Ban shook his head. “Were the subject good, I would swear it’s Rory’s writing, but being what it is… I cannot say yes. It does not seem written in his words, even.”
“It is by his hand.”
The words sounded like death blows, dull and hard and promising raw blood to come.
The earl crumpled the letter. All his blunt teeth were bared. “And a feast prepared for this ungrateful whelp! Ah! Find him, so I can disabuse him of this notion his father is too old and weak to govern.”
Ban held his hands out to stall Errigal, and let him see the anger now. Errigal could read it as he liked. “Wait. At least until you can hear from his own mouth what he intended with this letter! We donotknow if he wrote it, we do not know if he meant it—maybe he is testingme,as I said.”
“Ban!” Errigal ground out the name through clenched wide teeth.
“Father.” Ban put hands to Errigal’s broad shoulders. “Don’t do as Lear did. If you go violently against Rory and it’s merely a mistake, that is a gap in your honor, not his. Look at the chaos Innis Lear is experiencing already, with Kay Oak banished and the princess, too. Connley and Astore are ready at each other’s necks. We need Rory to be innocent of this.”
The earl’s jaw worked, his hairy brows dipping in uncertain anger. “All this is a disaster, you are right about that. If my own son… ah. He cannot be such a monster.”
“He cannot,” Ban murmured, only half in guilt.
The two leaned together at the window, both breathing hard, though for different causes.
“Ah, Ban.” Errigal sagged, and Ban dropped to the floor, kneeling. “Child against father—it is not natural. It is against the stars, and yet the stars warned us. These eclipses, these signs of division, of friend against friend, loves lost, what can we do? Heaven and earth, I love that fine, wretched boy. He must be as good as you, as loyal. Look at his stars! He was born under such good stars.” The earl thumped his head back against the wall and shut his eyes. “Discover the truth, Ban. Discover it.”
“I shall, Father,” Ban said, pressing his forehead to his father’s fist. He let his mouth twist and his eyes burn where the earl could not see.
Stars. Always the stars of birth. The blindness of old men, the weakness of their faith. Easy weapons to turn against them now that Ban understood power better.
Hurrying down stone stairs worn in the middle from generations of soldiers’ boots, Ban made his way to the kitchens where he knew Rory to be already, flirting with the cooks and maids as they prepared the feast.
Ban paused just outside the bend into the sweltering kitchen, catching his breath. He heard his brother’s voice trail brightly up the stairs from the larder instead. A young woman pressed past Ban, carrying a full platter ofsteaming bread. She smiled at him, but Ban’s attention was all for the story his brother told.
“… and though battered and bruised, Ban the Fox had clutched in his hand the underwear of the commander of the Diotan forces!”
The triumphant words spread into a shout of laughter and cheers from surely a dozen throats. Ban stepped down, steadying the sword at his belt. A cluster of young people—retainers in Errigal sky blue, two servant boys in their aprons, and even some young women covered in flour and smiling under sweat-curled hair—surrounded Rory, all of them crushed into the space around the long butter table, ducking their heads around the jars of butter and cream hung on hooks to keep free of rats and insects.
“You were supposed to be telling stories of your own exploits,” Ban said softly, affection warming his belly beside stinging guilt.
“Ban! Ha! Worms!” Rory held out his arm. “You tell them a story about me, then.”
Ban smiled tightly, aware that though his presence didn’t quite crush the spirit of the room, he most definitely quieted it. They’d accepted him, to be sure, but he had not earned their ease. “Rory, I have an urgent matter for your ears only.”
“After, then,” Rory promised, grimacing wildly for his audience. He snaked through them, coming up to Ban. “What it is, brother?”
“Wait,” Ban said, leading Rory up into the kitchens again, and out one of the rear corridors toward the strip of earth between the kitchens and the inner stables. The evening sun shone, still high enough to glare over the outer black wall of the Keep. Ban put his shoulder to the rough wall and pulled Rory very close. “You spoke with Father as soon as you returned today?”
“Yes, I told you that, just before bathing.”
“And not again? Not recently?”
“No.” Rory’s brow wrinkled.
Ban nodded as if confirming suspicions. “Did he seem well? You parted on good terms?”
“What is going on?” the legitimate son eyed Ban crown to boot.
“He’s furious at you for something,” Ban said evenly.
“Furious? At me? What for?”
“I don’t know, but he raged at me for it, just now.”
