‘I prefer that he does,’ was all Laurent said, pacing forward, and leaving Damen no choice but to follow.
It had not been an entry into a town such as a prince would usually make, with a parade, and entertainments and days of feasts hosted by the lord. Laurent had ridden in at the head of his troop without any other spectacle, though people had come into the streets nonetheless, craning for a glimpse of a bright gold head. Any antipathy the commons might have felt towards Laurent had disappeared the moment they saw him. Ecstatic adoration. It had been that way in Arles, in all of the towns they had passed through. The golden prince was at his best when viewed from sixty paces, out of spitting range of his nature.
Since the entry, Damen’s eyes had been on Ravenel’s fortifications. Now he took in the dimensions of the great hall. It was massive, and built for defence, its doors two storey high, a place in which the whole of the garrison could be called together to receive orders and from which they could rapidly be directed simultaneously upon every point of the enceinte. It could also function as a point of retreat, if the walls were forced. Of troops stationed in this fort, Damen guessed there were perhaps two thousand in total. It was more than enough to crush Laurent’s contingent of one hundred and seventy-five horse. If they had ridden into a trap, they were already dead.
The next shoulder that interposed itself in his path had an armoured shoulderpiece and a cape attached to it. The cape was of an aristocrat’s quality. The man who wore the cape spoke.
‘An Akielon has no place in the company of men. Your Highness will understand.’
‘Is my slave making you nervous?’ said Laurent. ‘I can understand that. It takes a man to handle him.’
‘I know how to handle Akielons. I don’t invite them indoors.’
‘This Akielon is a member of my household,’ said Laurent. ‘Step back, Captain.’
The man stepped back. Laurent took his seat at the head of the long wooden table. Lord Touars sat in the lesser position to his right. Damen knew some of these men by reputation. The man in the armoured shoulderpiece and cape was Enguerran, Lord Touars’s troop commander. Further down the table was the advisor Hestal. The nine-year-old son Thevenin was joining them also.
Damen was not given a seat. He stood behind Laurent and to the left, and watched as another man entered—a man Damen knew very well, though this was the first time Damen had ever faced him standing, having been trussed up on every other occasion.
It was the Ambassador to Akielos, who was also Councillor to the Regent, Lord of Fortaine, and Aimeric’s father.
‘Councillor Guion,’ said Laurent.
Guion did not greet Laurent, but simply let the distaste on his face show plainly as his eyes passed over Damen.
‘You have brought a beast to the table. Where is the Captain your uncle appointed you?’
‘I stuck my sword through his shoulder, then had him stripped and run out of the company,’ said Laurent.
A pause. Councillor Guion regrouped. ‘Your uncle knows of this?’
‘That I spayed his dog? Yes. I think we have more important things to speak of?’
As the silence stretched out, it was Captain Enguerran who simply said, ‘You are correct.’
They began to discuss the attack.
Damen had heard the first reports alongside Laurent in Acquitart that morning. Akielons had destroyed a Veretian village. That was not what had made him angry. The Akielon attack was retaliation. The day before, a border raid had swept through an Akielon village. The familiarity of being angry with Laurent had sustained him through several exchanges. Your uncle paid raiders to cut down an Akielon village. ‘Yes.’ People are dead. ‘Yes.’ Did you know this would happen? ‘Yes.’
Laurent had said to him calmly, ‘You knew my uncle wanted to provoke conflict at the border. How else did you think he was going to do it?’ At the end of those exchanges, there had been nothing left to do but get on his horse and ride to Ravenel, spending the ride with his gaze fixed on the back of a yellow head that was infuriatingly not to blame for these attacks, no matter how much he wanted to think so.
In those initial reports at Acquitart, they had not been told the size and extent of the Akielon retaliation. It had begun before dawn. It was no small band of attackers, nor was it a strike that tried to disguise itself. It was an Akielon troop, full sized, armed and armoured, claiming retribution for a raid on one of their own villages. By the time the sun rose, they had slaughtered several hundred in the village of Breteau, among them Adric and Charron, two members of minor nobility who had detoured their small retinue from a camp a mile or so off to fight to protect the villagers. The Akielon raiders lit fires, they killed livestock. They killed men and women. They killed children.
It was Laurent who, at the end of the first round of discussion, said, ‘An Akielon village was also attacked?’ Damen looked at him in surprise.