Tomorrow's Kingdom (16 page)

Fulfilling her promise to Finn, saving the tribes, saving the
realm
—everything hinged on reaching the camp before the soldiers did. Or at least upon reaching it before Azriel reached it, that she might prevent him from walking into a death trap.

For if she was not able to do at least that, she'd be utterly alone in the world—again.

And quite apart from the fact that she simply could no longer bear the thought of a life without the handsome rascal with whom she'd fallen hopelessly, desperately in love, alone was no position for a powerless, pregnant queen with an impossible destiny to find herself in.

TWENTY-ONE

A
S A FIRST STEP
in his plan to destroy Mordecai and take the queen to his own bed, Lord Bartok invited half a dozen of his most influential peers down to the palace archery butts under the auspices of passing the idle midday hours with a private tourney dedicated to the memory of his recently deceased royal son-in-law.

Under normal circumstances, the ladies of the court would have trailed after them—twirling their parasols and swishing their skirts, gossiping and giggling, clapping their white-gloved hands and vying for the privilege of awarding trinkets to winners. With the young king barely cold in his tomb, however, the only thing any of them seemed to be vying for these days was who could put on the finest show of grief for the benefit of anyone who might be watching. This made the butts an excellent place for important men to speak without fear of being bothered by women
or
being overheard by the rats in the castle walls.

That is why Lord Bartok did not bother to lower his voice when he said, “Mordecai has kidnapped my son.”

The other great lords gaped at him, thunderstruck. Indeed, tall, skinny Lord Tweedsmuir was so startled that he loosed the arrow in his drawn bow without bothering to take aim. The arrow came within a hair's breadth of piercing the heart of a gardener trimming the leafy tail of a topiary mermaid in a distant garden.

“Atticus kidnapped by His Grace!” cried Lord Tweedsmuir in his reedy voice. “How can you be sure, my lord?”

“Yesterday I received a note—”

“A ransom note?” put in Lord Tweedsmuir's dandified nineteen-year-old brother-in-law with an eagerness that Lord Bartok found in poor taste.

“No, not a ransom note,” he said thinly. “A note written in Atticus's own hand, but with words he would never use and advice he would never give.”

“That is not necessarily evidence of mischief, my lord,” offered Lord Tweedsmuir by way of comfort.

“And yet I am certain that Mordecai has my son and means him far worse than mere mischief.”

Ponderous Lord Belmont—who, being too fat to participate but too sociable to be left out, was lounging nearby beneath a fluttering white canopy on a couch being tended to by a skinny girl who had nothing but a stump where her tongue should have been—asked what evidence Lord Bartok had to support his accusations against the former regent.

“I sent Atticus on a mission to rescue Queen Persephone,” shrugged Lord Bartok.

Grunting and digging his elbows into the back of the couch, Lord Belmont heaved himself into a more-or-less upright position. “You did this thing without informing the rest of the Council?” he rumbled.

“You openly declared your support for Mordecai,” reminded Lord Bartok, taking care to ensure that his words sounded like an accusation.

“We openly declared our support for the named successor of the dead king Finnius,” corrected Lord Belmont indignantly, wheezing slightly as he reached up to adjust one of his gigantic shoulder pads.

“And when that lowborn cripple lurched into the Council chamber and announced that he and the queen were to marry, you—just—sat—there,” said Lord Bartok, biting off each word. “Even though you
knew
there was no possible way that the queen had willingly agreed to marry him.”

Twitching the sleeve of his forest-green doublet, Lord Tweedsmuir's young brother-in-law sucked in his cheeks and muttered, “As I recall, Lord Bartok, you just sat there as well—”

“
AND
THEN
,
BY
THE
GODS
,
I
SACRIFICED
MY
ONLY
SON
AND
HEIR
IN
A
DESPERATE
ATTEMPT
TO
SAVE
HER
!” thundered Lord Bartok.

Though the mute didn't even blink, the far-off gardener glanced over in their direction.

“Quietly, my lord, please!” begged Lord Tweedsmuir, flapping his hands like an overexcited bat. “Remember that we are trapped in a city crawling with armed New Men!”

Lord Bartok sneered and swatted the air in front of his face to show what he thought of this.

Selecting a large sweetmeat from the silver bowl in the hands of the mute, Lord Belmont crammed it into his mouth. “You accuse us fairly, Lord Bartok,” he admitted as he laboriously chewed the sticky treat. “I only regret that you did not come to us
before
you sent Atticus to rescue the queen.”

“I am coming to you now.”

“Coming to us now?” grunted Lord Belmont's second cousin—a squat, beetle-browed nobleman who looked more like a blacksmith than a duke.

“I am going to challenge the cripple on the battlefield,” explained Lord Bartok.

After a short, shocked silence, Lord Belmont's second cousin responded with all the crude bluntness of a blacksmith born and bred, saying, “That would be suicide! Your army hasn't strength enough to defeat Mordecai's army.”

“I know,” said Lord Bartok. “Unless I am able to call upon considerably more men and horses, my army will be utterly destroyed.” He let his words hang in the air for a moment before continuing. “But I can no longer ignore the fact that some things are worth dying for, my lords. Honour. Justice. Chivalry. I cannot sit idly by and allow that twisted creature to make a mockery of all we hold sacred by murdering my noble son and violating the queen night after night.” His eyes burning with fervour, Lord Bartok said, “My lords, do you not think it is time that we of high birth stopped trembling before those of vile birth? Do you not think it is time that we came together to set things to rights for men like us—men who've suffered too long beneath the rule of a
nobody
? Join with me, my lords!
Together, let us rescue the queen, save my son, vanquish the cripple and send his despicable New Men back to the gutters where they belong!”

For a long moment, the noblemen fidgeted and cast furtive glances at one another—all except Lord Belmont, that is. He busied himself selecting another sweetmeat.

Eventually, his reedy voice sounding higher and thinner than ever, Lord Tweedsmuir said, “My lord, you … you are speaking of war.”

“Yes,” agreed Lord Bartok, a trifle impatiently. “I am speaking of war.”

Lord Tweedsmuir's brother-in-law—who'd never worn his gleaming suit of armour outside the tiltyard— glowed at the prospect of battle glory and smoothed his perfumed hair behind his ears.

Lord Belmont frowned. “Why would we not simply mount another attack on Mordecai's stronghold?”

“Because I do not know where it is,” replied Lord Bartok. “Atticus followed the cripple to his lair, and the note I received made no mention of its location. Attacking his army is the only way to draw him out. He will not stand by and see it destroyed because without it, he is nothing.”

“You may be right,” said Lord Belmont. “Even so, my lord, you are asking a great deal—”

“And offering a great deal in return,” interjected Lord Bartok, who needed Belmont's support above all others.

The fat lord shrugged one massive shoulder. “I and my noble brethren will need some time to consider—”

“There is no time,” interrupted Lord Bartok flatly. “Our queen is in the clutches of a monster, and my only
son is in imminent danger. That is why, though I well know it may be the end of me, I intend to move against Mordecai's army as soon as may be. You can join with me or not as you see fit, but mark me, my lords: if you fail to support me now and my army is annihilated, you will
never
have the strength to rid yourselves of the upstart. You will have to stand by and watch as he comes out of his hiding hole, plants his bony, lowborn backside on the throne of Glyndoria and crowns himself king. And
then
you will have to spend the rest of your days bending the knee— first to him and then to the malformed half-lowborn
brat
who comes after him.”

The vision was so unspeakable that all the great lords shuddered—even Lord Belmont, whose shudder made him jiggle like a bowlful of jelly.

When he'd sufficiently recovered from the horror of what could be, Lord Tweedsmuir said, “Lord Bartok, even if we agree to support your cause—and even if we can persuade other lords to do the same—there may be noblemen who do not care for the idea of sending thousands to their deaths in a war to save your son and set things to rights for us few, even if we do mean to rescue the queen in the bargain.”

“When we are victorious, those of noble blood who failed to support our cause will be stripped of titles, land and money,” said Lord Bartok tightly.

“If our ruling monarch says it shall be so,” said Lord Belmont pointedly. Heaving himself even farther forward on the couch, he said, “Pray tell, my lord, who shall that ruling monarch be?”

Lord Bartok made a great show of hesitating. Then, sighing heavily, he laid his hand over his heart and said, “While I truly believe that my son-in-law, the king, would have named his unborn child heir if he'd known that Aurelia was pregnant, as has been pointed out to me by some, he did
not
know. And so, my lords, since I would not have us divided on such a vital issue, I … I hereby declare myself content to abide by the dead king's expressed wishes.”

Lord Belmont raised his unkempt eyebrows so high that his fat forehead wrinkled impressively. “Upon your honour, Lord Bartok, you swear to see Queen Persephone crowned and anointed whether your daughter is safely delivered of a royal child or not?” he asked in surprise.

“Provided that the cripple is dead—so that he cannot claim the title of king—I do so swear, yes,” said Lord Bartok, consoling himself with the thought that the lie— which would only be exposed in the unlikely event that Aurelia managed to do her duty—was for the greater good of the Bartok Dynasty.

Lord Belmont smiled and stuck out his hand. “Then I pledge my sworn swords to your cause, Lord Bartok. And I pray that we soon find a way to overcome the soldiers who hold the city, for unless we do, I fear that any attack we might launch upon the former regent will come too late to prevent him getting the poor queen with child and murdering your son.”

Wrapping his own elegant hand firmly around the fat lord's sticky fingers, Lord Bartok smiled and said, “I think we will not need your prayers, Lord Belmont. For you see, I have a plan.”

Much later that night, there came a tentative knock at the door of Lord Bartok's private chambers. Setting his pen down next to the inkwell, he sprinkled the parchment before him with sand to dry the ink, then set it to one side. With a nod, he indicated to his manservant that he was to admit the visitor.

By the time the door closed behind the departing servant, Lord Bartok's daughter, Aurelia, had come to a nervous halt before him. It did not occur to him to greet her with a pleasantry, to tell her of the fate that had befallen her brother or even to offer her a chair. Instead, he examined her body carefully for signs that it was beginning to ripen. When he saw none, he frowned slightly. Then, without preamble, he explained what he wanted her to do.

Her pale face was paler still by the time he'd finished. “You … you would have me invite
another
disgusting commoner into my bedchamber?” she stammered in the voice of one struggling for control. “You would have me invite
that
disgusting commoner into my bedchamber?”