“You’re turning into a right proper fatpurse.” The man raised his voice in a snooty imitation of the other. “‘I’d prefer me a fine wine.’” He cut off abruptly amidst muttered warnings to hush, and a few men in front of Tristam looked nervously in his direction. He ignored their stares and entered to put away his own equipment.
“Good day, all,” he said after he finished, and left. The room remained silent behind him as he walked out the door.
A month in the Red Shield ranks hadn’t yet inured him to the scrutiny of his comrades. His fellow Red Shields were too intimidated by his bloodlines to give him trouble outright, but there were constant whispers about “the disgraced knight,” and nervous glances when someone forgot his presence and spoke too freely about the Palace’s noblemen. Every morning, Tristam breathed a sigh of relief when his daily rounds ended. He rubbed heat into his arms as he made his way back to his quarters.
He’d gone about halfway when someone called his name.
“Brancel!” Tristam turned at the voice. Sir Rollan was coming toward him with long, rolling strides. “Malikel requires everyone’s presence in his study.”
“Do I have time to get changed?”
“No. He wants everyone now.”
Whatever had happened must have been urgent, if everyone was being summoned on such short notice. “What is it?” Tristam asked.
“James managed to send a message out of the dungeon. To Kyra.”
“What?”
Rollan smiled fiercely. “You’re not the first to react this way.”
Malikel’s study was already filled with people when they arrived. Tristam spotted Kyra right away, standing next to Malikel’s desk and looking unusually subdued. He caught her eye, and she managed a wan smile in greeting. Was she all right? Had James threatened her? The room was too crowded and too quiet for Tristam to get a word with her. In addition to Kyra, there were the twenty knights and Red Shields under Malikel’s direct command. The Defense Minister himself paced in front of his desk, his dark eyes cutting through anyone who matched gazes with him. They waited in tense silence for a few more people to arrive. Then Malikel spoke.
“This is unacceptable,” he said, his voice hard as granite. “Our holding cells are not summer homes for criminals to lounge in and send missives from at their pleasure. I want the names of every man, woman, child, and dog who has come within a stone’s throw of the prison building. And I want them all questioned today.”
No one in the study dared respond or even move. After sweeping his gaze one more time around the room, Malikel started dividing the men into groups. “Tristam,” he said. “Take Fitz and Cecil, and round up the guards who were on duty two nights ago.”
Sir Rollan and another knight exchanged a glance at Malikel’s words. Tristam noticed, and stared straight ahead to disguise his annoyance. The other knights under Malikel’s command were still trying to figure out what Tristam’s demotion really meant. Here, he’d been given command of Red Shields again, a role that should not have fallen to him.
“Is there a problem, gentlemen?” Malikel asked.
“No, sir,” said Rollan.
“At your tasks, then,” Malikel said. “Make this quick.”
Tristam caught Fitz’s and Cecil’s eyes and led them out the door. He recognized Fitz as the wiry blond Red Shield who had helped the wounded Daly back to the Palace yesterday. Cecil, he didn’t know as well.
“Are the two of you willing to take orders from me?” he asked as they left the building.
“Aye,” said Cecil. “If Martin thought you were worth following, that’s good enough for me.” The look Tristam turned on Cecil must have been intimidating because the Red Shield immediately added, “I hope I’ve not spoken out of turn.”
“No…no…of course not,” Tristam said, pausing midstride to clear his head. “I just didn’t expect you to bring him up.” Martin had been a Red Shield and a subordinate, but he and Tristam had genuinely liked each other. He’d gone with Tristam in search of Kyra after she was captured by the Makvani, and he’d died at their hands. Tristam still couldn’t quite forgive himself.