SanClare Black (The Prince of Sorrows) (14 page)

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CHAPTER NINE

Jarlyth couldn’t believe his ears. He felt the flush burn up his neck and to his face as he stood in the middle of what seemed to be the entire Court.

He
’d imagined it all going a different way. When he’d walked into the throne room to make his official petition, Jarlyth had been confident of the king’s continued support.

Flannery, Evander, and a few of the other
“prince’s guard” had come with him in a show of solidarity.
They may have to drag me out.

After all the moons spent chasing around after pirates had ended
with cathartic punishment but no actual progress toward finding Nylan, Jarlyth decided to go back to King Teodor to request more people for his search team.

“
I beg your pardon, Your Majesty?” Jarlyth managed. Maybe he had misheard.

“
I have indulged you long enough, Lord Denara.” Teodor’s eyes flicked past him, dismissing Jarlyth as if he’d been offering the king some unwanted refreshment and not pleading with him to do even more to find his lost son. “He’s dead. His murderers have finally been punished. Let this go.”

“
He is not dead, Majesty!” He shouted it, his voice cracking. Jarlyth’s eyes flicked over to where Durran stood but the prince studiously avoided meeting his gaze. Whispers and titters and comments loud enough to be heard but low enough to be overlooked began to rise up all around.

“
I am his warder, Your Majesty!” Jarlyth insisted. “Warders feel their charges’ lives as certainly as we feel our own. Vail Herself—!”

“
Yes, Lord Denara. Yes.” Teodor waved his hand as if brushing away an annoying fly. “We all know the tale.”

The laughter
grew louder.
They all think he’s dead, and I’m mad—A mad fool.

Jarlyth tried again.
I have to keep trying.

“
If I could have just a few more men and women to help—”

“
Enough!” Teodor’s shout held no note of patience.

“
You made a vow to Queen Vedalanna, Sire...” A hiss came from the gathered courtiers, as if everyone of them had sucked in their breath at the same moment.

Teodor shot up from his throne and flew down the dais steps, stopping when his nose was all but pressed against Jarlyth
’s. “Do not say her name, Lord Denara.” The words were bitten-off.

“
I loved her more than my own life. More than my throne. And she is dead. I have had to accept that; you must accept your own loss, and move on.”

He knows.
Of course, he knows. I should have seen that the day Nylan was born.
He’d been young, though, and still not at ease with his powers. He’d mistaken the king’s bitterness for impatience and worry. He’d naïvely believed the king’s love for his dead queen might transfer to concern for her son.

Stupid.

“Are you forbidding me from continuing on my own?” Jarlyth heard a small gasp from behind him he identified as Flannery.

The
king’s eyes glittered with anger, but he did not lose control again. After a long, stomach-churning pause, he spoke.

“
You were his warder. I would not presume to dictate your duty to you, Lord Denara. But you are on your own in this insane waste of time.”

The king turned sharply on his heel and stomped from the throne room,
Durran and a flutter of courtiers following in his wake.

The room clear
ed very quickly after that, but Jarlyth stood frozen, shocked. He sensed someone approach, and at last he managed to move. He turned with a pitiful excuse for a smile struggling across his lips.

Flannery
’s eyes gave away her fury though her expression retained its usual solemn composure. Evander looked sick and angry and mortified, reflecting Jarlyth’s feelings exactly. The rest of the guard had gone.

Ah, well.
They did what they’d set out to do. Everyone else wanted vengeance. Everyone else thinks I’m mad.

“
I don’t think you’re mad,” Flannery said. He focused on her, surprised.

“
Even I could guess that’s what you were thinking, Jary,” Evander said. “Come on. Let’s go get a drink.”

He allowed himself to be herded out of the throne room.
He couldn’t stand to wait for a cab, so they walked together down the front lawn to the main gates and slipped through the guards’ entrance onto the street. A trolley was just about to clang by, and they chased it, caught the pole at the back in turns, and swung on.

Everyone made way for them
—three importantly-uniformed people coming from the castle—but they stood together in silence. They jumped back off only a post and a half later, just outside their favorite pub.

“
It’s over,” Jary said once they’d been seated and served. “I can’t believe it.”

“
It isn’t over just because he won’t help,” Flannery said.

She
’s mad at me now.

“
Flan, I know you think—” Evander began, but she turned her cool gaze on the man, and he subsided.

“
Nylan has more than one parent with power.” Her glass seemed in danger of shattering, her knuckles white as she gripped its handle, but that was the only sign she gave of her fury. She looked at Jarlyth, unblinking, as if trying to send a thought into his brain.

Which she could if I let her.
He didn’t feel up to it. He wanted to get drunk.
And maybe grab a nik.
He turned slowly, trying not to be obvious, and caught the barmaid’s eye. She grinned back at him.
She remembers. Good.
It wasn’t very difficult for a Sensitive to find willing bed-partners. Their reputation preceded them.

He flicked a glance at Evander and narrowed his eyes, trying to get him to leave,
and take Flan with you!

But Flannery was the one who excelled at reading him.
She stood up, the sound of her chair shoving away from the table startling him back into looking across the table to where she had been sitting. The look she gave him made him feel suddenly embarrassed and exposed, but when he opened his mouth, he found nothing to say.

Also wordless, Flannery
turned on her heel and strode out of the pub.
Leaving me with the tab. That’s fair.

Evander stood up more easily, but his grin was real this time.
“Shize, Jary. Next time, just say you want to be alone to relax.” He took out an herbal smoke and lit it, blowing out a mouthful of smoke as he gazed toward the door. “She’ll kill us both, one of these days.”

“
We’ll probably deserve it,” Jary agreed.

The other man snorted.
“I’ll go calm her down. We’ll meet up tomorrow and discuss next steps.”

Left alone, Jarlyth nursed his drink and thought.
Next steps...
Flannery was right.

Up until now, h
e hadn’t wanted to waste time running so far away to Voya to seek help he’d thought available to him in Serathon. But now it seemed the only thing to do.

I can
’t stand it. How many more moons will it take just to be able to continue the search? Where in all the hells is he?

They
’d searched Worldsend more thoroughly than anyone likely ever had. Nylan had been nowhere to be found, though rumors sprang up like weeds, all of them turning down dead-ends eventually. Even the mercenaries hadn’t been able to tell him anything of value.

The barmaid wandered over to his table, her smile more alluring, her eyes warm with anticipation.
“Good to see you, Lord Denara.” She sat a bottle of very fine wine down on the table, followed by two glasses. “May I join you?”

He echoed her smile and waved a hand, inviting her.

Tomorrow would not be soon enough, but it was too late to leave for
SouthPort today, and he had arrangements to make before he could even do that. Too late today to do any of it.
Might as well relax, then.

But he knew that someday he
’d regret these stolen moments.
When I find him...I’ll hate myself for every tic’s delay.

Nylan was
lost somewhere, alone, probably scared and unhappy and wondering what had happened to him.

But
Jarlyth couldn’t stop breathing, living, finding a moment’s peace once in awhile just because he knew his beloved charge was still lost.

I also can
’t stop feeling guilty.

But that seemed only a fair price to pay.

#

The rain had not stopped, though Michael didn’t notice it at first. He didn’t notice anything outside of himself for a very long time as he sat against the public pump, shivering and reliving everything that had led up to this disaster.

The
stone edge of the pump’s platform dug into his back and had probably left a bruise when he’d been dropped there by the nannas. He began to feel the discomfort; began to feel the cold of the rain and his wet clothes as the rain kept falling; began to feel the deep, gut-twisting terror.

T
he central building of the orphanage’s several loomed over him, seeming to glare down through its stories-high stained glass window eyes. The gates stood closed and locked for the night. Enormous chains wrapped the wrought-iron bars several times. Their weight underscored the impossibility of the gates being opened against the nannas’ will.

The scant
, waning daylight making its way through the storm clouds suggested that wherever the sun was hiding, it had yet to set.

Everything happened so fast.
Why does it always have to happen so nikking fast?

His mouth throbbed and a finger touched to his lips came away bloody.

Ethene
’s dead...I should have let her die the way Vail meant. I didn’t mean for it to be like this.

He was having trouble accepting what had happened to him.
He’d been thrown him out—he realized that—but all that this action meant, all that Ethene’s death meant, all that Mabbina had done and had meant to do to him—it was more than he could comprehend all at once.

“
I’m kiska now,” he whispered, frightened.
But where do the kiska go when JhaPel won’t take them?
He bit his lip as he thought of Telyr and the boys who’d attacked Cyra.
And me...but that won’t be me. That won’t happen to me.

“
Pol. Pol will help me,” he said. He used the platform’s edge to pull himself to his feet and just managed to avoid stepping in one of the troughs.

He splashed his face and hoped his lip had stopped bleeding.
His face and throat hurt, and he had no idea what condition they were in, but he knew he couldn’t afford to worry about that. He had to find Pol as quickly as he could.

But where is the Red Boar Inn?

He hadn’t seen anyone since the nannas—not surprising, thanks to the rain which, even for Queen’s City, was falling especially hard—but if he intended to find Pol, he’d have to find someone who could tell him where the Red Boar was. All he knew was that it was somewhere in Fensgate. JhaPel stood beside Fensgate Temple and together the two made up the southwestern border of the parish. He had to go the other way if he wanted to stay in Fensgate.

Not that I want to.
This is the worst place for a kiska to be!
But he was afraid it might be the only place, too.

He knew so little about anything
beyond the walls of JhaPel, and for the first time, he comprehended how dangerous this was. He had only three years’ worth of memories and knowledge, and virtually all of it related to the orphanage in some way.

He could count the number of times he
’d really been away from JhaPel on one hand—going to Holy Prayers certainly didn’t count—and he’d learned nothing of use to him now during those few outings.

The rain seemed to be easing off but already it was much darker.
Michael picked a street at random from the seven fanning out from the square, heading away from JhaPel and began to walk.

The buildings crowded together along either side of all the streets, towering up precariously and seeming to lean toward each other over the cobblestones below.
Nothing in Fensgate was tall enough to distinguish itself above the buildings and twisting streets except the temple’s bell tower, and even it sometimes disappeared amongst the tangle of streets and alleys and upper stories.

Michael
remembered what Pol had said and feared he was walking into a maze he might never escape.

The rain did prevent him from being overwhelmed by every shock Fensgate had in store for him
. It had fallen for so long that day, it had washed away—for a short time—the stench and filth that normally clogged the parish’s streets.