“There are more holes in that system than you might think,” Jade growled.
Emily took a breath. On the face of it, Jade was right. Warding a huge castle wasn’t easy, certainly not without a nexus point. There were so many people going in and out of the castle, from noble courtiers to servants, that Randor wouldn’t be able to ward the building as thoroughly as he might like. There would be so many people permitted to pass through the wards that fooling them wouldn’t be that hard.
But Randor would know that too. She had no doubt of it. The inner sections would be tightly sealed, particularly the king’s bedchamber. Randor might even have moved his bed to a whole different part of the castle, just in case Jade managed to break into the castle and came looking for revenge. And if they were caught and trapped…she’d torn a hole in his wards, once. She doubted she could do it again.
And we can’t get into the secret passages without Alassa, she thought. There was a whole network of catacombs under the city, but the tunnels that led to the castle–or at least the ones she knew about–were carefully warded. Alassa might be able to use the passages, if she’d been with them…Emily’s lips twitched. If Alassa was with us, we wouldn’t need to break into the castle in the first place.
She forced herself to concentrate. “Second, if we do capture the king, what next? He won’t be in any position to give orders, let alone enforce them. Will they free Alassa, on the grounds she’s the next in line to the throne, or summon Duke Traduceus? Or…or will they kill Alassa? Nightingale won’t want her to take the throne.”
“Nightingale doesn’t have the nerve to kill a defenseless woman,” Jade stated. His voice was so flat that Emily knew he was angry. “He wouldn’t fucking dare.”
Emily had her doubts. Alassa would be drugged, warded…perhaps even chained to the wall, if the king had allowed paranoia to dictate how his daughter would be treated. She would certainly be in no position to fight back if someone tried to kill her. Nightingale wasn’t the only one who’d have reason to fear her taking the throne. And even those who didn’t fear Alassa personally would be concerned about a female monarch. Zangaria had never had a woman on the throne before.
And then the nobility might try to take advantage of the chaos, Emily thought. The loyalists would be hesitant, unsure what to do, while the rebels would have a chance to scatter the king’s men and impose their own order.
“She’s right,” Cat said. “If we managed to kidnap Randor, we would plunge the kingdom into chaos. And even if we let him go at once, a great deal of damage would be done.”
Emily sighed. Randor would lose face if he was kidnapped. His enemies would laugh, while his allies would start to slip away. He wouldn’t be the first monarch of Zangaria to face hard times, but none of his predecessors–even Bryon the Weak–had been kidnapped and used as a bargaining chip. Women were bargaining chips, not men. The mentality that believed a woman could be married off to seal a bargain also believed that any man who lost control to the point that he became a bargaining chip himself was a laughingstock.
Jade slammed his fist into his palm. “Who cares?”
“Alassa,” Emily said, quietly. “She would care. If we unleash a civil war…”
“There’s going to be a civil war anyway,” Jade interrupted. “And…”
“Not like this,” Emily said, quietly. “This one would turn into a nightmare if there were no legitimate heirs left.”
She considered the possibilities for a long moment. Alassa was the confirmed heir, but she was imprisoned–and female. Her child wasn’t born, let alone confirmed as being in the line of succession. Duke Traduceus was third in line, by blood, but technically he’d been kicked out of the line of succession after he’d been turned into a puppet by his wife. After that…Alicia’s child was a bastard, while the stories about Baroness Harkness’s adopted son were nothing more than stories. But the nobility might find it convenient to believe the stories…
They put him on the throne, then administer the kingdom to suit themselves, she thought, grimly. They wouldn’t make the same mistakes–the mistakes that had allowed Alexis III to divide and conquer his enemies–twice. As long as they hang together, they won’t hang separately.
Jade let out a long breath. “Fuck it,” he said. “I…”
He turned and stalked towards the door. Emily opened her mouth to call him back, then stopped herself as he opened the door and strode through, closing it loudly behind him. She stared at the closed door, unable to believe what had happened. Jade had just…walked out on them?
“He needs to burn off some steam,” Cat said, quietly. He checked the wards, making sure they were still intact. “Which will be…unfortunate…for any footpads he happens to encounter.”
Emily glared at him. “And what if he encounters something more dangerous than mere footpads?”
Cat shrugged. “He’s got enough sense to teleport out, if he runs into real trouble, and send us a message from a safe distance. We do seem to be able to use minor magics without drawing attention from the king’s sorcerers.”
“It would be better not to take that for granted,” Emily said. She stood and walked to the window. The light was starting to fade. She could see fishermen and dockyard workers heading to the bars after a long day’s work. “Why…why isn’t he listening?”
“He feels helpless,” Cat said. She heard him walk up behind her. “He loves his wife, his pregnant wife. And she’s in the Tower and he can’t get to her and it’s gnawing away at his mind.”
Emily glanced at him. “Is there anything we can do about it?”
“Devise a plan in a hurry,” Cat said, with brutal frankness. “But I can’t think of anything that might work. Can you?”
“No,” Emily said. “I…”
Her mind raced. They could use batteries to muster the force to knock down the wards, she thought, yet they’d still have to deal with the guards. She hadn’t noticed if the soldiers who’d challenged them had been wearing antimagic armor or not, but she was pretty sure that at least some of the guards inside the building would have charmed armor. And even if they did manage to raise an army, storming the Tower would be a bloody nightmare. The defenders had so many advantages that they could hold out even if they were outnumbered ten to one.
And no one could fail to miss the fighting, she thought. Randor would dispatch reinforcements at once.
“We need to get into the Tower,” she said. It would be a great deal easier to dismantle the wards from the inside. “But how?”
“Good question,” Cat said. “I suppose we could dress up as women again.”
Emily snorted, rudely. The guards wouldn’t let just anyone into the Tower, even if they looked harmless. Trained professionals would know better than to believe that someone who didn’t carry a weapon was harmless. Besides, she was fairly sure the Tower’s staff lived in the building. They wouldn’t be allowed to go in and out on a whim.
She turned away from the window as something nagged at the back of her mind. Something she’d seen, something she’d done…but what? The sheer brutal simplicity of the ward network was a strength, in and of itself; there were no weaknesses, no points that could be used to pry the entire network apart until it collapsed. Even a necromancer would have trouble mustering the power to batter it down. Her fingers played with the snake-bracelet on her wrist. It was quite possible that the wards wouldn’t let a familiar enter the Tower…
“I don’t know,” she said. Perhaps they should try to make contact with Alicia. Or someone who might be inclined to help. But if the person they contacted went straight to the king…they’d be exposed. “I…what do we do?”