill. So why exactly he needed a personal guard, Jeffrey wasn’t sure. But then he remembered seeing the Prince hurt after his last sparring session two days earlier. Nothing to do with the Prince ever seemed to make sense.
Jeffrey had been given a task for times like these. The marshal had indicated he needed to get to know the palace as though he’d spent all his life in it. Jeffrey laughed inwardly at the thought and the irony of it, but the marshal could never know.
He’d been paying close attention to the passages used by the Prince, the rooms he visited the most and how to get from one to another. There were still a great many corridors and rooms he didn’t know, and his task was to explore them all, as quickly throughout the week as he could, using any minute available. He set a brisk pace as he explored as many hallways of the palace as he could, given the short time he had.
***
In the afternoon, Faruk once again came to relieve Jeffrey so he could spend more time training with the marshal. They spent most of their time that day studying blueprints of the castle, basic and without labels, normally stored in a safe so as not to easily fall into the wrong hands. They finished early so Jeffrey could spend more time wandering the hallways he saw on parchment.
The free time allowed Jeffrey to have his dinner together with other soldiers in the barracks, where he found Kieron having food with a group of other Clansmen. They were four in total, three sat on the benches of the long sides of the table, one sat on a chair at the head. Jeffrey knew enough of their culture to recognise the leader of the group. They were Palaceguards, except for Kieron, who by rights would be higher ranked. Among Clansmen, it wasn’t rank that mattered.
Jeffrey held his tray out to Kieron, “Trian.”
Kieron stared but stood to take the tray without question.
Standing beside their leader, Jeffrey let his gaze sweep across the group, landing on the man sat at the head. His tall frame reached Jeffrey’s chest even sitting down. Blond hair grown long and tied in the back, his beard thick and partly braided, his forest-green eyes met Jeffrey’s, one blond eyebrow raised in question, or challenge. Jeffrey remained quiet, holding the man’s gaze.
At length, the blond broke the silence. “You’re not one of us.”
“I demand your respect, Trian,” Jeffrey replied. The chair screeched across the floor, the blond man standing up to face Jeffrey, more than a head taller. Jeffrey lifted his head but remained unfazed.
“You’re nothing to me. A nobody with no worth,” he spoke with a strong accent, his voice low and deep.
One of the men at the table stood and leaned in to whisper to the blond giant. Jeffrey thought he heard his name but could not understand the rest, spoken in their own language. The blond’s eyes darkened and narrowed at the words he heard
. He made a gesture and the other man sat down again.
“You’re Jeffrey the Fierce?” he asked, disbelief and awe in his voice.
Jeffrey raised an eyebrow, his lips quirking. He’d not heard that one before. The tiniest nod his only response.
“Why do you do this?”
There was enough deference in the man’s tone to give Jeffrey the opening he needed. “I do not want your place. I want your respect and your acceptance. To be your equal.”
Someone in the group gasped. Jeffrey knew what he asked for would be contradictory to them; to demand respect was to be superior, to want to be accepted was to declare yourself inferior.
“You do not make sense. There’s no equal.”
“You don’t have Southerners in your group either. You will make an exception for me.”
“For you? Or for Kieron?” Jeffrey remained quiet, his gaze never wavering. “You are determined.” Not a question but a statement. The man turned his attention to Kieron. They said no words, but an exchange happened. Jeffrey didn’t see, his eyes never leaving the blond in front of him. When green eyes turned back to him, Jeffrey saw the change in them.
“My Name is Ulfar, you know Kieron, the other two are Niall and Gavin. You may join us.” He paused, then bowed his head. “You are Tiras.”
“Thank you, Trian.” Jeffrey laid a hand on the blond’s shoulder, then he bowed his head. Pulling away again, he turned to Kieron and saw that his tray had been placed across the table from the blond leader, a chair stood where there was none before. Kieron stood between the bench he’d sat on before and Jeffrey’s seat, beaming so much his lips were being introduced to his ears. Jeffrey grinned back and let his hand brush Kieron’s as he passed. He sat down, Kieron following only when Ulfar also sat.
The tension at the table hung heavy in the air. Jeffrey had made his position known but it was too unusual, they didn’t yet know how to deal with it. He turned to Kieron, who still grinned and winked at him.
“Off early today?” Kieron asked easily, either to break the tension or in an attempt to ignore it.
Ties of Destiny (Curse of the Crown Book 1) Page 6
