"You said almost identical. Perhaps yesterday he was thinking, You are my liege, drop dead."
Theron smiled. "No. You are my liege, do something about this." He reached up and yanked on the cord that would summon his valet then he swung his legs off the bed.
"So what are you going to do?"
He paused at the door to his dressing room. "I'm going to have to talk with our passionate young traitor. After that, we'll see."
They reached Riverton just as the sun crested the horizon and gilded the rooftops with light. A few lines of pale smoke drifting into the dawn showed they were no longer the only ones awake. As River Road carried them into the town, a pair of half grown dogs, deep-chested and short-legged, bounded out to greet them, tails slamming from side to side.
"Some guard dogs you are," Pjerin muttered, dropping down to one knee. "No, I don't want my face licked, thank you very much."
Annice rested her pack against the corner of a building, glad of the chance to rest, and watched him dig his fingers deep into fur, reducing both dogs to abject adoration. From the look on his face, this was the most important thing that had happened all night. There's so
much I don't know about him. She'd arrived in Ohrid only days after both his elderly dogs had been killed by a mountain cat. He'd fought tears when he'd told her what had happened. A person that animals trust so absolutely can't be capable of the kind of betrayal Pjerin was accused of. Cliche, perhaps, but it further convinced her that she'd done the right thing.
Pjerin bit the inside of his cheek, struggling to hide his emotions. More than Annice appearing in his cell, more than the midnight trip through secret passageways, more than disguises and leaving Elbasan in the middle of the night, this told him he was free. This was one of the things he believed he'd never do again.
The dogs sensed the desperation in his touch and kept pushing their noses at his face.
"Sandy! Shadow!"
Two pairs of ears perked up and Pjerin knelt abandoned in the middle of the road. He stayed there for a moment, unable to move, hands pressed against the ground so hard his knuckles went white. It had been a child's voice. He forced himself to breathe. If he wasn't going to die, he'd see his son again.
Teeth clenched, he surged to his feet. "Let's go."
Annice snagged the back of his pack as he went by. "Hold on! Try to remember I'm walking for two." He shortened his stride and, smothering a yawn, she fell into step beside him. "First inn we come to that's open for business, we stop for food and a rest."
"No." Pjerin shook his head, eyes squinted almost shut against the sun but locked on the east, locked on Ohrid.
"What do you mean, no?" But they had time to scratch dogs?
"What I said, no." There was no room for compromise in his tone. "We eat while we travel."
"Then you can travel without me. The kigh will spot you and you'll be back in that cell faster than I can find a rhyme for door hinge." She knew she sounded equally unreasonable, but she was tired enough and hungry enough not to care.
"Annice…"
"You can growl my name all you want to, but it's not going to change anything. You need me to hide you from the kigh, which means we have to stay together, which means you have to travel at my pace." Grabbing his arm, she pulled him around to face her. "Or have you forgotten about your child?" The sarcastic tone clearly suggested just how much value she placed on that possessive pronoun. "You remember; the one you wouldn't leave without?"
His mouth worked and she waited for the explosion. It never came.
"They'll have told Gerek I'm dead."
Oh, shit. She swallowed a sudden lump in her throat. You and your big mouth. "Pjerin, I'm sorry."
"We have to find out who did this to me." Every muscle of his body stood out in rigid delineation.
Annice sighed. Considering everything he'd been through, he was remarkably stable, but considering everything he'd been through, he had every right to go completely to pieces.
"Not now," she told him gently. "While a pair of traders arriving at dawn will attract no attention, that same pair of traders standing in the middle of River Road in a Command trance would give the whole game away." Linking her arm in his, she tugged him firmly down the street. "We'll need privacy and quiet and we'll have plenty of both before we get to Ohrid."
"… so I ask her what she's doing with my shield and she says that they're diggin' a hole in the commons and they don't got a shovel. She's gonna use my shield as a shovel. Well, I give her a cuff up the side of the head and tell her it's not my shield, it's the king's, and if she wants a shovel she can just hoof it over to her grandad's place. And she tosses her braid back over her shoulder, and I've got a good idea where she picked up that motion, and says ever so indignantly…" The guard lifted his chin and pursed his lips, continuing in a piping imitation of a small child's voice. "… but, Papa, you wasn't usin' it."
Aliute grimaced and thanked every god the Circle contained that the night was nearly over. Guarding the door to the dungeons was a dull assignment at best, but spending it forced to listen to story after story about a five-year-old removed it from the Circle entirely. This wasn't what she'd expected when she joined up. She'd wanted excitement, adventure, and never in her wildest dreams did she see herself standing guard so that prisoners, who were both shackled and locked in their cells, could have no chance of escape.
Escape; yeah, right. She rubbed an itchy shoulder blade against the rough stone wall and wondered if her partner was awake yet. What am I thinking, the nun's up. The kids probably got her out of bed ages ago. Her helm shifted forward slightly as she yawned. At the risk of sounding dissatisfied with the job, it sure is boring being a guard.
Footsteps sounded, coming down the spiral stairs that led to the upper levels of the palace. At first, Aliute thought they belonged to the drudge who came every morning to empty the pots, but there were too many of them and they were moving too fast.
The first set of feet that descended into sight wore boots and, over them, greaves enameled with the royal sigil of Shkoder.
The two guards stared at each other in shock.
Inspection? he mouthed, eyes wide and near panick.
At dawn? Aliute returned, shoving her helm straight.
As a second set of identical greaves appeared, they snapped to attention, pikes properly at rest, the effect somewhat ruined by identical expressions of disbelief. Ceremonial armor was worn only by the four members of the guard assigned to accompany the king.
Theron came down the last few steps, a second pair of guards on his heels, and acknowledged the two at the door. "I wish to speak with the Due of Ohrid," he said quietly.
"Sire!" As senior, Aliute set her pike against the wall and lit a lamp off one of the three tallow candles. Pinching off the smoldering end of the taper, she motioned for her companion to open the door. Shoulders back, head up, heart pounding, she moved into the passageway between the two rows of cells; however peculiar this visit might be, it was her chance to look good in front of the king and she wasn't going to blow it.
At the cell door, she set the lamp in the bracket and heaved up the bar. Motioned aside by one of the other guards, she watched as he picked up the lamp and went into the cell. He rushed back out a second later, his face pale, the flickering light illuminating the superstitious fear in his eyes.
"Majesty, the prisoner is gone."