22. Charlotte
CHARLOTTE
I t took her longer to fall asleep the second time, but she managed it in the end. And when she woke, the first brush of the morning was already past.
She bolted awake, staring from Henry to where Gwen now slept beside them. Easton sat to one side, keeping watch over her.
“What are we still doing here?” She gasped and lowered her voice. “Aren’t there grooms down there by now?”
Henry shrugged. “No one came. I guess the grooms are all captives.”
Gwen stirred, nodding sleepily at Henry’s comment.
“We needed to give Gwen a chance to rest,” Easton said. “She was awake all night keeping watch over us.”
“But now we need to get to the basement.” Charlotte’s stomach rumbled on cue, making her flush. “Ignore that. I don’t need to eat.”
“We should eat.” Gwen sat up and stretched, yawning. “I’m sure the grooms have something stashed in their office. Let’s go check.”
They found a whole basket of apples and a large hunk of cheese that they divided four ways.
“I’ll admit, I feel a lot better after that,” Henry said, and Charlotte nodded agreement.
The day before, it had been easy to sneak through first the grounds and then the palace. In hindsight, it had been too easy, the way cleared for the rebels to walk into the trap.
Now, the grounds teemed with guard patrols. They were everywhere, even if their steps lagged, and they kept rubbing their eyes as if they’d already been on duty all night.
“Thank goodness they’re all so tired,” Easton whispered as they once again dove into a clump of bushes to hide. “Otherwise we’d have been caught by now for sure.”
They finally made it into the actual palace, but that only meant substituting empty rooms and storage cupboards for bushes. By the time they reached the entrance to the basement level, Charlotte’s nerves were stretched so tight they were about to snap.
Two guards stood on either side of the door. Their attitude was far from alert, but they were awake, and they had swords at their sides.
“There’s no way to sneak around those two,” Gwen said. “There are only two doors down to the basement level, and if this one is guarded, the other one definitely will be. This is the back entrance.”
Charlotte looked Henry and Easton up and down. “You’re a prince, Henry, and you were a courtier’s son at least until you were thirteen, Easton. Do you both have combat training?”
The two men exchanged a look before nodding simultaneously.
Charlotte shrugged. “Then I think we’ll need a direct confrontation this time. There are only two of them, and they won’t know what either of you look like, so they won’t be sure who you are at first.”
“I’d rather not leave dead bodies in our wake,” Gwen said queasily.
“We can raid the last storage cupboard and look for something to use to gag and secure them,” Charlotte suggested, and Gwen reluctantly nodded.
Henry and Easton exchanged another look and another nod before striding forward together.
“Come on, hurry.” Charlotte pulled Gwen toward the cupboard, but Gwen resisted.
“Let me get the supplies,” she said. “You stay here in case they need backup.”
Charlotte grimaced, unsure what backup she could possibly provide, but Gwen was already darting away. And since Gwen knew her own palace better, it did make sense to let her go.
“You there!” Henry called in an imperious voice, pointing toward the guards.
They straightened instinctively, recognizing the casual note of command in his voice and bearing that marked him as someone with authority.
“What is going on?” Henry continued. “There are guards everywhere, and my wife couldn’t sleep for half the night from all the commotion. We’re supposed to be attending a wedding today, but—”
One of the guards interrupted. “This area is off limits. We’re going to have to ask you to leave.”
Henry and Easton kept advancing, and the guards looked warily at each other before the first one drew his sword and the other followed suit. But they’d left it too late and let Henry and Easton draw too close.
Breaking into a sprint, the two men rushed the guards, lashing out with fists and feet. Charlotte gasped, her heart in her throat, but before she could even think about moving forward, it was all over. The two guards lay on the ground groaning, and the swords were in the hands of their attackers.
Henry looked back and motioned her forward, and she rushed over.
“Gwen went on her own to get something to use as rope,” she said, and Easton looked up, alarmed.
But before he could go off in search of her, Gwen appeared, having managed to procure actual rope and several long stretches of torn material for gags. Henry and Easton made quick work of securing their defeated opponents, dumping the two men in a nearby room.
“Let’s hope we don’t have to do that too many times,” Charlotte said, eyeing the closed door uneasily. Easton had tied the ropes with a seaman’s knots, but there was still no telling how long it would take the defeated guards to get free.
Thankfully, they met no more guards on the basement level. Apparently, only the doors had been left guarded in order to free the others up to patrol the grounds and castle corridors.
Gwen led the way to the relevant set of rooms, having explained that while she’d never been inside, she had been to the door before. Since Gwen was no longer in her bear form, it was a good thing she’d remembered that she still had her stolen master key in her pocket. Celandine hadn’t remembered to confiscate it when she’d dragged Gwen away.
“I could have just unlocked the door and walked out.” Gwen looked down when she said it, apparently embarrassed.
Easton put a hand on her arm. “Didn’t you say what you went through in there was important? And you don’t know if this key would have worked anyway. The queen changed the lock on your room, so she might have changed that one too.”
“That’s true.” Gwen brightened. “Both of those things are true.”
“But let’s hope it works on this door,” Charlotte added nervously. Without a bear among them, it would take a long time to beat down such a sturdy door. She took the key out of Gwen’s hand since her fingers were trembling slightly after the reminder of her recent imprisonment.
The key slid in and turned. She threw a relieved look back at the rest of them, pushing the door open and stepping forward.
“No!” Gwen and Henry called at the same time.
Henry lunged forward and caught hold of the back of her dress, yanking her backward. A length of wood, being wielded as a baton, flashed down hard on where her head had just been.
Henry gave a sigh of relief and pulled her into a quick hug.
“How did you know that was going to happen?” Charlotte blinked up at him.
He gave a guilty look in Gwen’s direction. “I nearly did the same thing to Gwen when I thought she was the queen.”
Someone peered out the door and then turned to shout back into the room. Charlotte tried to pull away now that the prisoners had seen the identity of the arrivals, but Henry held on.
“I think we should let them come out here,” he said. “I don’t fancy all of us getting trapped in such a secure location.”
Easton and Gwen nodded fervent agreement, so Charlotte stayed in place, watching as people began to file out of the door. Most of them she didn’t recognize, but when Lydia and Jett emerged and rushed to their son’s side, she smiled, watching the reunion with pleasure. And when Emmett’s crutches appeared, the boy following a swing later, she almost cried to see him unharmed. His father hovered at his shoulder, his eyes meeting Charlotte’s.
He nodded at her, gratitude on his face, but she gestured with her head toward Gwen and Easton, who were already surrounded. He should save his gratitude for his future king and queen.
But when Count Oswin appeared, she hurried to his side. He hadn’t been in the line of prisoners who had paraded past her hiding place, so she hadn’t known to expect him there. He must have been arrested separately.
She was glad to see him, though. If he was there, they only needed to convince one person of the rebels’ new role in the day’s events.
The count clasped her hand. “It’s good to see you. More than good. When my son told me he’d had a glimpse of Easton, I hoped…But I wasn’t sure…” He glanced at his grandson and stopped, seemingly overcome with emotion.
“Of course we had to come rescue you,” Charlotte said warmly. “But we’re not just here to save you.”
The count looked at her sharply. “We’re still going ahead with the plan? How is that possible?”
Charlotte grinned. “There have been a few amendments…”
With the help of the count and his son, they got the grateful crowd separated, the servants heading down the corridor in one direction, while the rebels followed Henry and Charlotte several yards the other way.
After they’d explained the situation, the count surveyed the small crowd. “Anyone have any objections? Anyone want out?”
The group stayed silent.
Henry gave the count a disapproving look as he stepped forward to address the group. “We only want people who are actual volunteers. You’ve all had a highly distressing experience, and if you need to withdraw, we won’t take it as a reflection on your commitment to the cause.”
Still no one spoke up.
Charlotte stepped forward as well. “In that case, does anyone have any suggestions about how we can lure the queen into a secure location? Somewhere we can lock her in?”
The rebels who had snuck in from the city gave each other blank looks. But some of the freed prisoners were courtiers whose allegiances had shifted, and several of them narrowed their eyes in thought.
“I have an idea,” Emmett piped up.
His grandfather stepped forward, but Charlotte motioned for him to wait and let Emmett speak.
The boy looked back toward the room they’d just left. “Why not use that?”
Charlotte raised an eyebrow. “How do you propose we get her in there?”
“She’s already planning to come,” he said, gaining enthusiasm. “I spent the night talking with some of the servants.”
“Captives,” Henry said, and Emmett flushed.
“Yes,” he amended. “The captives. They said the only reason the queen hadn’t slaughtered them already was that she needed them.”
The count scoffed. “That’s what comes of replacing every single one of your servants with captive slaves.”
Emmett shifted uncomfortably, and Charlotte motioned for him to continue.
“Apparently, she was going to come back today and collect some of them so they could finish preparing her big event. The others were going to be left here, under guard.”
“She was going to threaten them in order to make the others comply,” Henry said thoughtfully, clearly turning Emmett’s suggestion over in his mind.
“But will she come herself?” Charlotte looked to the count as the one who must know her best. “Won’t she just send some guards to collect them?”
“She’ll come,” he said confidently. “She’ll want to make a big show to intimidate them, and she won’t trust that to any of her people. It’s one of her weaknesses that she surrounds herself almost entirely with subservient people. The old captain of the guard is more interested in not attracting her attention than showing any initiative. He doesn’t have the personality for chilling speeches or spreading fear by his mere presence.”
His son nodded. “Prince Henry and Princess Gwendolyn have both escaped her grasp. She knows she’s hanging onto the situation by a thread. She won’t want to risk anything else getting out of control.”
“In that case…” Charlotte grimaced. “How well does she know her own guards?”
“I’m going to guess not well at all,” the count said, looking bemused. “They aren’t loyal to her because of a personal connection. Only because she gives them power and gold.”
Charlotte surveyed the group, pointing at one man and then another. “You and you.” She turned to Henry. “What do you think? I think they’re the closest matches we’ve got.”
He narrowed his eyes, examining the two men before agreeing.
“How do you feel about playing guards for a little?” Charlotte asked them.
The two looked to the count, who redirected their attention to Charlotte.
“The door down to this level had two guards when we arrived,” Henry explained. “We…removed them. You’ll find them tied up in a room just upstairs. You’ll need to strip them and use their uniforms. Here’s one of their swords.” He handed the weapon over. “We’ll retrieve the other one from Easton.”
“The queen will likely use the main entrance,” the count said. ”But if she does appear, just keep your heads bowed in respect and attempt not to say anything. Hopefully no one will notice you’re not who you’re supposed to be.”
Charlotte handed the master key to the count’s son. “You go with them. The guards are locked away. Once they have the uniforms, lock them up again and bring the key back down. We’ll need it here.”
The three men moved off, a couple of others following to assist them.
“Won’t the queen notice something is wrong when she opens the door and the room inside is deserted?” Charlotte asked.
“That’s why I need to be in there,” Emmett said, rejoining the conversation.
“Absolutely not,” his father said instantly, and the boy rolled his eyes.
“I’m not a baby, Father. And obviously you’ll need to be with me. But look at me! I’m a child, and also—” He gestured at his leg. “Do I look like a threat? I’ll be in the first room, lying down without my crutches. The queen will send some guards in first to make sure no one tries what we did earlier, so when I see them, I’ll start crying and wailing, saying I’ve been abandoned and the others are all hiding in the back rooms. But the moment the queen comes inside herself—all the way inside—Father will leap up and grab me and sprint us straight out of the room. The rest of you can be ready to shut the door the second we’re out.” He beamed around at them. “And if I get a chance on the way out, I’ll snatch the key right out of her hand.”
“I can see some things that could go wrong with that,” Henry said through the side of his mouth.
Charlotte winced in agreement. But the idea did have some merits. It was true that no one else among them could possibly be as disarming and non-threatening in appearance as Emmett.
“What if it’s not just his father hidden in there with him?” she suggested.
Henry gazed at the amassed rebels. “Some of you are courtiers,” he said. “Do any of you have experience fighting with a blade, preferably of disarming a bladed opponent without a blade yourself?”
Four men shouldered their way through the crowd to stand before them. One had a roughly bandaged left arm, and another had a gash along one cheek.
“We can do it,” one of them said.
“And would welcome a chance,” added another in a low growl.
“We wouldn’t have been taken so easily back there,” the first added, “if they hadn’t gotten a knife to the boy’s throat.”
Emmett looked down at the ground, reminding Charlotte of what she had overheard the evening before. He wasn’t supposed to have been in the apartment at all. No wonder he was desperate to have a part in making up for his mistake. Charlotte could relate to the feeling.
“It’s fairly dark in there,” she said. “We should be able to conceal all five of you in there with him. You can be ready to burst out and fight your way out if necessary. The queen’s not going to send her entire guard force in ahead of her.”
The count tried to protest, but surprisingly it was his son who restrained him. “We have to let him do this,” he said quietly in his father’s ear. “If he walks away from this feeling like he was weak and helpless and at fault, it might destroy the rest of his life. He already has enough battles of that kind to fight.”
Both men glanced at the boy’s missing leg.
Charlotte watched them, impressed. She hadn’t expected so much insight from the count’s son. It was reassuring, though, after his actions earlier in his life. Maybe he really could prove a support to Gwen in the future.
Once the plan had been decided on, it didn’t take long to get everyone organized. Gwen and Easton led the captive servants away, taking them out through the back door that was now guarded by their own people in disguise.
Some of the rebels went with them to hide on the next level up and wait, splitting their forces. There were only so many people who could be helpful in a single corridor.
Once Emmett and his various protectors were hidden inside, the rest of them crowded through the next door down, hiding themselves out of sight from the corridor. Once the queen arrived, they would have to move fast.
It seemed like they’d hardly settled out of sight before Charlotte heard marching boots, and someone hissed, “She’s here!”