The King's Blood (35 page)

"You suspected that a little...frost would deter me from my mission?" he said indicating the snow that drifted half way up the trees. "I've followed you since you left your father's house. Ingenious plan, hiding in the bear trap. I only needed to keep a few fingers of the Empire at bay instead of the full arm."

"Yes, well..." Ciara said, suspecting he knew Aldrin fell into the pit on accident but wanting to play along as the tactician anyway. "Why?"

"The Empire may be made up of idiots, but they are zealous idiots. The most dangerous kind," he said idly plucking the bow strung across his shoulder like a bass.
 

Ciara glared, growing tired of the games, "Why are you following us? Why were you following us? Why have you been following us since the beginning?"

"See, young one," he started when a rustling began from within the trees. Taban drew the bow and fitted an arrow before Ciara could turn to the hand inexpertly shaking the trees, causing excess snow to drop upon it.

Some light cursing met with the wet plops as a torchlight bounced into view. Ciara looked over at the man who probably murdered people in his sleep and placed her hand overtop the arrow. Wolves didn't carry torches...unless young girls in vibrant capes were involved.

A shaggy blond head poked through the dark forest and offered some much needed illumination upon the situation. "Ciara?" Aldrin asked as his eyes rested upon her. "Ah! A shadow demon!" he shouted as he came upon Taban, his free fingers fumbling for his resized belt, trying to find the rusty sword.

Taban, for his part, made a show of slowly undrawing the bowstring and replacing his arrow. Then he chuckled quietly as the prince finished unsheathing his sword and still held onto his belt with his pinkie.

"He's no demon, Aldrin," Ciara said, adding under her breath, "I hope."

The prince glared from the dark man, dressed more like the old elves of legend than a farmer wandering in the forest in winter, over to Ciara who, in the coat, appeared an overly fluffy dove beneath a black hat. She stepped a few inches away from Taban, cursing under her breath for letting herself get that close.

The assassin seemed to take it all in stride, "Now that the weapons are sheathed..." Aldrin waved his sword in defiance of the dark man's words. "Now that the dangerous weapons are sheathed," he said again, savoring the look of disdain on the boy's face, "let us commence with pleasantries. I am Taban," he said bowing.

"Who is your Lord?" Aldrin asked. Etiquette rules burned into his brain from years of watching foreign diplomats track mud upon their welcome mat flooded back.

This threw Taban off, which shifted the smirk to Aldrin's face, "Beg pardon?"

"Who do you serve?" the prince asked, pointing his sword to the shade.

"Ah. You are concerned I work with the Empire, yes?"

"There's a stranger wandering about in the woods where the prince of Ostero is hiding," he glanced over at Ciara and added, "and holding my friend hostage."
 

Taban laughed at that. "I have done many despicable acts, but kidnapping was never one of them. I did have to steal a donkey once, but that was a very long story. No, I do not, nor have I ever served the Empire. I find the Emperor rather deplorable, and I hear he smells of haddock. I am in service to The Triad."

Ciara looked at Aldrin but he kept his sword held out, as if it could do anything other than fall apart. She'd heard whispers of the Triad on long nights when the castle was still. It was something only those few in the Lord's close circle ever mentioned. Aldrin had never heard of it.

"I've never heard of this Triad."

"Your ignorance is not my fault," Taban said, "I suspect there is some wet nurse or an oily man with a droopy mustache to blame."

Ciara walked slowly across the clearing towards the prince, her hands held up, "Aldrin, it's all right. He's a..." friend died on her tongue, as did colleague, and acquaintance, "he's someone we owe both our lives to."

The sword wobbled a bit at that, "What are you talking about?"

She sighed and told him about the night he was stabbed, "That assassin, the Emperor's man who came after you. I didn't kill him." Ciara pointed to Taban, who waved, "He did."

A moment's pain crossed his eyes and she shared it. Not another person they owed a favor too for their lives. How many more mythical swords can there be?

"He killed the assassin and saved us both," he said, "and has been following us ever since?"

Ciara sensed the opening there. Was it really a lie of omission if she didn't fill in all the details about her involvement with Taban? But as she looked over to the man who could slit both their throats before they uttered another word she decided to come clean.

"There's more," she knotted her hands into the coat's pockets, her fingers clinking against something glass, "the night of the 'party' I didn't escape on my own. He helped me."

"I'd say I did a bit more than help," Taban said, the smirk secure on his face, tilting up a mustache he'd cultivated in the past two months.

"Aldrin," she looked into his eyes, more disturbed that she was concerned about hurting him than from actually lying, "I'm sorry I never told you. It," she glared over at Taban, "I didn't think I'd ever see him again."

"Why?"

"As I was running nearer to the caravans he just vanished from my side. Then we packed up and sailed off so quickly I assumed he'd fallen into a badger hole or something," Ciara confessed.

"Thanks for caring," Taban said cheerfully.

"I, I'm sorry," she continued, ignoring the assassin.

"No," Aldrin said, his eyes breaking free of Ciara's warmth. He raised his arm again, pointing the sword toward the man calmly picking at his freezing shoulders, "Why did you save me? Why does everyone keep saving me?"

Taban chuckled cruelly at that, "I could not tell you the machinations of a witch. As my Gran always said, 'do not meddle in the affairs of witches for they are witches, moron.' But my mission is much like the girl's here."

"You are beholden to me, then," Aldrin said.

A shadow fell over Taban and his tone darkened, "I am beholden to no boy who can barely find his own bollocks. My mission is my own. Lucky for you, it involves keeping you alive for the time being."

"Then why save me?" Ciara asked pointedly, well aware what her life was worth when compared to a possible king,
 
"Aldrin was safe with the historians, with or without me."

Taban laughed at that, the shadow vanishing back into the night as quickly as it came, "Perhaps I am a sucker for damsels in distress."

"Or perhaps you simply hope she will do your job for you."

"Is it open stage night?" Taban muttered as a fourth voice joined their unexpected party.

Isadora dropped her hand covering a small blue crystal clutched in the other. It lit up the snow around her, casting such a glow over her face she looked as if she were frozen solid. A blanket was wrapped over her shoulders and she had a woolen hat covering her head and ears, almost down to her eyebrows.
 

"You let a witch follow you home?" Taban asked Ciara, "Very dangerous. Once you feed it, you'll never get rid of her."

Isadora gripped her light crystal tightly and turned it until the blue beam focused squarely upon Taban's face. He staggered a bit in the snow, but tried to hold his ground. Ciara thought she could see small shards of ice crystallizing across his eyebrows and mustache.

He threw up his hands and said, "Very well, I can see when I am unwanted," even as his teeth chattered. Taban turned, stomping away from the three deeper into the forest.

"Wait!" Ciara called out, running towards him.

Taban turned, a small smile heating up the ice still clinging to his face. She sloughed off the second sleeve of the coat and handed it to him.

"I do not wish to be beholden to you," she said, passing it to him.

He took it slowly, looking back at the witch who continued to cast her ice crystal upon the spot he'd been standing, "For your sake, Nachtegaal, I hope you never are." Slipping on his coat, he got a few more feet into the trees before his trail vanished, as if he'd never left it.

Aldrin looked over at Isadora, still watching into the woods in case the assassin turned around. "Thank you for your assistance."

The witch turned to the boy king, covering over her crystal once more, "Shouldn't you be researching? Unless you think the sword of Casamir will discover itself."

With the prince properly cowed, the witch glanced once over at Ciara and, shaking her head, vanished back to her corner of the woods, leaving the two teenagers alone.

Aldrin struggled to put his sword away while still holding a torch high in one hand. Ciara walked to him, and, like a mother hen, said, "Here, let me help." Grabbing his belt loop, she guided the no longer sharp end to its home.

As soon as she released her grip, he stumbled back a bit, his cheeks flaming in the cold, "Now that whatever that was is over we should be getting back. Medwin says he found something for you."

"Right," Ciara nodded, trying to shake off the disquiet she felt at Aldrin shirking away from her touch.
 

The prince led the charge back, casting his torch high. Ciara looked back towards the spot where Taban had stood fearing her already complicated life was about to go careening off a cliff.

Medwin placed another three books into her overburdened pile and, lightly tapping his whiskery chin, bent down into another indiscriminate pile of books to haul out a fourth one. Aldrin was long lost to research notes, the handful that had survived the trip, and his own source material that Pajama's begrudgingly handed over as well as Mitrione and Dean. None of them were happy to be giving up what could have been their own personal discoveries if they'd ever one day suddenly decided to look at those books again.

"What's a cubit?" a voice called from the stacks that replaced what was Medwin's bedroom. The Chancellor took to sleeping in his overstuffed chair while the two scoured the past three hundred years, trying to find any mention of a sword.

"I believe it is a unit of measurement, though there is some debate as to exactly how long," Medwin responded settling behind his desk.

"So, it's not a cake then..." Aldrin tipped the book he'd been reading sideways, scattering a pile of notes onto the floor.

Ciara scooped some of them up and started to rifle through, pausing as she came across a few drawings in the margins. One was of a goat head butting what could have been Bartrone in his knickers. She flipped through a few more and beside "Casamir = homily about stabbing?" was a simple girlish face. He'd forgotten the nose and one eye was much smaller than the other, but she was framed by yards and yards of curly hair. Aldrin had spun his quill about so much it overlapped and ran off the margins.

As she came upon the last drawing, Ciara slapped the extra sheets down on top and, without looking at the boy, handed the notes back. He seemed oblivious, thanking her without looking up as his finger followed along a tricky passage.
 

Her cheeks burning, she turned back to her own section of the world, remembering all the times her mother told the maids to keep the cleric's quills away from the Knights. She was tired of scrubbing smut off the walls.

Aldrin put down his book and rubbed weary eyes. They'd been at this for almost three days now, the caravans trapped on the roads until a good wind came. The historians kept themselves sequestered in their own houses on wheels, watching the heavy flakes fall upon the already laden roads and abandoning their orphaned work as chattering teeth dreamed of how to ready for the coming holy day.

Chase and Chance, a long scarf wrapped between the two, picked up one of the armor historian's battle axes, actually sharpened it, and wandered into the forest. An hour or so later they returned with a small tree missing half its pine needles, and one very angry squirrel forced to shop around for a new home in this terrible market.

Aldrin rose from his spot and carefully made for the window, holding the robe close to his legs to keep from sweeping any more piles over. Pulling his sleeve over his hand, he wiped the condensation off the glass and looked out.
 

A few of the historians crowded around the tree, little more than three feet tall, each carrying a string of garland formed from whatever they could find. Kaltar had carefully threaded coffee beans with some twine and was trying to wind it about the baby tree. Dean took the few remaining pickled apples and shoved the twine through the center for some slightly soggy brine scented ornaments.
 

Chase and Chance argued over whether it should be a star or a moon on the top of the tree. Mitrione shooed them both away as he placed the traditionally ancient ball of raven feathers on the leaning top branch. It was really a few pigeon feathers he painted black, but tradition could be a bit flexible under such situations.

At the far edge stood Bartrone, who'd kept himself as much to himself as he could while still having food to eat and a warm place to sleep. After Medwin placed him on probation, most of the others avoided him lest they also catch sanction cooties. While Bartrone was supposed to be using his time organizing the library thinking upon his sins, he fed the fire of vengeful ambition instead. And occasionally cursed the dyslexic historian Dewey who last tried to organize every book by some arbitrary number his addled mind transformed into a letter.