The King of Forever (Scarlet and the White Wolf, #4) (7 page)

“That I’m never as clever as I pretend to be,” he improvised. “If I’m wrong this time, it won’t be bearskins decorating the palace, but my own hide and probably yours, too. After the murder of their rightful prince and the execution of their
spare
prince, I fear many believe that the Kinslayer has come home only to finish the job. The rebellion in Magur was bad enough. We can’t afford another.”

“Spare prince,”
Alexyin repeated with emphasis. “You never mention Vladei in my presence unless you’re forced to, my lord. Or the Lady Shikhoza.”

Shikhoza had wed Vladei’s brother, Eleferi, only a few days after Cestimir’s interment at the Kingsdal. There had been no funeral for Vladei, nor any mourning. Liall had forbidden it.

“Astute observation. What of it?”

“Nothing, sire, except that if I notice it, others eventually will.”

And wonder at the omission.
He glanced at the cold lines of Alexyin’s profile. “Does Ressanda truly believe I crossed the waters of the Norl Ūhn simply to take revenge on my family?”

“A loyal subject would never think such a thing.”

“Loyalty,” Liall stated, “is a matter of perspective. One man’s fealty could be another’s treason. A kingdom divided needs a common threat to unite it, an enemy that all can all agree on. One just happens to be at our gates.”

“The Ava Thule,” Alexyin said.

“The Ava Thule,” Liall echoed. “Don’t say it like they’re a particularly clever figment of my imagination. The threat is very real.”

For many decades, the Ava Thule tribesmen had attacked small villages and towns on the borders of Nau Karmun. Once they had what they wanted—women, food, supplies, and slaves—they vanished again. Vladei had bribed the Ava Thule to swell the ranks of his red guards during the rebellion in Magur, promising the savages rich lands, coin, women, whatever they wished. Before that, the tribesmen had never dared attack a major city. When challenged in force, the Ava Thule way was to retreat deeper into the Tribelands. If pressed, they would go much further, into a hellish place where only Ancients and rift creatures could survive. Somehow, Vladei had been able to cajole thousands of them to join his cause.

“We thinned them out in Magur,” Alexyin said.

“Not thin enough. No matter how many campaigns we wage, they come back. Like lice.”

“Alas for the poor lice of Magur.”

Liall’s brows drew together. “I was disturbed to hear the reports of slaughter that occurred there, but I did not order it. My lady mother did.”

“Is that to be her legacy? Her last act as queen was to murder a city and burn the populace in their beds?”

“No,”
Liall snapped. Then, quieter: “No. Let them blame me if they will. It might even work to our advantage in the end. All the world fears a butcher, and we need Uzna Minor and her gentle baroness to support us.”

“Don’t you mean the baron?”

Liall smirked. Eleferi was as much a baron as Alexyin was a dancing master. “What, the little man who kindly offered his balls to Shikhoza along with his wedding ring? My silk-swaddled step-brother would dice, drink, and whore his way through ten lifetimes rather than spend a single moment running his barony. That’s what he has Shikhoza for.”

“Among other purposes. I’ve heard rumor that the baroness and her husband share a lover.”

Liall’s eyebrows went up a notch. “Your ears hear more than mine, then. Who is he?”

“Some disgraced Setna, young enough that I blush to tell you his age. And the tales I’ve heard of his carousing...” Alexyin shook his head. “Though a boy, he’s a libertine to put Eleferi to shame.”

“That’s quite an accomplishment, knowing Eleferi. And you say Shikhoza beds this rogue?” Liall was amazed. “She’s changed.”

They arrived at the doors. A female guard with a starred blue badge of rank on her shoulder bowed and stepped aside.

Liall signaled for the doors to be opened. “Come, friend. Let’s turn our minds from one pack of whores to the next.”

Those who saw the king enter the vaulted chamber of the great hall did so to the sound of Alexyin’s laughter. The low hum and buzzing of voices ceased.

Theor, the king’s equerry and new Master of Horse, stood with axe in hand. The man was a celebrated warrior with a square chin like a block of stone, a white beard, and a chest as broad as a bull.

Theor’s rich voice boomed throughout the hall:
“Nazheradei, blood prince of the Camira-Druz, master of the North Sea, Baron of Sul, Baron of Nau Karmun, Prince of the Kalaxes Isles, and Rightful King of Rshan na Ostre!”

The crowd parted smoothly and bowed low. Liall swept past them, wondering how many of the assembled found Theor’s proclamation as pompous as he did. Alexyin followed him to the dais.

Tesk was present. The man had an obvious manner for a spy, always prating of paintings and art, his perfume announcing him louder than even Theor could have managed. Such a peacock’s mask would fool most, but not everyone.

Still, Tesk had saved Scarlet. Such a service could not be forgotten.

The high, domed blue ceiling was dotted with gold and silver in the patterns of the stars, the Longwalker constellation glittering in crystal and silver directly above the carved wooden platform of the king’s dais. An enormous casement window in the north wall was thrown open to reveal the land spreading out below the heights of the Nauhinir, and the walls were lined with panels of silk tapestries and the banners of noble houses.

A small lacquered chest rested on a table on the dais. 

As he mounted the steps, Liall was keenly aware that he did so alone. None of the western barons were present themselves, even though Uzna Minor and Sul were far closer to the Nauhinir than far-flung eastern holdings like Tebet. Liall had at least expected baronial emissaries from Jadizek, but though the baron of Jadizek was the crown’s staunchest eastern ally, none had arrived. All those gathered in the hall were lesser nobles, equerries, secretaries, and the poor relations of nobility sent to listen and report. And Tesk, of course, whose yellow silk virca flashed with brilliant embroidered birds.

There are no teeth in this hall,
Liall thought. Whatever he decided, it was obvious that no one wanted to share the responsibility and the resulting blame—or even glory— that might follow. As a Kasiri atya, he had wielded absolute power over his krait, the final word in all disputes. In Rshan, control of the sprawling continent was parceled out to the barons, to govern as the king’s vassal-princes under his justice. But it was still a monarchy, and whether here in the chambers or in the yurts of the krait, both the burden and the blame would fall to him alone.

He was surprised that being the Wolf of Omara and being king of Rshan could feel so similar.
My old wolf fangs will have to serve me today.

He looked down on the milling crowd and raised his arm to show them his palm. At once, all eyes were on him.

“Last year, in the months before my return to Rshan, there was a revolt in Magur,” Liall said, pitching his deep voice to reach all corners of the room. “Vladei’s rebellion was his final, failed bid to become king. It was a treasonous plot that cost Prince Cestimir his life. Most of you know that there were reports of Ava Thule fighting alongside those rebels. We thought there were only a handful of tribal warriors in Magur, perhaps a few hundred at most.” He paused. “I have been informed that during the revolt, Vladei paid Tribesmen to cross the Greatrift in the thousands.”

Alexyin stood just below the dais. He shot Liall a look of caution as the chamber buzzed like a kicked beehive.

Liall rapped his knuckles on the wood of the dais for quiet.

“You should have put a sword through every living thing in Magur!” a man shouted. “Spit them like mad dogs! Hang them from the trees and put the entire city to the torch!”

“And then shall I command my army to spit infants on lances like Ramung did in the black years?” Liall scorned. The man wore the purple colors of Tebet, but Liall did not recognize his face. “I am not Ramung. So long as I am king we will not butcher women and children for the crime of being in the wrong place, or having the wrong fathers or husbands. And the city
was
put to the torch. Khatai Jarek assures me that every man who bore arms against us was killed in battle, incinerated, or executed afterward.”

“Every
man,”
the Tebeti stressed. “Not every male. Was it Queen Nadiushka who spared the young boys and allowed the animals to take root and flourish in our midst, or was it you, sire?”

Liall looked down on him. The man had a sharp face and a reddish tint to the thin, pointed beard he sported. Liall fancied he had the look of a young Baron Ressanda. “Who are you, ser?”

“Jarad Hallin, of Tebet.”

Hallin meant
drover
. It was a new name, not claimed by any of the noble houses of Rshan. From the look of Hallin, he had Morturii blood somewhere in his ancestry. No few did these days, especially in Tebet.

“
Ser
Hallin,” Liall said with an edge of mockery in his voice. There were scattered titters throughout the room, and for once the customary prejudice of his people was something he could make use of. Few nobles would want to be seen allying with the political views of a peasant. “It is true that Jarek pardoned the youths who joined their fathers in revolt, so long as they swore an oath never to take up arms against the crown again. Those who would not swear—and there were no few—were beheaded.”

“Their
word
,” Hallin sneered. “And what good is the word of a fatherless rebel bastard?”

“Almost as good as the word of a cow-herder,” Liall replied.

Hallin’s expression turned sullen as chuckles scurried through the hall like a nasty rumor, and Liall knew he had won. A distasteful victory, but he would take it.

“The men of Magur have paid,” he said, raising his voice one more. “When the battle was lost, the Ava Thule fled like the cowards they, but not to the Tribelands. They are still here.”

While the crowd erupted into shouts and calls, Alexyin moved quickly to join him on the dais. Alexyin shot a look at the lacquered chest, only now seeming to notice the brilliant blue of the varnish, and the royal badge of stars set in diamond on the lid. Liall saw that Alexyin knew what it meant, and that he was not pleased.

“Sire,” Alexyin said into Liall’s ear, “you will lose the advantage if you reveal everything now.”

“I don’t agree,” Liall answered, keeping his head down and his face turned into Alexyin’s shoulder in case there were lip-readers in the chamber.
He chooses this moment to have an opinion?
he thought. His mentor had been painfully distant on the matter of the proposed war, close-mouthed to the point of insolence at times. Now Alexyin wanted to be heard. Why now?

“This information would be useful as bait,” Alexyin argued.

“Some secrets are more damaging if they’re kept, and ultimately a member of
my
family is responsible for this invasion,” Liall said. “Dead or not, it makes no difference. I am Camira-Druz and the blame will fall to me.”

“I could watch to see who lets this secret slip. How else would they know unless they were allied with
them?
The death of your enemies is better than the goodwill of your friends.”

An astute observation, but one that led to a ruthless path. Liall shook his head. “I will not be that kind of ruler. We’ll need more than friends to drive the Ava Thule out of our lands for good. We’ll need the whole kingdom.”

“I don’t agree.”

“It’s not your decision.”

Alexyin pursed his mouth crossly and rapped his fist on the table. The noise died down. “The king shall speak!”

Liall scanned the faces of the crowd, meeting an attentive eye here, a dagger-look there. He had many friends, he saw, but there were many more he could not read. Currents ran around him like the rushing of a stream.
It will become a river soon enough, and much will be swept away. Time for the king’s famous speech, where he stirs the soldiers to courage before the battle, except this is a Rshani battle, and nothing ever goes like in the stories.

He was not looking forward to that part.

“On my lady mother’s command, soldiers under Khatai Jarek were sent to garrison Magur after the battle, but the soldiers will not remain there. They will be recalled to Starhold.” Liall looked quickly around the room to see who understood and who did not, and was pleased to see that many men in attendance were no fools. He nodded. “For centuries, the Ava Thule have attacked from the shadows, killing our men, stealing our women, kidnapping our children into their twisted litters to corrupt their hearts. We will rout these vermin from their holes and drag them into the sun to die on our pikes.” His gaze raked the crowd. “They have taken the hills beneath Ged Fanorl.”

Ged Fanorl. The sacred mountain of the Shining Ones, forbidden to men.

The previous noise was nothing to the roar that spilled out of the chamber and into the halls. Shouts of derision, fear, excitement, and accusation echoed around him:

“Blasphemy! Kill the defilers!”

“All lies! There is no threat!”

“Magur was sacrificed for the warmongers!”

“The filthy tribesmen will be slaughtering us on the streets of Sul next! They will fire the ships in the harbor and feast on our flesh!”

Liall closed his ears to the ruckus. It reminded him of the same paranoia and disbelief over Scarlet’s magic: that it was either a myth or it existed only to destroy them. Months had passed and the prophesied Hilurin Doom had not come. Instead, Scarlet’s beauty, wit, and bravery had gained him dozens of admirers.

With time and a little luck, Scarlet might even begin to think of Rshan as his home.

The king remained on the dais with Alexyin and let the chamber thrash it out. By custom, he had no voice when they argued among themselves, and the usual court etiquette was ignored. If a man was invited to council, he was allowed to say what was on his mind, even to the king. Creative insults were not uncommon. Scarlet would have been greatly shocked.