Private Receiving Room
The Royal Palace, Rasailles
For a series of chambers that saw use at best once in a decade, the crown apartments were opulent beyond anything she might have imagined. Wasteful in the extreme, for Duc Cherrain to keep a staff on retainer to clean and service an entire wing of the palace that had no inhabitants save when the royals made the trek across the sea. Clearly the men and women who served here took pride in their work—not a mite of dust or a frayed seam anywhere in sight. How like those in charge to misuse talent. At least the fruits of the servants’ efforts saw use now with Louis-Sallet in residence. It had taken longer than it should have by far for Marquis-General Voren to secure them this audience with the prince, but at last the summons had come. And now she, Lance-Lieutenant Acherre, and Voren himself sat in these luxuriously appointed chambers, waiting on the pleasure of His Royal Majesty.
She was not one to be overawed by titles, but in this place even the most jaded skeptic could not help but feel a touch of humility. That was the intended effect, of course. Portraits of the scions of the de l’Arraignon line hung on every wall of the royal wing, extending back for seven generations of kings and queens. In this particular chamber—the private receiving room fit for small audiences, away from the main throne room—they were watched over by a portrait of Louis-Toulard. Politics had never been her strong suit, but she knew her military history as well as any academy instructor. It had been Louis-Toulard who led Sarresant in its first great war against Thellan in the modern age, to secure the Ventane Reach, repelling the final claim the Thellan lords had on the ancestral lands of the people of Sarresant. They said he had been a Body binder himself, unafraid to lead the armies on the front lines as they clashed with their enemy. Would that they had such a man on the throne to lead them now. From all she’d heard of Louis-Sallet and his father, Gaurond, her expectations had been set low indeed. Even so, surely they would convince him here and now to give up the folly of ordering the colonies’ armies to return with him across the sea. In light of her last vision, there could be no other decision.
“His Royal Highness, the Crown-Prince Louis-Sallet de l’Arraignon.”
The crier’s words brought their party to attention, snapping into salutes, fist to chest. Civilians might be expected to bend the knee, genuflecting before the divine right of the royal line. Soldiers were accorded more respect, even junior officers like Acherre. And so they stood rigid for some time; evidently the crier had been somewhat overzealous in announcing the arrival of His Highness. That, or Louis-Sallet had taken his time traversing the length of the mirror gallery leading to the receiving room.
It appeared to be the latter, as the prince entered at last, staggering a few steps at a time until he collapsed with a grin into the luxuriously appointed chair at the head of the room. He was piss-drunk; she could smell the stink halfway across the chamber. By the Gods themselves. She had chosen Acherre for this meeting precisely because she wouldn’t trust Marquand within five leagues of the royal palace. And now this. At least Marquand wouldn’t have noticed the smell.
The prince’s guards flanked Louis-Sallet as if nothing were amiss, two men in purple tabards bearing the royal insignia. The Aegis of the King, the elite handpicked bodyguards of the de l’Arraignon line. Fullbinders all, and a narrow thing she had escaped being chosen for such service herself. Only her prowess at the academy and in the field had spared her, she was sure. Even so, if it were known that she had command of six bindings now—seven, if she included Need—nothing would stop the crown from settling a purple tabard around her neck like a collar and chain. Imagining herself shackled to their drunken sot of a prince made her feel a pang of pity on behalf of his present handlers. Perhaps the crown’s greatest waste, keeping so many fullbinders out of the army. Flowerguards, they were called by most, never mind their proper name.
“Voren!” the Crown-Prince bellowed, slurring his words together in a slow cascade. “How wonderful to see you again. I expect my brother’s hide is still stinging from the tongue-lashing you gave him.”
“Your Majesty,” Voren acknowledged, still standing at attention.
“Oh come to,” the prince said. “At ease and all that. Be seated. What have you brought me? The stewards say you insisted it be kept secret.”
A wise choice, one she had counseled when she had presented her vision to the marquis-general. Only a handful of soldiers knew the truth of the impending Gand invasion; a precaution, until they knew for certain the prince’s foolish order to withdraw would not be given. She suspected the sharpest of her brigade commanders had already guessed at her purpose from the training exercises she’d been running along the coast, but she would not confirm it without the assurance of this meeting.
“Yes, Majesty,” Voren replied as he sat, while she and Acherre remained at attention. “First, a demonstration of a new weapon.”
That got the prince’s attention, never mind the drink. He leaned forward. “A binding?”
“Yes, Your Majesty. Chevalier-General d’Arrent, if you would, please?”
“Sir,” she replied with a fresh salute, turning to the Crown-Prince. “Your Majesty. The binding is Need, a new type of leyline energy.” That got even the flowerguards to perk up from their lazy poise behind the prince’s seat. A new binding was exceedingly rare; for centuries there had been only Body, Life, and Shelter, until the great powers’ expansion revealed new powers, in turn driving them to more and greater conquests. Even so, discoveries came once in a generation at best. Need would be the third in three decades, a coup for Sarresant, never mind that Gand seemed to have had it first.
She continued. “The energy allows a Need binder to establish a link with a willing vessel, whereby the binder assumes control over their actions, seeing through their eyes similar to a projected Mind binding, but with full control.”
“And you are a binder of this new energy, Chevalier-General?”
“Yes, Your Majesty. Lance-Lieutenant Acherre”—she inclined her head toward the other woman—“can see the energy but cannot bind it—we don’t yet understand why.”
The prince cast a glance over his shoulder at the flowerguardsmen behind him, before turning back to her. “Continue with your demonstration.”
She nodded. “Lance-Lieutenant, if you would please excuse yourself.”
That earned a reproachful eyebrow from the prince.
“Part of the demonstration, Your Majesty,” she said. “Your pardon, please, if you would excuse the lance-lieutenant.”
He lifted a finger in approval, and Acherre saluted once more before seeing herself out of the reception chamber.
“Now, Your Majesty, if you would provide me a phrase, one the lance-lieutenant has not heard.”
Louis-Sallet chuckled. “A parlor game, Chevalier-General? Very well. Your phrase is ‘you wouldn’t know sense if it bit you in the ass.’ I believe that was your parting line to my brother, was it not, Voren?”
She nodded, ignoring the repartee between the prince and her commander. She had what she needed. Shifting her vision, she saw the Need energy pooling beneath Lance-Lieutenant Acherre on the other side of the door. As ever, finding Acherre’s Need was a trivial thing, like donning a well-worn glove. Perhaps that was the benefit of Acherre being able to see the Need energy, even if the lieutenant had thus far failed to bind it; compared to Marquand, or any of her other vessels, Acherre seemed to fit.
She tethered the binding and made the link. Her senses slid behind Acherre’s, with none of the lurching disorientation she felt with the others. One moment she was standing in the receiving room; the next she was on the far side of the door in the long hallway beyond.
Pushing her way back into the receiving room, she was met with startled looks from the prince and his flowerguard.
“The golden eyes are the sign of the connection,” she said with Acherre’s voice. “And the phrase is, ‘you wouldn’t know sense if it bit you in the ass.’” Ah, but it felt good to say that to a prince, never mind the circumstances.
She let the binding go.
“Well,” the prince said, his senses seeming to sharpen by the moment. “Now that was something.”
“You see, Your Majesty,” Voren said, “there is truth to the rumors of the golden light behind the enemies’ eyes. And this is what it betokens: command from afar, by a binder of Need.”
“I know damned well what it betokens, Voren!” the prince spat. He leaned forward as if to continue the tirade and found himself sliding out of the chair. If not for the timely intervention of one of his flowerguard, the prince might have graced the floor with his royal face. She knew to hide her disgust, but it was no easy thing. This man held the fate of the colonies, of the army in his hands?
“Of course, Your Majesty,” Voren said, continuing as if the prince had kept his composure and his seat. “And you can doubtless see the advantages this binding offers for command.”
“Are there others?” one of the flowerguard piped up, the one not presently occupied with helping the prince recover his seat. A young man, likely only recently graduated from one of the academies of the Old World. “Can it be taught?”
She met his eyes, seeing in him a hunger for new power. She remembered well the feeling from her youth. This flowerguard had likely only just emerged from adolescence, thinking the door forever closed on developing new abilities. To hear a binder a dozen years his senior had come into a new binding—to say nothing of the other new energies she kept hidden for now—would kindle similar hopes and aspirations in every binder with a shred of ambition anywhere in Sarresant.
“As I’ve said, Lance-Lieutenant Acherre can see Need, but so far I am the only one who can bind it, apart from however many the enemy has.”
“How long have you had it?” the prince asked in a soft voice.
She tensed at the question. There was an accusatory tone there, no mistaking.
“Chevalier-General d’Arrent came into this ability at the conclusion of the summer campaign, Majesty,” Voren said. “We worked together to understand it. Duc-General Cherrain awarded her the Legion of Valor for its use in defending the city.”
“‘The city’ refers to Sarresant itself, Voren, not this up-jumped newborn of a settlement. Never forget this is New Sarresant.”
“Of course, Your Majesty.” Once again Voren dissembled expertly, a sign of long practice dealing with the nobility. Not a skill she ever hoped to cultivate.
“And the Legion of Valor,” Louis-Sallet mused, his words running together. “There’s an honor that once meant something. Not a thing meant for commonfolk.”
Voren turned and gave her a look, wilting the retort on the tip of her tongue. She drew a breath instead, urging herself to calm.
“Majesty, there is more,” Voren continued. “Chevalier-General d’Arrent has established a Need connection with one of our spies, working from within Gand itself.”
“How exactly is a ‘connection’ established?” the prince interrupted. “What’s to prevent this binding from taking control of someone important at a critical moment, someone like me?”
“It doesn’t work that way,” she asserted. “The Need link has to be voluntary, at least for the first binding, which is also the most difficult to establish. It depends on a shared need, or a hope, between the binder and the vessel. An enemy Need binder couldn’t link with you unless you were already a traitor.”
Louis-Sallet’s face grew dark.
“ … Your Majesty,” she added belatedly.
“Forgiveness, Your Majesty,” Voren interjected. “As we’ve said, we are still learning the limits of this ability. Its functioning can be explained later.” He gave her a pointed look. “What matters now is the news Chevalier-General d’Arrent brings from the spy across the sea.”
“They mean to invade the colonies, Your Majesty,” she said. “Fifty, perhaps sixty thousand men, at least ten dozen ships, likely more. I saw them firsthand.”
Silence descended between them. The prince mouthed her words once more to himself, chewing on the thought like a dog worrying at a bone.
“How do you know they intend to sail across the sea?” the prince demanded. “Perhaps they merely intend a strike along our shores. Or perhaps they mean to invade Skovan lands, or surprise Thellan across the western channels.”
“I saw only their provisions, Majesty—the ships were being loaded for a long journey. And beyond that, I have come to understand the enemy commander. He has displayed a pattern of bold, unpredictable moves. I believe he intends to strike here.” She left unspoken her belief that the mysterious enemy commander intended to attack the colonies precisely because she was here. He had promised as much, back in their exchange in the Gand camp, when she had seen through the eyes of Marie d’Oreste.
“Why would they …?” The prince snorted. “No, never mind that.” He waved a hand in a dismissive gesture. “Voren, you bring me a great new weapon; for that I give thanks. But this news, this changes nothing.”
He rose to his feet, stumbling into the arms of one of his flowerguard.
The rest of the room rose to stand as well, snapping to attention and watching as Louis-Sallet batted away the aid offered him, struggling to stand on his own.
“We will speak on this new binding again,” the prince said, turning to make his way out of the room. The youth among the prince’s bodyguards met her eyes on his way out, but Louis-Sallet managed to make his exit without another word.
The mood in the room was sullen, and quiet, as a royal steward led the three of them back to Voren’s carriage. Hardly a fitting conveyance for a pair of cavalry officers, but Voren had insisted, back in the Harbor. Now she doubly regretted her acquiescence, wanting nothing more than to saddle herself onto Jiri’s back and fly. She had dealt with her share of incompetent fools in her career, but never a man so doggedly stupid as the Crown-Prince Louis-Sallet de l’Arraignon.
Acherre seemed stunned as they were seated in the carriage and Voren gave word to the driver to see them off. The poor lance-lieutenant had been brought up, nigh indoctrinated on tales of the divine right of the House de l’Arraignon since she was a girl, the same as every binder when they were taken for their training and service to the crown. And now she’d seen the face behind the mask. An ugly sight.
“We do the best we can,” she said to Acherre.
“Yes, sir,” Acherre said, sounding hollow.
“We do at that,” Voren said. “Though that went poorly. I had hoped even the chance of an invasion might temper him.” He removed his spectacles, rubbing the bridge of his nose.
“Marquis-General, sir,” she said, “I am certain the enemy means to invade. I feared to say as much to the prince, but I spoke with the enemy commander, through our vessels. He intends to find me, and see me dead.”
Voren regarded her for a moment, the jostling carriage casting a shifting light across the lines of his face.
“I do not believe it will matter,” he said at last. “Louis-Sallet has made up his mind. He intends to give his order.”
“Sir?” Acherre asked. “He cannot mean for us to abandon the colonies, can he? The people will be left defenseless.”
Voren laughed, a mirthless, empty sound. “Oh he can, Lance-Lieutenant. And he means to. The only question that remains is whether we will let him.”
A storm cloud settled over the carriage with those words. Treason. Voren knew it, as did she.
Settling his spectacles back into place, Voren looked her in the eye.
“There is an organization,” he began. “One that—”
Thundering hooves approaching the carriage cut him off. One of the riders barked an order to the driver, and their team slowed.
“What in the Exarch’s name is this?” Voren demanded, pulling back the window drapes.
Two riders in purple drew close, peering inside the carriage. The flowerguards, the Aegis of the King. Once again the young man with the hungry look met her eyes.
“Chevalier-General Erris d’Arrent,” the young flowerguard began with a nod. “Lance-Lieutenant Rosline Acherre. Both of you are under arrest, by the order of Prince Louis-Sallet de l’Arraignon.”