“You never cared where I was or what I did before.”
“I had little reason to until now.” The King shot him a sidelong glance. “I’m told you sent the guards away from Ione Hawthorn’s door last night. And that you spoke with her.”
Elm clenched his jaw.
The King’s timbre resembled the bark of one of his hounds. “Her family are vile, treasonous vultures.”
“What Tyrn said at the inquest was true enough,” Elm said, weighing his words. “Kill her, and people will talk. They’ll find out about Hauth. And about who you put him in bed with for a Nightmare Card. Perhaps your court will take a harder look at you, Father. They’ll see, for a man so wholly condemning of the infection, that you sure keep interesting company. Orithe Willow. Ravyn. Infected.”
Displeasure deepened the lines in the King’s face. “What,” he said, wine on his bitter breath, “would you have me do?”
It began to rain. Elm winced against it, shrouding his voice in disinterest. “Keep Ione Hawthorn close. She can give your excuses for Hauth’s absence. A symbol that all is as it ever was. For now.”
In the distance, thunder rolled. The King’s hand was ungloved, swollen and calloused, brutalized with age and years of swordplay. With it, he took the crown from his head. Examined it. “It rattles me to the bone, seeing your brother,” he said in a low voice. “Even with his Black Horse and Scythe, he broke so easily—” He winced against the wind. “Life is fragile. The line of kings, fragile.”
Elm had never spoken to his father speak like this, just the two of them, trading quiet words—not ever. It made his skin crawl. “Is that why Ravyn goes and I must remain? A pretense of strength?”
“Use your brain,” the King snapped. “We may pretend at it, but nothing is as it was. Even should Hauth wake and face the kingdom once more, his spine is in tatters. He will never sire an heir—the Physicians are certain.” He took Elm by the shoulder, his fingers prodding into weary, aching muscle. “I have Blunder to think of. Five hundred years of rule to think of.”
Elm stared into his father’s eyes, the words burning in his throat. “And so you reach deep into your pile of shit and pull the second Prince back into the light.”
The King’s grip tightened. “The throne of Blunder is Rowan. It is under our namesake tree that the Deck will be united. The mist will be lifted, the infection cured. When I die, I will be buried with my father and grandfather and their grandfathers in the rowan grove.” His gaze dropped to the crown in his other hand. “And you, Renelm, will be the one to take my place.”
Elm jerked out of his father’s grasp. His body was screaming—denying. Bile churned, escaping up his throat into his mouth. “I don’t want your throne. Hauth may yet—he may—”
“No. He will not.” The King placed the crown back onto his head. He looked weathered, the wind and rain washing all pretense from him. He was just a drunk old man, grieving.
And somehow, that made it so much worse. Anger, Elm had come to expect. His father had always been a man of wrath and an abrupt, exacting temper. But this resignation—Elm did not know it. Could not stomach it.
He pulled away from the King.
“Where are you going?”
“To see Jespyr.”
“She left with Emory this morning for Castle Yew.”
Ravyn, Jespyr, now Emory, gone. Elm bit the inside of his cheek and kept going, hail pelting him as he crossed back into the bailey.
“I’ll expect you at court tonight,” his father called into the wind.
“I won’t be there.”
“You will, Renelm. You’ll resign as Destrier. And you and Ione Hawthorn will pretend all is as it ever was, until I am ready to announce your succession. And her execution.”
Elm slept the day away. He might have rolled over onto his stomach and slept through the night as well, but the echoing clamor of dinner in the great hall swept up the stairs. He woke with a start, heart pounding, sweat on his brow and chest, certain there was something he must do—something he’d forgotten.
Hawthorn. He ripped the blankets off. Ravyn and Jespyr and Emory might be gone, but Elm was far from aimless. He’d no desire to twiddle his thumbs and wait for his father to christen him heir—he had a promise to keep. A Maiden Card to find.
He stripped and scrubbed himself clean with cold water, wondering with a shiver what would happen if the King sought to kill Ione Hawthorn before they found her Maiden Card. Would she die? Or would the Maiden’s magic heal her, even from a fatal blow?
His stomach knotted at the thought.
He left his chamber in a fresh black tunic and hurried down the corridor, gnashing his teeth against the raucous sound of court wafting through the castle. He knew what he would find in the great hall. Men, slipping Providence Cards between their fingers, talking too loudly of magic and money and Card trade. Mothers, ready to thrust their daughters onto his arm. His own father, grunting into his goblet, surveying his court, as if everything he held in his pitiless green eyes was owed to him.
“You look like you’re about to hurl yourself down those stairs, Prince,” a voice called from behind.
Elm’s hand crashed into his pocket. He tapped velvet only twice before his brain caught up with his fingers. “Spirit and trees, Hawthorn, you have to stop doing that.”
Ione stood half in shadow, half in light. “Sorry,” she said, not sounding sorry at all. “I’d thought you’d heard me.”
Her hair was fastened in a tight knot at the nape of her neck, and someone had given her a new dress. It was dark, grayish-blue, the color of deep, icy water. It hugged her poorly, marring the shape of her curved body. The fabric bunched at her neck, secured by a gray ribbon just below her jaw, collar-like.
Two figures emerged out of shadow behind Ione. They weren’t the same sentries from her chamber door last night. They stood too tall—too broad—to be castle guards. And, unlike the castle guards, when they beheld Elm, they didn’t cower.
Destriers. Allyn Moss and, to Elm’s bottomless chagrin, Royce Linden.
“Gents,” Elm said, offering them a mocking bow.
They lowered their heads in reply. Moss’s eyes dropped. Linden’s didn’t.
“They’ve moved you to the royal wing, I see,” Elm said to Ione. His gaze returned to the Destriers. “And you are—”
“Miss Hawthorn’s guards,” Linden replied.
“Not anymore. I’ll see to that.”
The Destriers exchanged a glance, and Linden’s voice hardened. “The King wants a keen eye kept on her, lest she try to escape.”
“I have two eyes, and they’re keen enough.” Elm pulled his Scythe out of his pocket, a quiet threat. “You’re dismissed, Destriers. Enjoy your evening.”
Moss hurried down the hall. Linden’s pace was slower. He muttered something that sounded like bloody git as he passed, his eyes narrow as they darted between Elm and Ione.