Kings Rising (16 page)

‘The child’s wet nurse,’ said Jokaste, ‘will tell Kastor the truth if I am killed.’

‘If you are killed.’

‘That’s right.’

‘You,’ said Damen, ‘but not your women.’

There was a pause.

‘You are the only one protected in your arrangement. These women are going to die. Unless they talk to me.’

She said, ‘You
have
changed. Or is this the new power behind the throne? Who am I really negotiating with here, I wonder?’

He was already nodding to the nearest soldier. ‘Start with her.’

It wasn’t pleasant. The women resisted, and there was screaming. He watched impassively as soldiers took hold of the women and began to drag them from the room. Kyrina wrenched herself bodily out of the grip of two soldiers and prostrated herself, forehead to the floor. ‘Exalted—’

‘No,’ said Jokaste.

‘—Exalted. You are merciful. I have a son of my own. Spare my life, Exalted—’

‘No,’ said Jokaste. ‘He will not kill a roomful of women for loyalty to their mistress, Kyrina.’

‘—spare my life, I swear, I will tell you all I know—’

‘No,’ said Jokaste.

‘Tell me,’ said Damen.

Kyrina spoke without lifting her head from her
prostration. Her long hair, which had escaped from its bindings during the tussle, spread over the floor.

‘There is a child. He was taken to Ios.’

‘That’s enough,’ said Jokaste.

‘None of us know if the child is yours. She says it is.’

‘That’s enough, Kyrina,’ said Jokaste.

‘There’s more,’ said Damen.

‘Exalted—’ said Kyrina—

—as Jokaste said, ‘
No.
’ —

‘My lady did not trust the Regent of Vere to protect her interests. In the case that there was no other way to save her life, the wet nurse could be instructed to bring the child to you—in exchange for Jokaste’s freedom.’

Damen sat back in his chair, and lifted his brows slightly at Jokaste.

Jokaste’s hand was a fist in her skirts, but she spoke in a calm voice. ‘Do you think you have overturned my plans? There is no way to circumvent my conditions. The wet nurse will not leave Ios. If you are going to make the exchange, you will need to take me there, and exchange me personally.’

Damen looked at Kyrina, who lifted her head and nodded.

Jokaste, he thought, believed that it was impossible for him to travel into Ios, and that there was no place where it was safe for him to attempt an exchange.

But there was a place where two enemies could meet without fear of ambush. An ancient, ceremonial place, which held to strict laws, where, since days of old, the kyroi could
gather in safety, protected by the standing rule of peace, and the order of soldiers who enforced it. Kings travelled there to be crowned, nobles to settle disputes. Its strictures were sacred, and allowed parley without the prickling spears and spilt blood of the earliest, warlike days of Akielos.

It had a fated quality that appealed to him. ‘We make the exchange in a place where no man can bring an army, or draw a sword, on pain of death.’ Damen said, ‘We make the exchange in the Kingsmeet.’

There was not much to do after that. Kyrina was taken to an antechamber to arrange communication with the wet nurse. The women were escorted out. And then he and Jokaste were alone.

‘Give my congratulations to the Prince of Vere,’ she said. ‘But you’re a fool to trust him. He has his own plans.’

‘He has never pretended otherwise,’ said Damen.

He looked at her, alone on the low couch. He couldn’t help but remember the day they met. She had been presented to his father, daughter of a minor noble from Aegina, and he had been able to look nowhere else. It was three months of courtship before she was in his arms.

He said, ‘You chose a man who was bent on destroying his own country. You chose my brother, and look where it’s left you. You have no position, no friends. Even your own women have turned on you. Don’t you think it’s a shame things had to end this way between us?’

‘Yes,’ she said. ‘Kastor should have killed you.’

B
ECAUSE HE COULDN’T
put Jokaste in a sack and carry her bodily across the border into Kastor’s territory, the journey presented certain logistical challenges.

In order to justify two wagons and an entourage, they would be pretending to be cloth merchants. This disguise was not going to stand up to any serious scrutiny. There would be bolts of cloth in the wagons. There would also be Jokaste. Stepping out into the courtyard, she looked at the preparations with the sort of calm that said she would cooperate wholly with Damen’s plans, and then, given the first opportunity, smile and wreck them.

The real problem was not even the disguise. It was getting past the border patrols. ‘Cloth merchants’ might help them travel unimpeded inside Akielos, but it would not get them
past border sentries. It would certainly not get them past border sentries who—Damen was quite sure—had already been alerted to the possibility of their coming by Jokaste. Damen spent two fruitless hours with Nikandros trying to plot a course that could sneak two wagons across the border without alerting patrols, and another fruitless hour alone staring at the map, until Laurent wandered in and outlined a plan so outrageous that Damen had said yes with the feeling that his mind was splitting apart.

They were taking the best of their soldiers, those elite few who had excelled in the games: Jord who had won short sword, Lydos of the trident, Aktis the spear thrower, the young, triple-crowned Pallas, Lazar, who had whistled at him, and a handful of their best spear throwers and swordsmen. Laurent’s addition to the expedition was Paschal, and Damen tried not to think too deeply about the reasons why Laurent thought it necessary to bring a physician.

And then, ludicrously, Guion. Guion could use a sword. Guion’s guilt made him more likely to fight for Damen than anyone else. And if the worst happened, Guion’s testimony had the potential to bring down the Regency. Laurent had said all of this succinctly, and told Guion, in a pleasant voice, ‘Your wife can chaperone Jokaste on the journey.’

Guion had understood more quickly than Damen. ‘I see. My wife is the leverage for my good behaviour?’

‘That’s right,’ said Laurent.

Damen watched from a second-storey window as they
gathered in the courtyard: two wagons, two noblewomen, and twelve soldiers of whom ten were soldiers and two were Guion and Paschal in metal hats.

He himself was dressed in the humble white cloth of a traveller, with a wrist-gauntlet of leather strapped over the gold cuff. He was waiting for Laurent to arrive in order to discuss the finer points of his ridiculous plan. Damen picked up a glazed pitcher of wine in order to pour it into one of the waiting shallow cups.

‘Did you learn the rotation of the border patrols?’ said Laurent.

‘Yes, our scouts found—’

Laurent was standing in the doorway wearing a chiton of unadorned white cotton.

Damen dropped the pitcher.

It shattered, shards flying outward as it slipped from his fingers and hit the stone floor.

Laurent’s arms were bare. His throat was bare. His collarbone was bare, and most of his thighs, his long legs, and all of his left shoulder. Damen stared at him.

‘You’re wearing Akielon clothing,’ said Damen.

‘Everyone’s wearing Akielon clothing,’ said Laurent.

Damen thought that the pitcher had shattered and he could not now take a deep draught of the wine. Laurent came forward, navigating the broken ceramic in his short cotton and sandalled feet, until he reached the seat beside Damen, where the map was laid out on the wooden table.

‘Once we know the rotation of the patrols, we’ll know when to approach,’ said Laurent.

Laurent sat down.

‘We need to approach at the beginning of their rotation in order to give us the most time before they report back to the fort.’

It was even shorter sitting down.

‘Damen.’

‘Yes. Sorry,’ said Damen. And then: ‘What were you saying?’

‘The patrols,’ said Laurent.

The plan was no less outrageous when laid out in meticulous detail, with estimates of travel times and distances. The risk if it failed was enormous. They were taking as many soldiers as they could justify, but if they were discovered, if it came to a fight, they would lose. They had only twelve soldiers. Twelve-ish, amended Damen, thinking of Paschal and Guion.

In the courtyard, he looked at the small assembled party. The armies they had spent so long building would be left behind. Vannes and Makedon would stay to jointly defend the network they had established, from Ravenel, through Fortaine, Marlas, and Sicyon. Vannes could handle Makedon, Laurent said.

He ought to have known that an army was never going to have been the way to fight the Regent. It was always going to be like this, a small group, alone and vulnerable,
making their way across the countryside.

Nikandros greeted him in the courtyard, the wagons prepared, their small band ready to ride out. The soldiers only needed to know their own roles in the enterprise, and Damen’s briefing to them was short. But Nikandros was his friend, and he deserved to know how they would get across the border.

So he told him Laurent’s plan.

*   *   *

‘It’s dishonourable,’ said Nikandros.

They were approaching the border sentry on the southern road that crossed from Sicyon into the province of Mellos. Damen scanned the blockade, and the patrol, which was forty men. Beyond the blockade was the sentry tower, which would also be manned, and which would relay any message across the network of towers to the main fort. He could see the armed readiness of the men. The approach of their wagons, trundling slowly across the countryside, had long since been observed from the tower.

‘I wish to restate my strong objection,’ said Nikandros.

‘It’s noted,’ said Damen.

Damen was suddenly aware of the flimsiness of his disguise, the incongruity of the wagon, the awkward mien of his own soldiers, who had had to be schooled multiple times not to call him ‘Exalted’, and the threat of Jokaste herself, waiting cool-eyed inside the wagon.

The danger was real. If Jokaste found her way out of her bindings and gag to make a sound, or was discovered inside the wagons, they faced capture and death. The sentry tower held at least fifty men, in addition to the forty here in the patrol guarding the road. There was no way to fight past them.

Damen made himself sit at the reins of the wagon and continue to drive it slowly, not giving in to the temptation to speed up, but approaching the blockade at a sedate walk.

‘Halt,’ said the guard.

Damen reined in. Nikandros reined in. The twelve soldiers reined in. The wagons stopped, with a creak and a long drawn-out, ‘Whoa,’ to the horses from Damen.

The Captain came forward, a helmeted man on a bay horse, a short red cape flowing over his right shoulder. ‘Declare yourself.’

‘We are the escort to the Lady Jokaste, returning to Ios after her labour,’ said Damen. There was nothing to confirm or deny this statement other than a blank, covered wagon that seemed to wink in the sun.

He could feel Nikandros’s disapproval behind him. The Captain said, ‘Our reports said that the Lady Jokaste was taken prisoner at Karthas.’

‘Your reports are wrong. The Lady Jokaste is in that wagon.’

There was a pause.

‘In that wagon.’

‘That’s right.’

Another pause.

Damen, who was telling the truth, looked back at the Captain with the steady gaze he had learned from Laurent. It didn’t work.

‘I’m sure the Lady Jokaste won’t mind answering a few questions.’

‘I’m sure she will mind,’ said Damen. ‘She requested—quite clearly—not to be disturbed.’

‘We have orders to search every wagon that comes through. The lady will have to make allowances.’ There was a new tone in the Captain’s voice. There had been too many objections. To stall again wasn’t safe.

Even so, Damen heard himself saying. ‘You can’t just barge in on—’

‘Open the wagon,’ said the Captain, ignoring him.

The first attempt was less like the throwing open of illicit cargo and more like the awkward knocking on my lady’s door. There was no answer. A second knock. No answer. A third.

‘You see? She’s sleeping. Are you really going to—’

The Captain called, ‘Open it up!’

There was a splintering sound of impact, as of a wooden bolt struck by a mallet. Damen forced himself to do nothing. Nikandros’s hand went to the hilt of his sword, his expression tense, ready. The wagon door swung open.

There was an interval of silence, broken by the occasional
muffled sounds of an exchange. It went on for some time.

‘My apologies, sir.’ The Captain returned, bowing deeply. ‘The Lady Jokaste is of course welcome wherever she chooses to go.’ He was red-faced and sweating slightly. ‘At the Lady’s request, I will ride with you personally through the last of the checkpoints, to ensure that you are not stopped again.’

‘Thank you, Captain,’ said Damen, with great dignity.

‘Let them through!’ came the call.

‘The stories of Lady Jokaste’s beauty are not exaggerated,’ said the Captain, man-to-man, as they wound their way across the countryside.

‘I expect you to speak of the Lady Jokaste with the greatest respect, Captain,’ said Damen.

‘Yes, of course, my apologies,’ said the Captain.

The Captain ordered a full salute for them when they parted ways at the final checkpoint. They trundled on for two miles, until the checkpoint was safely out of sight behind a hill, when the wagon stopped and the door swung open. Laurent stepped out of the wagon, wearing only a loose Veretian shirt, slightly dishevelled over his pants. Nikandros looked from him to the wagon and back again.

He said, ‘How did you convince Jokaste to play along with the guards?’

‘I didn’t,’ said Laurent.

He tossed the wad of blue silk in his hands to one of the soldiers to dispose of, then shrugged into his jacket in a rather mannish gesture.

Nikandros was staring at him.

‘Don’t think about it too much,’ said Damen.

*   *   *

They had two hours before the sentries returned to the main fort and saw that Lady Jokaste had not arrived, at which point the Captain would have a slow-dawning realisation. Not long after that, Kastor’s men would appear, pounding down the road after them.

Jokaste gave him a cool look when they took out the cloth from her mouth and undid her bindings. Her skin reacted like Laurent’s to confinement: red weals where they had tied her wrists with silk rope. Laurent held out his hand to escort her back from the supply wagon into the main wagon, a bored Veretian gesture. Her eyes had the same bored look as she took his hand. ‘You’re lucky we’re alike,’ she said, stepping down. They looked at one another like two reptiles.

In order to avoid Kastor’s patrols, they were riding for a childhood sanctuary of sorts, the estate of Heston of Thoas. Heston’s estate was thickly wooded and contained ample places to hide and wait for patrols to pass, until interest in them slackened. But more than that, Damen had spent hours of his boyhood in the orchards and the vineyards, as his father took repast with Heston on his tours of the northern provinces. Heston was fiercely loyal, and would shelter Damen from an invading army.

It was familiar countryside. Akielos in summer: part rocky hillside covered with brush and scrub, and stretches of cultivatable land, scented with orange blossom. Wooded patches of concealing trees were rare, and none of them filled Damen with confidence that they could hide a wagon. With the danger of patrols growing, Damen liked less and less the plan they had for him to leave the wagons unprotected and ride ahead, to scout the territory and make his presence known to Heston. But they had no choice.

‘Keep the wagons on course,’ Damen said to Nikandros. ‘I’ll be swift, and I’ll take our best rider with me.’

‘That’s me,’ said Laurent, wheeling his horse.

They made fast time, Laurent light and sure in the saddle. About half a mile out from the estate, they dismounted, and tethered their horses out of sight off the road. They proceeded the rest of the way on foot, pushing scrub out of their path, sometimes bodily.

Sweeping a branch out of his face, Damen said, ‘I thought when I was King I wouldn’t be doing this kind of thing again.’

‘You underestimated the demands of Akielon kingship,’ said Laurent.

Damen stepped on a rotten log. He unpicked the bottom of his garment from a thorn bush. He sidestepped a jut of razor-sharp granite.

‘The undergrowth was thinner when I was a boy.’

‘Or you were.’

Laurent said it holding back a low tree branch for Damen, who stepped past with a rustle. Cresting the final rise together, they saw their destination spread out before them.

The estate of Heston of Thoas was a long, low series of cool, marble-fluted buildings that opened onto private gardens, and from there to picturesque orchards of nectarine and apricot.

Seeing it, Damen could only think how good it would be to arrive there, to share the beauty of its architecture with Laurent, to take their rest—watching the sun set from the open balcony, Heston offering his warm-hearted hospitality, ordering him simple delicacies and arguing with him on some obscure point of philosophy.

The whole estate was dotted with convenient rocks that protruded through the thin covering of soil. Damen tracked them: they provided a covered route from the scraggle of trees where he stood with Laurent all the way down to the house gate—and from there he knew the way into Heston’s study, with its doors out onto the gardens, a place where he could enter, and find Heston alone.

‘Stop,’ said Laurent.

Damen stopped. Following Laurent’s gaze, he saw a dog lounging on its chain near a small penned field full of horses on the west side of the estate. They were downwind; it had not yet begun to bark.

‘There are too many horses,’ said Laurent.

Damen looked again at the pen, and his stomach sank. It
held at least fifty horses, in a small overstuffed patch of field that was never meant to contain them; it would be grazed out too quickly.