Alive. It was unsaid, but I saw the word looming behind his eyes.

He left to get the message into the hands of the Valsprey handler. If all went well, he said, it would be there by tomorrow, but he warned me there would be no return message. It took months to train a bird to fly to a distant location. They weren’t trained to return to Civica.

I looked at the Field Marshal, nodding thanks and apologies in the same gesture. “And from this point forward, you must trust the king of Dalbreck as one of our own. His word is true.”

I told the soldiers to release him, and ordered the Huntmaster, the Timekeeper, and Trademaster freed as well. The rest of the cabinet would remain in their cells to face trial and execution—if I didn’t kill them first. My threat to the Viceregent had been real. If any harm came to my brothers or their comrades, his death would not be an easy one.

Devastation looked down on us,

But a green valley lay ahead.

The end of the journey was in sight at last,

And I did what I knew I would do all along;

I buried my knife deep in my betrothed’s throat,

And as he gasped for his last breath,

As his blood soaked into the earth,

There were no tears

Among any of us,

Especially none from me.

—The Lost Words of Morrighan

CHAPTER SIXTY-NINE

RAFE

It was a warm dark hole I climbed into as I had interrogated the prisoners that morning. It had no bottom, a free fall that invited me to let go. All I could see in the darkness as I asked questions were barrows full of bounty taken from Dalbreck’s dead soldiers. With every swing of my fist, I saw Lia sitting in a dank Vendan holding cell, grieving for her dead brother. And when I drew my knife on the Viceregent, I saw only Lia, bleeding and limp in my arms. Sven had finally pulled me back.

The Viceregent dabbed his lip with his sleeve, then smirked. “I had planned on killing you both, you know? An ambush staged to look like a common robbery by Dalbretch bandits on your way back home after the wedding.”

His eyes glowed with smugness. “You think I don’t have my reasons, just as you think you have yours? Don’t we all get tired of waiting for what we want? The only difference between you and me is I stopped waiting.”

The man is insane, Sven had muttered as he stopped my fist mid-swing. Enough, he said and pushed me away. He locked the cell door behind us and then turned my attention elsewhere, reminding me that I still needed to tell Lia.

* * *

I entered the quarters that Lia’s aunt Cloris had ushered me into earlier, still feeling like an intruder. It seemed wrong to be staying in the room that Lia’s brother had once shared with his bride, Greta. Most of their belongings had been removed, but in the corner of the wardrobe I found a pair of soft kid gloves sized for a woman’s hand, and on the bedside table, two delicate pearl-tipped hairpins. I took one look at the large four-poster bed and chose to catch an hour of sleep on the settee instead. I would have preferred staying on a bedroll in Aldrid Hall, where many of my men were, but Lady Cloris insisted I take the room, and I didn’t want to begrudge her hospitality.

When I walked in, Orrin was lying sideways across my bed, asleep with his mouth hanging open and his legs dangling over the side. Jeb was spread out on the settee, his eyes closed and his hands neatly woven across his stomach. They’d both been up all night securing the citadelle and assigning posts. Only Dalbreck’s soldiers were to guard the prisoners until we were certain there were no more Vendan soldiers among the ranks. Sven was seated at a table, eating a game pie and reviewing files seized from the Viceregent’s apartments. Tavish sat at the other end, his feet propped up on the table, sifting through papers in his lap.

“Anything?” I asked.

Sven shook his head. “Nothing of import that might help us. He’s a clever devil.”

I grabbed a boiled egg from a tray of food and washed it down with milk.

“Did you tell her?” Tavish asked.

Both Jeb and Orrin opened their eyes, waiting for an answer too.

I nodded.

Tags: Mary E. Pearson The Remnant Chronicles Fantasy
Source: readsnovelonline.net