Cal agrees with this plan and says farewell to the Chief Scribe; the old man wobbles back into the tower, barely strong enough to pull the door open.
The Small Council is scheduled to meet tomorrow, and Cal will raise the issue there. Lord Burley alarms easily and may want more guards at every door, not to mention all-night vigils on every floor of the tower. The Duke of Auvigne will scoff, no doubt, and cast aspersions on the elderly scribe’s sanity. He’s been rude before about the languid pace of Daffran’s writing, and has suggested more than once that one of the younger junior scribes—one who still has his hearing and doesn’t wheeze when he climbs the stairs—should take Daffran’s role at the Small Council.
If the Small Council agrees, Cal will confide in the captain of the guard, and a thorough search of the castle can begin. This place is a small city, with many underground stories, cellars, and tunnels, not to mention the catacombs. If the Aphrasians have infiltrated Castle Mont, there are many, many places to hide. But why would they seek out the tower, which has no underground access, and a portico leading to its only door? It’s the easiest place to be seen and unmasked, not to mention trapped.
On the far side of the courtyard, the captain of the guard is waving. He needs Cal to resume his duties. The first contingent sets off for the north in two days, and not a man among them is ready to fight.
Chapter Five
Lilac
In my chamber I hurl my jerkin and arm guards to the floor and dismiss all my attendants, apart from Lady Marguerite. She drops to her knees to unlace my boots, but I practically kick her away.
“That Guild fighter,” I say. “The one training me today. Who is she? Can you find out?”
Marguerite stares up at me, eyes wide. “The girl from the mountains?” she asks. “I believe she is called Rhema.”
“I know that,” I say, a surge of irritation pushing out my words. “I mean, why has she been taken on as an assassin? She could be anyone. She could be here to murder me.”
“Oh no, Your Majesty!” Lady Marguerite looks horrified. “She is highly regarded. I’m told that she was personally selected by Caledon Holt to join his elite group.”
I say nothing. I just stand with my back to the window while Lady Marguerite unlaces my boots and eases out my stockinged feet, one by one. Really, I don’t trust myself to say a word.
“Also, ma’am,” Lady Marguerite adds, her voice hesitant, “there was a rider at sunup with some missives taken straight to His Majesty the King.”
“Missives? From where?” It’s ridiculous that I have to rely on my ladies for such intelligence.
“Stavin, I believe, ma’am. And another report from the northern region where the terrible . . . terrible . . .”
“Yes, yes,” I say. “Very well. Please leave me. I wish to write a letter.”
Lady Marguerite bows and leaves the room.
My ladies return. “Fetch me writing materials,” I order. There’s more fluttering, the ladies competing to fetch the inkpot and sharpen the quill, one unrolling a sheet of vellum that’s the same ivory as bones. One lady sets a dish of scented lilac wax next to a candle, ready for the seal of my heavy gold ring. My desk sits facing the window, with a view of the castle’s gray stones and soaring turrets and the gloomy winter sky. Lady Marguerite lurks nearby like an owl, blinking at me.
“Please don’t think me impertinent,” she says, “but I wonder—is this a letter that will leave the castle grounds? Or is it something that will be delivered to His Majesty or one of your advisors on the Small Council?”
“I don’t see why the destination of this letter should concern you, Lady Marguerite,” I tell her. “I have everything I need here, and I’ll summon a page when I’ve finished my correspondence. You are dismissed.”
“Of course, ma’am.” Another curtsy. She’s facing the floor, her veil drooping onto the flagstones, when she speaks again. “I’m just concerned for your well-being. Deeply concerned.”
The fire crackles and spits. I tap a sharpened quill against the wood of the desk. It sounds like the beak of a woodpecker, drilling into a tree.
“I don’t understand,” I tell her, sounding as impatient as I feel. “What is the reason for this concern?”
“I’m just thinking of your safety, ma’am.”
“Well, at this moment I am simply writing to my mother, as I do every week. Unless one of you has poisoned the ink, I don’t see why this letter compromises my safety.”
“Of course. I just fear that since . . . the incident.” Lady Marguerite peeks up at me. “When you rode out with the king. I fear that not all support you as they should. I would not wish the letter to fall into . . . enemy hands, as it were.”
“The enemy, whoever they may be, would be very bored with this letter,” I tell her. “From daughter to mother, with no matters of state discussed or anything of import. Unlike, I presume, the missive that arrived this morning and was sent directly to His Majesty.”
“Your Majesty.” She backs out of the room, almost stumbling on the hem of her dress. I wait until the heavy door clangs behind her before I turn back to my desk and the blank sheet.
I can’t write a word. I’m seething. Apparently I’m the queen of this realm, but important letters arrive for Hansen’s perusal only. If something is happening in Stavin, it should be considered by both of us. And now I can’t even sit down to write a letter without being interrogated about its destination. What does Lady Marguerite think—that I’m writing a love letter to the Chief Assassin? Who is this “enemy” who plans to pounce on a letter to my mother?
Maybe she knows more, sees more, than she reveals to me. Perhaps I’m wrong to discount the opposition to me in Montrice. I must be careful about what I write, I suppose, and keep in mind that anything I send to my mother may be intercepted and read—or misread—and used against me.
This is so frustrating. I write to my mother on this day every week, and now I feel as though I can’t write a word. Still, she’ll be expecting something from me, and I mustn’t delay. It’s a difficult journey for the messenger, for Renovia is a place of secrets and deep hollows, of misty moors and damp gullies. Even expert travelers can find themselves disoriented and lost in its miles of dense scrub and birch forests.
I dip the quill into black ink and start to write—benign drivel, really. Even if I had no fear of the letter being intercepted, I wouldn’t want to tell my mother about the ride with Hansen when the people expressed their displeasure. Where I was booed, and villagers looked at me with horror and disgust, as though I were a witch. I won’t endorse the story about the lilac ice in the village of Stur by committing it to vellum. It’s unlikely to be true, and even if it were, the sight is evidence of black magic, not malfeasance on my part. If this letter is intercepted, or falls into the wrong hands in any way, nothing in it must suggest I’m afraid.