“After years of training, the newly qualified dwarven recruits have been sent to the front lines. They will pass through Corcillum on their march down from the elven border in two days’ time. When they get here and find their homes under siege, there will be conflict, one way or another. There is nothing we can do to prevent that.”
Arcturus stopped and looked at them, as if for the first time.
“I don’t know what’s going to happen when they find out you’re alive,” he said, half to himself. “But you can bet that Cress will be arrested, if not the whole lot of you as accomplices, given Fletcher and Othello’s history with treason charges. Sylva, just your association with these three alone…”
“We need to leave, now,” Sylva said, jumping to her feet. Arcturus waved her back to sitting, shaking his head.
“The students downstairs were all commoners, since the nobles didn’t bother attending. So, we’ve got until tomorrow before the word gets out. I’ve ordered them straight to bed and asked Dame Fairhaven to keep an eye on them, making sure they don’t leave their rooms. You’re safe for tonight at least.”
Fletcher couldn’t believe what he was hearing. From fugitives to fugitives. How could this be possible? They would have been safer living out their lives in the ether.
“Fletcher, what about the—” Sylva began.
But she never finished her sentence, because King Harold burst through the library doors, his eyes wide and unbelieving, sweat-slicked curls of gold plastered across his forehead. Lovett followed behind, wheeling herself through in a high-backed wooden wheelchair.
“So it’s true,” he panted.
“I told you,” Lovett said drily. She broke into a grin and shook her head in mock disbelief. “I bet they have quite a story to tell. Sixteen of the ether’s days, that’s almost a week in our time!”
But the king was not listening, or even looking at the four students seated at the large table in front of him. He was staring at Fletcher’s mother. As if he were a sleepwalker, he staggered to the armchair where she sat, her face cast in shadow by the flickering flames.
“Alice,” he croaked, kneeling in front of her. “Is it you?”
He looked at Fletcher with a questioning gaze and received a solemn nod back. There were tears in the king’s eye, and he took Alice’s limp hand in his own.
“It can’t be … Fletcher, do you…” Arcturus trailed off, his fingers straying to the long scar that marred his face. The same scar he had received while seeking revenge on the orcs that had attacked the Raleighs on that fateful night.
Fletcher could see Arcturus’s obvious joy at finding his old friend, the look of astonishment plain on his face, followed by a grin as wide as Fletcher had ever seen on the scarred man’s lips.
Arcturus lay a hand on the king’s shoulder, gazing into Alice’s blank eyes. As the two looked at her, Alice’s eyes flickered for a moment, and the barest hint of a smile played across her lips. Then it was gone, so swiftly that Fletcher couldn’t even be sure he had seen it.
“Alice, it’s me,” Arcturus said, squeezing her other hand.
But the moment had passed. Her eyes stared unblinkingly into the flames.
“Is she … always like this?” Harold asked, a slow tear rolling down his face.
“Yes,” Fletcher answered. There was nothing else to say.
CHAPTER
23
THERE WAS LITTLE TIME to rejoice at Alice’s return, bittersweet though it had been. The morning was fast approaching, and Fletcher’s team would need to be long gone by then.
Their urgency was further stoked when Lovett reminded them that a student was capable of sending a note by flying demon, and it was likely the Forsyths would have spies among even the commoners at Vocans. After all, they had gained the loyalty of two already: both Atlas and Jeffrey. An impressionable first-year commoner, stunned by the proffered friendship of a wealthy noble family, could be easily bought.
Lovett had already told the king and Arcturus of what had happened during the mission. So Fletcher stumbled through their journey across the ether, with interruptions from the others where he left out some important details. The revelations from his conversation with Khan about Alice’s treatment at the orcs’ hands elicited growls of anger from the others, and a tirade of furious swearing from Lovett.
By the end, Fletcher’s throat was dry and hoarse, leaving the rest of the table brooding over their predicament in the dim glow of the dying hearth fire. Sylva ended the tale with a summary of the contents of Jeffrey’s journal, and now it was passed around the table as they digested the new information.
Cress was the first to speak in the grim silence.
“Isn’t it obvious?” she asked, taking the slim volume from Arcturus’s hands and holding it aloft. “This is it. Proof. Proof that Jeffrey was a traitor, proof that he was behind every explosion, every death—hell, everything that humanity has laid the blame of at dwarven feet over the past year.”
Silence.
“They’ll know that I didn’t kill Rufus, and that the Anvil attacks were nothing to do with the dwarves,” she continued, brandishing the journal. “It’s enough to have Zacharias Forsyth and Inquisitor Rook thrown in jail.”
Still nothing. She turned to Harold, exasperated.
“What are you going to do about this?” she asked, taking the letter from between the journal’s pages and dangling it in front of the king’s face. Fletcher couldn’t help but grin. King or no king, Cress wasn’t one to stand on ceremony.
“It’s not that simple,” Harold said, his brows furrowing at her impertinence. “Who am I supposed to take this to? The Pinkertons? The Inquisition themselves? They’re under my father’s thumb. Even most of the Judges are under his sway.”
“But—you’re king…,” Cress said, her brows furrowed with confusion.
Fletcher understood her confusion. He had told the others that Harold wanted to help the dwarves, and was estranged from his father because of it. But he had never told them that it was Alfric who held the power in Hominum; that his son Harold was king in name alone. Even Lovett and Arcturus looked perplexed. This was news to them as well.
The king sighed and rubbed his temples.
“My father rules in the shadows,” Harold said. “I am no more than a figurehead, someone to take the fall if things go wrong. He wants to exterminate the dwarves, and has been looking for an excuse to do it for years. His aims align with the Triumvirate’s.”
“What about the council?” Cress demanded. “And the laws you passed to allow dwarves to fight, to remove the child quotas? Was that Alfric too?”
Harold sighed.
“It’s true that I have a majority in the council, which has some powers over the rule of law, allowing me to pass minor measures. But for something like this … no.”
“Could we go to the generals of the army, my king?” Arcturus said, bowing his head in sudden reverence. His intent was clear—to leave Harold in no doubt of where his loyalties lay.