Tinwright wished he had the courage to bristle, to protest. It was disappointing that the princess seemed to be unaware of his small but growing reputation, but surely it must be obvious from looking at him that he was not of the same mettle as poor Gil.
“She’s right,” said Prince Barrick. He spoke more slowly and haltingly than reports of his mercurial nature would have suggested. “That merchant fellow probably told everyone in Southmarch what happened to him. And spread it over half the countryside before he even got here, as well.”
“If you look at the letter these two sent us,” Brone told them patiently, “it says, ‘I can tell you of the Prince of Settland’s daughter and why she was taken, with her guards and her blue dower-stone.’ That’s why we’re bothering with these lackwits.”
“I don’t understand,” said the princess.
“Because the merchant Beck didn’t know about the great sapphire the girl was bringing to Earl Rorick as part of her dowry. Nobody in the caravan knew, not even the guards, because her father was afraid of theft I only know myself because I received a letter out of Settland a few days ago, carried to me by a monk. The prince wrote to ask after his daughter and her safety, since he had heard disturbing rumors, and he specifically mentioned the sapphire she was carrying—in fact, it seemed almost as important to him as his child, so it is either a very expensive stone or he is a less than doting father. In any case, how…?”
“How can a mere potboy know about the stone?” Briony finished for him. She turned to Gil. “And you claim this came to you in dreams? What else can you tell us?”
He shook his head slowly. “I have forgotten some of what I meant to say, some of the things I heard and saw when I was sleeping. I was going to have Tinwright put it all down in writings for me, but the guards came and took me away from the Quiller’s Mint.”
“So even if he did somehow know something,” said Barrick, his words ripe with disgust, “he doesn’t know it now.” “I know you saw the ones in black,” Gil told the prince.
“What?”
“The ones in black. The walls aflame. And the man with the beard, running, calling you. I know you saw it…”
He did not finish because Barrick leaped forward and wrapped his hands around the potboy’s neck. Although Gil was a grown man, he offered no resistance. Barrick shoved the scrawny figure down to the floor and climbed onto his chest, shouting, “What does that mean? How could you know about my dreams?”
“Barrick!” Briony rushed forward and grabbed at his arms. The potboy was not struggling, but his face was turning a terrible, hectic red. “Let go— you’ll kill him!”
“How could you know? Who sent you? How could you know?”
As Tinwright watched in astonishment, the lord constable—moving with surprising swiftness for all his bulk—yanked the boy off the gasping, but still unresisting Gil. “I beg your your pardon, Highness, but have you lost your wits?” he demanded.
The prince squirmed free of the big man’s clutch. Barrick was breathing harshly, as though he had been the one strangled instead of the other way around. “Don’t say that! Don’t you dare say that!” he shouted at Brone. “Nobody can speak to me like that!” He seemed about to cry or to scream again, but instead his face suddenly went stony as a statue. He turned and walked out the chapel door, although it was a walk that was only one headlong step away from becoming a run. Two of the guards exchanged a weary look, then peeled off and followed him.
The potboy was sitting up now, wheezing quietly.
“How could you know about my brother’s dreams?” Briony Eddon demanded. Gil took a moment to answer. “I only tell what I saw. What I heard.”
She turned to Brone. “Merciful Zoria preserve me, I think sometimes I’m going mad—I must be, because otherwise I can make no sense of the things that happen in this place. Do you understand any of this?”
The lord constable did not answer immediately. “I… for the most part, I am as puzzled as you, my lady. I have a few ideas, but I think it unwise to share them in front of these two.” He jabbed his bearded chin toward Tinwright and the potboy.
“Well, we must do something about them, that’s sure.” Briony frowned. Tinwright still did not find her particularly fetching, but something about the princess definitely drew his attention, and it was not just her fame and power. She was very… forceful. Like one of the warrior goddesses, he thought.
“Clearly we must at least keep the potboy until we find the secret of his knowledge,” Brone said, giving the poet a spark of hope. Perhaps they would let him go! “Not to mention discovering how he got his hands on that gold dolphin he gave to this so-called poet. I suppose I can find a place for the potboy in the guard room—he’ll be under many eyes there. But I am not sure we want this other one gossiping in the taverns about what he’s seen.” Brone frowned. “I imagine you won’t simply let me kill him.” Suddenly breathless, Tinwright could only hope it was meant as a joke. He was relieved when the princess shook her head. “Too bad,” Brone told her, “because there is little need for his shiftless sort, and Southmarch already has armies of them.”
“I don’t care what you do with the one who wrote the letter.” Briony was staring fixedly at Gil; Tinwright had an inexplicable twinge of jealousy. “I doubt he has anything to do with this matter—the potboy cannot write and needed someone to do it. Send the poet back home and tell him we’ll cut his head off if he whispers a word. I need to think.”
Tinwright had suffered a series of glum realizations. If he went back to the Quiller’s Mint, he would soon be getting that promised visit from the guard whose woman he apparently stole; not only would he be brutally beaten, but it would be for something he couldn’t even remember—drinking with Hewney nearly always ended in oblivion. He could only hope the wench had been pretty although, looking at the guard, he rather doubted it. But since the lord constable had confiscated his gold dolphin, he couldn’t afford to move elsewhere. There was no well-heeled lady in his life at the moment to take him in, only Brigid who lived at the Mint. And the cold weather had come. It would be a bad time to live in the streets.
Tinwright was now feeling extremely sorry for himself. For a moment he considered concocting a story of his own to make himself more useful and important, pretending that he shared some of the potboy’s strange knowledge, but one look at the massive Brone convinced him of the folly of that. For some reason, Gil actually did know things he shouldn’t, but Tinwright could summon no such weaponry, even in bluff. He contemplated the distracted princess and an idea struck him so abruptly that he couldn’t help wondering if Zosim was trying to make up for the fickle cruelty of his other gift. He dropped to his knees on the floor.
“My lady,” he said in his most sincere voice, the one that had kept him in food and drink since he first ran away from home, “Highness, may I beg a favor? It is far too much and I am far too lowly, but I beg you at least to hear me. She looked at him. That was a first step, at least. “What?”
“I am a poet, Princess—a humble one, one whose gifts have not always been rewarded, but those who know me will tell you of my quality.” She was losing interest so he hurried ahead. “I came here in fear and trepidation. My attempt to do a kindness for my simple friend the potboy has caused you and your brother pain. I am devastated.” She smiled sourly. “If you tell anyone about this, you certainly will be devastated.”
“Please, only hear me, Highness. Only hear your humble servant. Your attention to the cares of the land have doubtless prevented you from knowing of the panegyric I am writing about you.” That, and the fact that he had been writing no such thing before this moment.