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  "You know, you don't need to mock all my ideas." Hadrian frowned as he pulled his own tabard over his head. "Besides, I still think we should consider it. We could travel from town to town performing in dramatic plays, even a few comedies." Hadrian gave his smaller partner an appraising look. "Though maybe you should stick to drama-perhaps tragedies."

  Royce glared back.

  "What? I think I would make a superb actor. I see myself as a dashing leading man. We could definitely land parts in The Crown Conspiracy. I'll play the handsome swordsman that fights the villain, and you-well, you can be the other one."

  They dodged branches while pulling off their coifs and gloves, rolling them in their tabards. Walking downhill, they reached one of the many small rivers that fed the great Galewyr where they found their horses still tied and enjoying the river grass. The animals lazily swished their tails, keeping the flies at bay.

  "You worry me sometimes, Hadrian. You really do."

  "Why not actors? It's safe. Might even be fun."

  "It would be neither safe nor fun. Besides, actors have to travel and I'm content with the way things are. I get to stay near Gwen," Royce added.

  "See, that's another reason. Why do you keep doing this? Honestly if I had what you do, I would never take another job."

  Royce removed a pair of boots from a saddlebag. "We do it because it's what we're good at, and with the war Alric is willing to pay top fees for information."

  Hadrian released a sarcastic snort. "Sure, top fees for us, but what about the other costs? Breckton might work for that idiot Ballentyne, but he's no fool himself. He'll certainly look at the seal and won't buy the story about it softening in the saddlebag."

  "I know," Royce began, as he sat on a log exchanging the imperial boots for his own, "but after telling one lie, his second tale about sentries breaking the seal will sound even more outlandish, so they won't believe anything he says."

  Hadrian paused in his own efforts to switch boots and scowled at his partner. "You realize they'll probably execute him for treason?"

  Royce nodded. "Which will neatly eliminate the only witness."

  "You see, that's exactly what I'm talking about," Hadrian sighed and shook his head.

  Royce could see the familiar melancholy wash over his partner. It appeared too often lately. He could not fathom his friend's moodiness. These strange bouts of depression usually followed successes, and frequently led to a night of heavy drinking.

  He wondered if Hadrian even cared about the money anymore. He took only what was needed for drinks and food and stored the rest. Royce could understand his friend's reaction if they were making a living by picking pockets or robbing homes, but they worked for the king now. It was almost too clean for Royce's taste. Hadrian had no real concept of filth. Unlike Royce, he had not grown up in the muddy streets of Ratibor.

  He decided to try and reason with him. "Would you rather they find out and send a detachment to hunt us down?"

  "No, I just hate being the cause of an innocent man's death."

  "No one is innocent my friend. And you aren't the cause…you're more like…" he searched for words, "the grease beneath the skids."

  "Thanks. I feel so much better."

  Royce folded the uniform and, along with the boots, placed it neatly into his saddlebag. Hadrian still struggled to rid himself of the black boots that were too small. With a mighty tug he jerked the last one off and threw it down in frustration. He gathered it up and wrestled his uniform into the satchel. Cramming everything as deep as possible, he strapped the flap down and buckled it as tight as he could. He glared at the pack and sighed once more.

  "You know, if you organized your pack a little better it wouldn't be so hard to fit all your gear," Royce said.

  Hadrian looked at him with a puzzled expression. "What? Oh-no, I'm…it's not the gear."

  "What is it then?" Royce pulled on his black cloak and adjusted the collar.

  The fighter stroked his horse's neck. "I don't know," he replied mournfully. "It's just that-well-I thought by now I'd have done something more-with my life, I mean."

  "Are you crazy? Most men work themselves to death on a small bit of land that isn't even theirs. You're free to do as you choose and go wherever you want."

  "I know, but when I was young I used to think I was-well-special. I used to imagine that I would triumph in some great purpose, win the girl, and save the kingdom, but I suppose every boy feels that way."

  "I didn't."

  Hadrian scowled at him. "I just had this idea of who I would become, and being a worthless spy wasn't part of that plan."

  "We're hardly worthless," Royce corrected him. "We've been making a good profit, especially lately."

  "That's not the point. I was successful as a mercenary, too. It's not about money. It's the fact that I survive like a leech."

  "Why is this suddenly coming up now? For the first time in years, we're making good money with a steady stream of respectable jobs. We're in the employ of a king for Maribor's sake. We can actually sleep in the same bed two nights in a row and not worry about being arrested. Just last week I passed the captain of the city watch and he gave me a nod."

  "It's not the amount of work; it's the kind of work. It's the fact that we're always lying. If that courier dies, it'll be our fault. Besides, it's not sudden. I've felt this way for years. Why do you think I'm always suggesting we do something else? Do you know why I broke the rules and took that job to steal Pickering's sword? The one that nearly got us executed?"

  "For the unusual sum of money offered," Royce replied.

  "No, that's why you took it. I wanted the job because it seemed like the right thing to do. For once I had the chance to help someone who really deserved to be helped, or so I thought at the time."

  "And becoming an actor is the answer?"

  Hadrian untied his horse. "No, but as an actor, I could at least pretend to be virtuous. I suppose I should just be happy to be alive, right?"

  Royce did not answer. The nagging sensation was surfacing again. He hated keeping secrets from Hadrian and it weighed heavily on his conscience, which was amazing because he never knew he had one. Royce defined right and wrong by the moment. Right was what was best for him-wrong was everything else. He stole, lied, and even killed when necessary. This was his craft and he was good at it. There was no reason to apologize, no need to pause or reflect. The world was at war with him, and nothing was sacred.

  Telling Hadrian what he learned ran too great a risk. Royce preferred his world constant, with each variable accounted for. Lines on maps were shifting daily and power slipped from one set of hands to another. Time flowed too fast and events were too unexpected. He felt like he was crossing a frozen lake in late spring. He tried to pick a safe path, but the surface cracked beneath his feet. Even so, there were some changes he could still control. He reminded himself that the secret he kept from Hadrian was for his friend's own good.

  Climbing on Mouse, his short gray mare, Royce thought a moment. "We've been working pretty hard lately. Maybe we should take a break."

  "I don't see how we can," Hadrian replied. "With the Imperial Army preparing to invade Melengar, Alric is going to need us now more than ever."

  "You'd think that wouldn't you? But you didn't read the dispatch."

  Chapter 3

  The Miracle

  The Princess Arista Essendon slouched on the carriage seat buffeted by every rut and hole in the road. Her neck was stiff from sleeping against the armrest and her head throbbed from the constant jostling. Rising with a yawn, she wiped her eyes and rubbed her face. An attempt to straighten her hair trapped her fingers in a mass of auburn knots.

  The ambassadorial coach was showing the same wear as its passenger, having traveled too many miles over the last year. The roof leaked, the springs were worn, and the bench was becoming threadbare in places. The driver had orders to push hard to return to Medford by midday. He was making good time, but at the expense of hitting every rut an
d rock along the way. Drawing back the curtain, the morning sun flashed through gaps in the leafy wall of trees lining the road.

  She was almost home.

  Dirt, floating in the flickering light that revealed the interior of the coach, coated everything in a fine layer of dust. A discarded cheesecloth and several apple rinds covered a pile of parchments spilling from a stack on the opposite bench. Soiled footprints patterned the floor where a blanket, corset, and two dresses nested along with three shoes. She had no idea where the fourth was and only hoped it was in the carriage and not left in Lanksteer. Over the last six months, she felt as if she had left bits of herself all over Avryn.

  Hilfred would have known where her shoe was.

  She picked up her pearl-handled hairbrush and turned it over in her hands. Hilfred must have searched the wreckage for days. This one came from Tur Del Fur. Her father gave her a brush from every city he traveled to. He was a private man and saying "I love you" did not come easy, even to his own daughter. The brushes were his unspoken confessions. Once, she had dozens-now, this was the last. When her bedroom tower collapsed she lost them and it felt as if she lost her father all over again. Three weeks later this single brush appeared. It had to be Hilfred, but he never said a word or admitted a thing.

  Hilfred had been her bodyguard for years, and now that he was gone she realized just how much she had depended on him, and took him for granted.

  She had a new bodyguard now. Alric personally picked him from his own castle guards. His name began with a T-Tom, Tim, Travis-something like that. He stood on the wrong side of her, talked too much, laughed at his own jokes, and was always eating something. He was likely a brave and skilled soldier, but he was no Hilfred.

  The last time she saw Hilfred was over a year ago in Dahlgren when he nearly died from the Gilarabrywn attack. It was the second time he suffered burns trying to save her. The first was when she was only twelve-the night the castle caught fire. Her mother and several others died, but a boy of fifteen, the son of a sergeant-at-arms, braved the inferno to pull her from her bed. At Arista's insistence, he went back for her mother. He never reached her, but nearly died trying. He suffered for months afterward, and Arista's father rewarded the boy by appointing him her bodyguard.

  His wounds back then were nothing like what he suffered in Dahlgren. Healers had wrapped him from head to toe and he lay unconscious for days. When he woke, to her shock, he refused to see her. He left in the back of a wagon without saying goodbye, and at Hilfred's request, no one would tell her where he had gone. She could have pressed. She could have ordered the healers to talk. For months, she looked over her shoulder expecting to see him, waiting to hear the familiar clap of his sword against his thigh. She often wondered if she had done the right thing in letting him go. She sighed at yet another regret added to a pile that had been building over the last year.

  Taking stock of the mess around her increased her melancholy. This is what came from refusing to have a handmaid along, but she could not imagine being cooped up in the carriage with anyone for so long. She picked up her dresses and laid them across the far seat. Spying a document crushed into a ball and hanging in the folds of the far window curtain, made her stomach churn with guilt. With a frown, she plucked the crumpled parchment and smoothed it out by pressing it in her lap.

  It contained a list of kingdoms and provinces with a line slashed through each and the notation IMP scrawled beside them. Of course, the likes of Chadwick and King Ethelred were the first in line to kiss the empress' ring. She shook her head in disbelief. It happened over night. One day nothing, the next-bang! There was a New Empire and almost all of Warric and Rhenydd had joined. They pressured the small holdouts like Glouston, then invaded and swallowed them. Alburn caved in after a few threats. She ran her finger over the line indicating Dunmore. His Highness King Roswort graciously decided it was in his kingdom's best interest to accept the imperial offer of extended landholdings in return for joining the Empire. Arista would not be surprised if Roswort was promised Melengar as part of his payment.

  It all happened so fast.

  A year ago, the Empire was merely an idea. She had spent months as ambassador trying to strike alliances. Without support, without allies, Melengar could not hope to stand against the growing colossus.

  How long do we have before the Empire marches north, before-

  The carriage came to a sudden halt, throwing her forward, jerking the curtains, and creaking the tired springs. She looked out the window, puzzled. They were still on the old Steward's Road. The wall of trees had given way to an open field of flowers, which she knew placed them on the high meadow just a few miles outside Medford.

  "What's going on?" she called out.

  No response.

  Where in Elan is Tim, or Ted, or whatever the blazes his name is?

  She pulled the latch and, hiking up her skirt, pushed out the door. Warm sunlight met her, making her squint. Her legs were stiff and her back ached. At only twenty-six she already felt ancient. She slammed the carriage door and, holding a hand to protect her eyes, glared as best she could up at the silhouettes of the driver and groom. They glanced at her, but only briefly then looked back down the slope of the road ahead.

  "Daniel! Why-" she started but stopped after seeing what they were looking at.

  The high meadowlands just north of Medford provided an extensive view for several miles south. The land sloped gently down, revealing Melengar's capital city, Medford. She saw the spires of Essendon Castle and Mares Cathedral and farther out the Galewyr River marked the southern border of the kingdom. In the days when her mother and father were alive, the royal family would come here in the summer for picnics and enjoy the cool breeze and the view. Only today the view was quite different.

  On the far bank, in the clear morning light, Arista saw rows and rows of canvas tents, hundreds of them, each flying the red-and-white flags of the Nyphron Imperial Empire.

  "There's an army, Highness," Daniel found his voice. "An army is a stone's throw from Medford."

  "Get me home, Daniel. Beat the horses if you must, but get me home!"

  ***

  The carriage had barely stopped when Arista punched open the door, nearly hitting Tommy-or Terence, or whoever he was-in the face when he foolishly attempted to open it for her. The servants in the courtyard immediately stopped their early morning chores to bow reverently. Melissa prepared for the onslaught as soon as she spotted the coach. Unlike Tucker-or Tillman-the small redheaded maid had served Arista for years, and knew to expect a storm.

  "How long has that army been there?" Arista barked at her even as she trotted up the stone steps.

  "Nearly a week," Melissa replied, chasing after the princess and catching the traveling cloak as Arista discarded it.

  "A week? Has there been fighting?"

  "Yes, His Majesty launched an attack across the river just a few days ago."

  "Alric attacked them? Across the river?"

  "It didn't go well," Melissa replied in a lowered voice.

  "I should think not! Was he drunk?"

  Castle guards hastily pulled back the big oak doors, barely getting them open before the princess barreled through, her gown whipping behind her.

  "Where are they?"

  "In the War Room."

  She stopped.

  They stood in the northern foyer, a wide gallery of polished stone pillars, displayed suits of armor, and hallways that led to sweeping staircases.

  "Missy, fetch my blue audience gown and shoes to go with it and prepare a basin of water-oh and send someone to bring me something to eat, I don't care what."

  "Yes, Your Highness." Melissa made a curt bow and raced up the stairs.

  "Your Highness," her bodyguard called chasing after her. "You almost lost me there."

  "Imagine that. I'll just have to try harder next time."

  ***

  Arista watched as her brother, King Alric, stood up from the great table. Normally this would require ev
eryone else to stand as well, but Alric suspended that tradition inside the council chamber, as he had a habit of rising frequently and pacing during meetings.

  "I don't understand it," he said, turning his back on all of them to begin his slow, familiar walk between the table and the window. As he moved, he stroked his short beard the way another man might wring his hands. Alric started the beard just before Arista left on her trip. It still had not filled in. She guessed he grew it to look more like their father. King Amrath had a dark, full beard, but Alric's light brown wisps only underscored his youth. He made matters worse by drawing attention to it with his constant stroking. Arista recalled how their father used to drum his fingers during state meetings. Under the weight of the crown, pressures must build up until action sought its own means of escape.

  Her brother was two years her junior, and she knew he never expected to wear the crown so soon. For years she had heard Alric's plans to roam the wilds with his friend Mauvin Pickering. The two wanted to see the world and have grand adventures that would involve nameless women, too much wine, and too little sleep. They even hoped to find and explore the ancient ruins of Percepliquis. When he tired of the road, she suspected he would be happy to return home and marry a girl half his age and father several strong sons. Only then, as his temples grayed and all of life's other ambitions were accomplished, did he expect the crown would pass to him. All that changed the night their Uncle Percy arranged the assassination of their father and left him king.

  "It could be a trick, Your Majesty," Lord Valin suggested. "A plan to catch you off your guard."

  Lord Valin was an elderly knight with a bushy white beard known for his valor and courage, but never for his strategic skills.

  "Lord Valin," Sir Ecton addressed the noble respectfully, "after our failure on the banks of the Galewyr, the Imperial Army can overrun Medford with ease, whether we are on or off our guard. We know it and they know it. Medford is their prize for the taking whenever they feel comfortable getting their feet wet."