For all the memories I have of my brother sneaking out of the palace as a boy, I don’t have any recent ones. The king can go where he likes, do what he likes, see who he likes. There’s never any need to sneak anywhere.
But tonight, he’s in the back corner of my carriage, wrapped in a cloak. I’m so keyed up about the journey that I almost shout for a guard before I recognize him.
“Don’t make a fuss,” he says quietly.
My heart is pounding so hard that I can’t speak for a moment. I’ve stopped short in the doorway to the carriage, and a porter behind me says, “Your Highness?”
I force air into my lungs. “Yes. We should be on our way.” I give my brother a look as I climb into the carriage, then tug the door closed behind me. “You’re lucky I didn’t pull a weapon,” I murmur.
Outside, rain begins to patter on the roof of the carriage, and the driver clucks to the horses. As we begin rattling over cobblestones, I wait for Harristan to talk, but he says nothing, so I say nothing. The carriage bounces along forever, until I finally say, “What are you doing?”
“I wanted to see you off.” “You just did that.”
And he did. It wasn’t very grand, as we’re leaving earlier than expected, but he said his goodbyes in the salon in front of the few courtiers in attendance. He said something appropriately regal and clasped my hand, but I was barely listening because my thoughts were screaming at me about the fact that any of this was happening.
“No, Cory,” he says, and his voice is low and quiet. “I didn’t.”
The sentimentality of that strikes me. I can’t believe he did this. I can’t believe he’s here.
In truth, I can’t even remember the last time we shared a carriage together. Surely before our parents died. Once he was crowned king, the security risk was always too great to chance putting us both in the same vehicle. I should probably call for a stop right this instant.
I don’t.
“None of your guards are with me,” I say, and my voice is rough. “How did you get in here?”
“I told Quint he needed to use his skills of secrecy for
my purposes this time.”
My eyebrows go up. Quint is just full of surprises this week.
Then again, maybe it’s not a surprise. They aren’t friends, not even close, but Quint would never deny the king anything.
“How will you get back?” I say. “Or are you planning to stow away altogether? I’m sure I have a trunk strapped to the carriage.”
“I thought about it.”
He’s teasing, but there’s a note of truth in there.
I hate that there’s a tiny part of my brain that wishes this were a possibility.
Maybe he does, too, because a sad light glimmers in his eyes when he says, “I’ll offer the driver a few coins for a
return trip to the palace.”
I smile. “You’ll give him a heart attack.” “I suppose I could walk.”
I imagine him strolling up to the palace gates like an ordinary citizen. He would never. Could never. The gossip mill wouldn’t stop churning for weeks.
But I can play this game. “It’s a cloudy night,” I say. “Watch out for cutpurses.”
Harristan grins, his smile bright in the shadows. It reminds me of all the times we went tearing through the sectors as boys, when no one knew who we were. He’s so severe as the stoic king that I sometimes forget he knows how to smile like that.
The rain picks up, rattling hard on the roof. It’s not a long carriage ride to the docks. But my brother holds my eyes, and his smile fades. “Are you afraid?”
He’s the only person who would ask me that so directly
—and also the only person who’d get a wholly honest answer. “A little.” I pause. “Are you?”
“A little.” He hesitates, then coughs faintly.
“We don’t need to leave today.” I pause. “We could wait.”
“Do you want to wait?” he says.
It’s a genuine question. I could say yes, and he’d call this whole thing to a stop.
But we’ve discussed this with our advisers and some of the top sailors from Artis, most of whom agreed that leaving ahead of the storm would provide strong winds for a quick journey—and less risk.
Delaying now could look fearful and indecisive. That doesn’t seem like a good way to begin trade relations with the new Ostrian king.
“No,” I say. The ground under the carriage has changed as we draw close to the docks. Between the heavy clouds
and the weather, it’s hard to make out much detail through the tiny window of the carriage, but I can make out the letters curving along the hull. The Dawn Chaser.
Lord. Even the name of his ship seems over the top.
My eyes scan the docks. I don’t see Tessa, but I know she left ahead of us. I have no idea whether Lochlan is on board yet. There’s a part of me that thinks Harristan should have just locked him in the Hold and told everyone he was on the ship. Maybe we still could. I bite at the edge of my thumbnail.
“Cory.”
I look at my brother. “What.”
“Do you want to wait?” He says each word with quiet emphasis.
His eyes are searching mine, and I search his right back. I keep thinking of what Quint said, how this is the first time Harristan and I will be doing any of this alone. The enormity of that tightens my chest. We’ve never been alone. Not when we were boys, sneaking into the Wilds with a few pieces of silver in our pockets, not when our parents were killed, not when rebels stormed the palace and we ran for our lives.
“Harristan,” I say. “Do you want me to wait?”
He says nothing, and the carriage draws to a stop. Suddenly, there’s no rattle of hooves on cobblestones, and the air between us is silent.
A porter begins to swing the door open. “Your Highness
—”
“Not yet.” I reach out and snap the door closed. My
voice drops until it’s barely louder than a whisper, and I repeat the question. “Do you? Do you want me to wait?”
He inhales deeply—then coughs. I frown.
He lifts a hand, then takes a slow breath. “I’m fine.”
I clench my jaw. I hate this.
“We have an opportunity to do something good, Cory,” he says. “Father was so well regarded.” He pauses. “I don’t want fear and anger to be my legacy. I want to be … better.”
He sounds … hopeful. I don’t remember the last time I heard my brother sound hopeful.
“I do too,” I say.
He nods, then extends a hand.
I reach out and clasp it. Harristan isn’t one for affection, but his grip is tight and sure. For one brief second, my throat tightens, and I’m not sure I’m going to be able to climb out of this carriage.
But then he blinks and lets go, then reaches out to ruffle my hair, ending with a light shove, the way he did when we were boys. I scoff and bat his hand away, then reach for the latch on the door.
“Corrick,” he says quietly, before my hand pulls the latch.
I turn. “What?”
He says nothing for a moment, and in that breath of silence, I feel the weight of his emotion.
“Come home safe, little brother.”
I give him a nod. “I promise. Be here when I get back.” Then I open the door and slip into the falling rain alone.
 |
Porters and footmen carry umbrellas, but the wind is such that I’ve got rain in my boots and down my collar by the time I make it to the line of guards who’ve assembled for my departure. I’m still tangled up with emotion about my brother, full of doubts and worries about the trip, and then Rocco informs me that Tessa is already on board with
Kilbourne and Silas. “Captain Blakemore sought to get Miss Tessa out of the weather,” Rocco says.
I’ll bet he did.
“Excellent news,” I say flatly. I glance around at the guards standing at attention in the rain. “What about Lochlan?”
“On board as well,” he says. “He’ll be watched by Guardsman Silas until we determine he’s not a threat to you, Your Highness.”
“Well chosen,” I say, but I’m not entirely sure about that. Of all the guards Rocco could have chosen, I wouldn’t have considered Silas. He’s younger than I am, and I doubt he’s ever been charged with anything more important than babysitting empty carriages. He’s hardly been a member of the guard for six months. But his family owns a number of iron mines in Trader’s Landing, and they have a bustling shipping business.
Meaning this guard will know iron and steel—and will likely know ships as well. That will be an asset right up to the moment when I need an experienced guard.
I glance at the gangway, then pull my pocket watch free. Water droplets immediately speckle the face. Men and women are shouting orders on the deck, and the rain steadily beats down. I didn’t expect—or want—fanfare, but I did expect someone from the Dawn Chaser to escort us aboard.
Or maybe I’m just irritated because this means Tessa is on board with the captain, while I’m standing down here getting rain in my boots, and the king of Kandala is hiding in a darkened carriage, waiting for me to go.
The thought feels petulant, and I hate it. Surely they’re busy preparing to leave in this weather.
From above, a woman on deck shouts, “Captain! I think he’s down there now.”
I glance at Rocco. “Have I kept them waiting?”
He inhales to answer, but before he can, Captain Blakemore all but slides down the gangway, springing agilely off the end to land right in front of us.
“Your Highness,” he says a bit breathlessly. “The ship is ready to depart.” The ship’s sails snap in the wind, and he glances at the sky. “If you’d still like to outrun this storm, we shouldn’t wait much longer.”
“Do forgive us for the delay,” I say, but I’m pretty sure my eyes say, I’m about to push you off the dock.
That spark of challenge lights in his gaze. “Forgiven, Your Highness.”
His eyes say, Go ahead and try.
But he glances at Rocco, then steps back and extends a hand. “Shall we?”
My feet almost refuse to move. I don’t want to.
But of course I’m being foolish. I force myself to step onto the gangway. My heart gives a jolt when my foot meets the wood, the world seeming to tilt. I have to take a deep breath to clear my head. I’m leaving my brother.
Captain Blakemore steps onto the gangway just behind me. Rocco will follow us both. Somewhere at the top of this ramp is Tessa, whose presence fills me with warmth—but also Lochlan, who will surely be a problem at some point. We only have a small handful of guards, all of whom are outnumbered by the shadowed workers on the ship deck.
Harristan’s voice breaks through the sound of raindrops slamming the deck. “Captain.”
Captain Blakemore turns in surprise. So do I. A ripple of alarm runs through the guards waiting on the dock, and many of them shift to flank the king.
Harristan ignores them all and steps onto the gangway. Rocco quickly steps aside to yield passage. My brother strides right up to Rian, and there’s fire in his eyes.
“I expect Prince Corrick to return unharmed,” he says, and there’s a note in his voice I don’t think I’ve ever heard before. The promise of vengeance hangs in every syllable.
Captain Blakemore doesn’t back down, but he matches Harristan’s intensity when he says, “Understood, Your Majesty.”
The rain pours down among us, but my brother doesn’t move.
Harristan needs to see confidence in my expression, so I clap him on the shoulder. “I have no doubt Captain Blakemore and I will be old friends by the time we return.”
Rian smiles slyly. “I’m so glad to hear it, Your Highness.”
I cut him a glance. “Do you want him to let me get on the boat or not?”
Harristan sighs as if he’s tired of us both, but then he stifles a cough.
I frown. “Your carriage is waiting,” I say, as if this was entirely planned, and there’s no surprise to my brother being out on the docks. “Get out of the rain. We shouldn’t delay.”
My brother nods, then takes a step back. “Farewell, Cory.”
Somehow this is harder than it was in the carriage.
Without warning, a dozen random memories flash in my thoughts. The time he spilled tea down the front of his jacket just before a meeting with the consuls, so I shrugged out of mine before anyone would catch him in a state of disarray. The time we snuck into the Wilds and a fortune- teller tried to trick me out of the few coins I carried, but Harristan saw through his ruse and snatched my money back out of the man’s palm. The time when he couldn’t catch his breath in the training arena, and his opponent, Allisander himself, took advantage of the moment to chase my brother into the dirt. I was only ten or eleven, but I
climbed the fence and tackled Allisander myself. The weapons master had to haul me off him.
The moment Harristan dove to cover me when our parents were assassinated.
My throat threatens to tighten, so I blink the memories away.
“Farewell,” I say, and my brother steps onto the dock.
“Follow me, Your Highness,” Captain Blakemore says, before my heart can start pounding at the thought that this is it. He doesn’t even wait to see if I follow; he simply heads toward the top of the ramp. “Miss Cade insisted on allowing you to select your choice of quarters first.”
If anything could send a bolt of warmth to the center of my chest, it’s the mention of Tessa. I’m not alone here. Not really.
I shove wet hair back from my face and stride forward, Rocco at my side.
I expect Prince Corrick to return unharmed.
My brother’s words, his vehemence, add to that bolt of warmth in my chest.
But then I consider what Rian said in response.
Understood, Your Majesty.
Not an assurance. Not a promise. An understanding.
I glance at Rocco. “Stay sharp,” I say quietly.
“Yes, Your Highness.” He glances at the sea captain striding ahead of us. “You have my word.”
