Prince of Thorns

“Please Jesu! You’re the same old wart-bag that tried to stop me last time!” And he was. The stink that jumped me when he opened the door brought it all back. “I’m surprised my father let you live.”

“Who—”

“Who the hell am I? You don’t recognize me? You didn’t last time either. I was shorter then, yay high.” I held out a hand to show him. “It seems like a while ago to me, but you’re an old man, and what’re three or four years to the old?” I sketched a bow. “Prince Jorg at your service, or rather you at mine. Last time I walked out of here with a band of outlaws. This time I just need one knight, if you please. Sir Makin of Trent.”

“I should call the guards on you,” he said, without conviction.

“Why? The King has issued no orders about me.” That was a guess, but Father thought he’d struck a mortal blow, so I was probably correct. “Besides, it’d only get you killed. And if you’re thinking of that big fellow with the pike, I rammed his head into the wall not three minutes ago.”

The jailer stepped back and let me pass, just as he had the time Lundist escorted me when I was a boy. On this occasion, I hit him as I went by. Once in the stomach, and a second blow to the back of the neck as he doubled up. For a moment I considered finishing the job with Katherine’s knife, but it’s good insurance to let ineffective jailers live.

I took his keys and moved on down the corridor, knife at the ready. I’d rather have had my sword. I felt half-dressed without it. My mind kept returning to the fact of its absence, to the weightless sensation around my hip, like a tongue returning to an empty socket in constant overestimation of the loss.

Makin put that sword in my hand on the day he found me. As captain of the guard in search of the heir, he had the right to bear it. I’d kept it close ever since, the family blade, Builder-steel.

I found my way to the torture chamber where I’d first met the Nuban. The table at the centre lay empty. There were no faces at the cell door windows. I made a slow circuit, directing the beam of my lantern into each cell in turn. The first held a corpse, or someone so near death as to be mere bones in a bag of skin. The next three were bare. The fifth held Sir Makin. He sat back against the far wall, bearded and smeared with filth, a hand lifting to shield his eyes from the light. He made no move to rise. I felt a hurt in the back of my throat. I don’t know why, but I did. Anger in my stomach, and an acid pain in my throat.

“Makin, oh my brother.” Soft.

“Wha—?” A croak, the sound of something broken.

“I’m to the road again, Brother Makin. I have business to the south.”

I set the key in the lock. A slight tremble, a little rattle.

“Jorg?” A wet sob, half gurgle. “He killed you, Prince. Your own father.”

“I’ll die when I’m ready.”

The key turned, the door opened without resistance. The stink grew worse.

“Jorg?” Makin let his hand fall. They’d made a mess of his face. “No! You’re dead. I saw you fall.”

“All right, I’m dead and you’re dreaming. Now get on your feckin’ feet before I kick out whatever shit they left you. And that ain’t too much by the smell of it.”

That got to him. He tried to rise, one hand scraping across the wall.

I hadn’t thought what kind of state he might be in. To me it seemed I’d taken Father’s knife only yesterday. Makin’s beard said weeks at the least.

He got halfway to his feet, and his leg failed.

I took two steps toward him.

The Count’s castle stood well over a hundred hard miles ahead of me, through the garden lands of Ancrath and into the Renar highlands. He’d never make it.

Makin slid to the floor with a groan. “You’re dead anyway.” The one good eye shone bright with tears.

Play the game. Sacrifice knight, take castle. That old dry voice again. I’d listened to it so long I couldn’t tell if it were mine or Corion’s. Either way, I should leave him.

“You’ve got one chance here, Makin. That’s two more than most bastards get in life.” The lantern beam swung from wall to wall. “Dead or not, I’ll leave you if you can’t stand and follow me. I left a man here to die before. A man I should have loved. I’ll leave you in a heartbeat.”

He kicked out, fierce with fear or something else, but his arm buckled and his foot just skittered across the muck.

I turned and walked away. Two yards past the door I stopped.

“Lundist died here.” I was speaking too loud for safety, wasting breath on foolishness. “On this spot.” I stamped on it. “I left him to bleed.”

Nothing from the darkness of the cell.

I’d been soft with Katherine, but at no real cost. This was different. They’d broken Makin, he could do nothing but slow me at a time when I most needed speed.

I started for the exit.

“No . . .”

Don’t let him beg.

“No . . . he didn’t die there.” Makin’s voice came a little stronger now.

“What?”

“He got a bad knock.”

Sounds of movement in the dark.

“A knock’s all. Nothing but a bruise to show for it the next day.”

“Lundist is alive?”

“Your father had him executed, Jorg.” Makin came into the light, clutching the doorframe. “For failing to protect you, he said.” He spat a black mess onto the floor. “More likely he just didn’t have any use for a tutor once his son had run off. That’s been the King’s way all these years. When a thing’s no use any more—throw it away.”

Makin managed a grin. “Damn but it’s good to see you, lad.”

I watched him for a moment. I saw his smile die, and an uncertainty replace it, mirroring my own.

I should leave him. In truth, I should kill him. No loose ends.

I didn’t look at my knife. You never take your eyes off your mark, not when it’s a man like Makin, not even in his current state. But I knew the knife was there. In my mind’s eye I could see the gleam where it cut the lantern’s light from the air. Makin didn’t look at it either. He knew better than to offer weakness to the viper. Nothing decides a man’s mind better than opportunity.

Father would leave him. Dead.

The creature into which Corion had chosen to forge me, that tool, that piece in a game of thrones, he’d never even have come close enough to savour the dungeon stink.

But what about Jorg?

“I’m my father’s son, Makin.”

“I know.” He didn’t plead. I admired that in him. I chose my pieces well.

The knife felt like hot iron in my fist. I hated myself for what I was going to do, and just as much for hesitating. I hated myself for the weakness in me.

For a moment I saw the Nuban, just the white line of his teeth, and the darkness of his eyes, watching me as he’d watched since the day we met.

Makin took that moment. A swift kick snatched my legs from under me. He followed down with what weight remained to him, and sandwiched my head between the flagstones and his fist. We neither of us were in great shape. One punch was all it took to send me back to wherever it was I’d escaped from in Katherine’s room.

Shakespeare had it that clothes maketh the man. The right clothes could take Brother Sim from a boy too young to shave to a man too old to be allowed to. He makes a fine girl also, though that was a dangerous business in road company and reserved for targets that just couldn’t be killed any other way. Young Sim is forgettable. When he’s gone, I forget how he looks. Sometimes I think of all my brothers it’s Sim that’s the most dangerous.