The Dragonprince's Heir (7 page)

"But not all that's left of humanity," Caleb said, his voice ominous. "Mankind has persisted by doing what it does best."

I didn't want to ask it, but I had to know. I swallowed hard. "What do they do best?"

He shrugged one shoulder. "Survive." He said no more, but his eyes spoke of endless horrors. For a moment I imagined the atrocities man might be capable of, living under the constant terror of the dragonswarm. Robbed of civilization. Surviving. I trembled.

"We are not just waiting here in the fortress," Mother told me. "We have never been. We're working hard to fix a broken world."

Caleb nodded. "We are rebuilding order. That requires dedication and sacrifice."

"Precisely," she said, bending his words back against him. "And that is why we must do what we must do."

"Hm. Then who will carry on Daven's work?" Caleb asked. "Who will protect these people?"

"The king will," she said. "That is his responsibility, after all. He is leaving a garrison here, and a steward to manage things in my stead."

Caleb snorted his disapproval, but he was finished fighting her. "Are you sure you want me along?"

"I would not go one step outside the walls without you at my side," she said, sincerity warming her voice until it glowed. "But I will not order you to come."

"You would not need to," he said. "I must go where you go. How many can I bring with me?"

"The king has approved Taryn's knights," she said.

"Good. And?"

She bit her lip. After a moment Caleb sighed and nodded. "Very well. I shall make preparations."

He turned toward the door, but she stopped him with a light touch on his arm. "Thank you, Caleb."

Caleb only shook his head. He gave her a humorless smile, then pulled gently away. He left us alone. For a while after he left she only stood there, staring at the door. I left her to her thoughts, because I had troublesome realizations of my own clawing at the back of my consciousness.

My excitement at the thought of visiting the capitol had pushed aside the things we'd discussed before, including the dark suspicions of the cruel king. But in that light, I had no wish to leave. For the first time in years, I cherished the quiet security of my home. Too much was changing, far too fast.

When she finally turned her attention to me, she looked wilted. Her fine dress looked too big, too heavy for her shoulders. She raised a hand to wipe away a tear I hadn't seen in her eye. Then she blinked at me with a hollow smile. "His loyal dedication can be quite a burden at times."

I held her gaze. "It is not an invitation." She shook her head. I nodded. "We are not guests of the king." Again she shook her head. Again I nodded. "We are his...prisoners?"

Now she nodded. She wiped away another tear, then straightened her shoulders and came to meet me. She looked proud and tall again. Strong enough for anything. She tipped my chin up. "I imagine he shall find us some astonishingly comfortable cells."

She wanted me to laugh at that. I couldn't. I sighed. "I did this."

"No," she said. "The king did this. Or if we blame anyone else, we must blame us all. You. Me. Caleb. Your father. This moment is the price we pay for fifteen years of doing the right thing."

"Will he...what will he do with us?"

She sniffed lightly, shook her hair back, and smiled. "He will give us rooms in the palace and Green Eagles to watch over us. He will give us a pension to keep us in luxury. He will invite us to feasts and send us to plays and probably eventually take you along on foxhunts and marry you off to some courtier's pretty little daughter."

She straightened my collar, and smiled more genuinely.

I eyed her askance. "Comfortable cells indeed. Why would he—"

"To keep us close," she said. "He doesn't need to kill us, Taryn. He doesn't need to lock us up. He needs to keep us away from our people and to show the world that we are his."

"Oh." I chewed on my thumbnail for a moment, thinking. It did not sound such a terrible fate. But something in Caleb's sharp defiance, in Mother's sad resignation, told me there was worse to this.

And then I understood. "Prisoners," I said. "The lady and the heir. That works if
we
are the threat. But if Father's still alive, if he ever turns up—"

"Then we become hostages," she said. "Against your father, until the king is satisfied."

I swallowed and met her eyes. "Satisfied?"

She stared at her fingers for a moment, then said, "We have a long journey ahead of us. Make your preparations."

"We could still ask Caleb to find us a way out of this."

She came two paces back to me and kissed me warmly on the forehead. "All will be well, Taryn. Just...be ready. You have three days."

And then she was gone.

4. Travel Plans

I did not enjoy my last three days at the Tower of Drakes. Every meal was a feast in the great hall. Every day featured parades or spectacles. Every evening there were stories and songs. But they could not touch me.

Everywhere I went for three days, the king was there. I did make a formal apology, and he accepted it with a smile and a laugh, but nothing changed. For three days I watched him watch my mother. I watched him survey the great fortress my father had built like some run-down country estate he intended to acquire. I watched him appoint the stewards who would govern in Mother's absence and the soldiers who would protect my father's people.

I watched him assert his ownership—of my home and of my family. I had set it all in motion. I spent three days feeling the full weight of that fact. And I could do nothing to stop it. On the night of the third day I went early to my bed. I lay in the darkness staring up at the ceiling and listening to the frantic tremor of my heart.

I did not sleep.

Well before dawn on the fourth day, I heard a single knock on my door. I turned in time to see the door thrown open. Caleb came in, Jen and Toman one pace behind him. I squeezed my eyes shut an instant before Caleb spoke the word of command, and my father's fire lit the room.

"Today," Caleb said.

I swung my legs over the edge of the bed and blinked against the light. Outside my window the sky was still dark.

"Your things?" Caleb asked. He needn't have. My bags lay in the bottom of the open wardrobe. I nodded once, and he nodded once, and Jen fetched the bags for him. She held them open while Caleb peered inside. He checked all three in a matter of moments, then grunted.

"Come on." He jerked his head toward the door. I stamped my feet into my boots, buckled on my belt, and followed him out into the corridor with my knights trailing behind me.

Caleb headed toward the stairs. I caught at his sleeve and fought against a yawn. "Can I speak with Mother before we go?"

We rounded the corner and headed down the outer stairs before he answered. "You aren't going anywhere with these bags. You wouldn't make it two days on the road. I should have checked on you sooner."

I scowled at his back. "What am I lacking?"

"Common sense. Understanding. Patience. Discipline. Flint and steel."

Behind me, Jen chuckled. I did not look back at her, but Caleb tossed her a quick glare. Then we left the stairs on the fourth floor and wasted most of an hour moving through the stores. Caleb stuffed my packs to bursting, choosing things apparently at random.

While we were doing that, the tower woke up around us. Servants scurried in the corridors. The huge cook fires were stoked in the kitchens below, and soon the smells of bacon and bread rose up to us. As we approached the central staircase I could hear the sounds of breakfast in the great hall below.

But Caleb walked right by the stairs. I tried to catch his sleeve again, but he jerked his arm angrily away before I even reached it. "What?" he growled.

"Are we not going down to breakfast? Mother will be expecting me."

He rounded on me and glared down. "You've never been outside the walls. You don't know what you will need—"

I raised both hands in surrender. "Perhaps, but we couldn't stuff so much as a sewing needle into any of my packs at this point. Unless you want to find me another bag...."

He weighed it for a moment. "No," he said at last. "Even so, I fear you will have to do without breakfast today. The king expects us to be mounted and ready by morning bell, and we have much to do."

"We do? What?"

He scowled. He almost didn't answer. "As your Mother explained, the true hope of this land rests on the plans we have for the people of the Tower. There are long-term projects that must be maintained in our absence."

"But the king is leaving stewards—"

"Who will serve the king's interests," Caleb said. "And the king's interest is for everyone here to forget Daven's name. They might very well try to encourage the people to go start new farms on the open plains."

I frowned, remembering the vague terrors Caleb had hinted at before. "That would not work?"

"Bandits would eat them for breakfast," Caleb said, off-hand.

I looked toward the great hall again. "What does this have to do with
my
breakfast?"

"Your mother has been tied to the king. You and I must go and speak with the master craftsmen who will carry on our work while we are gone. You can offer official goodbyes in your mother's name, and I will provide instructions. Do you understand?"

I drew myself up tall. "Of course."

"Good," he said. "Come."

At the foot of the tower he sent Toman with my bags to prepare our horses, but Jen still followed on my heel. We visited with the carpenters and the smiths, with the millers and the farmers, with the builders and the scavengers. We crossed the south courtyard five different times, back and forth, as though Caleb had not planned his route at all. More than an hour burned away while we said our goodbyes, and whenever we passed close enough to see the north courtyard beneath the gate, I could see the king's train being assembled.

The king had a fine carriage, all violet and gold, and large enough by the look of it to host a minor feast. I had never seen it without a dozen Green Eagles standing guard, and now there were four times that number arrayed and waiting to act as escort.

Behind his carriage were several others. Any one of them might have seemed extravagant on its own, but they paled in comparison to the king's. These belonged to the lords who had accompanied him—powdered wigs and powdered faces I had seen at all the dinners, but otherwise they had made no impression. Now they gathered around their carriages and snapped at the servants loading heavy boxes on the tops.

And there at the back of the train was another carriage. It looked plain and shabby. Its walls were unadorned wood, its harness plain brown leather. That one was ours. By the time we left our meeting with the scavengers, the carriage was already in position before the great gate.

I caught Caleb's arm, fought to keep my grip until he finally stopped and turned to me, and I pointed. "Our carriage is ready. Shouldn't we—"

He shook me off and shook his head. "We aren't riding in the carriage."

I frowned. "But Mother—"

"Isabelle is riding in the carriage. I'll find us a place in one of the cavalry regiments."

"What?" I asked. "But why?"

"Because you irritate the king. My duty is to protect your mother's life. Right now the king's impetuous judgment is the gravest threat to it. And you get him riled up."

"So I will not see her at all?"

He frowned down at me for a long time. "Perhaps at Cara," he said. "We may find a moment. But otherwise no. I want you as far from the king's train as possible."

I wanted to argue. It seemed entirely unfair. But before I could find the words, I saw the procession coming out of the tower. The king's wizards were close by his side, and the Green Eagles hung in a cloud around him like a swarm of angry bees.

I paid them no mind. My eyes were on Mother. She wore a plain white dress today and her hair tied back. She strode at the king's side, her hand in the crook of his elbow, and even from this distance I could see his smile and laughter. They talked as he walked her to her sad carriage. Then the king himself handed her up into its confines. He watched with a careful eye until the door was closed behind her. Until a half dozen of his personal guard moved into position on either side of it. Then he left for his own carriage.

I turned to Caleb, alarmed. "They're leaving! Without us!"

He tore his gaze from the carriages and looked down at me. After a moment he laughed. "I believe we can catch up."

"But—"

"Taryn, he has ten thousand men to coordinate. He'll be lucky to make two miles before midday. We will join him before he passes Teelevon."

I frowned up at him. "But won't he be angry? He might have someone looking for me already. I'm supposed to be his hostage."

Caleb's laughter died away, but still he did not seem worried. "He has someone looking for you. Or rather, your mother does. The king is quite confident you will be apprehended and brought along in due time."

I turned to see the carriages begin to move. They rolled easily across the smooth stone floor of the courtyard, then clattered out onto the unpaved road that stretched north toward the heart of a broken kingdom. For several heavy minutes we watched them go.

Then, without turning to him, I said, "It's you."

He nodded. "The king has Isabelle. That is enough assurance that I will do as he desires."

"Ah." I waited a moment longer, staring at the cloud of dust that now obscured my mother's carriage from sight. Then I narrowed my eyes. "But why? You have been at this since before the dawn, haven't you? Why keep me back?"

He turned me to face him, and for the first time I could remember, he softened his voice for me. "I would ask a favor of you."

"Oh," I said. "Um. Certainly. What?"

"Escape."

I frowned up at him. "What?"

"Slip through my grasp. Lose yourself among the Tower folk. You won't be able to play the little prince with the king's stewards here, but Haven knows you'll be comfortable enough."