"Yet one minute you're locked in a prison cell and the next you're catching up with old friends."
Alvantes shrugged resignedly. "All right. As you must have realised, my father's a senator in the Court. Back in the cell, he passed me a message. A simple code."
"A code?"
"Something we settled on years ago. A message hidden in the final words of each sentence."
How had I missed it? I'd been so quick to write Alvantes Senior off as senile that I'd hardly bothered to consider what he was saying. From what I could remember of his diatribe, I could even piece together a little of what he'd told his son. There had been directions in there — and hadn't he mentioned something about the stable? All those strange allusions to times made a lot more sense now.
Thinking back brought another realisation — one I'd have made at the time if only I'd been paying attention. "He gave you the key to your shackle, didn't he? When he hit you."
"Yes."
"Then he arranged for the door to be left open and the guard to be drugged."
"Something like that. If the details are so important to you, ask him yourself."
We'd almost reached the wooded glen and the small columned building with its militant passenger. It struck me almost in the same moment that it must be a tomb, and that a figure on horseback was just visible in the thick arboreal shadows.
"Good morning, Father," said Alvantes.
Alvantes's father walked his horse out to meet us. "Gailus passed you my message, then?" he said. "I half-expected him to forget."
Alvantes tipped his head towards the statue. "He remembered. Grandfather, at least, looks well."
"Sometimes I envy him. He fought his battles in simpler times."
"Probably they didn't seem that way to him."
"Perhaps. Perhaps the fights never seem straightforward when you're in the midst of them." Alvantes's father sounded weary — more so even than a man of his age would normally be for staying up all night. "It's good to see you free. But you should never have come to Pasaeda, Lunto."
"I did what I had to do," said Alvantes.
"Maybe. Either way, you're ahead of schedule. I take it they know you've escaped?"
Alvantes nodded.
"No time for pleasantries then. We'll talk as we ride." Alvantes Senior turned his horse's nose toward a road other than the one we'd arrived by, and set off at a trot. He waited for us to match his speed before he continued, "Panchetto's loss was a terrible blow. For the King and the kingdom. For all of us."
Alvantes hung his head, much as he'd done when they last spoke. "I know. Believe me."
"I'm willing to accept that you'd have saved Panchetto if you possibly could. I think the King would be too, were he in his right mind. Moaradrid's rebellion and the uproar in the far north have been poisoning his thoughts for a long time now; and there are always elements in the Court ready to inject fresh bile."
"Is there any way I can help?" asked Alvantes.
"Absolutely not." His father's voice had acquired a note of iron forcefulness. "Lunto, listen to me now, if it's the only time you ever do. The best and only thing you can do is to go home. Help Altapasaeda however you can. We'll send aid if we're able, but don't rely on it. In fact, for the time being, anticipate the worst."
"What will you do?"
Alvantes Senior shook his head. It struck me more as a response to circumstances in general than to Alvantes's question. "His Highness must not be allowed to become a tyrant. There are many of us in the Court who strive to keep him on the higher path."
By then we were halfway down a long street, quite narrow by the standards of Pasaeda, hemmed on either side by two-storey buildings fronting directly to the road. They were still impressive, but considerably less so than the manors I'd seen on the way in. Perhaps here was the answer to my wonderings as to where Pasaeda's not-quite-so-wealthy citizens resided. Ahead, the walls were clearly visible about the rooftops, no more than a couple of minutes' ride away. Our freedom was truly within reach.
Pulling just ahead, Alvantes Senior wheeled his horse. "We're near the gates," he said. He motioned skyward, where the first light of sunrise was gilding the rooftops. "Unless someone's had the foresight to pass on the alert, they'll be opening the gates at any minute. Go, while you still can."
"The King's bound to realise you helped us," said Alvantes.
"He'll see reason eventually. He'll understand my motives."
"And if he doesn't?"
"Then he's still the King," said Alvantes Senior. "Go, Lunto."
There was strain in his voice that hadn't been there an instant ago — controlled but unmistakeable. I glanced at Alvantes, saw I wasn't the only one to have noticed it.
"Come with us," he said. "For a while, at least. Give the King time to calm down."
"It isn't for you or me to predict the moods of a King."
"Father…"
"Don't insult me by asking me to further dishonour our family. I told you to go." If the words were angry, his father's tone betrayed them. The strain had become something more. Could it be fear?
Whatever it was, it sent shivers through me. "Come on," I told Alvantes.
I could see the conflict in his face. But his father's was an inscrutable mask, offering no room for argument.
"Goodbye," Alvantes said.
"Go!" Alvantes Senior stirred his horse into motion and rode swiftly past us, back in the direction we'd come.
After a moment's pause, Alvantes encouraged his own mount forward. Relieved that the family drama was done with, I followed.
We were almost at the end of the road before we heard Alvantes Senior's voice again. It was faint, but there was a clear note of remonstrance in it, as though he were arguing with someone.
I didn't want to stop. I didn't want to look. There was no good reason he'd be arguing with anyone in the street at this hour. Alvantes had already jerked to a halt — as though the sound were a shock of thunder that his gaze had sought out. His expression showed something worse than my own mounting alarm.
It was grief. It was the grief of loss.
There was no way I could have known what to expect. Yet when I looked round and saw them, I felt only a sick sense of inevitability. Stick and Stone, the King's chequered jester-assassins, had come to a halt just ahead of Alvantes's father. They looked absurd, dressed up like that in the middle of the street, all the more so because their horses were piebald — one black but splashed with white and the other white with stains of black. That absurdity did nothing to make them less terrifying. If anything, the opposite was true.
Though they were too distant for me to catch individual words, it was clear Alvantes Senior was protesting. It was hard to imagine any complaint penetrating that grim, clownish exterior, and yet they seemed to be waiting patiently enough.
Or so I thought.
As far as I saw, neither one moved. When Alvantes's father jerked backward, it seemed purely of his own accord. He kept his balance a moment, reaching with one hand to his chest. He might have been struck by indigestion. Then he slid backwards, sideways.
The crunch as he struck the cobbles was loud even where we were.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
"Alvantes…"
I meant to say Let's go. I meant to say There's nothing you can do. But the sounds just wouldn't come.
It hardly mattered. Even if I'd managed to get the words out, I might as well have pleaded with a wall. Alvantes held himself so utterly still that it was hard to believe he'd ever move again.
The jester-assassins waltzed their steeds delicately round his father's body, as though its presence on the cobbles was in questionable taste. They showed no sense of urgency. They were hardly even looking in our direction. Every nerve in my body ached to flee, yet I couldn't. Not alone. Because the prospect of being alone and hunted through Pasaeda by those freaks was more than I dared imagine.