Ewen nodded.
“I don’t think you’ll find anything there, and neither does the Captain. But if you do . . .” Pen was silent for a long moment. “If you do, you’re a Queen’s Guard now. A real Queen’s Guard, you understand? You protect the Queen, no matter the cost to yourself.”
Ewen was too bewildered to do anything but nod, and Pen clapped him on the shoulder.
“Draw me some pictures while you’re down there. When we all get back to the Keep, we’ll sit and have another look through your portfolio.”
Ewen smiled. Pen had been the first one to tell him that his pile of pictures had a name.
“Luck to you, Ewen.”
“And you,” Ewen replied. As Pen walked away, he tried to puzzle out what Pen had said. Queen’s Guards were supposed to lay down their lives to protect the Queen, and Ewen understood that. But Pen seemed to be talking about something different.
Bradshaw was approaching the corral now, a heavy pack over one shoulder. Ewen waited for him, still considering Pen’s words. There was a word for these things . . . it danced right on the edge of Ewen’s mind for a moment before he retrieved it. Sacrifice. That was what it was. For Pen, being a Queen’s Guard was a matter of sacrifice, and from the look of him, it was hurting him badly. Ewen hesitated for a moment longer and then, not quite knowing why, he grabbed his grey cloak from the Mace’s saddle and stuffed it back into his own saddlebag.
Javel woke to shouting.
The voice was a woman’s, and for a moment he was confused, until he remembered where he was: in the Keep. He had ridden hard for three days, with only brief breaks to water his horse, and at the moment he put the Mace’s letter into Devin’s hand, he had not cared whether the man believed him or not, had only felt great thanksgiving that the ride was done.
Now a man was shouting. Javel sat up in bed, scrubbed a palm across his face, and found at least four days’ growth of beard. He had been asleep for some time. The argument continued to rage outside, unintelligible but rancorous, and Javel sighed and grabbed his boots.
When he emerged into the hallway, he found it lined with Queen’s Guards. The guard in charge, Devin, was squared off with a tall, dark-haired woman just outside Javel’s door. Javel did not recognize the woman, but he marked how hard the rest of the Queen’s Guard were working not to look at her, their gazes fixed on the floor or the ceiling or anything else.
“I tell you, they are coming!” the woman shouted at Devin.
“Calm down, Andalie! You’ll wake the wing!”
“Good! We must get out of here, now!”
Devin glanced at the men around him, his face reddening. “Are you giving me an order?”
“Yes, you great ass! Get these people out of bed!”
“Shut up!”
The voice echoed down the hallway. On Javel’s right, a new figure emerged from one of the rooms farther down the corridor, and this was someone Javel did recognize: Arliss, one of the biggest bookmakers and dealers in New London. If a man spent any amount of time drinking in the Gut—and Javel, of course, had spent plenty—he could not fail to encounter Arliss’s ubiquitous, gnomelike figure, in and out of various pubs, wheeling and dealing, making money hand over fist.
“This had better be good,” Arliss growled. “I’m trying to resettle nearly a hundred thousand people who still don’t want to leave. The provisioning alone would make you cry.”
The woman, Andalie, said, “We must leave. Now. Immediately.”
“To go where?”
“Anywhere,” she replied flatly.
“The woman had a nightmare,” Devin told him. “I will clear this up, sir. Never mind.”
But Devin’s voice had weakened, and he would not look directly at Andalie either. Even Javel could feel the aura of strangeness around her, her eyes so distant that they seemed to see beyond this world. The group of Queen’s Guards shuffled uncomfortably, looking from Devin to Arliss.
“Andalie?” Arliss asked.
“The Holy Father’s people are coming here, now. We must get out of here.”
“I warned you, Andalie.” Devin lowered his voice, for now doors were beginning to open up and down the hallway. “Get yourself back to your children.”
“I will not,” Andalie replied coldly. “The Mace put you in charge of the Guard, not of me.”
“How do you propose the Holy Father means to enter the Keep? He has no soldiers!”
“Yes, he does. The Mort.”
“The Mort are gone!”
“No.”
“She’s right!” said a younger guard. Javel vaguely remembered him from that long, dreamlike trip back from the Argive. He could not be more than twenty. There was a bow slung across his back. “Andalie always knows! We must get out of here!”
“Shut up, Wellmer!” Devin snapped. At the same moment, a thundering blow shook the floor beneath their feet. Javel cried out, and he was not alone.
“A ram,” Arliss muttered. “Too late.”