King of Thorns

2

Wedding day

“Princess Miana is being attended by Father Gomst and the Sisters of Our Lady,” Coddin reported. He still looked uncomfortable in chamberlain’s velvets; the Watch-Commander’s uniform had better suited him. “There are checks to be carried out.”

“Let’s just be glad nobody has to check my purity.” I eased back into the throne. Damn comfortable: swan-down and silk. Kinging it is pain in the arse enough without one of those gothic chairs. “What does she look like?”

Coddin shrugged. “A messenger brought this yesterday.” He held up a gold case about the size of a coin.

“So what does she look like?”

He shrugged again, opened the case with his thumbnail and squinted at the miniature. “Small.”

“Here!” I caught hold of the locket and took a look for myself. The artists who take weeks to paint these things with a single hair are never going to spend that time making an ugly picture. Miana looked acceptable. She didn’t have the hard look about her that Katherine does, the kind of look that lets you know the person is really alive, devouring every moment. But when it comes down to it, I find most women attractive. How many men are choosy at eighteen?

“And?” Makin asked from beside the throne.

“Small,” I said and slipped the locket into my robe. “Am I too young for wedlock? I wonder…”

Makin pursed his lips. “I was married at twelve.”

“You liar!” Not once in all these years had Sir Makin of Trent mentioned a wife. He’d surprised me; secrets are hard to keep on the road, among brothers, drinking ale around the campfire after a hard day’s blood-letting.

“No lie,” he said. “But twelve is too young. Eighteen is a good age for marriage, Jorg. You’ve waited long enough.”

“What happened to your wife?”

“Died. There was a child too.” He pressed his lips together.

It’s good to know that you don’t know everything about a man. Good that there might always be more to come.

“So, my queen-to-be is nearly ready,” I said. “Shall I go to the altar in this rag?” I tugged at the heavy samite collar, all scratchy at my neck. I didn’t care of course but a marriage is a show, for high- and low-born alike, a kind of spell, and it pays to do it right.

“Highness,” Coddin said, pacing his irritation out before the dais. “This…distraction…is ill-timed. We have an army at our gates.”

“And to be fair, Jorg, nobody knew she was coming until that rider pulled in,” Makin said.

I spread my hands. “I didn’t know she would arrive last night. I’m not magic you know.” I glimpsed the dead child slumped in a distant corner. “I had hoped she would arrive before the summer ended. In any case, that army has a good three miles to march if it wants to be at my gates.”

“Perhaps a delay is in order?” Coddin hated being chamberlain with every fibre of his being. Probably that was why he was the only one I’d trust to do it. “Until the conditions are less…inclement.”

“Twenty thousand at our door, Coddin. And a thousand inside our walls. Well, most of them outside because my castle is too damn small to fit them in.” I found myself smiling. “I don’t think conditions are going to improve. So we might as well give the army a queen as well as a king to die for, neh?”

“And concerning the Prince of Arrow’s army?” Coddin asked.

“Is this going to be one of those times when you pretend not to have a plan until the last moment?” Makin asked. “And then turn out to really not have one?”

He looked grim despite his words. I thought perhaps he could still see his own dead child. He had faced death with me before and done it with a smile.

“You, girl!” I shouted to one of the serving girls lurking at the far end of the hall. “Go tell that woman to bring me a robe fit to get married in. Nothing with lace, mind.” I stood and set a hand to the pommel of my sword. “The night patrols should be back about now. We’ll go down to the east yard and see what they have to say for themselves. I sent Red Kent and Little Rikey along with one of the Watch patrols. Let’s hear what they think about these men of Arrow.”

Makin led the way. Coddin had grown twitchy about assassins. I knew what lurked in the shadows of my castle and it wasn’t assassins that I worried about. Makin turned the corner and Coddin held my shoulder to keep me back.

“The Prince of Arrow doesn’t want me knifed by some black-cloak, Coddin. He doesn’t want drop-leaf mixed into my morning bread. He wants to roll over us with twenty thousand men and grind us into the dirt. He’s already thinking of the empire throne. Thinks he has a toe past the Gilden Gate. He’s building his legend now and it’s not going to be one of knives in the dark.”

“Of course, if you had more soldiers you might be worth stabbing.” Makin turned his head and grinned.

We found the patrol waiting, stamping in the cold. A few castle women fussed around the wounded, planting a stitch or two. I let the commander tell his tale to Coddin while I called Red Kent to my side. Rike loomed behind him uninvited. Four castle years had softened none of Rike’s edges, still close on seven foot of ugly temper with a face to match the blunt, mean, and brutal soul that looked out from it.

“Little Rikey,” I said. It had been a while since I’d spoken to the man. Years. “And how’s that lovely wife of yours?” In truth I’d never seen her but she must have been a formidable woman.

“She broke.” He shrugged.

I turned away without comment. There’s something about Rike makes me want to go on the attack. Something elemental, red in tooth and claw. Or perhaps it’s just because he’s so damn big. “So, Kent,” I said. “Tell me the good news.”

“There’s too many of them.” He spat into the mud. “I’m leaving.”

“Well now.” I threw an arm around him. Kent don’t look much but he’s solid, all muscle and bone, quick as you like too. What makes him though, what sets him apart, is a killer’s mind. Chaos, threat, bloody murder, none of that fazes him. Every moment of a crisis he’ll be considering the angles, tracking weapons, looking for the opening, taking it.

“Well now.” I pulled him close, hand clapped to the back of his neck. He flinched, but to his credit he didn’t reach for a blade. “That’s all well and good.” I steered him away from the patrol. “But suppose that wasn’t going to happen. Just for the sake of argument. Suppose it was only you here and twenty of them out there. That’s not so far from the odds you’d beaten when we found you on that lakeside down in Rutton, neh?” For a moment he smiled at that. “How would you win then, Red Kent?” I called him Red to remind him of that day when he stood all atremble with his wolf’s grin white in the scarlet of other men’s blood.

He bit his lip, staring past me into some other place. “They’re crowded in, Jorg. In those valleys. Crowded. One man against many, he’s got to be fast, attacking, moving. Each man is your shield from the next.” He shook his head, seeing me again. “But you can’t use an army like one man.”

Red Kent had a point. Coddin had trained the army well, the units of Father’s Forest Watch especially so, but in battle cohesion always slips away. Orders are lost, missed, go unheard or ignored, and sooner or later it’s a bloody maul, each man for himself, and the numbers start to tell.

“Highness?” It was the woman from the royal wardrobe, some kind of robe in her hands.

“Mabel!” I threw my arms wide and gave her my dangerous smile.

“Maud, sire.”

I had to admit the old biddy had some stones. “Maud it is,” I said. “And I’m to be wed in this, am I?”

“If it pleases you, sire.” She even curtseyed a bit.

I took it from her. Heavy. “Cats?” I asked. “Looks like it took a lot of them.”

“Sable.” She pursed her lips. “Sable and gold thread. Count-” She bit the words off.

“Count Renar married in it, did he?” I asked. “Well, if it was good enough for that bastard it’ll do for me. At least it looks warm.” My uncle Renar owed me for the thorns, for a lost mother, a lost brother. I’d taken his life, his castle, and his crown, and still he owed me. A fur robe would not close our account.

“Best be quick about it, Highness,” Coddin said, eyes still roaming for assassins. “We’ve got to double-check the defences. Plan out supply for the Kennish archers, and also consider terms.” To his credit he looked straight at me for that last bit.

I gave Maud back the robe and let her dress me with the patrol watching on. I made no reply to Coddin. He looked pale. I had always liked him, from the moment he tried to arrest me, even past the moment he dared to mention surrender. Brave, sensible, capable, honest. The better man. “Let’s get this done,” I said and started toward the chapel.

“Is it needed, this marriage?” Coddin again, doggedly playing the role I set him. Speak to me, I had said. Never think I cannot be wrong. “As your wife, things may go hard for her.” Rike sniggered at that. “As a guest she would be ransomed back to the Horse Coast.”

Sensible, honest. I don’t even know how to pretend those things. “It is needed.”

We came to the chapel by a winding stair, past table-knights in plate armour, Count Renar’s marks still visible beneath mine on the breastplates as if I’d ruled here four months rather than four years. The noble-born too poor or stupid or loyal to have run yet would be lined up within. In the courtyard outside the peasantry waited. I could smell them.

I paused before the doors, lifting a finger to stop the knight with his hands upon the bar. “Terms?”

I saw the child again, beneath crossed standards hanging on the wall. He’d grown with me. Years back he had been a baby, watching me with dead eyes. He looked about four now. I tapped my fingers against my forehead in a rapid tempo.

“Terms?” I said it again. I’d only said it twice but already the word sounded strange, losing meaning as they do when repeated over and again. I thought of the copper box in my room. It made me sweat. “There will be no terms.”

“Best have Father Gomst say his words swiftly then,” Coddin said. “And look to our defences.”

“No,” I said. “There will be no defence. We’re going to attack.”

I pushed the knight aside and threw the doors wide. Bodies crowded the chapel hall from one side to the other. It seemed my nobles were poorer than I’d thought. And to the left, a splash of blues and violet, ladies-in-waiting and knights in armour, decked in the colours of the House Morrow, the colours of the Horse Coast.

And there at the altar, head bowed beneath a garland of lilies, my bride.

“Oh hell,” I said.

Small was right. She looked about twelve.

In peace Brother Kent reverts to type, a peasant plagued by kindness, seeking God in the stone houses where the pious lament. Battle strikes loose such chains. In war Red Kent approaches the divine.