Fate's Ransom(The First Argentines #4)

“I must,” he said, shaking his head. He feinted with the sword and lunged at her with the dagger.

She dodged the blow and kicked his injured leg, making him hiss in pain as he dropped to one knee. Wrenching his arm, she forced him to drop the dagger and jabbed her fingers into his throat. He couldn’t breathe.

Ransom grabbed her by the fabric of her dress and yanked her down to the floor. He lifted his sword to finish her off, but she landed a kick to his groin that made him double over in pain.

She swept free of him, kicking him in the temple to knock him down to the floor.

Then she yanked up the bedcover and dropped low, looking in the darkness beneath the bed. He was gasping, struggling to breathe, but from his position, he saw the underside of the bed as well as she did. The space was empty.

Alix shrieked in frustration. She went to the curtains and shoved them aside, one by one, revealing nothing. The children were not there.

Then Ransom heard the creak of the roof. He looked up, and so did Alix.

The children had gone outside and climbed up on the roof. If they’d held still for a moment longer, the trick might have worked.

A smile of triumph came to Alix’s lips as she drew another dagger and walked to the balcony window. The sound of shouting came from the bottom of the stairwell. Men were running up the steps in hastened fury, but it would not be soon enough.

He watched as Alix opened the latch of the balcony door and stepped into the night. What fragile moon was left glowed in her hair. Ransom saw a pair of legs dangling there, the prince’s. He no doubt had helped his sister up first. The boy was honorable, nothing like his father.

Ransom grunted, his loins throbbing with pain still, but he rose and charged Alix.

She’d pulled back her arm to stab the boy in the leg. One cut was all it would take for the poison to destroy him. But she didn’t finish the stroke. Ransom grabbed for her wrist, thinking of nothing but saving the boy, the young king, and was nicked by the blade as he deflected it. He felt a sting of pain shoot up his arm as his body collided with hers. He had time for one thought—it’s over—and they both tumbled into the stone barrier of the balcony. When she lifted her leg to kick him, she fell backward, and the momentum carried them both over the edge. In a panic, Ransom grabbed at the stone ledge, and his fingers found a firm grip.

Alix grabbed his foot.

He hung at the edge of the balcony, his fingers straining from the weight of holding them both.

“Don’t! Don’t!” Alix screamed with real fear throbbing in her voice.

Ransom twisted slightly, his muscles and tendons strained beyond endurance. He tried to reach up with his other hand but missed.

Alix’s fingers dug into his pants and then the fringe of his chain mail as she attempted to climb him. The added strain of the swaying made him moan with despair. They were both going to fall.

He looked down at Alix’s upturned face, at the desperation and terror in her eyes. She’d dropped the poisoned dagger to cling to him with both hands.

“Hold!” she pleaded.

Her strength failed before his did. As she reached to grab him higher, to pull herself up more, she lost her grip and went plunging down into the darkness. He heard her body strike the stones an instant later.

Without her weight, he sighed in relief. He still sensed her, down at the base of the tower, still alive—still breathing. That surprised him. The fall should have killed her.

And then it did.

The sense of her Fountain magic guttered out.

His wrist screamed in pain. He knew he couldn’t hold on any longer. In a moment, he’d join Alix on the stones, a strange embrace of two enemies at the end.

He thought of Claire calling him an eejit. It made him smile as his grip finally failed.

Two young hands grabbed at his hauberk, and another two grabbed his wrist.

“Pull, Léanore! Pull!” said the prince, his teeth chattering with cold.

“I am! He’s . . . too . . . heavy!” moaned the princess.

“We can do it. Pull your hardest!”

Ransom dangled from the tower, twisting slowly, his strength gone. He had no dregs of Fountain magic left. No scabbard to heal his injuries. What remained of his life was literally in the hands of two young children.

“We have to pull him up,” Devon said. “We have to! Come now! Pull!”

The two children strained. Ransom reached out with his other hand and caught the lip of the railing. With his own power assisting them, they got him on his chest on the edge of the ledge. Dawson and his knights found them then and helped haul him the rest of the way over.

He lay panting on the balcony floor, gazing into the eyes of the prince and the princess.

Alix had come to kill them, and if he hadn’t been there to stop it, she would have. His life had been spared, for a little while, by the strength of an eight-year-old boy and his sister, who had refused to let him go.





I will save my tears for later. They can do me no good today.

—Claire de Murrow

Palace at Kingfountain





CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX


Beloved


The deconeus of the sanctuary of Our Lady finished the rite and bowed his head in solemnity as the commotion of the river rushed past. It was time to lift the canoe with the pallid body stretched inside. The barber who’d prepared it had meticulously wiped away the scabs of dried blood around the eyes and nose. The lifeless hands were crossed over the corpse’s chest.

Ransom breathed out, preparing for the pain as he grabbed the staff and helped hoist the body. He couldn’t conceal the grunt caused by a jolt of pain in his leg where Alix had stabbed him, and the small yet soon-to-be fatal wound on his wrist. He felt a trickle of blood go down his leg, but he performed his duty. Faulkes held the other end of the staff and gave Ransom a worried look, prepared to shoulder the front of the canoe himself if Ransom faltered.

He would not falter.

With a limp, he marched in step with the others and carried Jon-Landon’s body down the planks to the edge of the platform. Simon and his Espion had said that a large crowd had gathered on the bridge to witness the rites. The sun was directly overhead, but it was a cool autumn day, and the gentle breeze was soothing to his soul. His insides were on fire, though, a series of cramps and burning sensations that rode his every step. The same poison that had killed Jon-Landon. And Benedict. And both Devons.

When they reached the end of the docks, he squinted and prepared to lower the staff, which he and the other knights did with practiced grace. The men in the rear, including Sir Dawson and Lord DeVaux, lifted their end a little higher. The canoe plunged down and splashed into the river. It bobbed a moment before the current dragged it away, sending it on its one-way journey to the Deep Fathoms.

As Ransom watched it go, he thought about the king’s final moments of grief and guilt. Four kings he had failed to save. But the fifth, named after his predecessors, would be crowned this day. The boy would have a clean slate, a fresh chance.

He released his grip on the staff and turned to the crowd assembled at the docks, mostly nobles and knights. The queen dowager—so strange to think of Léa with that title now, for she was still so young—dabbed her eyes with a kerchief. The look of misery on her face moved him. The prince stood at her side, silent and resolute. The young princess approached Ransom, squeezed his hand, and told him that he’d done his duty well.

He smiled at her and thanked her before limping back toward the castle. Dawson walked behind him, providing distance but also ready to lend aid if it was needed. He appreciated the concern. Before either of them reached the door, they heard a collective gasp as the boat carrying Jon-Landon’s body arrived at the falls.

“It is over,” Dawson said.

Ransom nodded, grateful to be alive but grief-stricken that his own death would so quickly follow that of the king.

“Can I help you climb the stairs?” Dawson asked.