“Some entertainment for the wedding guests,” the guard replied, closing the door again. “Got to keep them occupied somehow.”
Ambrose wondered what the guests were thinking. Did they believe Tzsayn was ill? Or did they imagine he’d just got cold feet? Did any of them suspect the truth—that something larger was afoot? Boris might, he supposed. Brutal and cruel the prince might be, but he was no fool. He had planned this wedding like a military operation. What would he do now it was all going wrong?
Ambrose frowned.
A military operation . . . The more he thought about it, the stranger it seemed that Boris would be such a passive player in this great invasion plan. Boris was a warrior; his place, like Ambrose’s, was on the front line. And yet he had chosen to be the one to give his sister away in marriage. To sit at a feast while his father stood on the battlefield. It seemed . . . unlikely. Yes, the wedding was necessary as a diversion to get the northern lords of Pitoria away from their lands, but there was no honor in it. Not like the honor of combat. That was the honor Boris craved—the honor of spilled blood and fallen enemies.
And Noyes was here too; he was the king’s spymaster, but he also had a small team of elite fighters. Why had Noyes come to Tornia? He wasn’t needed for the wedding. So why could he be here?
Ambrose felt a chill settling upon him. Could there be another reason for Boris insisting that all the lords were here? So that he could make an attack on them? It would be risky—very risky—but Boris would love the idea of attacking noblemen, rather than ordinary soldiers. The prestige from such a fight, from a victory, would be huge, but what would be the tactical advantage?
And suddenly Ambrose understood Boris’s plan, as clearly as if the prince were whispering it into his ear: while the nobility of Pitoria gathered for the wedding of their prince, Aloysius’s army would cross the border, overrunning the north, which would be unprepared with its lords absent; and then, at the very moment when decisive leadership was needed in Tornia, Boris would strike, killing King Arell, Prince Tzsayn, and as many of the Pitorian lords as he could, before fleeing the city to join his father.
It was ambitious and a little insane, but what two words better described King Aloysius of Brigant?
Ambrose ran to the door, banged on it, and shouted to the guard, “I need to see the king.”
The guard opened the door and laughed. “The prince said to get you whatever you asked for, but that might be a little difficult.”
“There’s going to be an attack on the king’s life.”
The guard shook his head. “He has his guards around him. No one will get through.”
“Can you take a message to him?”
“Forget it.”
“What about taking a message to Princess Catherine?”
“One thing the prince was clear about was that you weren’t to see her.”
“I don’t want to see her; I want to give her a message. He didn’t forbid that, did he?”
“Fine. Write her a letter.”
Ambrose made his message short and to the point.
Boris is planning to kill the king tonight.
Warn him.
He handed it to the guard and said, “Make sure she gets it immediately.”
The guard left, locking the door behind him, and Ambrose went back to his post at the window. A while later the guard returned.
“Her maid took it and said she’d give it to her. I can’t do more than that, sir.”
Ambrose lay down but couldn’t rest. His mind was racing. The more he thought about it, the more certain he was that tonight was the night Boris would attack. This would have been the wedding night, when everyone was drunk and tired and off their guard. But the situation had changed. There had been no wedding, not yet. Boris might wait a day if he believed the story that Tzsayn was ill, and that the wedding would happen tomorrow.
Or would he?
No. Not Boris. He wouldn’t delay. The schedule was set. Aloysius’s army would already be at the border—there would be no time to get a message to them to tell them to wait. The lords were here, so was the king. Boris and Noyes would have their escape plan worked out. The attack would go ahead tonight.
At that moment, Ambrose heard a shout. It was distant, muffled. Maybe someone had had too much to drink. There was another shout. Then another. Then more.
It was happening. The attack on the king.
And, to his horror, Ambrose remembered his letter to Catherine.
Boris is planning to kill the king tonight. Warn him.
He had sent her into danger.
Ambrose grabbed his sword and banged on the door. The guard opened it with an exasperated “What now?” and Ambrose pulled him into the room as he leapt past, slammed the door behind him, and ran toward the shouting.
CATHERINE
TORNIA, PITORIA
Killing the leader provokes chaos and fear: that’s always a good start.
War: The Art of Winning, M. Tatcher
AT SUNSET, Catherine retired to her bed but couldn’t sleep. If all had gone to plan, this would have been her wedding night. Instead she was there alone, Tzsayn was riding north, and Ambrose was somewhere “safe” in the castle. Her father was invading this peaceful country, and that had been his plan all along. She was nothing to him, at least no more than a pawn in his game. Tomorrow was her seventeenth birthday; it should mark the start of her new life. Well, it certainly was going to be that, though not the one she had always been envisaging. But then she had never wanted to be married to a man she’d never met, nor to be locked away from the world like her mother. She thought she wanted to be loved by the people, but one setback and she was already having doubts.
A scratch at the door and Sarah came in with a note. “From Ambrose, Your Highness.”
Catherine almost snatched the letter from Sarah’s hand.
Boris is planning to kill the king tonight.
Warn him.
Catherine dressed quickly and set off with Sarah to find the king. They had to go up numerous flights of stairs to reach his apartments, which were in the largest tower of the castle.
“Princess Catherine!” said the king’s chamberlain, a portly man with a waxed mustache, emerging from a side room. “It’s a rather late hour for visiting. Is something amiss?”
“I must speak with the king,” Catherine said, her voice pure princess.
The chamberlain looked puzzled but bowed. “Of course, Your Highness.”
Catherine and Sarah were ushered through to a huge marble-floored room. Large glazed doors opened onto a balcony. The king stood looking through them and out over the city of Tornia.
He turned and she curtsied. King Arell looked weary but dignified.
“I owe you thanks for your information about the invasion, Princess Catherine. I apologize for not seeing you before now, but there has been much to organize.”
“And I’m afraid I have more information, Your Majesty. I believe Boris, my brother, is planning an attack on you. I—”
Before Catherine could say more, she saw a movement on the balcony behind the king. She pointed and said, “Are they your guards?”
The king turned as the windows behind him burst open. Four men dressed in black ran in, daggers in their hands. Catherine shouted the alarm, and a moment later two of the Royal Guard rushed in through the door. But the men in black were already across the room. One assailant grabbed the king by his arm, spinning him round, and another stabbed at his back.
King Arell fell with a cry. His guards ran forward, slashing at the king’s attackers with their swords, but with a splintering of glass more black-clad assassins smashed in through the windows. They swung on thin dark ropes, and with a jolt of horror Catherine remembered the night on board ship during her crossing to Pitoria, when she had seen Boris’s men climbing ropes in the rigging in the dark.