“Lady.”
Mace was in the doorway. Kelsea straightened automatically, drawing her arm over the bill she was signing. But Arliss was far ahead of her; he had already whisked the entire stack of copies out of sight.
“What is it?”
“I need you to weigh in on something.”
Kelsea got up from the desk, heard a slither of paper behind her as Arliss made her bill disappear as well. “What is it?”
Mace closed the door behind him. “Pen insists on accompanying you this morning. I’ve said no, but he won’t listen. I could have him restrained when we leave, but I don’t wish to do that.”
“What’s the question?”
“Do you think he should come?”
Kelsea nodded slowly. “It would be cruel to leave him behind.”
“All right.” Mace lowered his voice. “But when we get back, Lady, you and I will have to talk about Pen. He cannot be your close guard and your paramour, all at once.”
Paramour. It was such an antiquated concept that Kelsea almost laughed, but after a moment’s thought, she realized that Mace had chosen the right word. Paramour … that was exactly what Pen was.
“Fine. We’ll discuss it.”
Mace looked over her shoulder. “What goes on here?”
“We’re going over the tax situation.”
“That so?” Mace fixed his keen glance on Arliss. “Taxes a crucial issue right now?”
“Whatever Queenie wants to talk about is the issue on my desk, Mr. Mace.”
Mace turned back to Kelsea. He stared at her for a very long time.
“Spit it out, Lazarus.”
“Why not tell me what you’re planning to do, Lady? Don’t you think I could help?”
Kelsea looked down, blinking, suddenly near tears. He would not understand, she thought, not until it was all done, and at that point it would be too late to ask his forgiveness. But Mace was a Queen’s Guard right down to his core. He would knock her unconscious, if necessary, to keep her from her intended course, and so she could not explain to him, nor to the rest of the Guard. She would not be able to say good-bye to any of them. She thought of the day they’d all ridden up, tired and impatient, to collect her from the cottage. That departure had been terrible, just as this one would be. And yet the world had opened wide, from that day onward. She remembered riding down the length of the Almont, farms all around her, the Caddell still a blue twinkle in the distance. How she had been struck by the land, its vastness, its sweep … and remembering, she felt a tear slide down her cheek.
I can’t fail, or everything is lost.
“Get the other three together, Lazarus. It’s time to go.”
LATER, THINKING ON that ride, Aisa would only remember that it should have been raining. Rain would have been fitting, but instead the sky was a deep, clear blue, blushed with pinkish-orange clouds in the coming dawn, the light just bright enough to reveal the ocean of people on either side of the Great Boulevard. New London was bursting at the seams, and although it wasn’t yet six in the morning, the entire city seemed to have crowded into the streets.
Despite the three guards with her, Aisa felt very small and alone, and she was frightened, not of death but of failure. Last month the Mace had given her a horse, a pretty young stallion that Aisa had named Sam, and Fell had been teaching her to ride. But riding a horse was much more difficult than working with a knife or sword, and Aisa did not deceive herself that she was proficient. At any moment, she felt, Sam might throw her, and she would rather die than have that happen now, in front of all of these people, in front of the Mace, who had chosen her to come along on this dangerous errand. Aisa’s weapons were currently stowed in her belt, but if anyone so much as made a move in the direction of the Queen, she could be off the horse with her knife ready in two seconds flat.
The Queen rode tall and straight between the four of them, the dim light of dawn gleaming dully off her silver tiara. She looked very regal to Aisa, very much as a Queen should when going out to negotiate with her enemy. But the Queen’s hands were clenched on the reins, her knuckles fiercely white, and Aisa understood that all was not as it seemed. Before they left the Keep, the Mace had drawn the three of them aside, speaking in a low voice.
“She’s up to something. Watch her close. You see any sign that she’s going to bolt, raise the alarm and grab her. She can’t take all four of us at once.”
Aisa didn’t know what to make of this order, or, truly, of the Queen herself. She knew from Maman and the Guard that the Queen sometimes went into a trance, but nothing could have prepared her for last night: the Queen shambling from one room to another, her eyes sometimes closed, sometimes open, as she staggered forward, holding conversations with no one, even bumping into walls. The Mace had cautioned them not to worry, to simply let her be, and left her in the care of Pen. But Aisa did worry. In her own way, the Queen reminded her of Glee, who would wander in the same manner, following things that weren’t there, tormented by some other world that none of them could see. Sometimes Glee herself wasn’t entirely there, and Aisa had thought more than once that one day Glee might simply disappear, vanishing into her unseen world. Perhaps the Mace was worried that the Queen might do the same.
“Queen Kelsea!” a man shouted, and Aisa swung that way automatically, putting her hand to her knife. But it was only an old man standing near the front of the crowd, waving at the Queen. His was the first voice they’d heard raised above the murmur of the crowd; the city seemed to be stunned, all of them staring at the Queen with wide, lost eyes. After perhaps ten minutes of riding, Aisa also noticed another anomaly: they had passed many thousands of people, but she had not seen a single glass of ale, not even when they passed the Cove, New London’s notorious run of pubs.
Why, they’re scared sober! Aisa realized. They didn’t know that the Queen was going out to parlay, but Aisa suspected that it would have made no difference. She, like everyone, had seen the massive force spread across both banks of the Caddell. What could the Queen offer to counter? Aisa thought this was a fool’s errand, but she was proud to be chosen, proud to be with them. When the Mort came, she would not stand there defenseless, her eyes lost. She would fight to the end to keep them from reaching the Queen. As the Cove ended, her heart froze; for a moment, she thought she had seen Da, his tall form and black eyes burning, in the center of the crowd. But when the people shifted again, he was gone.
The Boulevard took its final turn and the New London Bridge appeared, a long stretch of stone before them. The vast crowds of people on either side began to melt away, and Aisa finally relaxed as the five of them guided their horses onto the bridge.
Ahead reared the barricade. Aisa was no engineer, but she saw the problem immediately: the barricade was nothing more than a hastily constructed mess of furniture and what appeared to be planks of lumber piled on both sides of the bridge. A thin aisle ran down the middle, so narrow that it would allow passage only in single file. But the entire structure was unwieldy; the low walls that bordered the bridge would not support the barricade’s height. The Mace said that the Mort had brought battering rams, and from the look of things, one good blow from a ram would send half the barricade straight over the sides of the bridge and into the Caddell.