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Finding Lord Broderick Gramiren’s wife took longer than William had expected. No one had seen her leave the castle, but her ladyship valued her privacy, and she was known to disappear from time to time for the principle of the thing. Fortunately, William managed to find a housemaid who had seen Baroness Muriel heading up one of the servants’ stairways. He checked in the dark, low-vaulted storerooms of the interstitial floors, and listened at the doors of a number of servants’ rooms. But he didn’t find what he was searching for until he got all the way up to the highest floor of all, even above Lady Anne’s room, at the base of the huge glass dome.
One of the doors was closed, and he could hear sighs and moans coming from behind it. He hated to ruin the baroness’s fun, but he had his orders, so he knocked.
The noises stopped immediately, and a slightly breathless feminine voice called out, “Who’s there?”
“Sir William, my lady. I bring word from your husband.”
“Come in.”
He did so and immediately regretted it. Her ladyship valued her privacy, but she had an odd notion of what sort of things needed to be kept private, and a very curious sense of humor. For half a second, before she closed her dressing gown, he caught a glimpse of her body. All those curves, and those long legs, too.
He had more than a glimpse of the young man on the simple camp bed: Pedr Byrne, the son and heir of the Duchess of Keneburg. Earstien certainly had been generous to the boy, though William wasn’t sure he had wanted to know that.
“Holy Finster, give me a second to get dressed,” Pedr whined, grabbing a pillow and covering himself.
The baroness ignored him. “What is it, William?”
He bowed. “My lady, the king is dead. His lordship, your husband, wished you to know.”
“I see.” She made no effort to appear upset by the news.
Pedr, on the other hand, looked stunned. “Oh, Earstien, are you serious?” He started fumbling into his trousers. “Oh, how awful! I’ve got to...oh, Earstien, I’ve got to go see my mother. If she hasn’t heard yet, someone needs to tell her.” He grabbed his shirt from the floor on his second try. “Muriel, I’m sorry. I’ll see you later.” He was still bare-chested as he jogged out the door, nodding to William as he passed, but not quite able to meet his eye.
Lady Muriel didn’t look even slightly embarrassed. She went to a dusty table in the corner and poured herself a glass of wine. “Where exactly is my husband?”
“I understand he rode down to the city with Colonel Sir Volker Rath, my lady.”
“Probably to go see my brother. A wise move. If you see either of them, let them know they can feel free to stop by and see me anytime. A coordinated strategy would be best.”
“Of course, my lady.”
“Thank you, William. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to get dressed.” She turned and let the robe fall off her, even before he could leave the room or shut the door.
William had long since ceased to be surprised by the baroness’s affairs, or those of her husband, either. He didn’t exactly disapprove of them, though he did not particularly like Baron Broderick’s latest girl, Lady Anne. To his mind, it was not his place to approve or disapprove of what his commander and Lady Muriel did in their spare time.
He did sometimes wonder, however, why they seemed to have eyes for virtually anyone in the world but each other. Broderick had the vigor of a man half his age. And judging by the sounds William had overheard in Lady Anne’s apartment, that was just as true in the bedroom as in the training yard. As for Lady Muriel, she was one of the most beautiful women at court. If William hadn’t known that she had given birth to two children, he would not have guessed it. And yet, after those two children, the baron and baroness seemed to have given up on each other. It seemed very odd to William, and he often wondered why it had happened, but it wasn’t any of his business to ask.
He left the palace and headed over to the guards’ barracks, where his initial stop was the apartment of Sir Samuel Yarmouth, the captain of the castle guard. William guessed that Lord Broderick and Colonel Rath were going to speak to the troops down in the city, but someone needed to make sure of Sir Samuel, as well. No one had ordered William to do this, but he had learned to anticipate the needs of Lord Broderick, rather than wait for explicit orders.
Sir Samuel had not heard the news of the king’s death yet—a shocking oversight on someone’s part. Like Pedr Byrne, he was stunned and dismayed, and he immediately stood up and put on his sword belt, clearly intending to run over to the palace and find out if he was needed. He wasn’t especially, and William counseled him to stay where he was. “At least until you get new orders from the captain general.”
The guard commander frowned. “You know I answer directly to the king, not to the captain general.”
“The new king is an 8-year-old boy,” William pointed out. “For the time being, it might be best to take directions from Lord Broderick, instead.”
For a few minutes, Sir Samuel dithered, until William slowly drew his longest dagger and tapped the flat of it against his palm—a style of argumentation which rarely failed to convince.
“Tell the captain general that I eagerly await his orders,” the man said, quivering a little as he sank back into his chair.
With that settled, William rode down into the city, and after asking a few soldiers, he managed to locate Colonel Rath in the commander’s office at the East Gate. The good colonel, normally so calm and stolid, was in a red-faced temper, shouting at soldiers and servants alike.
“Thank Earstien you’re here,” he said to William. “People are refusing to cooperate.”
William plucked a pen and parchment from a nearby desk and handed them to Rath. “Who are these people? Give me a list.”
Rath’s list turned out to be a lot longer than William had expected. He had been hoping to sleep in his own bed again, but it didn’t look like that was going to happen soon. He permitted himself a tiny groan of disappointment, and then he went to work.
His first visits were to a trio of Wislicshire knights who commanded part of the city’s southern wall. They had heard they were under the command of Lord Broderick now, through his deputy, Colonel Rath, but they had refused to send any troops to patrol the streets when Rath had asked them to.
“I don’t see why I should have to take orders from that man,” one of the knights sniffed.
“Because the captain general asks you to,” William said.
The knight shrugged. “And why am I supposed to take orders from the captain general? Because he’s King Ethelred’s bastard?”
William drew his dagger, pinned the man’s sleeve to his desk, and slammed his face into his inkwell so hard it left a deep red mark. The fellow quickly saw the benefits of cooperation, and promised not to cause any trouble in the future.
“Good,” said William. “If you do, I’ll hear about it.”
The other two knights were more amenable to persuasion—William barely had to put a hand to the hilt of his dagger before they promised to obey Rath’s orders. Sometimes there were benefits to having a certain reputation.
After the knights, the next names on the list were the heads of the city guilds. Rath had said they were being “seditious,” though when William talked to them, they all claimed the colonel had demanded fifty Sovereigns from each of their guilds to provide for their “protection.” That was certainly interesting, but William didn’t think it was any of his business how a man earned his living.
“It’s positively outrageous!” cried the head of the goldsmith’s guild. “What am I supposed to do?”
William gave the man a long look, then said, “I would pay him, if I were you.”
One of the guildsmen, the head of the apothecaries, had a little more guts than the others, and required a second visit, in the middle of the night, to his bedroom. William didn’t like doing that sort of thing. A man’s home was his castle, but sometimes a castle needed to be captured. There wasn’t any way around it, and the man quickly saw sense when he woke up to see William leaning over him.
In the gray hours of dawn, William went across the river to Abertref to visit the Earl of Stansted. His lordship had a large force of knights and men-at-arms, and he had so far refused to place them under the command of Lord Broderick. William liked the earl; he’d been a fine commander during the Loshadnarodski War. But personal feelings didn’t enter into a business like this. He had to persuade the earl to do the right thing.
When he pulled his long knife, however, and slapped the flat of it against his palm, the pommel and guard rattled and shifted.
“You’d better get that fixed,” the earl observed.
William sighed. He really liked that knife, but he had others, and after ten minutes, the earl agreed that it would be best if he sent some of his men home and put the rest at Lord Broderick’s disposal.
With the sun coming up, William finally finished the list and headed home. He knew better than to check in with Colonel Rath first—Rath would almost certainly have new names for the list. There would be time for them later, and William felt he had earned a short rest.
Almost dead on his feet, he turned into Shieldworten Street, where all the forges were lit, and the music of hammers filled the air. About halfway down, he ducked into one of the larger shops, where he was immediately hailed by a huge, slope-shouldered man in the back—Philip Rowley, his friend, longtime armorer, and landlord. William pulled out his favorite knife and handed it over.
“I can have this done by noon,” Philip said, his smile gleaming white in his soot-blackened face. “You should really get some rest. You look done in.”
That was exactly what William’s wife, Gwendolen, said when he got upstairs. She had her long, golden curls up in a headscarf, and was obviously in the middle of the washing. But all the same, she ran to give him a kiss and made him sit by the fire while she brought him a basin of water to wash his face and a big mug of cold ale. He pulled her onto his lap in the creaking old rocking chair they’d bought in the market and kissed her again.
“How’s Robby?” he asked.
“Napping,” said Gwendolen, with a relieved grin. She waved a hand toward the low, slightly off-kilter doorway to the little room that served as their nursery. Everything in that direction was blissfully silent. They both loved their boy, but at two, he was becoming something of a little tyrant. “If you wanted a nap,” she said, “I could put some blankets over the windows to muffle the sounds from outside.”
He shook his head. After living on Shieldworten Street for two years, the sound of hammers on steel no longer kept him awake. But he wasn’t about to go to sleep while Gwen was working. It wouldn’t be right. So he peeked in on his sleeping son, and then he helped his wife carry the big baskets out to the backyard, where the soot from the forge wouldn’t stain them. As they hung the sheets, Gwen started singing a little Kenedalic song, as she often did.
But then she stopped, and she turned to him, brow furrowed. “Hazel Rowley told me the king died,” she said. “Is it true?”
“It’s true, I’m afraid,” he said.
“Oh, that’s so sad. Those poor little children.”
He pinned up a corner of the sheet, then went over and kissed the top of her head. “Don’t worry. Everything will be alright.”
***
A FEW NIGHTS BEFORE the funeral, Elwyn and the entire household attended a strange and solemn ceremony. All the captains of the guard gathered in the library, with the privy council, too, and the other great nobles. Four bishops of the Leafa church were in attendance, along with the two court hillichmagnars and Lady Jorunn’s young magy apprentice, a thin, awkwardly pretty girl named Evika Videle.
All the lamps were dimmed, and Lord Aldred led them in a prayer for “the right guidance of his serene majesty, our new king.” Then, from the far side of the Palm Court, over by the council chamber, two candles appeared, and a pair of dark figures approached. One was the queen, almost covered in layers of flowing black. The other was Elwyn’s little brother Edwin—her new king—dressed in a black mourning suit cut like a military tunic and wearing a simple gold circlet on his head. His face was deathly white, and his lips moved slightly, repeating the same silent phrase over and over.
Together they passed through the Palm Court, through files of soldiers and servants, and then up into the library, past Elwyn and all the high nobility. At the far end of the room, Lady Jorunn and Lord Aldred drew aside a richly-embroidered curtain, and young Edwin passed alone into a darkened chamber. Elwyn caught a brief glimpse of a huge volume with worn leather covers resting on a gilded stand: In Aid of Leornian’s Rulers. Then the curtain fell back, and the poor boy was alone with the most powerful magysk artifact in the world.
In the tense silence that followed, Elwyn heard shuffling footsteps and rustling cloth. Then someone jostled her arm, and she turned to see that Cousin Broderick had slipped in next to her. He had on a new black tunic, which set off the gold collar perfectly. His black hair was slicked back, and there wasn’t a trace of stubble on his chin. Normally he looked ten years younger than his true age. Tonight, it could have been fifteen or twenty years.
He bowed slightly and whispered an apology for arriving late.
“It’s alright,” she whispered back. “Edwin just went in there.”
He was quiet for a while before speaking again. “It’s rather exciting, isn’t it? The first time a new sovereign views the book alone. One can only imagine what secrets the Creator may choose to reveal.”
She turned and looked more carefully, and there was definite mockery in his smile. “Don’t you believe in the book?” she asked.
“Oh, I believe in it. More than most do, I would wager.” He nudged her with his elbow, and now his smile became an inappropriately boyish grin. “Have you ever seen it?”
“Of course I’ve seen it,” she replied. “Everyone’s seen it.” On festival days, the curtains around the little sanctuary were thrown back so people could admire it.
“No, I mean have you used it?” He leaned closer. “Do you know the spell?”
“Obviously not.” She scowled and shuffled slightly away from him. Only the king, the queen, and the heir to the throne ever knew the spell to open the book or move it from its pedestal. For two thousand years, those secret words had been passed down, from father to son, from bridegroom to bride. The court sorcerers didn’t know them—not Lord Aldred, not Lady Jorunn. Not even the great Lord Valamir and Lady Ovida. Right now, the only people in the world who knew that spell were Rohesia and little Edwin.
Before Cousin Broderick could respond, Edwin emerged from behind the curtain. His hands shook so badly he nearly dropped his candle. But when he saw everyone watching, he managed a weak grin. Then, at a harsh whisper of command from the Bishop of Formacaster, a small choir of monks emerged from the southern reading room to lead the congregation in a long series of hymns. All of them were about Earstien’s Light—“seeing the Light,” “being led by the Light,” “finding the Light in darkness.”
But poor little Edwin, shuffling nervously next to the bishop, looked like a rabbit that had been startled by the sudden glare of a lantern.