Chapter One
Westminster Palace
“Jareth, watch out!”
Jareth heard the warning before he hit the ground, face first, and a blade whizzed over his head. Infuriated, and with a mouth full of dirt, he managed to kick his legs out and catch his opponent by the ankles.
Stefan de Lohr went down in a heap.
Jareth sat up, spitting clumps from his mouth, as he pounced on Stefan and shoved the man’s face into the dirt as well.
“That’s what you get, you overgrown child,” he said, rolling off the man when he resisted. “Honestly, Stefan. Grabbing my ear and twisting? As if that would force me to capitulate?”
Stefan spat out some dirt of his own as he pushed himself onto his knees. “What’s that you say?” he said. “I did not quite hear.”
Given that Stefan was mostly deaf, Jareth had learned to speak very loudly to him.
They all had. But sometimes Stefan used the deafness to his advantage and pleaded ignorance.
Jareth, and the rest of the Guard of Six, had learned that as well.
Stefan may have been hard of hearing, and they knew it was growing worse, but he was anything but ignorant or helpless.
The man was a beast in the best sense of the word.
“I said you are an overgrown child,” Jareth shouted at him, watching Stefan grin. “This was to be a training exercise, not a brawl.”
Stefan stood up, reaching out a hand to pull Jareth to his feet. “It was great fun, whatever it was,” he said. “You may not have the size of some of the others, but you are faster than lightning. That makes you more dangerous.”
Jareth turned his nose up at him. “Do not flatter me,” he said. “I do not like you and I do not believe you.”
Stefan started laughing.
The men known as the Guard of Six had been training in a smaller yard of Westminster Palace beneath a May sun that was surprisingly warm.
Tunics were off, shoulders were starting to bronze up and burn, but they were enjoying every moment of it.
Training, and practice, was something that had been part of their lives since they were small children because, as English knights, perfect skill and readiness was expected of them.
No one trained more diligently than Jareth.
A de Leybourne son, he had an older brother, a father, and an ancestral home named Tyringham Castle deep in the wilds of Cornwall.
He’d been raised in that mysterious land that was built on legends and blood, so there was something wild in his soul.
He wasn’t the largest man in the Guard of Six, as Stefan had mentioned, but he was by far one of the most cunning.
Jareth was as wise as he was ethical, as skilled as he was fast.
But he was not a small man by any definition.
He was over six feet in height, with enormous shoulders and big arms. But the Guard of Six, by the king’s design, comprised some of the biggest, strongest men in the kingdom, so Jareth’s height against the others was all relative.
He was a big man in any room he entered and certainly the smartest.
He was also the bravest.
And everyone knew it.
Which was why Stefan’s comment about him being dangerous was true. When an enemy sized up the Guard of Six, they often overlooked the man of shorter stature.
And that was a deadly mistake.
“I love you madly, Jareth,” Stefan said as Jareth brushed the dirt off his breeches. “You know that you are the air in my lungs, the very blood that flows in me.”
Jareth looked at him, his lips pressed in a doubtful line. “You can take that statement and toss it into the river with the rest of the rubbish,” he said, watching Stefan laugh. “Train with Dirk for the rest of the day. If you try to twist his ear, he’ll cut your fingers off.”
The other Guard of Six members were chuckling at the pair, who were, in reality, the best of friends.
Stefan had officially joined the Guard of Six earlier in the year when Kent de Poyer, one of the original Six, married and temporarily resigned his post to spend time on the Welsh marches with his new wife’s family.
Torran de Serreaux, the unofficial leader of the group, was also the Earl of Ashford, so he spent about half of his time at his seat of Kennington Castle in Kent.
That meant the Guard of Six, which had originally started with six men, needed reinforcements.
Those reinforcements had come in the form of Stefan, who was a de Lohr and therefore from one of the most powerful families in England, and another knight who was from the north of England and came with an astonishingly deep pedigree.
Orion Payton-Forrester.
Annoying was where he started. Where he ended, one could only guess.
He was big and blond, with a dark blond mustache and a manner that was infinitely charming, bright, and resourceful, but the man was so perfect that he was, predictably, annoying.
Even now, as he tried to engage Stefan into practicing some techniques with him, Jareth turned to watch the man.
He was the great persuader because he was so persistent that one gave in simply to shut him up.
Jareth took a drink of boiled water from a pitcher they had sitting on the stoop, swishing it around his mouth and spitting out the dirt that was still lodged in his teeth.
But his gaze never left Orion as he finally convinced Stefan to work with him.
“He knows how to make grown men cry.”
Jareth turned to see Aidric St. John walk up beside him.
Tall and fair, the man looked like a Dane.
He had a big, square jaw and strong features, far more of a follower than a leader, but he was the Six’s secret weapon.
He was the most vicious member of the group, someone that Stefan and Orion wouldn’t spar with, not yet.
They didn’t know him well enough, but they were learning.
Aidric had been watching them like a hawk since they had joined the group, and when Henry traveled and the Guard of Six stayed close to him, as their primary function was as royal bodyguards, Aidric took point because he looked positively terrifying.
Stefan and Orion had simply fallen in behind him.
But that was their lot in life these days.
If they wanted to truly be considered part of the Six, they had to earn it.
“Orion, you mean?” Jareth said. Then he snorted. “He’s getting better about it. Remember when Britt slapped him early on?”
That had Aidric grinning. “Britt has no patience,” he said, referring to Britt de Garr, the least tolerant of the group. “That slap at least forced Orion to think twice about his behavior. He does not vex as he used to.”
“True,” Jareth said. “And before I forget yet again to tell you, Henry is planning on traveling to Windsor next month to do some hunting, so we will be traveling with him. With Torran and Kent away, I will take command.”
That was usual, so Aidric simply nodded. “Any instructions?”
“None yet,” Jareth said. “Henry may want us in the hunting party, so be prepared.”
“With pleasure.”
Hunting was always great sport. As they pondered what fun the journey to Windsor would entail, Stefan and Orion began engaging in swordplay.
They were practicing a particular technique, joined by the final members of the Guard of Six in Britt and Dirk d’Vant, another Cornwall native.
Aidric ended up with them as well, working beneath the noon sun, and Jareth was thinking of joining them when he caught movement off to his right.
Thor de Reyne was heading in his direction.
An enormously powerful knight with black hair and piercing blue eyes, Thor held the title of Lord Protector, the king’s personal bodyguard.
He worked autonomously from the Guard of Six because he literally stayed by the king’s side in all things, while the Guard of Six formed more of a perimeter.
Fortunately, they all worked very well together and Jareth liked the suave and debonair Thor a good deal. He considered the man a good friend.
“Did you come to see us beat de Lohr and Payton-Forrester into the ground?” he called to him. “You are not too late if you wish to help.”
Thor started to laugh, watching the five members of the Six as they went through their paces. “Is Payton-Forrester being a nuisance again?” he asked.
“A little.”
“A little beating now and again might solve that.”
“We’ve tried. He likes it.”
That caused Thor to laugh harder. “Then I cannot help you,” he said. “But I have come with a missive. It came for you a little while ago.”
Jareth looked at him curiously. “Are you a messenger now?”
Thor shook his head. “Nay,” he said. “But I was at the gatehouse when it arrived, so I brought it over.”
With that, he extended a vellum envelope, carefully folded and sealed. Curious, Jareth looked at the seal—and there were three of them, all in a row—before realizing whose it was.
“My uncle,” he said, sounding pleased. “Christ, I haven’t spoken to him in years.”
Thor watched as Jareth broke all three seals. “Why not?”
“A few reasons, I suppose,” Jareth said. “The man is in Bristol. He hasn’t come to London in years.”
“You can go visit him, you know. Bristol is not that far.”
Jareth shrugged. “No need,” he said. “He’s always come here, and we sup together when he does. We’ve never been particularly close, but with him, at least the effort is made.”
“Unlike your own father.”
Jareth shook his head. “Nay,” he said without remorse. “My father only had time for my older brother, who only had time for himself. When my father died a few years ago, Jasper inherited everything and I’ve not heard from him since.”
Thor watched the man open up the envelope and inspect the careful writing. “Pity,” he said.
“Not really,” Jareth said. “My brother is an arse. In fact, I… Damn…”
He was reading the missive, and Thor looked at him with concern. “Is something amiss in Bristol?”
Jareth didn’t answer for a moment. He just kept reading. “It seems so,” he said slowly. “It seems that my uncle has died.”