The Queen's Consort (28 page)

As he moved through the city Ansel
discovered that filling her army with men who knew how to work with their hands had been another inspired stroke. Already many of Clairwyn’s men had sheathed their swords and were building shelters to house the city's civilians. Queen Clairwyn the Beloved would not leave a swath of death and destruction behind her.

             
Gladnys' words echoed in his head, reminding him that good could come from war, that life went on. Even now he watched the city being reborn around him.

             
Clairwyn’s soldiers were everywhere, watching for trouble, helping the wounded, rounding up fearful citizens and setting up stations to feed them. The fighting had changed the men. Their faces, once fresh and eager, now bore the mark of the true soldier—confidence in their courage and ability and a fresh respect for life. Seeing men die—by your hand or at your side—always changed a man.

             
He realized that he was proud of Clairwyn, of her abilities and her tactics. Her casualties were light, considering that she’d taken an entire fortified city, and seasoning her men with a relatively easy victory was pure genius.

             
A soldier waved and hailed Ansel from a street corner and he drew rein. It took him a minute to recognize Cordy under the grime.

             
“Prince Ansel,” Cordy said, eying Ansel's magnificent warhorse, “we're trying to clear a fountain. An entire wall fell over it. We've two ponies but they can't budge the stone.”

             
Ansel blinked, then looked at Perry and Hugh astride their own destriers. “Well, if three warhorses can't move those rocks, boys, I'm buying the drinks tonight.”

             
“You're on.” Hugh grinned and the trio turned their horses to follow Cordy.

             
They entered a small square littered with rubble. Surveying the area, Ansel noted that Cordy had stationed bowmen at vantage points to cover the soldiers on the ground. The boy might actually have a soldier inside him. Stranger things had happened.

             
Cordy hastened ahead and ordered the ponies moved out of the way. A huge, solid marble wall had toppled over directly onto the well. Ansel could see the wet ground where the water seeped out and clotted in the dust.

             
“This is the only source of water in the entire neighborhood,” Cordy said as the men dismounted.

             
The wall was heavy but the work was far more difficult than it should have been. The three horses detested the harness but they hated each other even more, snapping irritably and striking sparks off the cobblestones with their slashing metal-shod hooves. Getting them to work together was a herculean task.

             
“Knock it off, Renshaw,” Ansel said irritably. “If I can work with these guys then you can, too.”

             
Renshaw snaked his massive head at him and snapped his monstrous teeth an inch from Ansel's nose.

             
“I don't like it either, sometimes. But try it. Maybe you'll make a friend today.”

             
Renshaw bunched his haunches and gave a series of hopping half-kicks.

             
Ansel smacked him crisply on the neck, shocking them both. “Pay attention! We have to work together to succeed!”

             
Renshaw rolled his eyes and chewed on his bit, but he stood still while Perry and Hugh harnessed their horses on either side of him.

             
“Ready?” Ansel called.

             
“We've got the straps in place,” Cordy yelled. “Go!”

             
“Yah!” Ansel, Perry, and Hugh hauled on their horses' bridles, urging them forward. The horses protested the unfamiliar weight, shifting uneasily and bouncing off each other. Then they leaned into their harness and strained forward.

             
“Push!”

             
A dozen soldiers braced themselves against the stone and pushed with all their might.

             
“It's moving!”

             
Renshaw leaned into the harness, his hooves scrambling until he found purchase on the cobblestones.

             
“It's moving!”

             
On either side of Renshaw the other destriers put their massive strength into the effort. Step by step, the stone slid away from the well.

             
Suddenly the fountain erupted, showering them all. The horses liked that even less than they'd liked the harness, and untangling three angry war-trained horses from wet leather was as dangerous as anything Ansel had ever faced on a battlefield.

             
Finally three men and three horses stood on the cobblestones. They were soaked to the bone and filthy. Ansel had an angry red welt on his arm, the result of a half-hearted bite from Renshaw.

             
But the fountain flowed freely. Crystal clear water soared skyward and crashed back down. From the streets and buildings all around them, shy children crept forward to watch.

             
Ansel dropped the reins. Renshaw kicked sullenly at Hugh's horse and then stood still, resigned to the appalling misery of a bath.

             
Ansel stripped off his armor and piled it haphazardly out of the way. He shrugged out of his leather jerkin and his shirt. He sat down on the wet cobblestones and pulled off his boots.

             
Hugh, Perry, and the soldiers gaped at him as if he'd gone insane.

             
Ansel grinned. “If I'm gonna get soaked, boys, I might as well enjoy it.” With a very unsoldierly-like whoop of joy, he leaped into the fountain.

             
The children shouted and piled in after him, laughing and splashing. Ansel lunged and grabbed Cordy, dunking him in the water. “That's for not waiting for the signal!” he yelled.

             
“What?” Cordy sputtered. “I can't swim!”

             
“The water's six inches deep, you yokel. I couldn't drown you if I tried. But you'd better not tempt me.” Ansel grabbed a squirming, giggling girl and tossed her in the air, then caught her as she screamed with delight.

             
“Again!” she cried as a dozen children mobbed him.

             
“The prince is besieged,” Hugh noted gravely.

             
“He is indeed,” Perry said. “Should we come to his aid?”

             
Hugh sighed mightily. “'Tis our duty,” he said, stripping off his own gear and wading into the flowing fountain. He peeled a boy out of the scrum and tossed him to Perry. “You take this one, General. But be careful. They're wriggly.”

             
Within minutes the soldiers joined them, too, and the muddy square echoed with laughter.

             
Finally, exhausted and battered, Ansel collapsed against a wall. A little girl curled up in his lap, sucking her thumb and rubbing the fabric over his knee.

             
Only then did he notice the women around the square. They held pots and pans and buckets, anything that would carry water. But they watched from the shadows, afraid to approach the soldiers.

             
His gut tightened. They were right to be afraid. They'd probably been brutalized by Durnham's own men.

             
He tucked the little girl awkwardly into the crook of his arm and stood. Her head tilted to look up at him, but she seemed calm enough. Her tiny pink lips stayed locked on her thumb.

             
Ansel slowly approached the women, who watched him warily but didn't retreat. Perhaps holding a child made him seem less threatening.

             
He stopped an arm's length away from them. “May I fill your bucket?” he asked one.

             
With a jerky nod she handed the bucket to him. Ansel crossed the square to the fountain, filled the bucket, and returned it to the woman. She nodded gratefully and slipped away.

             
The soldiers noticed. Soon they were filling vessels and helping the women carry them. The children grew tired of running and screaming and settled down to play in the mud.

             
The child in Ansel's arms slept, her small body completely limp against him. He looked down into her angelic face and his heart tightened. In a long siege this girl probably would have died of hunger. And when the army came over the walls…. Ansel had seen children her size skewered and gutted, dead on the road.

             
And he hadn't even spared them a second look. He'd rode right past their mangled bodies.

             
A woman sidled up to him, her eyes on the child. Carefully Ansel passed the little girl to her and she turned to leave.

             
“Wait,” Ansel said. He reached into his pouch and his fingers closed around some coins.

             
The woman's eyes widened in surprise.

             
Ansel pulled out his fingers. He handed her the whole pouch.

             
She spilled the coins out across her palm. He figured that it was enough money to buy a good sword. Perhaps she could defend herself and this child from men like him.

             
“This will feed my neighborhood for a month,” she marveled.

             
No weapons for her, then. But it shouldn't have surprised him. “Buy something pretty for your little girl,” Ansel said.

             
“I will, my lord.” Her smile lit up her thin, plain face. She bobbed a quick curtsy, then hastened away.

             
It pained him to admit it, but Clairwyn was right. It was the people who mattered.

             
The knowledge hurt. Perhaps, Ansel reflected, all life-changing epiphanies were painful. 

Thirty-One

              After Clairwyn’s stunning victory at Durnham the army travelled unopposed through Courchevel. They found the fortified towns of Hart’s Leap and Flint Ridge burned to the ground. The people they met were the people who hadn’t been able to flee—the old, the young, the weak and sick.

             
Every one of these people wore the dull expressions of those resigned to whatever evil fate would bring them. They expected pain and suffering. Instead, Clairwyn’s army fell on them with compassion, treating their ills, building them shelters, replanting the fields with the broad, work-hardened hands of experienced Vandau farmers.

             
Ansel sat on his horse and watched Clairwyn’s farmer-soldiers laboring in Courchevel’s fields. How had he ever been arrogant enough to scorn these men? They built and created where Courchevel’s soldiers had left an ugly swath of death and destruction. They offered kindness and solace, and Ansel couldn’t find it in himself to call them weak. 

             
After two weeks of travel—which, in Ansel’s experience should have taken six weeks—they finally reached the capital of Courchevel. They stood out of bowshot and studied the castle of Kingsford.

             
“Beaumont has outdone himself,” General Perry admitted with reluctant admiration. A huge, freshly-dug moat circled the city. The excavated dirt had been piled against the massive stone walls of the city.

             
“Even if you reduce the stones to dust, my Queen,” General Carpenter noted, “our men will have to scramble up that pile of loose dirt to attack.”

             
“The moat is fortified with pointed stakes on both sides,” Perry observed, “and there are probably more stakes under the water.”

             
Carpenter lifted a glass to his eye. “They have piled felled timbers in the streets and built wood-frame towers and siege engines. They are ready for a long war, my Queen.”

             
“They merely hope to wait us out,” she said. “They expect our farmer-soldiers to desert long before the castle falls.”

             
“They're probably right.” Perry cleared his throat. “I believe our best option, my Queen, is to negotiate their surrender.”

             
“We can force them to accept reasonable terms,” Carpenter agreed.

             
“Ansel,” Clairwyn said, “what reasonable terms would Beamont consider?”

             
He thought about it. “He would be happy to accept
your
unconditional surrender. Otherwise, I’m afraid, we’re going to have to root him out of Kingsford like a badger out of its den.”

             
Perry looked glum. “Which means a long and ugly fight with a rapidly disappearing offensive force.”

             
“Oh, come on,” Sayer said, “don’t be such a Gloomy Gus. We came all this way. You don’t expect us to leave without a decent fight, do you?”

             
“Oh, we’ll see a fight,” Carpenter said. “Unless,” he added hopefully, “you have other magics to use, my Queen?”

             
“What about the scourge you loosed at Moth's Crossing?” Carpenter asked.

             
“I can only use that once,” she said, “but I continue to hope that we can negotiate Beaumont's surrender.”

             
Out of the corner of his eye Ansel saw Carpenter and Perry exchange hopeless looks as Clairwyn turned to him.

             
“Ansel, what say you? Will you speak with your father and find out his terms?”

             
“I will do so, my Queen.” He looked down into her dark eyes. “What would you ask of him?”

             
“He must surrender his throne to you,” she said promptly. “And then you and I will rule Courchevel and Vandau together.”

             
Ansel stared at her for a long moment. “Was this your hope all along?” he finally asked.

             
“It was always my desire,” she said, “but I hardly dared to hope.”

             
He shook his head to clear out the cobwebs. She had managed to shock him yet again. “As long as he lives, Beaumont will never surrender the throne.” Of this, at least, Ansel could be sure.

             
She sighed and rubbed her hands over her eyes. “I have other magics but I am loath to use them. But I will if I must, to end this war. Warn your father, Ansel. If he will not negotiate, I will destroy the city.”

             
Ansel nodded. He knew that his father would never negotiate or surrender but he held his tongue. Beaumont did not believe in a woman's magic and would scoff at the notion.

             
She read the truth in his face. “Very well. I will have to demonstrate my powers.” She turned to her generals. “Withdraw all of our troops from the roads,” she told them.

             
Thankfully, by now they were used to taking mysterious orders from their Queen. They merely nodded in agreement.

             
“Ansel,” she continued, “go to your father. Plead with him to open his gates and urge all to leave.”

             
“All?”

             
She nodded. “Any who wish to leave may pass freely. I give my word on it.”

             
“None will go,” Ansel told her. “Even if they wished to do so, Beaumont will not allow it.”

             
Briefly, she closed her eyes. When she opened them silver rimmed her dark pupils. “May the Gods help me,” she whispered. “Ansel, tonight I will visit terrible destruction on this city. Terror will rule the night and many—so many, Ansel—will die. I do not wish it to be so, but I see I have no choice.”

             
“Worse than Moth's Landing?” Carpenter asked eagerly.

             
Clairwyn rocked back on her heels and folded her arms around herself. “The horror I released at Moth's landing,” she whispered, “was the least of three favors that I am owed. And there only soldiers and fighting men died. Here, tonight, death will not discriminate.”

             
“And what of the fortifications?” Perry edged forward. “Will those be destroyed too?”

             
She shrugged. “Perhaps. It matters not. One way or another, Beaumont and his army will fall. Before the sun rises twice more, the castle will be ours.”

             
The men exchanged looks but didn’t speak.

             
“Go, Ansel. Plead with your father.” She clutched his sleeve. “But I beg, for your own safety, return to me before the sun sets on this day.”

             
He nodded, bemused.

             
She opened her tight-fisted hand to show him a silver pendant. “You wear my mark, the raven, at your shoulder. Tonight, for my sake, wear this raven at your throat.”

             
He let her place the pendant around his neck, the silver warm against his skin. “I will, my Queen. I vow it.”

             
Heedless of their audience, she kissed him with a lingering sweetness and released him reluctantly. “Remember: you must return to me before the sun sets today.”

             
“I will.”

“Then
go, my prince, with all of my hopes riding on your shoulders.”

             
He nodded.

             
“But, lest the prince’s mission fail,” she said to her commanders, “spread these orders among your men. There will be no fires in our camp tonight. Not a spark, not a candle is to be lit. Is that clear?”

             
“No watchfires?” Perry asked diffidently.

             
“No.” She shook her head emphatically. “Not for any purpose. The penalty, I promise you, would be far worse than any inconvenience.”

             
Sayer straightened. “There's a full moon tonight, gentlemen. The Highlanders will stand watch. We don't need a fire to slit a throat.”

             
“You have never steered us wrong, my Queen,” Carpenter said. “As we obey you in all things, we will obey you in this.”

             
“I will order cold rations,” Perry added. “Should we order all men to their tents from dusk until reveille, my Queen?”

             
“There is no need for that.” She sounded sad. “The ban on fires will suffice. When the screaming starts and the flames consume Kingsford, my soldiers may watch.”

             
Ansel turned to go. He couldn’t begin to understand the emotions roiling through him.

             
Clairwyn put a restraining hand on his arm. “The danger will last from sunset until the full moon rises,” she said.

             
“Only a scant hour?” He couldn't hide his surprise.

             
Her face was drawn and tight. “It will seem far longer, I promise you.”

*****

              Ansel prepared himself carefully for his role as the prodigal son. Roger helped him into his glorious armor, carefully placing Clairwyn’s raven outside of it.

             
“If the Queen says to wear it,” Roger said, “you’d best be wearing it.

             
Even Renshaw seemed to sense the gravity of the occasion. He arched his neck and lifted his hooves briskly as Ansel’s banner unfurled over him.

             
Both armies watched as Ansel rode across the no-man’s-land between them and into Beaumont’s city.

             
The King’s Corps met him at the gate. Ansel swung down from his horse and embraced his father.

             
“Ansel.” Beaumont hugged him hard. “My own son. And now, with Elric’s fall, my heir. Come, my boy. We have much to discuss.”

             
“I am sorry for my brother's death,” Ansel said with only small regret. His brother had been very difficult to love.

             
“Yes, it was tragic.” The years had been kind to Beaumont. His body was still strong and, even in full armor, he still moved nimbly. His full head of hair and tidy beard had silvered but that made him seem even more distinguished. “And the tragedy was compounded when his wife and children died, too.”

             
Ansel pondered this as they climbed the inner stairs to the battlements. Beaumont had constructed a wooden apartment over the gates for a forward command center.

             
“Yes.” The king heaved a sigh. “I believe in my heart that they died of grief.”

             
More likely a sword to the guts. Beaumont wanted control of the throne and he wanted to pick who would rule after him.

             
With an effort Ansel remembered his task. “Father. My king. The Queen herself has sent me here to warn you. She has great magic—”

             
“Bah. A woman's magic? Why do you speak to me of this?”

             
“Her magic is very powerful,” Ansel continued doggedly. “I have seen it myself. Her magic killed the legions at Moth's Landing.”

             
Beaumont smiled coldly and seated himself at the large table that dominated the room. “Pure incompetence led to our defeat at Moth's Landing. A woman's magic is no proof against a man's sharp steel.”

             
“I believed so once, myself. I have since learned otherwise.”

             
The king leaned forward and lowered his voice. “Rumor has it you're beside the Queen day and night, eh.” It wasn't a question.

             
Ansel's teeth ground together. “'Tis true,” he admitted. “She is pregnant.”

             
Beaumont clapped him on the shoulder and his laughter filled the room. “Excellent!” he cried. “We shall rule the two kingdoms together, my boy. We will defeat her army here—”

             
“I am not so certain we can defeat her. You underestimate her at your peril.”

             
“But I also have a secret weapon, my boy. I have you. She's afflicted with that most womenly of vices,
love.
” Beaumont spat out the word as if it tasted bitter on his lips. “She loves you, boy. You shall have her. With her by your side her kingdom will fall without a single blow.”

             
Had not Ansel often thought the same thing? Why did it sound so wrong coming from his father? He pushed his worries away. Beaumont was on his side. Clairwyn would be safe. That was all that mattered.              Beaumont signaled to the guard at the door. “Here, son,” he said magnanimously. “I want to introduce you.” The door swung open and four boys entered the room. The oldest was about thirteen, the youngest no more than seven.