Prince of Fools (The Red Queen's War)

“I believe her this time,” he said.

 

“Hmmm.” I didn’t like the sound of that. When your sole travelling companion is a seven-foot maniac with an axe, it can be unsettling to hear that he’s starting to believe the devil that whispers in his ear when the sun sets. Even so, I didn’t argue the point. Baraqel had told me the same thing that morning. Perhaps when an angel whispered to me at sunrise, I should start believing what he said.

 

I dreamed of Sageous that night, smiling a calm smile to himself as he watched the board across which I was pushed, from black square to white, white to black, dark to light . . . Snorri beside me, matching my moves, and all about us, shadowed pieces, orchestrated to some complex design. A grey hand pushed its pawns forwards—I felt the Silent Sister’s touch and stepped forwards, black to white. Behind her loomed another, more huge, deepest crimson, the Red Queen playing the longest game. A dead black hand reached across the board, high above it a larger hand, midnight blue, guiding. I could almost see the strings. Together the Lady Blue and the Dead King advanced a knight and without warning the unborn stood before me, only a plain porcelain mask to preserve my sanity from its horror. I woke screaming and waited for dawn without sleeping.

 

? ? ?

 

In the Thurtans we kept to ourselves, avoiding inns and towns, sleeping in hedges, drinking from the rivers, of which there are too many, dividing the country into innumerable strips.

 

On the border between East and West Thurtan there lies a great forest known as Gowfaugh, a vast expanse of pine, dark and threatening evil.

 

“We could just take the road,” I said.

 

“Better to cross the border without notice.” Snorri eyed the forest margins. “Thurtan guards are like as not to give us a month inside one of their cells and take any valuables as payment for the privilege.”

 

I looked back along the trail we’d taken down from the hills, a faint line across a dour moorland. The Gowfaugh had nothing inviting about it, but the threat behind worried me more. I felt it daily, nipping at our heels. I had been expecting trouble since we left Crath City, and not from King Olidan worried that I’d sullied his queen’s honour. The Dead King had moved twice to stop us and the third time could be the charm.

 

“Forwards, Jal, that’s the place to keep your attention. You southerners are always looking back.”

 

“That’s because we’re no fools,” I said. “You’ve forgotten the unborn at the circus? Edris and his hired men, and what they became when you killed them?”

 

“Someone is seeding our path to stop us, but they’re not chasing us.”

 

“But the thing in Vermillion—it escaped, Sageous said we would meet it, he—”

 

“He told me the same thing.” Snorri nodded. “You don’t want to believe much that man says, but I think he’s right. It did escape. I suspect the creature you saw in the opera house was an unborn, one grown old in its power, the target of the Silent Sister’s spell. Probably an important lieutenant to the Dead King. A captain of his armies maybe.”

 

“But it’s not following us?” It was following us. I knew it.

 

“Did you not listen to the dream-witch, Jal?”

 

“He said a lot of things . . . Mostly about killing you—and how I could go home if I did.”

 

“The curse, the Silent Sister’s spell? Why’s it still on us?”

 

That did ring a bell. “Because the unborn wasn’t destroyed. The enchantment is an act of will. It needs to complete its purpose.” I crossed my arms, pleased with myself.

 

“That’s right. And we’re heading north and the spell is giving us no problems.”

 

“Yes.” I frowned. This was going somewhere bad.

 

“The unborn isn’t chasing us, Jal. We’re chasing it. The thing’s gone north.”

 

“Hell.” I tried to calm myself. “But . . . but, come on, what are the odds? We’re headed for the same place?”

 

“The Silent Sister sees the future.” Snorri touched a finger to his eye. “Her magic is aimed towards tomorrow. The spell sought out a way to reach the unborn—it followed the path that would see it carried by someone, some somebodies, who would end up in the same place as its target.”

 

“Hell.” I hadn’t any more to say this time.

 

“Yup.”

 

We skirted the Gowfaugh until we found a trail, too wide for a deer path, too narrow for a woodsman’s track. On reflection, as we pushed our way along it, leading the horses and trying to avoid getting a branch in the eye, the Gowfaugh wasn’t the kind of forest you’d hope to find deer in. Or woodsmen.

 

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