Princeweaver

Chapter 36

THIRTY-SIX

The truth is that there is no great uprising of sorcery in

Cyngalon, and you know it.

The princes defended themselves because we gave them no choice,

after we pointed the blame of the Sundering unfairly upon their

blood.

When it was as much our folly as theirs.

I know you are angry and hurt, but I pray – stay your hand. Do

not strike a blow that cannot be unmade. You taught me we must be as a

shield – so let me, now. Please. Before innocent blood runs this green

land red.

Personal letter from Hereward Arden-Draca,

Second Heir of Khaim, to their brother, King Uhtric. 612 A.S.

THIRTY-SIX

The noise reached them as they approached the southern gate, and Osian turned his horse. ‘Take Meilyr to my rooms—’

‘No,’ Meilyr said, seeming to startle himself. His expression firmed. ‘I will come with you.’

Osian should deny him, for his own safety. But something made him not want Meilyr further than this, so he nodded to Pedr and set off across the cobbles, away from the castle, towards the town.

He could still taste him.

They followed the sound. Familiarity hit as they passed parallel to the street where he had found Meilyr and into a small, packed square.

The amassed crowd was agitated, craning and crammed together, murmuring and shouting. Crownsworn pressed them away, and Osian waded through, the bow wave of their arrival rippling out.

A crownsworn at the head of the mess cursed in relief at the sight of him. ‘Majesty, thank the gods! We’ve kept them back, but…’

Osian followed the hands pointing upwards, the focus of the crowd’s attention.

He heard Meilyr’s sharp intake of breath.

Hung by a rope from the dragon-spire of the Khaimlic church was the body of a crownsworn. Slashed and beaten, blood marked their face like tears from cuts carved into their eyes, their wrists opened, painting their slack hands red.

A fake crown, the kind sold at festivals, rested atop their head. A long, dirtied white sheet drifted like a cloak about their shoulders. It caught the wind like the banners on the church’s walls and around the square.

There were scrawled marks on it, red as their hands. Words, perhaps, though it was too far to see.

‘You just missed Her Majesty, she rode back to the castle. Gave instruction to get them down, but…’ The crownsworn gestured, utterly out of their depth.

There were other crownsworn at the higher church windows, trying to reach the body with a clergy stave. They easily met the rope but could not find leverage for more.

The square hung tense. Baited. The build of static before lightning strikes.

They had to contain this, fast. There was only one thing they could do.

‘Cut them down.’

‘What – Majesty?’

‘Clear the ground,’ Osian called, circling his mare towards the crowd, making some back up. The crownsworn floundered, then took up the motion. ‘Clear the ground. Cut them down!’

The call echoed higher, the stave retracting. A sword was drawn.

Osian rode to Meilyr, close enough to press their legs together. He took his face in his hands, forcing his eyes to him, and covered his ears. ‘Focus on me.’

‘What—’

The snap of the rope. The not quite instantaneous, sickeningly wet sound – the horror ripped from the crowd.

Meilyr flinched, hands flying over Osian’s.

‘Focus on me,’ Osian whispered. ‘Meilyr, focus on me.’

Osian held him, their heads pressed together, and wished he could spare him this.

‘Majesty,’ Pedr called, reluctantly urgent.

Osian moved enough to see Meilyr properly. ‘Do not look. Please.’ He had already seen enough horrors.

Osian pulled away and rode to Pedr, dismounting beside the broken body. Sick recognition flared.

Levett. Levett, who had beaten Wade Bevan to his death and should have been locked in a cell in the castle. The makeshift cloak had covered the worst of the state of him. Pedr now drew it taut. The red markings, in blood, were indeed writing.

Osian recognised splinters immediately.

‘Is that… Cyngaleg?’ the closest crownsworn asked.

Osian felt Meilyr turn. ‘Keep all these people back, please.’

‘Yes, Majesty.’ They went to it.

The parts Osian could read doused him with foreboding, but he could not look away. He felt more than heard or saw Meilyr drift to his side.

‘Pedr,’ Osian said.

Pedr had gone very still.

‘Pedr.’

‘It reads…’ They could not say it.

Meilyr had stiffened, hand tight in Osian’s, no telling who had reached for whom.

Somewhere in the crowd, glass shattered. Shouts echoed.

Pedr swallowed, and translated, ‘Your princes will soon be more dead than ours.’

They were met in the castle courtyard by a summons to the Throne

Room. A summons that included Meilyr.

Osian’s meagre hope of returning him to the tower unnoticed snuffed out.

He expected to find the full court and Council in an emergency session, but there was only Aldreda, Wystan, Demelza, Captain Radnor and Gelens. His and Meilyr’s boots echoed down the central aisle as he led them towards the dais.

‘My knights were in sight at all times,’ he began before anyone else could. ‘If you are about to suggest—’

‘This isn’t about that.’ Aldreda was terse, with the emptied look she wore when she had to concede to someone who outranked her. These days, that expression only came from one place.

She had spoken to their father. Dread crawled up Osian’s spine.

‘You see, we did make an arrest connected to the killing in the square.’ Gelens stood like a vulture at the edge of the dais, hands neatly clasped.

‘A killing that could have been prevented if that crownsworn were still in his cell,’ Osian said.

Gelens spread their hands. ‘The populace acted; to say such a thing was preventable is merely hubris. Nonetheless, I thought you might want your husband to be here for this.’

Aldreda glanced at Gelens, as though she truly hated this, even as she levelled her voice to hide it. ‘Bring them in.’

Through the doors, two crownsworn dragged someone in peasant garb and chains.

Osian had no time to truly recognise them. Any attempt at subtlety or concealment vanished with Meilyr’s stricken gasp, the hands that flew to his mouth in pained shock.

‘Well,’ Gelens said pleasantly, ‘good to know we have the right man.’

Celyn. Gods damn them, it was Celyn.

Celyn who was pushed to his knees at the foot of the dais. Celyn who only glanced up, before keeping his bloodied head down.

‘What reason do you have for arresting this man?’ Osian’s voice was rough to his own ears. Meilyr still had his mouth covered with his hands.

Gelens cleared their throat gently, counting off fingers. ‘Inciting unrest and sentiments against the Crown. Treason. Attempted murder. Murder. Should I go on?’

Meilyr snapped back into himself. ‘No! Celyn could not have—’

‘Now, that isn’t quite the truth, is it.’

Meilyr blanched, and Osian understood in the same awful beat. Damn them. Damn them all. Gelens and Wystan and likely Captain Radnor had known for some time that Celyn had accidentally killed a crownsworn, but had waited for the perfect moment to spring their trap.

‘The bond-brother of our favourite suspect,’ Gelens said, ‘with the latest murdered crownsworn being one of two arrested for detaining – what was their name? Ah, Wade Bevan, yes. What a predicament.’

‘If you hurt my brother,’ Celyn began, hoarse.

‘I asked you to be quiet, remember? Good boy.’

Celyn’s hatred flared, but he glanced at Meilyr and lowered his eyes to the floor.

Damn Gelens. Gods damn them.

‘If he is to be accused,’ Osian said, ‘then he is to be treated as a lawful member of the royal family. He is the prince consort’s bond-brother, and by right—’

‘By right, he may be acquitted of any crime. Save a direct act of treason against the Crown.’

Osian bit back his surge of anger: a brutally well-practised action, which was almost not enough. ‘And what act of treason do you accuse him of?’

‘Attempted murder of a prince of Khaim.’

Osian looked at Wystan. ‘And when did this attempted murder…’

Oh. Aldreda’s pained silence. How could he not have realised?

‘He did not have me poisoned. You have no evidence.’

‘We have enough, and a rather convenient motive, if I do say so myself.’

Osian looked at his sister. ‘You know he had no hand in this.’ If she even suspected it, Celyn’s blood would already soak the Throne Room’s floor. ‘Aldreda.’

‘He is vital to the whereabouts of his co-conspirators,’ Gelens supplied smoothly, ‘who we will find and detain soon enough. Though, I do worry this speaks to far wider issues for the Denelands.’

‘He did not do this.’ Meilyr’s voice was clear and pained and steady, his fists tight at his sides. ‘Celyn did not poison Osian. He did not do any of this.’

‘Can you truly be sure?’ Gelens asked, concerned. ‘The way that I could be?’

‘Yes.’ Meilyr straightened, fierce and protective. ‘Celyn had nothing to do with it.’

‘How touching, considering the company your brother keeps.’ Gelens stepped off the dais past Osian and Meilyr, towards Celyn, languid and unhurried.

‘Considering his hatred for your husband. A shame, I would be able to find out if he was involved, of course, but…’ They turned as if on a stage, tunic stirring in an arc, their captive audience hung on their every word.

They returned leisurely and stopped close to Meilyr.

It was a near-impossible effort not to reach for his sword. Not to step between them.

‘Well, there is a more pressing matter…’ They turned their hand towards Meilyr’s wrist. Meilyr, who could only stare at Celyn, his entire body emanating strain and terror.

‘Enough,’ Osian began.

‘For your brother?’ Gelens whispered.

Meilyr met their gaze, resolute and unflinching. He turned his wrist, offering it willingly.

‘No—’

Gelens slipped their hand around Meilyr’s wrist and entwined their fingers with a sharp, exhilarated inhale.

Osian wanted to run them through. He stood frozen in the utter, disarmed horror of what was about to happen.

It was over in a single moment. Gelens exhaled unsteadily, let Meilyr go and huffed a laugh.

Osian finally moved. He pulled Meilyr against him and put himself between them all and him. ‘That is enough. You have manipulated everything quite expertly, Lord Gelens. My father will be proud.’

‘Oh, Majesty, but you must be dying to know what I just felt.’ Pleased and hungry, Gelens grinned like a starving dog loosed into the coop.

They gestured idly at Celyn. ‘Have him taken away to be questioned. You, however’ – they focused on Meilyr, and Osian’s heart stopped – ‘are free to go, and are released from arrest.’

‘What!’ Wystan cried, as Captain Radnor said, ‘Crownsworn, take the prisoner to his cell.’

‘But he is innocent,’ Meilyr demanded, leaning heavily on Osian. ‘You know he is.’

‘I know I have some fascinating questions for him. But not to worry, he won’t be tried for attempted murder of a prince – at least not yet. Go on, go about your day as you may, but do not leave the castle grounds. For your own safety.’

‘If he is not guilty of treason,’ Osian said, ‘then he is to be released at once.’

‘I did not say he was innocent of treason. Time will tell.’

‘You lied,’ Meilyr bit, beginning to shake with shock and rage in Osian’s arms.

‘A serious accusation for a simple misunderstanding.’ Gelens looked at Osian. ‘The prince consort must be exhausted and understandably upset, Majesty. Some rest, perhaps.’

Osian wanted sorely to deny them, but Meilyr needed to be away from here. There was nothing to be done for Celyn like this, so he turned to half carry Meilyr away from them all, his skin crawling, his fury broiling.

‘Osian.’ Aldreda’s voice was still devoid of colour. ‘Father wants to speak with you. Now.’

He wanted to refuse. Wanted to drag her from the Throne Room and demand to know why, and how she could sit and let his happen.

Instead, he went to the door, summoned Pedr and put Meilyr into his knight’s arms.

As he returned, he overheard Gelens tell Wystan, ‘Not to worry, I am now far less inclined to believe our dear prince consort responsible for the killings. But I do have every belief he rather wishes he could kill me. It truly was something, that resolve. Our little Denelands rose has some thorns.’

The chamber at the top of the castle’s easternmost tower was

nine-sided, with the tight vastness of a chapel. Each of its tall

windows was patterned with tinted glass of gold and cream and palest

yellow. The conical ceiling was painted with motifs of kings past,

swearing allegiance to a great white dragon, its claws red with

blood.

The air was mottled with dust, catching the sallow light.

At the exact centre of the room was an inlaid pool of shallow water. Its low rim had been intricately carved from stone, ash wood and bone: further dragons, coiling about trees and birds and men, reaching skyward.

The water would never dirty, refracting the world with a mirror-sheen.

Osian moved to the edge of the pool. Unease filled his reflection.

There was no place in Eascild, in all of Cyngalon, that he hated more than this room.

Unable to stomach the face in the water, he applied gentle pressure to the central band of the thick ring on his thumb, turning the innermost third of it. It snapped loose a tiny, needle-sharp barb. He pricked it into his other hand and squeezed off a drop of his blood into the water.

The lower part of the ring, with another small twist, opened a minute compartment glistening like garnet: less than half a thimble-full of more blood.

His father’s blood. The king’s blood.

There was not much left. Aldreda had not been far off when she had suggested he pretend to have run out, though he had another vial kept locked in his desk.

He hated every part of this.

Angling his hand, the mechanism in the ring allowed a single droplet of that blood to join his own. It clouded just as his had done, before the water caught its purpose and began to churn.

In the drained, fractured white light before the pool, Osian took a knee like a knight swearing his life, and waited.