Sacrifice: The First Book of the Fey (41 page)

He dried off, then sprawled backward on the softness of his bed, letting the feathered mattress enfold him. His body tingled from the exercise, and his stamina was good. But he had worked too hard on that fight. If he’d wanted that kind of battle, he could have gone into the woods and waited for a Fey to appear.

A knock at the door startled him.

“Yes?” Nicholas said.

“Yer Highness, yer father requests yer presence.” The voice belonged to his chamberlain. “Says there’s news.”

How often had he heard those words in the last few months? News was rarely good anymore. It was more dead, or sunken ships, or a food crisis near the marshes. His father had placed a food tax on the outlying provinces that hadn’t been invaded by the Fey, and the landowners weren’t happy with it. But with the Fey so close, Jahn would have suffered a food shortage if his father hadn’t taken action.

“Come in, then,” Nicholas said. “I’ll need your help.”

The door opened. His chamberlain entered. He was a gaunt man. His son had been Nicholas’s chamberlain for three years, but the boy had died in the battle. His father never spoke unless he had something he felt was important to say. He apparently stepped into his son’s job because the family relied more on the palace income than it did on the subsistence farm he had tried to maintain.

The chamberlain bowed his head. “Highness.”

“Clothes,” Nicholas said, as if it weren’t obvious. “I was going to dress myself, but there isn’t time.”

The chamberlain peered at him. “You’re bleeding, Highness.”

“It’s not serious,” Nicholas said. “It’ll be all right if I give it a chance to scab. But I don’t have time to wait for clothing. Find me a cloth to keep against this cut, and a shirt that won’t show blood.”

The chamberlain disappeared into the wardrobe. Nicholas slipped out of his pants and threw them beside the bed. The chamberlain returned with a strip of cloth, which he wound around Nicholas’s waist. Then he went back and got a dark shirt and fawn pants, which he helped Nicholas put on.

“Did my father say what the news is?” Nicholas asked as he adjusted the wide lace cuffs on his sleeves.

“No, Highness. But it seems important. ‘Tis men on horseback.”

Nicholas nodded. “Thank you,” he said by way of dismissal. Then he ran his fingers through his damp hair and pulled it into a ponytail. The chamberlain picked up Nicholas’s discarded clothes. Nicholas strapped his knife around his waist—he no longer went anywhere without a weapon—and headed to his father’s audience chamber.

He took the winding staircase down two steps at a time and wondered what had happened now. The last time he had been called down the stairs, only a day ago, was for the news that the fifth Fey ship had been defeated at the mouth of the Cardidas. He couldn’t hope for good news two days in a row.

He hurried through the passageway, entering the audience chamber alone and unannounced.

In the last year the audience chamber had lost its musty smell. The spears still lined the walls, but guards now stood between them. Real swords rested in a stand behind the dais, as did vials of holy water.

His father was seated on the throne, Stephen and Lord Stowe beside him. Stephen raised his eyebrows and half smiled as Nicholas came in. Nicholas did not acknowledge him.

Two men wearing stained clothing and days’ old growth of beard stood at the base of the stairs, looking a bit confused by the sudden delay.

“Nicholas,” his father said. “We started without you.”

“I’m sorry, Father.” Nicholas walked to the stairs, nodding as he passed the men. They smelled of sweat and horses. They had been riding for some time. “I only just heard that you’d be here.”

His father nodded as if the matter was really of no consequence. Nicholas took his place behind the throne, between Lord Stowe and Stephen.

“All right,” Nicholas’s father said to the men below. “Continue.”

“‘Twas one of their scouts we was following, Sire,” said the man on the right. He was stocky with broad lips and a red nose. “He was watchin’ the whole battle at the mouth of the Cardidas.”

“Why didn’t you capture him there?” Lord Stowe asked.

“Dinna see him, milord,” the other man said. He was stocky as well, but his stockiness looked more like muscles. “He showed up outta nowhere right in front of us.”

“Showed up out of nowhere?” Nicholas asked.

“Ye see, Highness, ‘twas like we seen an outline, and then it become this man,” the first said.

“But you let him go,” Lord Stowe said again.

“Yes, milord,” the second man said. “We thought if he was scoutin’, he would have ta report somewheres, and since they left the river, we knew that ye been lookin’ for them.”

“We have,” Nicholas’s father said.

“And we know where they are.”

Nicholas leaned forward, his arms on the back of the throne. His posture was not quite disrespectful, but only because he was Alexander’s son and would occupy the throne one day. “We already know about where they are. We’ve heard tales of their disappearing in the woods to the west of Jahn, near a bunch of old hovels.”

“Not disappearin’, beg pardon, Highness,” the first man said. He took a step forward. He seemed to be the one with the courage. “They got a door.”

“If they have a door, why can’t we see it?” Lord Stowe asked.

“Ye can,” said the second man, who then bowed his head and added, “milord.”

Nicholas didn’t move. If these men were correct, they had found the Fey’s hiding spot. The lords had been hoping for this. They hoped they could find a way to trap the Fey inside.

The first man glanced at his companion, clearly exasperated, and continued for him. “Ye canna see the door in the day. They got tiny lights around it, like fireflies. The lights blink at different times, so ye gotta be lookin’ for it. But it makes a circle that a man can put his head and shoulders through.”

“What did you do after you found the door?” Nicholas’s father asked.

“We waited until we dinna see nobody, then we walked around it. ‘Tis like they say about the one in the river. Ye canna feel nothing except if ye close yer eyes and pretend. Although them lights at the door are hot if ye touch one.”

“How do you know this is the proper door?” Stephen asked, his voice full of disdain. Nicholas shot a sidelong glance at him. Stephen was standing at attention, not looking at all tired from their exertion earlier.

“Beg pardon, sir, but we seen the creature go through it.”

“You what?” Stephen asked. Color flooded his face. That news shouldn’t upset him. Unless he knew something that Nicholas didn’t.

“We seen him go through. He was runnin’ from us fast as he could—him not knowin’ that we was gonna let him go—and he dived through that door like he was headin’ into a lake. Then he vanished,” the second man said. He didn’t add the niceties for Stephen.

“A man that was half-visible when you first saw him,” Stephen said, his tone implying that the man’s story seemed too tall to be true.

“Aye, sir,” the first man said, ignoring Stephen’s tone. “But this was different. ‘Twas like that circle ate him. He went through a door.”

“It is in the right location,” Nicholas said.

“Lord Stowe,” his father said, “I want you to take these men to a room where they can clean up and rest, as well as eat whatever they want. Then I want you to get a scribe and have them tell everything they remember, every nuance and every detail. We will need that to go over.”

Nicholas stood up, astonished. The meeting was just getting interesting. His father never broke up a meeting so quickly, especially when they were getting such valuable information. Perhaps he had caught Stephen’s tone and was going to reprimand him for it.

“I’ll take care of it, Sire,” Lord Stowe said.

“When you’re done, report back to me.”

“I will, Sire.”

Lord Stowe led the men out of the room. The guards continued to stare straight ahead, as if they had heard nothing. Nicholas waited for his father, unwilling to challenge him in public.

“Stephen, Nicholas, come with me,” his father said. He also pointed to one of the guards and indicated that he should accompany them. Then his father left the dais by the small door in the back. It led to a tiny chamber that had once been a listening booth. The last time Nicholas had been in there had been when he was a boy. He saw his first spider there, crawling across the floor, and screamed so loud he had interrupted his father’s audience.

All four men barely fit inside. The chamber had four scarred chairs that looked as if they belonged in the servants’ quarters. Alexander pushed one against the door, and the guard sat on it, facing them. Nicholas and Stephen took two other chairs. Nicholas’s father remained standing.

“What happened?” Nicholas asked. “Why did you end that? They weren’t done.”

“We have enough information to begin plans,” his father said. “We need to get to those Fey as quickly as we can. We have the advantage of surprise.”

“If those men are right,” Stephen said, “we would need hundreds of fighters.”

“Not with enough holy water,” Nicholas said. “We send in some fast-moving people. Maybe even that whole secret construct they have would disappear if touched. We don’t know.”

“What if those men are wrong?” Stephen asked. “Then what?”

“Then nothing,” Nicholas’s father said. “We have lost nothing.”

“I think we should go with a small force, observe, and see if the men are right,” Nicholas said. “Then if they are, we get enough holy water to drown the place and do a two-pronged attack, one with arrows and the other with men carrying the vials. We could rout them in no time.”

“Stephen?” his father asked.

“I still think we should gather as many men as we can and send them in. We are safer in larger numbers.”

His father templed his fingers and put them against his lips. “We don’t know what kind of powers this secret place gives them,” he said. “We shouldn’t risk a lot of our own people until we have knowledge. If we can defeat them in one attack, fine. If not—“

“We have tipped our hand. They will know that we can get them, that we know where their secret place is,” Stephen said.

“I suspect they already know that,” Nicholas said. “The men said their scout knew he was being followed.”

“But he wouldn’t have gone in if he thought they saw him,” his father said. “We’ll have to act quickly. Stephen, I want you to fetch Monte. We’ll have a meeting after dinner tonight and finalize plans. Then we’ll send out a force after dark.”

“At night?” Nicholas asked.

“They said lights surround the door. It makes sense, doesn’t it?”

“I guess,” Nicholas said. Something was odd about this conversation. It left him unsettled.

“All right, Sire,” Stephen said. He stood and bowed. The guard got up and moved the chair away from the door. Nicholas’s father stood and watched Stephen walk through the audience chamber. Then he dismissed the guard and eased the door closed.

“What was that?” Nicholas asked. “I have never seen you make plans on such little information.”

His father grinned. “War councils are supposed to act quickly.”

“But not that quickly. We don’t know everything.”

His father shrugged. “We know enough.”

Nicholas tilted his head back and watched his father. He leaned against the door as if he didn’t want anyone to come in.