Sacrifice: The First Book of the Fey (97 page)

Two guards stood at the door to the War Room, arms crossed. More guards had been at the entrances to the tower below. Nicholas had refused the guards his father had assigned to him. He wasn’t certain if having guards was such a good idea. He was afraid it made the Fey’s access to him that much easier. Yet not having guards was also difficult. No one protected him from the surprise attack.

He nodded to them as he grabbed the doorknob. The guards nodded back. Then Nicholas pushed the door open.

New maps covered the walls, and the room shone with polish. Someone had cleaned the stains off the floor long ago, but Nicholas still saw them. This was the place where he had grown up, where he had learned that even if he loved someone, love did not mean he could trust. He missed that easy faith in the people around him. Its loss made him feel lonely.

His father was sitting at the head of the table, staring at a scrolled list that seemed to extend forever. When he saw Nicholas, he smiled and waved a hand, indicating that Nicholas should close the door. Nicholas did.

“Do you realize,” his father said, “that we have lost over a thousand lives in the skirmishes since the invasion? And those are just the official lives. They don’t count women or children or men who stayed home to defend their families. Only the men who worked as guards or volunteered to defend an area. And it doesn’t count the people in the invasion.”

“I don’t know why you’re torturing yourself with that,” Nicholas asked with a touch of impatience. “We’re at war.”

Something in Nicholas’s tone must have alerted his father. He let go of the scroll, and it rolled on its own. “What’s happening?”

“I don’t know,” Nicholas said. He stopped at the edge of the table. The room smelled faintly of ink and parchment. “I was hoping you could tell me. Has the Rocaan told you of any plans to leave Jahn?”

“No,” his father said. “I haven’t spoken to him in a day or so, but I’m sure he would have told me.”

“Well, he hasn’t,” Nicholas said. “I was riding near the bridge tonight when I saw his entourage cross. I spoke to an Aud. The Rocaan and three Elders are headed to Daisy Stream.”

“Some kind of ceremony?”

“In the past maybe. But not now. The road to Daisy Stream leads them past the Fey encampment.”

His father rolled up the scroll and tied a ribbon around it, placing it on the table behind him. “Why didn’t you speak to the Rocaan?”

“I tried. The Rocaan and the Elders won’t speak to anyone until they return.”

“And they knew it was you?”

“Yes.” And that was the strangest thing. The Rocaan’s entourage had not stopped for him.

His father let out a breath and leaned back in his chair. It squeaked under his weight.

“Their determination and secrecy bother me,” Nicholas said. His father’s silence was not the reaction he had expected. “Combine that with the problems in the Tabernacle with the bones and the blood, and we have a serious problem. The Rocaan makes our holy water. If he dies or it gets contaminated—”

“I understand the problems, Nicholas,” his father snapped. He ran a hand through his long blond hair. “I take it you came straight to me.”

“Yes,” Nicholas said.

“We could send someone to the Tabernacle, but it would take too long.” His father frowned. “We’ll send a contingent of guards to follow them and see if anything’s wrong.”

“I already sent the guards,” Nicholas said. He was trembling, although he didn’t want to show it. This was the first time he had taken action without his father’s permission.

“You what?”

Nicholas swallowed. “There wasn’t time to contact anyone and get permission. So I found Monte, explained that I needed guards, and sent them after the Rocaan.”

“To do what, if I might ask?”

Nicholas ignored the sarcasm. “To keep an eye on him, in case something happens.”

His father leaned back and rubbed his jaw reflectively. He took a deep breath. “It is what I would have ordered.”

“I know,” Nicholas said.

“What I don’t understand is why you were in such a hurry to see me, if you had already taken action.”

“I want to go with them as well.”

His father stared at him for a long moment, his expression unreadable. “Why?”

“Because I think something is going to happen, and I want to be there.”

“What would you do there?”

Nicholas shrugged. He couldn’t tell his father he was tired of indecision. It was his father’s indecision that bothered Nicholas. He wanted to go with the Rocaan because he felt that the Rocaan had a purpose. “I would be able to report back here, probably much more clearly than any of the guards could.”

His father shook his head. “Your first instinct was right. This is not a place for you. The Rocaan is a smart man. If this is his doing, then it might be a simple ceremony. He has said in the past he does not like being held hostage to the Fey. If it is not, the guards will inform us. I don’t want you in the middle of this.”

“Like it or not, Father,” Nicholas said, “I am in the middle of this. I fought during the invasion beside kitchen staff, I sat next to a Fey in this very room, and I suspect I’ve seen even more. Trying to protect me won’t accomplish the job. Either I die or I don’t.”

His father’s cheeks flushed. “It’s not that simple. You’re the heir. If something happens to me, this country needs you.”

Nicholas sighed and sat down. He knew his father would say that, and he really had no argument against it. Fey leaders fought beside their men, but Islanders were not Fey. “Father,” he said, “I would like to know what the Rocaan is doing because he is doing something. And it’s time. We can’t let these Fey stay on our lands. They have too many tricks, and someday they’ll outsmart us. We have only one advantage. They have several.”

“I’ve thought of this,” his father said. “But I have no ideas. We can’t let them through the Stone Guardians. They’ll just get reinforcements. The Fey prisoner told me a lot, and I have him attempting something that might help us, but I don’t know if I can trust him to work for us. And now the Rocaan, the source of holy water, has left the city. Each change leaves me more and more unnerved. More and more confused. I take an action, and I wonder if I’ve gone far enough. Then I take another action, and I think I may have gone too far. I am not prepared for this kind of leadership, Nicholas. Nothing in our history teaches the kind of thinking a man needs to fight an invasion. Internal dissent, yes, but an invasion—“ he shook his head.

Nicholas stared at him. He knew his father was having trouble with all of the changes, but he had never thought of him as weak. The evidence was becoming clearer and clearer, though. Alexander was failing to act, to press any advantage that the Islanders had. And someday the Islanders would no longer have an advantage.

“We have two choices,” Nicholas said. “Either we fight them and defeat them completely—kill them all—or we somehow learn to live with them. This halfway stuff where occasional skirmishes break out, and people die, is not going to work for much longer. We’ve already had one Fey come over to our side. How many Islanders will they convince to go over to theirs?”

His father looked stricken. He had obviously not thought of that. He glanced at the scroll, tied in red ribbon, then back at Nicholas. “What would you suggest?”

“We go into their Shadowlands with the strongest force we can gather, get them to open up, and throw all the holy water we can inside. It might not kill them, but it might.”

His father shook his head. He had argued against this once before in front of all the advisers, worrying that the supply of holy water would disappear and the Islanders would have gained nothing. Nicholas had thought then that his father’s argument was faulty.

“We even have a way in,” Nicholas said. “Lord Stowe introduced me to a boy yesterday who was one of the prisoners the Fey held. His father is still inside. He might be able to get us into the Shadowlands, just enough that we could make this plan work.”

His father stroked his chin. His eyes held a sadness that had been growing all year. “Even if we can talk the Rocaan into making enough holy water,” Alexander said, “we still would not be certain we have all the Fey. They don’t all look like us. Some are tiny wisps, and others shape-change, and still others duplicate themselves into us.”

“We could get them over time,” Nicholas said. Why was his father waiting? If his father’s actions hadn’t been consistent since the Fey arrived, Nicholas would have thought the King on their side. “What would they do without their friends? They would be stuck here and would probably live as quietly as they could.”

His father looked away. Nicholas followed his gaze. His father was staring at the scroll. A thousand dead. No King had ever presided over so many deaths. Nicholas sat down. It was finally becoming clear. “And what if we decide not to annihilate them?” his father asked. “What if we decide to make peace?”

Nicholas started. Peace? Peace with the Fey would change Blue Isle forever. But war with the Fey had changed it too. And Nicholas had also seen the dead. He just hadn’t ordered their deaths. He thought for a moment, then said, “We would need a guarantee, something to show that they would never double-cross us, that we could learn to coexist peacefully on this small stretch of ground. And we would have to continue our self-imposed exile here. We couldn’t have any contact with the outside world, because if any Fey left, they might bring reinforcements.”

“Reinforcements might come anyway,” his father said. “We don’t know if they were scheduled to arrive after so much time has passed. What if we slaughter them all and the Black King’s entire army arrives? What then?”

“We fight again.”

“We don’t have those kinds of resources, Nicholas,” his father said. “The more men we lose, the fewer we have to fight with.”

“But holy water—”

“Is a weapon. We always will need someone to wield it.”

His father actually had a point. Perhaps what Nicholas had seen as weakness was consideration for life. “And if we make peace?” Nicholas asked.

“Then we do so in a way that they can’t break that peace. No matter who arrives.” His father picked up the scroll and hit it against his palm. “Let’s see what the Rocaan is about. He’s a wise man. When he returns, we’ll ask his advice. We’ll let him settle this once and for all.”

“I sure wish you would let me go with him,” Nicholas said.

His father smiled. “I know, Nicky,” he said. “But part of learning to rule is realizing that you will never be able to do what you want.”

EIGHTY-THREE

The kirk at Daisy Stream was a small building the size of a cottage in Shadowlands. The building was made of wood and stone. The wood was so old that it had been bleached white by the elements. The stone was crumbling. Rugar had no idea how long the kirk had stood there, but he knew it had probably stood for centuries. The wood, even though it was
white, looked as if it had been replaced more than once.

He did not touch anything. He waited until his lieutenants had touched each part of the exterior before he even went near it. They also pushed down the weeds that surrounded the building on three sides. Only the front, with the dirt path leading to the open door, had no weeds.

The kirk appeared to be well used, for all its age.

It stood at the edge of the stream. The water burbled beside it, down a bank so steep that the water had no chance of rising over it. Rugar had made Burden dip a finger into the water itself, half hoping that Daisy Stream was the source of the poison, but no such luck. Burden had removed his hand with an exclamation about the chill, and nothing more.