Chapter 22 Aldric
Chapter twenty-two
Aldric
The day was brisk. The sky was overcast. His foot hurt. Even seated upon Mourn and riding the length of the yard with Sir Easome, Duke Percival, Calix, Leif, and Rakon to inspect the Elmorian troops, he was painfully aware of his latest injury.
His men thought it was all terribly hilarious, though. Even Kyn—who was usually the polite one—had been fighting not to laugh earlier that morning while stitching him up. “At this rate, you’ll be full of holes before we even make for the front.”
Funny.
He did his best not to think about it. Neither the stabbing nor what had happened after. The sight of Sera tending to his wounded foot like a medic rather than a queen. The bright sound of her laughter as she played Sovereign late into the night with his sister.
No. He couldn’t think about that right now. He couldn’t think about her right now. She was far too distracting, and he had a job to do.
His one-eyed gaze scraped across his wife’s soldiers as they drilled together in the yard. Some were clearly seasoned. Others a little too seasoned. Yet more were fresh from the fields—farm boys without a lick of training or natural skill.
He could only hope the reinforcements marching in from the north would be more impressive, or Arlund was certain to be a massacre.
“You said there was a report of a witch in Arlund,” he reminded Sir Easome, wheeling his attention that way. “Just the one?”
The Lord Constable grunted. “Just the one.”
Leif clicked his tongue and paused in the midst of smuggling another chunk of raw meat straight from his pocket into Soot’s waiting maw. The black-scaled usuru purred from where he was warmly tucked within his Son’s jerkin, being spoiled rotten.
In Kunishi, Leif observed, “No experience with the fire women.”
The people of Kuni had no word for “witch.”
Aldric grunted. The most he and his men had ever had to contend with was the occasional Fangtalker. And he had a feeling these witches, with their foul flame and unholy blades, would be a good deal more annoying to deal with.
There was no point in complaining about it, though.
“We will soon,” he rumbled back.
Duke Percival leveled a sharp look at the both of them. “In the common tongue, if you don’t mind.”
Aldric had half a mind to ignore the Lord Chancellor. He outranked the man. There was no need for him to cater to his kirei’s godfather. And yet, “We were discussing the fact that we have no experience handling a witch.”
Sir Easome grimaced. “Neither do we.”
Aldric arched an eyebrow. “What’s your strategy, then?” he asked the Lord Constable.
But it was Duke Percival who answered, “Pray for rain.”
It took him a few moments to realize the old man wasn’t joking.
Calix and Rakon shared a glance, saying nothing. He could guess what they were thinking, though. Probably the same thing he was.
This wasn’t going to end well.
“Your Highness!” a voice called out, floating toward him on the chill wind. His shoulders stiffened at the sound. Sera.
With a twitch of the reins, he brought Mourn around to face the beautiful woman riding toward him atop her sleek palfrey, her cheeks pink with the cold.
Queensguard wreathed her as ever. In her wake trailed a handful of mounted ladies-in-waiting, who looked perfectly miserable bundled up in their fur cloaks.
For once, there was no sight of her godmother. Nor her attack rat.
Sir Easome, Duke Percival, and his Sons bowed and murmured their greetings from atop their horses. Sera barely spared them a passing glance. Her eyes were all for him when she drew her mare up short and asked, “Well? What do you think?”
That if your goal is to water the fields of Arlund with Elmorian blood, you’re well on your way to achieving it. But he couldn’t say that. That wasn’t what she wanted to hear. She wanted hope. Strategy.
A miracle.
“You don’t want to know what I think,” he rumbled to her under his breath.
Immediately, his wife’s porcelain features hardened into cool marble. “On the contrary, I do.” Nudging her mare forward, she rode away from him by several paces. When her godfather and Queensguard made to follow, she insisted, “I wish to speak with my husband alone.”
Husband.
Against his better judgment, his pulse quickened as he rode after her, the weight of Duke Percival’s eyes boring into his back.
The moment his horse came alongside hers, she softly demanded, “Tell me.”
Not a question that time. A command.
He obliged. “Arlund is going to be a bloodbath if this is truly the best Elmoria has to offer. These boys don’t know the first thing about war. And I don’t know the first thing about how Arath fights, other than that they wield witches and…” His mind hunted for the right word. “Gadgetry.”
Sera smiled, as if he had just given her a flattering report of her troops. No doubt for the sake of the soldiers they were riding past. “You’re thinking of Lothmeer with their ‘clockwork.’”
“No. I’m thinking of Arath with their exploding powders and siege engines.” After a beat, he added, “And the witches.”
“There’s only one witch on our shores,” his wife countered, as if one witch weren’t already bad enough.
He couldn’t help but point out, “That you know of.”
He had expected her to shoot him a sharp look in the wake of those words; she surprised him when she adopted a thoughtful expression instead. “I suppose you’re right.” Lower still, she observed, “The assassin had to have gotten that witchblade from somewhere.”
The witchblade. His pulse spiked again as he jerked his attention away from his kirei and looked out toward her troops instead.
Every man they passed stood a little taller at the sight of their queen—back straight, eyes agleam.
They were all clearly besotted with her.
Clearly, they would die for her, down to the very last man.
Love made men do foolish things like that.
Unbidden, the memory of the ridiculous vow he had made just yesterday during their first dance as man and wife flashed to the forefront of his mind.
To distract himself from his own stupidity, he turned his attention back Sera’s way and asked, “What did you end up doing with it?” When she frowned at him, obviously confused, he clarified, “The witchblade.”
Her frown deepened. Beneath the weight of her searching gaze, he fought hard to keep his features smooth. To appear apathetic. But still, she looked at him. Was his guilt stamped so plainly on his face? No more secrets. That was what they had promised each other just last night.
But the truth about the witchblade’s origins was the one secret he couldn’t afford to reveal. Not if he wanted to keep Sera as an ally.
Not if he wanted Drakmor.
“I gave it to Father Perero to dispose of,” his wife finally revealed, her voice so soft he hardly heard it over the various sounds filling the yard: the stamp of hooves, the whinny of horses, the crash of practice weaponry, the shouts of men. “Why?”
“Just curious,” he claimed, happy to let the subject drop. The witchblade was gone, and Sera had never even made mention of the scrap of cloth found wrapping its hilt—the one bit of evidence that could have possibly tied it all back to him.
There was no need to think about it further.
Out of nowhere, she asked, “Will you be at chapel tomorrow?”
Now it was his turn to frown. “Why?”
“Because you are my consort, and it will look odd if you are not beside me in the pew.”
He opened his mouth, ready to argue, to point out that he had far better things to do than to sit through a rambling sermon about matters that did not concern him. Before he could, Sera reached over and laid her gloved hand atop his.
“Please, Aldric,” she whispered, looking as though the utterance of those two words pained her. “I am not in the mood to argue.”
Beneath the warmth of her hand, his grip on his reins tightened. “Very well.”
Just past his wife’s shoulder, he spotted a sudden flurry of movement. A young man from the Royal Roost sprinted across the yard, making directly for him and his kirei before Duke Percival waylaid him. Hurried words were exchanged. A scroll changed hands.
Whatever words it contained saw all the color draining from the Lord Chancellor’s face.
“Your Majesty!” his kirei’s godfather called out, riding over at a brisk clip.
At the sound of the older man’s voice, she twitched away, her hand returning to her own reins.
A tight smile curved her lips. “Your Grace,” she gently reminded when her godfather drew to a halt alongside her, that scroll tightly gripped in the clutch of his hand, “I still have matters I need to discuss with His Highness.”
“But this cannot wait,” the Lord Chancellor insisted, holding out the scroll for her to take.
Aldric frowned, watching as Sera unrolled the scroll to read it for herself. The moment she did, her face went ash-white.
“What is it?” he asked, annoyed that no one had yet thought to inform him of what was happening now. Had more Arathian ships landed on their shores? Had Arlund fallen?
“It’s Mysai,” his kirei whispered, stopping his heart in its tracks. Her gaze turned his way—cold and sharp, like honed steel—as she shoved the scroll into his hands. All it housed was six small words:
Mysai will fall. Drakmor betrayed us.