WHOOSH. WHOOSH.
All three men suddenly were ablaze.
As the Warlord knew well, there was no way to survive flames like that.
CHAPTER11
THEDowager Queen ruminated over the last dregs of her breakfast.
She was anxious to hear Captain Nikola’s plan for locating Taillefer, especially after successfully setting into motion his disownment. Upon further interrogation, the imprisoned pirate had produced a contract for hire, signed by her second son. It was proof enough of his treachery for her councilors to do their part, butsheneeded him to stand trial for treason so that there would be no question in anyone’s mind that he should not and could not have claim to the crown of Pyrenee.
But the captain was late, annoying her greatly because it was necessary she depart as soon as possible for Basilica. Still, his delay allowed her time to receive one more of her daily treatments from Medikua Aritza, something she wanted to avoid doing on the ship, as it required swallowing a large amount of red raspberry leaf tincture—difficult enough to keep down on solid land, much less a seafaring vessel. The royal ship was already brimming with cargo and passengers—all it needed was her.
After the treatment, as the medikua packed up her many tinctures, Inés brought her to a momentary halt. “Medikua Aritza? Do you have anything within your collection that might provide a…boostfor my betrothed? Some sort of male equivalent to the service you are providing me?”
Domingu was more than double the Dowager Queen’s age and had sired no children with his recently departed wife—a woman more than a decade Inés’s junior.
A wry smile crossed the medikua’s thin lips. “Nothing I haven’t provided him before, Your Highness, if he’ll take it.”
“I will see to it that he does.” There was a knock on the door—ah, finally. “Ensure that your items are prepared for travel at ten strikes of the bell, medikua. You shall ride to the port in my carriage.”
“Yes, Your Highness.”
As the medikua scuttled away, the Dowager Queen turned herattention to her next visitor. “Come in, Captain. Tell me, I hope you have a clever plan for a clever mark?”
Nikola entered, looking ghostly pale underneath the not-yet-faded sunburn from his excursion into the Torrent with Renard’s search party to “rescue” Princess Amarande. His voice was raspy and dry with lack of sleep. “We have more pressing concerns, Your Highness.”
He offered a scroll. The Dowager Queen’s attention snagged on the broken seal. “Captain, you know all official correspondence addressed to the Crown is to be opened by my hand only.”
The boy blanched further at her tone. “It was addressed to ‘The People of Pyrenee,’” he stammered. “Not to the Crown. Delivered not by rider but bybird. Please, read it, Your Highness.”
Most unusual, indeed.Purse-lipped, Inés stood and plucked the parchment from him. She did not break eye contact with Nikola, whose desperation did not excuse his insolence. “Of course I will read it, though I am angry you took it upon yourself to do so first.”
“Punish me later, Your Highness. Read it now. Immediately. Please.”
In spite of his youth, Nikola did not often appear rattled—as he did now. That, in itself, was cause for concern.
Inés unfurled the parchment, revealing the painstaking penmanship of a court scribe. The Dowager Queen read the lines in silence. Her face flushed, fingers shaking as she swallowed down the lump that had formed in her throat by the conclusion.
The parchment fluttered to her breakfast table, coming to rest atop her butter dish. The Dowager Queen stared at the letter as if it couldn’t be real. But there it was, the parchment immediately stained translucent with butterfat.
Ardenia had struck first. Despite all her scheming and preparation, they had made the first cut. A deep one. Nothing superficial about it. Slashing through the fraying fabric holding together the continent.
According to this document, Pyrenee now stood accused ofmurderingPrincess Amarande in retaliation for Prince Renard’s death, which occurred during anillegalwedding.
Right there on the page was the accusation that the Warrior King’s daughter was kidnapped by Renard and forced into vows without the consent or knowledge of the Royal Council of Ardenia, or the kingdom’s regent ruler, General Koldo. No mention was made of thesigned contract the Pyrenee party witnessed Renard deliver in the council room of the Itspi.
Even more shocking, it seemed Ardenia had done its own scheming and preparation: The kingdom had crowned a new and surprisingking—Ferdinand, Princess Amarande’s brother, younger by a scant year.
Inés reread the letter. She did not care how long the captain waited in silence.
At the bottom of the parchment—beneath the stacked signatures of the new king, his suddenly reappearing mother, and each of Ardenia’s Royal Council members—was a footnote specifying that copies of the letter were sent to the other standing kingdoms of the union of the Sand and Sky.
Domingu had promised to send word of the wedding on the heels of the finished contract. A short delay meant to give Inés time to inform her council and prepare to travel for the nuptials.
Those announcements would arrive tomorrow to Ardenia, Myrcell, and the nobility worth filling a court. Which meant this letter was sent without knowledge of the impending wedding.
A gutsy first strike, indeed.
