Castle Town, page 25
In an odd way, it made him think of his mother, the consistency of her reading habits and her love for the castle library. She had a curious side to her with an appetite of its own, an open-ended passion for learning and understanding for its own sake. He decided to take her up on her offer to help him as soon as she got back and the idea of having her pacing his chambers, pouring over his partial translation, was oddly intriguing.
We’d work late into the night, he thought. Perhaps she’d change into that nightgown she’s so fond of and let her hair down.
He could practically smell her on top of the mental image, and he was a bit unnerved by the excited reaction of his body. Things had been different since she’d become the underqueen, since he’d realized how much he desired to be elected heralder king. It was confusing in a way that was more bad than good or perhaps the bad kind of good.
He pulled himself out of his daydream before it meandered in too weird of a direction and moved on to the next paragraph. It seemed as though he’d reached the end of the beginning section of the spell, but what followed made no sense. He wasn’t entirely sure he was translating correctly, but if he was, a good page and a half of the book appeared to be related to geographical directions.
It was as though the book wanted to devote itself to describing the outer bounds of a kingdom on top of explaining spell mechanics. He didn’t have any examples of location names in the book poems, so even if the directions had been useful, he was lacking any orientation to ground them properly.
He took another break, laying in his bed for a while, not quite napping, but not quite thinking, either. Eating had fallen to the wayside for much of the day, so he was eager for the evening meal, both to sate his appetite and to check in with Ruby, Petra and his mother.
It seemed as though they were only just arriving back to the castle as he made his way down to the dining hall. Koa watched them filing into the vestibule alongside a rough looking contingent of guardsmen, many of them wounded and battered.
Avina and Petra were frowning and whispering to one another with Mav and Ruby following in their wake. Koa fell into step alongside them.
“What’s happened?” he asked, frowning.
“We… made an attempt at intercepting the dustwalker,” said Avina.
“Unsuccessfully, I will assume.” Koa rubbed his chin as he eyed the injured guards. “Why wasn’t I informed about this expedition?”
“Your mother assumed that you would have insisted on putting yourself into danger,” said Petra. “Rightly so, in my opinion. You do not exactly shy away from such challenges, Makoa.”
“That depends on the challenge.” He smiled and Petra held his gaze for an interesting moment.
His mother seemed to bristle as she cleared her throat.
“Captain Lauric suffered heavy casualties among his men,” she said. “He was injured himself, arm fractured and set into a sling. Makoa… the situation is becoming dire. We’re going to have to decide together what happens next.”
He nodded slowly. “As in… we prepare our defenses to hold here in the castle?”
Avina and Petra exchanged a glance that left him wondering if his suggestion must sound naïve to them.
“We’re still weighing our options,” said Avina. “I need to change. And eat.”
“I was on my way to the dining hall, as it happens,” he said. “I’ll wait for you there.”
Avina nodded, rubbing his shoulder as she and Petra and her handmaidens hurried off. Koa met Ruby’s eye for a few seconds, catching her mouthing a word that he couldn’t sound out to make sense of.
He waited in the dining hall, and one by one, the women he loved arrived for dinner. Ruby, miraculously, showed up first, affording him an opportunity to sneak off briefly with her around the corner leading to the kitchens.
“It was a complete disaster, Koa!” she whispered. “I think your mother wanted to spare you the reality of it.”
“Well, what’s done is done,” he said. “I’m just glad all of you are safe.”
She’d bathed in what must have been record time, hair still wet and dark red, cheeks still with that scrubbed and flushed quality from the water’s heat. He touched her cheek, glanced around to make sure they were still alone, and then kissed her.
“Koa…” whispered Ruby, smiling even as she touched his chest, gently pushing him back.
“Come to my room,” he whispered in her ear. “Later tonight. I have a question I need you to help me answer.”
“Your mother has ears in the castle walls,” she said. “She’ll find out.”
“Doubtless she knows already. Besides, I simply wish to ask you a question.”
“A question. Right.” She let out a small laugh as he kissed her again, his lips brushing her neck. “I’m sure you’re rather eager to get an answer as soon as possible?”
“Would you rather I ask someone else?”
Ruby made an annoyed noise and nudged her foot into his shin. “You can ask whoever you please, but something tells me I’m the only woman within reach who will hear you out.”
“I wouldn’t be too sure about that.” Koa smirked and eyed Petra and Avina around the corner as they entered the dining hall. “Your queen has arrived for dinner.”
“She’s your queen, too.” She gave him one last peck on the lips. “You should wait a minute before joining us.”
“I wasn’t born yesterday.”
“Neither was your mother.”
She smiled and stepped away from him and he waited a while before joining the queen at her table. Avina rose and swept into a hug very nearly as bodily as the one he’d given Ruby.
“Koa,” she said. “Oh, gods. What a mess.”
“Talk to me,” he said, still holding her. “Better yet. Explain why you didn’t trust me enough to tell me about your earlier excursion before it happened.”
“You’d just returned.” She sighed and her body felt oddly small within his arms. Too small to be both his mother and his queen. “I suppose I didn’t want to take even just the smallest chance of losing you again.”
“I’m right here.” He gave her one last little squeeze before walking with her to the table. “All of those guards I saw limping into the castle… Has this monster truly grown so powerful?”
The look Avina and Petra exchanged told him more than enough. He sat down across from his mother, forcing himself to eat in the face of his dwindling spirits.
“We’ve never faced a threat like this before,” said Avina. “When this monster reaches Gladetown, I… have no idea what will happen. There’s almost no limit to how much destruction it could cause.”
“We cannot simply wait, Avina,” said Petra.
“What other choice do we have?” she snapped back.
“Gods, this is a mess,” muttered Koa. “I should have dragged Hazafallius back to the castle by the scruff of his shirt. I’m sure he’d have a spell or something up his sleeve in a pinch.”
“Haza… fallius?” Avina’s frustration seemed to morph into surprise.
“The sorcerer I told you about,” said Koa. “The one who gave me the spell tome. Are you familiar with him?”
“Ah, no. I’m just… yet surprised by the pronunciation of less common Sabantian names.”
“It is an odd one, but so is he,” said Koa.
He sighed, annoyed at the ridiculousness of the spell he was trying to translate once more bubbling to the surface. An effective spell might be just the stratagem they needed, but at the pace he was translating he’d hardly be able to identify one by the time the monster stormed the town, let alone figure out how to cast it.
The ominous mood lingered for the entirety of the meal. Koa gave his mother another long hug after he’d finished, nodding to both Ruby and Petra, secrets abound. He got straight back to work after that, flipping through pages of poetry and sorcery and marking down his translation.
The progress he was making was substantial, though it was still on directions for the first spell, the opening joke of the tome. He resisted the urge to skip ahead, sensing there might be a message hidden with the first spell or some kind of lesson related to an apprentice’s diligence. But the urge was there and the tension of knowing that the dustwalker would soon be approaching the town, his home, had him second-guessing himself.
He made another trip to secure more ink and sent Verity off to bring him some wine to help his focus. As he returned and re-entered his room, he sensed the presence of someone else and let out a tired, smiling sigh.
“About time you showed up, Ruby,” he said. “I could use a break.”
“I’m afraid the break I have in store for you will be most indefinite, Prince Makoa.” A deep, raspy, but not unfamiliar voice came from behind the door.
Koa whirled around, but not in time to see or get out of the way of the red-eyed assassin’s first attack. A dagger punched through the back of his shoulder, pain unlike anything he’d felt before.
His attacker was dressed in the dirty, blood spackled uniform of one of Captain Lauric’s guards. It was odd how his attention focused on that detail in the moment. The assassin had picked his opportunity perfectly, striding into the castle amidst a beaten guard company with bigger problems on their mind.
“I cannot help but wonder why I was paid so much to remove you as a problem,” muttered the assassin. “You’re barely an afterthought in this world.”
The dagger was still jutting from Koa’s shoulder, preventing him from rolling the way the pain demanded or even shouting out as he wanted to. Everything was red around the edge, a horrible pain that flared from a dull, demanding ache to blinding, jagged agony. The assassin drew a second blade and stepped forward to finish the job.
Koa tried to stand, but that motion began and ended with a tensing of his abdomen, muscles seizing, refusing to obey. There was a tremendous bang as the door to his room burst open. He expected a guard or Petra, but perhaps that was merely a figment of his hopes.
Verity, the spy his mother had assigned him, entered his bedchamber. She strode forward, expression carefully guarded even in what must have been her moment of ultimate triumph. Why had he been so careless? He’d looked at her and seen a pretty young woman around his age, despite what he’d known.
The assassin whirled around. Verity shifted the sleeve of her gown, a knife seemingly appearing within her hand from nowhere. She rushed forward, not toward Koa, but at the man with the blood red eye.
Koa heard the clash of steel, but never saw the contact of their weapons. Verity dodged a slash, surged forward and buried her weapon into the assassin’s chest hilt deep. He staggered backward with a rough little gurgle, falling to his knees as he fumbled as though to pull the skewered knife loose.
What… just happened?
Verity rushed to his side, holding Koa at an angle that kept the dagger still jutting from his shoulder from brushing up against anything.
“Focus on breathing,” she whispered. “I can’t take it out just yet. You’ll bleed too much if I do.”
More footsteps. Avina, Petra and Lauric thundered into his room. Koa raised a hand as though to shield Verity from his mother and her esper, knowing how they might read the situation.
“She… saved me,” he managed.
Avina and Petra looked as shocked as he currently felt, but they hid it well, not that their concern for his state wasn’t already predominant. Koa took Verity’s advice and focused on breathing as the room slowly went dark.
CHAPTER 41
Avina was a step back from her body, emotions and sounds and time flashing by as she stayed by Koa’s side, holding his hand. Her heart could only handle so much, and this was too much. Her thinking was disordered and voices came to her from what felt like a great distance away.
“We assumed she was a spy in Underqueen Lassius’s employ,” said Petra. “As such, when I saw her with the assassin, it only seemed natural that they were working together. It is possible that it was quite the opposite. Verity may have warned the man off… but for what reason?”
They were in the castle’s infirmary. Cathelia was tending to the wound on Koa’s back, a horrible, mouth-shaped gash that bubbled with black blood each time he inhaled. Avina rubbed her unconscious son’s knuckles, adrift in the surreal nightmare that was her current reality.
“Hazafallius,” muttered Petra. “That is the same name as Makoa’s paternal grandfather, no? Is it mere coincidence that he shows up to give him a spell book just now, as he spins at the center of events?”
Too much to think about. Too much all at once. The castle’s floor had begun to shake, trembling from the rumble of the monster’s footfalls. Each time it did, dust shuddered loose from the places in the castle’s walls where the mortar shifted more readily, like the first taste of the dustwalker’s breath.
“Your Highness.” Captain Lauric, voice serious and somber. “We have to begin preparations for the evacuation. My men are in no shape to fight. There is nothing standing between us and this monster, and it draws nearer to Gladetown by the second.”
“Why?” muttered Avina.
Why did I lose focus on what matters? Why didn’t I think to keep Koa closer in a time of such heightened danger? Why is this happening to me?
“It is an interesting question, no?” said Petra, responding to the topic rather than Avina’s thoughts. “A family in one of the outlying farms claims the dustwalker tore the roof from their home, peered down at them and continued on. It has a manner through which it discriminates its targets.”
“It could refrain from attacking in anger completely and it would still demolish Gladetown just by shuffling through,” muttered Lauric.
“Yes, but this monster is a different sort of threat than an attacking army,” said Petra. “It may well be that we can simply avoid it and at least limit loss of lives, if not property.”
“Perhaps we could have,” said Avina, finally joining the conversation. “Perhaps some still can. But not Koa. There’s no way he could travel with such a wound, let alone through the back paths out of the glade which we’d need to take to escape the dustwalker.”
“It is unlikely he would weather such a journey without the wound souring even if he survived the blood loss,” said Cathelia. “I could stay with him, if you preferred, Your Highness. He would not be left behind alone.”
Petra and Lauric said nothing, but Avina suspected they were both of the same mind. There was no sense in defending the castle against an enemy they could never hope to match.
“The monster might divert its attention if it sees us take flight,” suggested Lauric. “There’s no need to approach this option from a place of perceived cowardice.”
Avina squeezed Koa’s hand tighter and chewed her lower lip.
Am I truly so cursed as to lose another child? Another boy who represents the embodiment of all the love I have to give?
She knew that many of her fellow underqueens would naturally prioritize their own safety under such circumstances. Her own mother likely would have, certainly over risking herself in a hopeless situation to save her daughter, were the roles reversed.
“It is fairly late in the day,” said Petra. “The sun is already set. I could try this dustwalker once more, see how it handles the full unleashing of my power.”
“It’s kind of you to offer such, my friend, but there must be another way.” Avina gave her esper a tight smile, knowing what the outcome would likely be. She’d seen the way the dustwalker had resisted Petra’s attacks during their previous encounter. It was a question more of how long Petra could last against the monster, rather than which would prevail.
“If you choose to stay here, there will be no other way,” said Petra. “You are not the only one with the right to risk your life for the sake of someone dear.”
Petra took Avina’s free hand, holding it as tightly as she held Koa’s. Lauric folded his arms behind his back and leaned forward.
“What of the evacuation, Your Highness?”
“It should proceed as soon as possible,” said Avina. “Get everyone out of Gladetown and everyone out of the castle. Including all staff, all guards, everyone, regardless of how essential.”
Her own handmaidens, Ruby and Mav, were already within the infirmary, as was Verity. Ruby seemed on the verge of a breakdown, eyes not having left Koa since she’d first arrived, though she restrained herself from showing any more emotion. It was more telling to see her work so hard to control herself than any display of concern or affection would have actually been.
“I will stay with you and Makoa, if it please, Your Highness,” said Ruby.
“As will I,” barked Mav.
Lauric frowned and looked as though he wanted to protest, but Avina gave a small shake of her head. As committed to not risking anyone else’s life as she was, she would need help if they managed to last for long enough for Koa to heal enough to travel safely.
“The last matter, Your Highness,” said Lauric. “What of the assassin’s body? Is it a priority?”
Gods, the ominous, red-eyed bastard was still sprawled across Koa’s floor, wearing a guard uniform in mock of her authority even in death. “Move the body to the dungeon where the cold might help it last longer. I doubt we’ll learn much from this, but there’s no point in cutting that avenue of inquiry off if we do survive this.”
Lauric saluted, stood in place a moment longer, and then finally set off. Within minutes, the castle was alive with activity and movement on all fronts. It was as though all of the castle’s staff and servants had been striving to remain steadfast in their duties and all that suppressed fear and emotion rose up at once like a boiling pot.
The low, regular rumbling tremors of the dustwalker’s steps forced the world into a singular pace. Avina watched Koa blink his eyes open after one such interval. He smiled at her, winced in pain, much to the concern of the healer, and cleared his throat.
“I’ll be all right,” he muttered. “Mother, please. You have other matters to attend to.”
