Chapter 349: Room at the Table

On May twenty-seventh, I discovered that even a king could be excluded from his own sitting room.

Julian stood in the doorway with both arms extended.

Behind him, Garrick Valewood was carrying something covered in a sheet.

“I need my book,” I said.

“Which one?”

“The one on the table.”

Julian looked over his shoulder.

“There are several.”

“The blue one.”

He considered that for a moment, then shut the door in my face.

I waited.

There was a scrape of wood, a whispered discussion, and a small voice insisting that something needed more stars.

The door opened just far enough for Julian to hand me the book.

“Thank you,” I said.

“You’re welcome.”

It closed again.

Mary came around the corner and found me standing there.

“A difficult morning?”

“My authority is in question.”

“Only in that room?”

I looked at her.

She kept walking.

The council meeting was less cheerful.

Ordel’s latest report showed enemy troops moving upstream from Slateford. They had stopped trying to replace the bridge in front of our archers.

That did not mean they had given up crossing.

“They are looking for somewhere we cannot cover,” Eliza said.

Rennick’s scouts were following from the western bank. The provincial councils had begun moving grain and livestock away from the likely approaches.

At Orselle, Baldr was strengthening the inland defenses while Dorevan and Sareth watched for the remaining enemy dragon.

Arvek was still at the quarry.

He had taken a short flight that morning with Aurethar beside him, then returned to rest.

“He says he is not ready to fight,” Mary read from the report.

“Then he doesn’t fight,” I said.

She continued.

“He would like to speak to someone about the valleys where he was held.”

Eliza reached for a clean sheet.

“When he is ready. We can send a recorder through Orselle.”

We marked the request and returned to the river.

By evening, Thor was moving her injured arm well enough to annoy Evelyn.

She had interpreted improvement as permission to test its full range with a hammer.

Evelyn had interpreted it differently.

I encountered them in the courtyard halfway through the discussion.

“It did not hurt,” Thor said.

“While you were doing it.”

“An important distinction.”

“Yes. That is why I made it.”

Thor looked toward me.

I continued walking.

Some battles were beyond even the god of storms.

That night, I found Adriana sitting beside the window with Mirelle.

They had been discussing baby clothes.

Very small ones, judging by the piece of linen across Mirelle’s knees.

“Already?” I asked.

Mirelle looked up.

“I am mending something that already exists. It gives me time to think.”

Adriana held out her hand to me.

I took the chair beside her.

“What are you thinking about?”

“How quickly my children stopped fitting into these,” Mirelle said.

She smoothed the linen.

“And how your children seem determined to do it even faster.”

Adriana glanced down at her stomach.

There was no obvious change yet beneath her dress.

“I still find it difficult to believe.”

“You have time,” Mirelle told her.

I rested our joined hands in my lap.

For once, there was no reason to hurry the conversation.

I woke on May twenty-eighth to someone touching my nose.

Carol stood beside the bed with Evelyn’s hand supporting her.

Garrick waited on the other side, held securely by Adriana.

Both children were trying very hard to be quiet.

Neither was succeeding.

“Birthday,” Carol whispered at the volume of a watch bell.

I opened one eye.

“Is it?”

Garrick nodded so firmly that Adriana had to adjust her grip.

“Yours.”

“I wondered whose it might be.”

Evelyn smiled.

“They have been waiting since breakfast.”

I looked toward the window.

The sun was higher than I expected.

“You let me sleep.”

“We did.”

Adriana set Garrick carefully beside me.

Carol immediately requested the same treatment.

Within moments, I had a child against each side and very little room to move.

“A coordinated attack,” I said.

“Julian helped plan it,” Evelyn replied.

That explained the thoroughness.

The promised small celebration occupied the family dining room.

There was a cake.

There were flowers.

There was a considerable amount of blue paint on a cloth protecting the far end of the table.

“I thought the paint belonged on the wood,” I said when I saw it.

Garrick Valewood sighed.

“That was our original intention.”

Julian stood beside a covered object with Seraphina and Ignatius crowding close to him.

Carol pulled at my hand.

“Look.”

“I am looking.”

“More.”

I knelt so I could obey properly.

Julian took hold of the cloth.

“We made it together.”

He glanced toward Garrick.

“Grandfather helped with the difficult parts.”

“And Julian did more of those than he admits,” the older man said.

The cloth came away.

It was a wooden tray.

Broad enough to hold breakfast for three, with raised edges and handles cut into the sides.

The bottom had been painted blue.

Across it stood a castle that leaned slightly to the left, a dragon with more legs than was usual, and several figures beneath a row of uneven stars.

Four small handprints occupied the corners.

In the middle, carefully outlined, were three larger figures standing together.

“That’s you,” Julian said, pointing to the one with white hair.

“I suspected.”

“And Evelyn. And Adriana.”

Carol pointed to a smaller figure.

“Me.”

Garrick claimed another.

Seraphina announced that she had painted the dragon, and Ignatius immediately touched one of its numerous feet.

“Helped.”

“I can see that,” I said.

I ran my fingers along the smooth wooden edge.

The joints were neatly fitted. Under one handle, a small mistake had been filled and sanded rather than hidden beneath paint.

Julian followed my glance.

“I cut that wrong.”

“Then fixed it.”

He nodded.

Garrick watched him with quiet pride.

There was a little empty space beside the three figures.

I looked at Julian.

He lowered his voice.

“For the baby. Later.”

Adriana pressed her fingers to her mouth.

Evelyn put an arm around her.

“We don’t know what to paint yet,” Julian added.

“No,” I said. “We don’t.”

I swallowed and set the tray safely on the table before reaching for him.

He came into the embrace without pretending he was too old for it.

The smaller children joined immediately, largely around my knees.

“Thank you,” I said into Julian’s hair.

He held on a little tighter.

Mary found us before the cake was cut.

She paused at the doorway when she saw the tray.

Then her expression softened.

“That is considerably better than my present.”

I looked up.

“You brought one?”

“A revised schedule.”

Lexander laughed from the far end of the room.

Mary ignored him and handed me a folded page.

The morning’s routine decisions had been assigned to people who were fully capable of making them.

There were two short briefings marked for later.

Everything between was blank.

“Emergencies still reach you,” she said. “The grain-cart wheel dispute does not.”

“There is a grain-cart wheel dispute?”

“Not yours.”

She took the page back before I could ask anything else.

We cut the cake.

The children had argued over its decoration, apparently, and the cooks had solved the matter by including all their suggestions.

There were sugared flowers, a storm cloud, and something that might have been a horse.

Bruni received his portion in the courtyard on a platter normally used for several people.

“Small birthday,” he said approvingly.

Thor looked at the platter.

“For you.”

He considered that, then offered her a piece large enough to justify a separate plate.

She accepted with her uninjured hand.

Evelyn saw.

So did I.

Neither of us commented.

Later, I stepped out onto the quiet side of the courtyard.

The laughter from the dining room followed me through the open door.

Beyond the wall, carts continued toward the receiving yards. A pair of soldiers crossed the lower passage with clean bandages showing beneath their sleeves.

I watched until they disappeared.

“There you are.”

Aurelia came to stand beside me.

She carried two cups.

I accepted one.

For a while, we said nothing.

Then I admitted, “I keep thinking about the people who cannot do this today.”

She looked toward the door.

Inside, Carol was insisting that someone admire her handprint again.

“I know.”

“It feels wrong sometimes.”

“Would you ask Rennick’s daughters to refuse a birthday because their father is holding the river?”

“No.”

“Would you ask Halen’s brother never to laugh again?”

I looked down at my cup.

“No.”

Aurelia rested her hand on my arm.

“You may miss people and still eat with your family, Uriah.”

Her voice was gentle.

“They have been waiting to give you that tray for days.”

I laughed softly, despite myself.

“I noticed.”

“Then go and let them enjoy giving it.”

The first briefing brought better news than I expected.

The enemy force at Slateford had begun pulling two damaged engines back along the eastern road.

Its remaining infantry still held the village’s eastern edge. The crossing was still contested.

But Istren’s scouts had confirmed that the upstream movement was smaller than feared, and Rennick had moved defenders to the likely ford in time.

No crossing had succeeded.

Ordel’s report ended with a request for replacement saws.

“Not rope?” I asked.

Mary glanced at the second page.

“Also rope.”

Of course.

The afternoon brought a visitor.

Vaelith landed in the eastern field, her old wing scar pale in the sunlight.

She had gone first to Orselle.

She had seen Arvek.

Aurethar accompanied her back to Greykeep, leaving the quarry’s healers and guards with instructions to send word if he needed them.

I met them with Lexander and Thor.

Vaelith lowered her head until she could see us clearly.

“He showed me his throat.”

Nobody answered immediately.

“He let me touch where the collar had been,” she continued. “I have seen the metal you removed.”

Caldris joined us carrying the copied drawings.

Vaelith looked toward him.

“The elders have agreed to send two healers who know our bodies. One has worked with damaged scales and wing joints for longer than this city has stood.”

Aurethar’s shoulders eased.

“That will help him.”

“They are bringing materials for treating the burns as well. More of us are willing to discuss patrols.”

She paused.

“No common pledge yet.”

“We will welcome the healers,” I said.

Her gaze moved over my coat, where Carol had attached a blue ribbon earlier.

“Is this a rank?”

Thor looked away.

Lexander did not bother.

“A birthday distinction,” he said.

Vaelith considered me with renewed interest.

“Then I have come on a useful day.”

There was no news of her brother.

I asked quietly while the others spoke with Aurethar.

Vaelith shook her head.

“Arvek remembers a voice in the place where he was held. He cannot tell me whose.”

“He may remember more when he has rested.”

“He may.”

She looked toward the distant hills.

“I did not ask him to try harder.”

I nodded.

After a moment, she looked back at me.

“He said you left the way to the sea open.”

“We wanted him to know he could leave.”

“Yes,” she said. “He understood.”

The rest of the afternoon belonged mostly to the family.

Helena and Lisbeth had arranged a game in the garden that became complicated as soon as the little ones joined.

Mirelle kept score until Cassia challenged the method, at which point both abandoned it and began laughing.

Julian tried to explain the rules to Garrick Grey.

Garrick listened carefully, then walked directly across the marked boundary to retrieve the ball.

“That is not—” Julian began.

Garrick Valewood raised an eyebrow from the bench.

Julian stopped.

Then smiled.

“All right. Different rules for this round.”

Lexander sat beside me with Ignatius asleep against his chest.

“You are enjoying yourself,” he observed.

“Apparently.”

“A dangerous precedent.”

I watched Evelyn take Adriana’s hand as they walked beneath the trees.

My new wife had tired more quickly than she wanted to admit. Evelyn guided her toward a shaded seat without making a discussion of it.

“I might risk it again,” I said.

Near sunset, Garrick Valewood sat beside me while Julian helped the children gather the wooden game pieces.

“He asked whether the tray was useful enough,” Garrick said.

I looked at him.

“Useful enough for what?”

“For you.”

Across the grass, Julian accepted a piece from Carol with grave thanks.

“I told him making something with care was a good beginning.”

“I will use it.”

“I know.”

Garrick leaned back against the bench.

“He is sleeping better.”

I turned toward him.

“Since our conversation?”

“Partly. Since the wedding too. Since he began believing people would still be here when he woke.”

I watched Julian laugh when Seraphina tried to carry too many pieces at once.

“Thank you,” I said.

Garrick followed my gaze.

“He makes it easy to care.”

The last message of the day came from the quarry.

Arvek had dictated a description of the valley where he was captured and the road along which the collar handlers traveled.

Eliza would compare it with Neris’s records in the morning.

Beneath the information, the recorder had included another line.

He asks whether the families from the burned fields have shelter.

I read it twice.

Then I asked Mary to send a plain answer, with what we knew and what we were still checking.

He had asked about people.

He deserved more than reassurance chosen because it was easy to give.

That night, we used the tray.

Evelyn carried it into our rooms with three cups and a small plate of cake the kitchens had saved.

Adriana sat beside me on the couch and traced the empty space in the painting with one finger.

“We will have to be careful choosing the next color.”

“Julian may already have a plan,” I said.

“Several,” Evelyn replied. “Apparently they depend on whether the baby likes dragons.”

Adriana smiled.

Her hand moved from the tray to her stomach.

There was still so much we did not know.

I put my hand over hers.

Evelyn settled on my other side.

“Was it small enough?” she asked.

I looked at the painted castle, the crooked stars, and the handprints pressed into each corner.

Then at my wives.

“It was exactly enough.”

Adriana kissed my cheek.

“Happy birthday, Uriah.”

I drew them both closer and let the day end there.