A Red-Rose Chain

“You have done something wrong,” said Rhys, still sounding profoundly disappointed. We had let him down; we had failed to live up to his lofty ideals. And if I had possessed any respect for the man whatsoever, that might have mattered to me. Sadly, under the circumstances, all he was doing was pissing me off. “You have plotted treason against my throne; you have brought seditious elements into my demesne. How do you plead, Sir Daye? What possible excuse can you have for what you have done?”


I folded my own arms, feeling a little silly in the trailing sleeves the false Queen had saddled me with. It’s hard to look like a force to be reckoned with when wearing something that a Disney princess would think was cute. “Since no one’s told me what I’ve done, I plead get your head out of your ass and start explaining yourself. I’m here to prevent a war, remember? What good would plotting treason do? I didn’t bring an army. I don’t even know how we’re getting back to the Mists if you don’t open a portal for us.” The bus, probably. Greyhound would be a real adventure with this bunch. “Also, there’s the whole ‘diplomatic immunity’ aspect of things. I have it, and so do my people. Plus we’re not your subjects, so while we can plot insurrection, we can’t be guilty of treason.”

“One of my maidservants stopped off at your quarters to clean and remove the laundry, as is only proper within a noble household. She was sparing you the effort of performing such menial chores yourself. But in her attempts to gather the washing, she found this.” Rhys unfolded his arms and gestured at one of the guards. The woman—whose face didn’t betray a flicker of emotion—moved to pick up a small chest from the edge of the dais. She turned back to us, holding up the chest like it was supposed to mean something.

Apparently it did, to at least one member of my little posse: Walther groaned, reaching up to pinch the bridge of his nose with one hand as he said, “That’s mine. It’s not treasonous for an alchemist to carry his supplies with him.”

“But it is treasonous for an alchemist to serve the deposed rulers of this land.” Rhys leaned over, opened the chest, and pulled out an amethyst bottle. It looked like it had been carved from a single impossibly large stone, with gold filigree around the top and bottom. Rhys held it up like it was proof of a crime. “Or do you deny that this is yours as well?”

“I am a cousin of the Yates family,” said Walther. “I never claimed I wasn’t. I never changed my last name—the only line of Tylwyth Teg to go by ‘Davies’ has long been known as related to the Yates line. But I don’t serve them. I didn’t come here to overthrow you. My service is to the Kingdom of the Mists, and I am here as Sir Daye’s private alchemist, to supply whatever potions or posies she requires.”

“I need a lot of potions and posies,” I said. “My complexion isn’t great—human blood, you know—and my hair gets frizzy when people use too much magic around me. And hoo, boy, you do not want to know about my digestion problems.” I gestured to Quentin. “And my squire over there—you do know that’s my squire, right? That you have detained and restrained my squire, without my permission, despite him being underage and hence my responsibility, rather than someone who’s capable of plotting treason on his own? I’m just checking, I don’t mean to imply that you don’t understand your own rules—anyway, he’s a teenage boy. Acne, weird rashes, chafing, they’re all on the table. You’d travel with your own alchemist, too, if you didn’t own a whole Kingdom full of them.”

Rhys blinked. Whatever response he’d been expecting, it apparently hadn’t been a bucket of refutations and denials.

Then Tybalt stepped forward.