Throne of Eldraine Page 5

Oko’s smile held an eerie glamer. His gaze fixed first on Rowan and then on Will, drawing them closer as if by force of will. “No need to thank me, my friends. Really, you need not think about our meeting at all now we’re parting ways. You have duties and obligations and I have my own quest to attend to. I’ve learned so much from you that makes my task here all so much clearer to me now. My thanks.”

  “What quest is that?” Rowan asked brightly, leaning toward the elf.

  “Nothing you need concern yourself with. Entirely forgettable.” Oko wiped his sweating brow.

  Will hooked fingers around Rowan’s elbow and dug in near the gash. “We really do have to go. I hope we meet again.”

  As she winced, he guided her away.

  “Ouch! What’s wrong with you?” she said, shaking off his hand.

  “It’s not like you to be dazzled by a pretty face, Ro. No, wait, it’s completely like you.”

  “Are you jealous he paid more attention to me than to you?”

  “I don’t like the way he calls that man ‘Dog.’ That’s no way to treat a person.”

  “Maybe it’s a joke between them,” Rowan muttered sullenly as she looked back. They’d gotten far enough away by now that Will couldn’t see the elf amid the crowd come to greet the High King. Much of Beckborough’s population had turned out to line the road. Cheers rose as the procession’s banners floated into view, bright and colorful and stirring.

  With the moment upon them, Rowan became all business, keeping her head down behind the crowds as the vanguard passed.

  The High King rode at the front, escorted by knights from each court as well as his longtime boon companion, Cado, who had ridden with him through thick and thin. A modest gold circlet crowned his head, hard to see against his golden-blond hair and nothing as fancy as the elaborate diadems seen in the portraits of high rulers of days gone by. His gelding was more splendidly adorned than he was, caparisoned in embroidered white and gold cloth while Algenus Kenrith’s own riding tabard matched that of his attendants. The High King wore a sturdy leather sheath and plain-hilted sword. Once he’d achieved the high rulership he’d hung up the gilded sword gifted to him by the Questing Beast and settled to the less glamorous but more difficult task of ruling well.

  More than anything he looked as absolutely delighted to be greeted by the citizens of Beckborough as they were to be greeting their beloved High King. He was always smiling, Will was sure of it. In all these years he’d never figured out his father: Did he love the praise and the cheering so much he couldn’t get enough of it? Was he simply genuinely eager to serve the Realm with all his loyalty, knowledge, persistence, courage, and strength? He wasn’t a particularly inquisitive or deep-thinking man—he left that to their mother—but he was so honorable and courteous and gallant that he was impossible to hate.

  Well, the denizens of the Wilds hated him, since the High King’s entire purpose for existing was to keep the Wilds in check by expanding the orderly peace of the Realm. Even as a young man questing in the hope of proving himself worthy to sit on the high throne, Algenus Kenrith had come in for assaults of hate. Will didn’t dwell on it, but he never forgot that he and Rowan’s birth mother had been murdered in the Wilds soon after they’d been born.

  “Hey! Keep your head down.” Rowan yanked him back into the crowd. They kept moving against the flow of people who were walking alongside the procession toward town. “There’s Titus!”

  It was impossible to miss Titus’s blazing red hair and pale, freckled face. Their friend rode toward the back with the younger knights and hopeful knight-candidates still making a name for themselves. Cerise had shaken off the other healers—the old windbags, as she called them. She and her unicorn, Sophos, had managed to creep into the ranks beside Titus. Will felt the familiar ache, seeing his friends riding together. It had been so much easier to be companions when they were younger, not to wrestle with the complicated, intense feelings each friend raised in him now: accomplished, attractive Titus and brilliant, beautiful Cerise.

  “Will! There’s our ponies.”

  Trust Rowan never to let inconvenient doubts interfere with a galloping charge toward her intended goal. The crowd was breaking up now that the High King had passed. They slipped in among the passing wagons, and just like that they were walking with their ponies as if they’d been with the procession the whole way. If the drivers around them noticed, no one said a word. Why would anyone say a word? It was all very well for their mother to demand they act like everyone else, taking training and doing chores along with all the other youths in the castle, but Will knew perfectly well they weren’t treated like everyone else. No one would ask them where they had gone and why they had only returned just now. If the queen didn’t want to see, it was only because she refused to see.

  The baggage wagons trundled up to the tourney field at last. Will worked alongside Rowan to set up traveling tents for the night. She was better at pounding in stakes. He liked to string ropes in decorative patterns whose tensile strength also held exceptionally well if the wind picked up, as it often did at dusk or if a chance-met flock of mischievous wind spirits decided to trouble the night camp. On more casual journeys around Ardenvale, the High King would have joined in with the setup, working alongside the others. But this time the man who sat atop the High Throne must meet formally with the representatives of each town or region where the procession halted. The Grand Procession was an annual reminder of his overlordship.

  Once the encampment was set up, they waited their turn to get their share of the evening’s supper: cold venison pie from the castle ovens, bread and cheese, and honey oat cakes. As they settled down beside an isolated campfire on the edge of the field, Titus and Cerise appeared with their own trenchers.

  Cerise carried a bowl of fresh berries bathed in warm cream. “I win the forage tournament yet again,” she said, brandishing the bowl.

  Titus grinned at Will, who blushed, but the young knight sat down beside Rowan.

  “I smell something rotten,” Cerise said, handing the bowl to Will before crouching beside Rowan. Her sensitive healer’s nose led her straight to the wound. When she peeled back the fabric, Rowan set her teeth as Cerise probed the gash. “That smells like pusflower. And this looks like a blade cut. The only time I ever hear of pusflower juice smeared onto blades is when redcaps do it to poison their prey if they don’t kill them outright.”

  Her eyes could melt you or slay you, Will reflected, and she was in slaying mode right now.

  Between bites of bread Titus remarked, “I rode up and down the line during the day. I saw your ponies but I never saw you two.”

  “Ro?” demanded Cerise. “This will go rotten and you’ll be too sick to walk by the end of the week. But I won’t heal you until you tell me the truth.”

  Rowan cast a desperate glance at her twin. He spooned a bite of delicious berries and cream into his mouth, meeting her gaze as he chewed and swallowed with relish.

  “It’s all right, Will,” Cerise added. “Whatever happened, we know it was Ro’s idea.”

  “All right, all right!” said Rowan. “We missed the departure, so we crossed over Choking Drum to get here before you.”

  “Choking Drum?” cried Titus. “That’s the Wilds. You’re not old enough—”

  “Never mind that,” said Cerise. “You didn’t find Will in time, did you? The queen must have forbidden you from coming because you were late. How’d you get out?”

  Rowan sighed. “She was called away. She won’t be back until tomorrow or later.”

  Cerise rolled her eyes. “You have all the luck.”

  “There are still redcaps on Choking Drum?” Titus looked up at the ridge line beyond, distinguishable as a dark mass like a sleeping beast. Stars shone above the hill, a few clouds spun fine like fraying cloth against the realm of the high heavens. “Did you report it?”

  Shame struck Will like a spear. What if redcaps attacked Wealdrum again?

  “No?” Titus jumped up, outraged.
“You’re not responsible enough to quest yet. You do know that, don’t you, Rowan?”

  “Rowan?” she cried. “What about Will?”

  The young knight didn’t even look toward Will. “I expect better of you, Rowan. You should expect better of yourself! I’ll have to report it.”

  Rowan squeaked in protest but as she attempted to leap up, Cerise clamped a hand over her arm to hold her down.

  Titus strode off, ever dutiful. Will mopped his forehead with the back of a hand. Now they were in for it. He shoveled another soothing spoonful of berries and cream into his suddenly dry mouth.

  “Sit quietly while I heal this,” hissed Cerise. “Because if you don’t, you’ll not enjoy how it eats you out from the inside when it putrefies and fills you up with nasty green pus.”

  She bent over Rowan’s arm, hands emanating a pale mist. Rowan gave a pained grunt before shutting her eyes and gritting her teeth.

  A buzz of noise caught Will’s attention. A jovial group of travelers moved their way, pausing at each fire to speak to those gathered there. The High King was making his rounds, accompanied by a steward, a clerk, and Cado, who was still in armor.

  “What’s this mishap?” the High King called cheerily as he strolled up to their campfire. Few things escaped his observant eye. His gaze lit on Rowan’s torn sleeve and bloodied arm.

  Rowan stared up at her father like a rabbit caught in a trap as the fox approaches. Cerise still had her head down, murmuring the sealing words of her spell. Most likely she was staying out of it, which was fair enough. Will could not lie to his father. He gripped the bowl with white-knuckled fingers and wished he was back on Choking Drum surrounded by howling redcaps.

  Titus appeared out of the gloom. “Is that scratch sorted out yet, Cerise?” he said, then gave a pretended start of surprise. “Your Highness! My apologies. We were horsing around and things got out of hand.”

  “Ah, well, the young have an energy we older folk lack at the end of a long day’s march. I myself seek only a chair to sit in and a large slice of venison pie to shore up my flagging limbs. I hope you have received the same.”

  The High King gave each of them an amiable nod as he indicated their trenchers. He by no means betrayed to the council members that Rowan and Will were his children since he would never go against Queen Linden’s directive. Cado gave Will and then Rowan a wink, and somehow there came a mirror flash like reflected light that made Will blink repeatedly as if chaff had gotten in his eyes.

  Kenrith and his retinue strode off to the next campfire.

  Will exhaled. “I thought we were in for it.”

  “You didn’t rat on us,” said Rowan to Titus, running her fingers over the healed cut.

  Titus crossed his arms on his broad chest. “You must know I would never rat. I informed Steward Narina a local told me of a sighting. She’ll see a patrol of responsible knights is sent out.”

  Rowan glared at the sky but could not retort.

  Cerise settled her slaying gaze on Will. “Did you really just eat all the berries and cream?”

  He looked down to discover that, indeed, in his fit of nervousness, he had. But Cerise only laughed because she was the most wonderful person in all the Realm.

  Titus looked up from his trencher. “How many redcaps were there?”

  “Six…Or seven?” Rowan spoke with more hesitation than usual.

  “You fought them off, just the two of you?”

  Rowan pressed her hands against her eyes. Will too felt a headache coming on. A sickly memory of vines turning into snakes to devour dead redcaps slithered through his mind, and then he was reminded of Cado’s glittering wink. The rest of the memory went dark. All he could recall was trees rustling with an unseen threat creeping closer. He wiped damp palms on his leggings and began humming the tune to “The Brave Hunter of Silver Mountain.”

  “I’m impressed,” said Titus. “Seven redcaps!”

  “It was nothing Will and I couldn’t handle,” proclaimed Rowan with a proud lift of her chin. “All’s well. No harm done.”

  “All hail, scamps. I hope you had an uneventful first day’s journey.” Cado strolled up with a genial smile. His short black hair was mussed, and he was no longer wearing armor, just his tabard. He held a curry comb. “I’m looking for the High King. Have you seen him?”

  Will exchanged a puzzled glance with Rowan. “You’d know better than us.”

  “How’s that?”

  Rowan grinned. “I see the riddle you’re setting us. We just saw you with him.”

  Cado shook his head good-naturedly. “You two jokesters. I’ve caught you out this time. I wasn’t with him.”

  “You winked at us,” said Will, but he broke off and grasped Rowan’s wrist. “The wink. Do you recall the wink?”

  She pressed a hand to her forehead, wincing. “No.”

  Cado rocked back as if he’d been struck. “I wasn’t with him. I just now finished tending to his horse and tack as I always do when he has duties that prevent him from doing it himself.”

  The knight kept his black hair cut short, ever since the day an angry undine had reached out of a still lake, caught him by his long, glorious locks, and slashed him across his right eye.

  “Your scar.” Will desperately tried to gouge the memory back to the surface, but it fought like an eel that kept slithering out of his grasp. “Cerise. Titus. Do you recall? He winked at us, but he had no scar.”

  They all looked out into the darkness, at the scatter of fires and the shadow of tall trees.

  A sharp scream rose out of the night, then cut off.

  Cado drew his sword. “Which way did they go?”

  PART TWO: WINTER

  6

  A relentless storm had swept in on Wintertide’s Eve and now, mid-morning on the first day of winter, showed no sign of letting up. Its winds gusted so violently the massive keep of Castle Ardenvale shook even though it was built of stone and anchored by the Circle of Loyalty.

  Will stood at the back of the great hall, wishing he did not feel so uneasy. Always a popular gathering place during the long dark winter months, the hall was especially crowded today. Queen Linden sat straight-backed in a modest wooden chair set to the right of the empty high throne.

  A sword hung on the wall behind the throne. Gold laced its hilt and was inlaid along the incised blade. Older people often spoke of how the blessed sword had once been enchanted, how the gold had glowed with a fiery and blessed light as part of a protective spell woven into the weapon by the Questing Beast. In the course of the quest for the high throne the spell had been expended or used up. Now the sword was displayed to remind people that a just, truthful, and loyal individual had proven himself worthy of the honor of ruling the Realm as High King.

  Of course, the Questing Beast had chosen two candidates to quest for the high rulership and gave each a sword as the mark of its favor, but only one sword was displayed in Castle Ardenvale. Had the Questing Beast taken back the second blessed sword from Linden when she did not complete the High Quest? Had she locked it away herself? No one quite knew, and the only time the twins had asked, their parents had made it clear the answer was the business of no one except the two who had quested and the beast itself.

  The queen was surrounded by stewards and clerks, lords and knights and councilors, each waiting their turn to bring yet another crisis to her attention. Right now she was listening to a bedraggled delegation of villagers who had braved harsh weather to travel all the way from Embereth to seek the High King’s aid. A witch had set upon their village a hex that had killed all its fires, forcing the inhabitants to leave rather than freeze, but Embereth’s ruling council was too busy arguing over who was responsible for rousing the witch’s ire so they could exile such a negligent, reckless individual that they hadn’t yet bothered to aid the houseless villagers. The queen’s determinedly calm expression never faltered as she gave the report her undivided attention, but at intervals her gaze flashed toward the high throne. In those
moments her shoulders would slump before she recalled herself and sat again with perfect posture.

  Will sighed, rubbing his eyes. Every day he woke thinking it had all been a terrible dream and then had to remember all over again. Three months ago, his father had gone missing at Beckborough on the first night of the Grand Procession. The steward and clerk who had walked with him on his rounds had been found dead in the woods, cleaved by a massive blade. A headache had plagued Will since that night as a persistent reminder of doom and loss.

  A soft whistle sounded to his left, followed by a low voice. “Whssh. Will.”

  An oil lamp lit the opening to the stairs that linked the main floor of the great hall to a gallery above. Hazel beckoned. She held her sling, which she was forbidden to use inside. Before he could scold her, she pressed a finger to her lips and tipped her head toward the throne and the sword. What had she discovered?

  He padded over. She led him up the stairs, stepping as quietly as she could as they approached the opening. The gallery’s balcony surrounded the great hall on three sides. During the cold season young children often played up here when they couldn’t go outside.

  He paused for his eyes to adjust to the lower level of light. A flash like light reflecting off polished metal caught his eye. Three young children cowered in the far corner, shrinking away from something he could not discern. Hazel slipped past him and with the deft movement of constant practice slung a set of stones down the length of the gallery. Two of the stones clacked against the wall above the children but one stone came to an abrupt halt in midair and thumped to the floor.

  Hazel ran down the gallery, slamming to a halt with Will behind her. The tiny body of a blue faerie lay crumpled, mouth pulled back in a rictus grin that revealed sharpened teeth. The stone lay on one side of the corpse and a toy griffin carved of wood on the other.

  “You killed it, Hazel,” breathed the smallest child admiringly. “Ash threw the griffin at it but it didn’t go away.”

  The faerie’s body dissolved into dust, leaving behind its weapon: a pen nib affixed to a toy-like wooden shaft. Will scooped up the nib, careful of its crudely sharpened point.