“Do you know what’s going on?” Lorna asked Davydd, ignoring the Prince.
“We’re evacuating, and rumor has it the Ox Lord is on his way.”
The Prince was amazed to see that theeshendainot only seemed unafraid of the prospect of fighting the Prince of Oxen, but even appeared excited by the idea.
“What do you want?” the big woman asked the Prince.
“I’m here with a message from Leah, via the Elder—Elder Crane.”
Both of them stopped doing up Lorna’s armor and stared at him.
“Well tell us!” the young man snapped, as if the Prince were intentionally stalling.
“We’re setting up an ambush to draw off the main force,” the Prince said. “Leah says she needs you and the twenty Ranger pairs under you to meet her at the north-west entrance to the valley within the next hour. The rest of the Kindred are evacuating to the—the Stand.”
“The Stand?” Davydd asked in surprise. He and Lorna exchanged a significant look. The red-eyed young man turned back to the Prince. “Tell Leah we’ll be there.”
The Prince turned and left the room, not quite sure what to do next. There was a sound behind him, and he turned to see Davydd walk out of the room. The young man approached, red eyes searing the air between them.
“Do they know who you are?” he asked.
The Prince swallowed, and a hundred different responses crossed his mind, from bare-faced denial to polite confusion. But in the end, he knew that the time for pretense was long past, and so he answered in earnest.
“Yes. I’ve renounced my claim to the throne and sworn myself to the Elders—to Crane—until the Prince of Oxen has been repulsed. I knew they wouldn’t believe me otherwise.”
“You did what?” Davydd asked, surprise widening those terrible glowing eyes.
“Now isn’t the time!” the Prince said, suddenly angry. “Do you want my help or not? No, I don’t care—I’m not doing this for you. I’m doing this for—”
He broke off and shook his head. Davydd stepped forward, and the Prince looked up. The red-eyed young man spoke quickly.
“Fine, your reasons are your own. But my sister trusts you, and that’s enough for now. If you’re coming with us, go to the armory. Find any spare bits of armor you can. And try not to poke anyone with the sharp point of that sword, yeah?”
The Prince nodded and started hurrying away.
“Idiot!”
The Prince stopped.
“Thatway,” Davydd said, pointing the opposite direction before ducking back into Lorna’s room and shutting the door.
The Prince made his way quickly down to the armory, watching the sun in the sky through various windows, trying to mark how much time was passing. Ramael was closer, that was certain. But the Kindred were moving quickly, and there was a chance they would be clear of Vale before the army arrived.
When he made it to the armory, the Prince found it was a free-for-all. Armorers and blacksmiths were pounding madly at metal, their forges blazing as they did last-minute repairs for soldiers of every rank and file who were waiting anxiously.
“Spare armor over here!” a voice was bellowing. The Prince followed it into a corner, where a large-bellied blacksmith in a grimy apron with soot-stained hands and face was handing out pieces of armor to various soldiers.
“What do you need?” he asked the Prince breathlessly.
“Whatever you have,” the Prince responded. He was looking at the pile around the large man and saw that there was very little left.
“What do you already have?”
“Nothing!”
“You have no armor?” the man asked incredulously.
“No! But I’m here on Elder Crane’s orders, so I need something now!”
