“Do you want us to go back there, Your Majesty?”
Grace turned in the saddle. Aldeth was gazing at the open Rune Gate, his expression grim, his gray eyes distant. He seemed not to notice the way his hand crept up his chest.
“No,” Grace said softly. “There’s nothing for us there.” She forced her voice to brighten. “Now come, let’s go see what Sir Tarus wants with me.”
9.
Half an hour later, they rode through an arch into the courtyard between the main tower of the keep and Gravenfist’s outer wall. Once this place had thronged with warriors, rune‑speakers, and witches desperately battling to hold back the army of the Pale King. It was crowded today as well, though there were far more farmers, weavers, tanners, potters, merchants, and blacksmiths than there were men‑at‑arms.
Over the last three years, Gravenfist Keep had become less of a military fortress and more of a working castle. Most of the men who had marched here with Grace had stayed, and their families had come north to join them. There were now a number of villages in the valley, and farms were springing up in the fertile lands between the mountains and the Winter Wood–lands that had lain fallow for centuries.
There had been a brief time when Grace had considered relocating her court to the old capital of Tir‑Anon, some thirty leagues to the south; that was where the kings and queen of Malachor had dwelled of old. She had journeyed there the autumn after the war, along with Falken and Melia, but they had found little. Tir‑Anon had been utterly destroyed in the fall of Malachor seven hundred years ago. There was nothing save heaps of rubble overgrown with groves of valsindarand sintaren. They had returned to Gravenfist sober, and determined to make it their home.
“There you are, Your Majesty,” Sir Tarus said, rushing up as Grace brought Shandis to a halt before the main keep. His face was nearly as red as his beard.
“So it appears,” she said. “Thanks to a little help from Master Larad, Aldeth here was able to ferret me out.”
She glanced to her left, but where the spy had ridden a moment ago there was now only empty air. A sigh escaped her. “I wish I could disappear like that.”
Tarus clucked his tongue. “Queens don’t get to disappear, Your Majesty.”
“And why is that?”
“Because they must be ever available to their counselors, vassals, and subjects, of course.”
She allowed him to help her down from her horse. “That’s exactly why I wish I could vanish sometimes.”
“None of that now, Your Majesty,” Tarus said, giving her a stern look. “There’s work to be done.”
Grace sighed. This was part of an ongoing battle with Sir Tarus. She had made him her seneschal three years ago (after Melia gently pointed out that Grace didn’t have to try to run the kingdom all by herself), and in the time since Tarus had taken the job seriously. Too seriously, she sometimes thought. He worked at all hours of the day and night, and he hardly seemed to smile anymore. Where was the dashing young knight with the ready grin she had first met in the forests of western Calavan?
He’s still in there, Grace. Just older, like each of us.
A groom came to take Shandis to the stables, and Tarus walked with Grace to the main keep.
“Well,” she said as they approached the doors of the great hall, “were you going to tell me what was so urgent it couldn’t wait? Or are you simply going to spring it on me and see if I faint from shock?”
“Now that you mention it, I was sort of favoring the latter option,” Tarus said. “Only then I reconsidered,” the seneschal hastily added when she gave him a piercing glance.
However, even after he told her what had transpired, Grace still felt a keen jolt of surprise as she stepped into the great hall and saw the two men standing before the dais. One she did not recognize at all. He was a younger man, short but well built, dark‑haired, and clad in a gray tunic. His face was squarely handsome, but softened by a sensuous mouth. He held a staff carved with runes.
The other man she did recognize, but only after careful consideration. When she first met him, at the Council of Kings in Calavere, he had been a corpulent man dressed in ostentatious clothes, his gaze haughty, his thick fingers laden with rings.
The years had aged him greatly. He was rail‑thin now, and wore a simple black tunic and no jewelry. His bulbous nose was still ruddy–a testament to a past penchant for too much wine– but his close‑set eyes were clear and sober. He and his companion knelt as she entered.
“Rise, Lord Olstin of Brelegond, please,” she said when she managed to find the breath to speak. “You are welcome in Malachor.”
A sardonic smile played across his lip, though the expression was self‑deprecating now rather than arrogant as it once had been. “You are kind, Your Majesty. Kinder than you have either right or reason to be. Though it has been nearly five years, I have not forgotten how uncivilly I treated you at the Council of Kings, and I warrant you have not forgotten either.”
Grace winced, for it was true. She remembered well how Olstin had wheedled and cajoled, attempting to play her against King Boreas, and then–after she ordered him to step away from a serving maid he had slapped–had threatened her.
“You didn’t know at the time I was a queen, Lord Olstin.” She couldn’t help a small laugh. “Of course, I didn’t know I was a queen, either. So let’s call it even, shall we?”
“I don’t think so, Your Majesty,” Olstin said, approaching her. “You see, we are not even at all.”
Tarus cast Grace a sharp look, but she gave her head a small shake. “And why is that, Lord Olstin?”
“Because Brelegond owes you something, Your Majesty. It owes you its gratitude, and its allegiance.”
Grace was too astonished by these words to reply, but Sir Tarus took her arm, led her to the chair atop the dais (she refused to call it a throne), and sat her down. Additional chairs were placed for the guests on the step below Grace, and Tarus found a servant to bring them all wine, though Olstin chose water instead. Gradually, Grace’s shock was replaced by fascination as she listened to Olstin speak. Little news had come from the Dominion of Brelegond these last three years. It was farthest of all the seven Dominions from Malachor, and during the war it had been sorely damaged by the Onyx Knights.
The rebuilding had been slow, according to Olstin, but over time much had been accomplished. King Lysandir, who had been chained in the dungeon beneath Borelga after Brelegond fell to the Onyx Knights, had never truly recovered from his ordeal, and had passed away last winter. His niece, Eselde, had been crowned queen, and under her rule Brelegond had regained its former strength; indeed, it was stronger than it had been before the war.
“The gods know we were a foolish people, ruled by a foolish, if not unkind, man,” Olstin said. “We were the youngest of the Dominions, and so became caught up in fostering the appearance of prosperity and importance, rather than doing anything to truly beprosperous or important. However, young as she is, Eselde is quite practical. Even before her uncle died she was ruling in all but name, and she has accomplished much in a short time.”
“I’m glad,” Grace said, and she meant it. “But now, Lord Olstin, you must tell me what you need.”
Olstin laughed, wagging a finger at her. “No, Your Majesty, this rudeness I will once again do you: You must not dare to offer Brelegond help, at least not now. Much news has come to us these last years, and we are quite aware of all you have done. You have helped Brelegond, and all the Dominions, quite enough. Now it is our turn. My queen knows Brelegond is the last of the Dominions to offer allegiance to you as High Queen. We hope we shall not be the least.”