Valaran held the tiny slip of parchment to the lamp flame. It curled and blackened as fire consumed it. She had read the message three times just to be certain she’d not imagined it.
Tol was coming.
She’d managed to place a spy close to him, and now knew even what road he would take. The fear that had been her constant companion for so long faded somewhat. For the first time in a very long time, Valaran allowed herself the luxury of wondering what he was like, whether he’d changed.
Almost seven years had passed. In that time she’d borne a child, learned to govern an empire, and survived the cruel machinations of her unpredictable husband. And she had killed an old woman.
In spite of her room’s warmth, Valaran shivered. She’d learned much in seven years. What had Tol learned?
Wornoth’s opulent quarters had been ransacked by servants and palace guards when the city fell. Fine tapestries had been torn down. Furniture too heavy to move had been chopped apart by swords and axes. What remained of Wornoth’s personal treasure had been stored in the dungeon below, for safekeeping, but random coins were scattered across the ruined, dark blue carpet like a rain of gold. Egrin was disgusted as much by the waste as by the unseemly extravagance of the governor’s rooms.
Searching through the destruction, he found several strongboxes, broken open and empty. The iron key fit none of them. Not until Egrin reached Wornoth’s bedroom did he find what he sought.
The bedchamber had received the same treatment as the rest of the rooms. The white walls had been stripped of tapestries and paintings, the furniture hacked by sabers, the broad mattress cut to ribbons. Heavy sculptures had been toppled and lay in pieces amidst shredded blue silk bed curtains. Eiderdown stuffing covered the floor and clouds of fluff swirled upward, disturbed by Egrin’s passage.
His toes bumped something solid as he reached the great bed. Egrin knelt and carefully brushed away an eiderdown drift. In the center of the wooden bedrail, he found a small slot, rimmed in black iron and hard to spot. The key fit perfectly. A click, and a drawer slid smoothly out.
The secret cache held no gold or silver, but bundles of parchment tied with string and a thick-bladed short sword. Egrin opened one of the bundles and discovered a series of dispatches from the emperor to Governor Wornoth. The last few messages were terse and to the point: Where was Tol? Was he coming to Caergoth? What had Wornoth done to defend the city?
Egrin dug deeper into the bundle. The earlier communications were much longer and wilder, sounding like the ramblings of a deranged man. In them, Ackal V railed about treachery, particularly from wizards of the Red and White orders. The emperor insisted over and over to Wornoth that, above all other tasks, he was to keep an eye on the members of those orders in Caergoth.
The next discovery was much more upsetting-a packet of messages to Wornoth from various warlords. These outlined the warlords’ struggles against the nomads and the bakali and requested that the governor send troops and supplies. As time passed and Wornoth sent neither, the requests became demands, then pleas. One dispatch from Bessian was literally spattered with blood. The invaders were closing in, it said, and the Ergothians could neither win nor escape; the governor must send aid. The governor of Caergoth, determined to defend his own neck, had done nothing to aid the dying hordes. This bundle contained no copies of outgoing missives. Wornoth had not even bothered to reply.
Coldly furious, Egrin put the pleading messages aside. The smallest bundle in the cache was not merely tied with string but also wrapped in a scrap of cloth. Egrin reached for this packet of letters, but it slipped through his fingers. He tried again. And again. And again. He glared at the bundle in perplexed confusion. No matter how hard he tried, he could not grab hold of it.
When Tol arrived moments later, Egrin told him of the strange small packet.
“I seem to have butter on my fingers. Can’t pick this up!” the former marshal said, pointing.
Tol squatted by the open drawer. He reached for the packet. Although a flicker of heat played over his fingers, they closed infallibly on the letters. The sensation of warmth was familiar. Someone had put a spell on the letters, most likely to prevent them being tampered with, but the nullstone had negated the spell.
He handed the small packet to Egrin, who held it warily. This time it stayed in his grasp. The elder warrior muttered something about being old and clumsy.
“Rubbish, you’re just tired,” Tol said.
The cloth wrapping contained a dozen or so squares of thin parchment. The backs of the slips were scorched by heat, but lines of writing in unusual brown ink filled the other side. None of the messages was signed.
“Letters from spies,” Egrin said.
The messages all were short, and most were demands for information from an anonymous correspondent. None concerned the nomads or bakali invaders. Some asked about the morale and loyalty of the imperial hordes in Caergoth and commented on the danger of sending troops beyond the walls and leaving the city “helpless and unguarded.” Most sought knowledge of Tol’s whereabouts; Helbin, too, was mentioned.
I’ve had no word from Helbin in many days, the anonymous correspondent had written. If he comes into your hands, let me know at once. Protect him. He is a valuable ally.
“Didn’t Queen Casberry say Helbin had been captured by Wornoth’s guards?” asked Egrin.
Tol nodded absently. They had looked all over for the Red Robe. There had been no trace of the wizard among the prisoners, either in the citadel or anywhere else.
“These messages are in Valaran’s hand!” Tol exclaimed. Egrin’s graying eyebrows lifted in surprise and Tol added, “Don’t you see? Wornoth was playing both sides. He was spying for the empress, while ruling in the emperor’s name.” The duplicity of the man was incredible.
“Then why would he arrest Helbin? He knew they both served the same mistress.”
Tol shrugged. “Maybe Wornoth was duping Valaran, betraying her trust to Ackal V. If so, the last thing he’d want around would be a loyal servant of the empress.” Tol tossed the letters back in the drawer. “Helbin could tell us more. He’s probably dead, but continue the search for him anyway.”
He left Egrin to finish examining Wornoth’s secret papers. Queen Casberry was departing, and Tol wanted to see her off.
Egrin waited until his friend and commander had gone, then picked up certain of the bundles again, riffled through them, and extracted a sheaf or two. These he burned in the flame of his lamp, watching the doorway all the while.
Tol, Casberry, and her bearers were just inside the north gate of Caergoth. Evening had come and Luin was rising, casting its pinkish light over the open landscape.
Tol asked the kender queen about her escort and received the breezy assurance that both Royal Loyals and Household Guard were “around somewhere.” She had already turned down his offer of an armed escort, saying she might not be heading directly home. Kender were afflicted with wanderlust, and the queen was the most kenderish of them all.
Front and Back hoisted the heavy sedan chair onto their shoulders, seemingly without effort. As usual, Queen Casberry offered a steady stream of advice to the duo on the best way to carry the chair and, as usual, the men ignored her. Tol smiled. They were certainly an odd threesome.
When he thanked her again for her assistance, she patted him on the head. “You’re a good fellow, for a human.” Putting her little prune face close to his head, she added, “You’re getting a bald spot up here, you know that?”
Tol cleared his throat and stepped back. He was past forty now, and it was true. Age was beginning to tell on him in many ways.
“Okay, boys, pick up your feet!” she said, and Front and Back headed for the open gate.