Chapter 397: An Hour at the Table

The prince was holding three blankets when Mary told him to move.

He moved immediately.

Unfortunately, he chose the direction in which two attendants were bringing a folded bed.

Mary caught his sleeve and drew him aside before the collision became a diplomatic incident.

“There,” she said, indicating a clear space beside the wall. “Stand there until they pass.”

“Of course.”

Prince Corvin, Queen Nerisse's grown nephew, stood exactly where she had placed him.

He had arrived with the Belleren household and had spent much of his first days in Havenreach trying to discover what useful things he was permitted to do. Carrying blankets had apparently been one of them.

Watching Mary had become another.

I noticed because I was waiting for the last supply list before we departed for Fenrir's convoy, and Corvin looked at her with an attention considerably greater than the movement of bedding required.

Mary noticed because Mary noticed nearly everything.

“Those go upstairs,” she told him.

“Yes.”

He did not leave.

She raised an eyebrow.

“Was there something else?”

“Could I speak with you when you're less occupied?”

Mary glanced at the stretchers being prepared, the clerk approaching with a question, and the list in her own hand.

“That may be a considerable wait.”

Corvin smiled before he could help it.

“I am beginning to understand.”

She handed me the supply list a moment later.

“The healers have everything they requested. The receiving rooms will be ready. Castellan knows which courtyard can accommodate the wagon if the cage must remain intact.”

“And the prince?”

Mary looked toward the stairs, where Corvin had finally taken the blankets.

“He knows where the linen room is.”

“I suspect that wasn't what he wanted to discuss.”

“I know.”

Her ears shifted slightly.

Before I could decide whether that meant irritation or amusement, she pointed at the list.

“You have a departure to make.”

“So I do.”

She stepped closer, lowering her voice.

“Bring back enough information for us to help him. Not only the cage.”

Fenrir.

I nodded.

Then took the paper and went to meet the others.

We reached Aurethar's position as the sky began to lighten.

The convoy had left the tollhouse.

Elyan found us on the wooded approach and led us to a shallow hollow where the scouts had tethered their horses. Beyond the trees, the road curved around a low ridge before narrowing between stone banks.

The wagons had not reached the narrow passage yet.

“How many?” Thor asked.

“Twelve mounted escorts. Eight with the wagons. Four white-marked riders traveling close to the covered cage.”

Aurethar's face looked older in the grey light.

“The case is still with their leader.”

Caldris knelt beside the latest drawing.

The empty cage followed behind Fenrir's wagon. Chains linked the two vehicles, although each had its own team of horses.

“That connection wasn't in the first account,” he said.

“They fastened it before leaving,” Elyan replied.

Vaerun looked toward the road.

“A second restraint?”

“Possibly a reserve,” Caldris said. “Possibly something that takes effect if the first is broken.”

We changed the plan.

Neither wagon would be separated from the other until Caldris understood the chain between them.

The horses would have to be stopped together.

Aurethar took me to the ridge.

Through the branches, I saw the covered wagon rolling slowly over the uneven road. Its wheels were wider than those of the supply carts behind it. The canvas barely stirred.

Then something beneath it moved.

A heavy impact shook the frame.

The nearest rider struck the bars through the covering with a hooked staff.

The movement stopped.

Thor, crouched on my other side, became very still.

I watched the rider return the staff across his knees.

“That one first?” I whispered.

“The case,” she said. “The staff after.”

It was the correct answer.

I hated how much effort it took to accept it.

Aurethar pointed to a flat patch beside the road, clear of the horses' path and visible between two trees.

“There. You can reach the rider carrying it before he gets beneath the rock face.”

I studied the ground.

No long journey. No hidden arrival. One visible place and a task I understood.

I drew my sword.

Elyan's light flashed once through the trees.

Vaerun moved first.

Wind pressed against the lead horses without striking them. They slowed, heads lifting, while rain swept across the road ahead and obscured the narrow passage.

Our soldiers came out beside the rear wagon.

“Halt!”

The convoy broke into shouts.

Thor's lightning struck an empty boulder above the road. Stone cracked, and the mounted escorts turned toward her.

I became a thunderbolt.

When the world returned, the case bearer was drawing back his hand to open its clasp.

My sword cut the strap holding it to his saddle.

I caught the case before it struck the ground.

His horse reared.

I stepped away from its hooves and turned my shoulder to rain as the rider's blade passed through me.

For an instant, he stared.

Then I struck his sword arm with my guard, pulled him from the saddle, and put him down beside the ditch.

He reached for the case.

I froze the earth around his boots and carried it clear.

Behind me, Avarn was already between the escorts and Caldris.

The fighting spread along the road.

Our soldiers caught the rear teams before the empty cage could roll backward. Vaerun held the frightened horses steady long enough for the reins to be taken, then turned toward the men trying to force a way past the wagons.

Thor's hammer struck the hooked staff in two.

The rider holding it fell from his horse and stayed down.

I set the case beside Caldris.

“Unopened.”

“Good.”

He placed both hands near it without touching.

Pale lines appeared beneath the dark leather.

Inside Fenrir's wagon, something began to ring.

Not metal striking metal.

A high, sustained note that made my teeth ache.

“They've started another working,” Caldris said.

I looked toward the white-marked riders.

One had dismounted behind the empty cage. His hand was pressed against a plate fixed to its rear wall.

Avarn saw him at the same moment.

He did not abandon Caldris's side.

“Uriah. Rear wagon.”

I was already choosing my arrival.

The man turned as thunder struck the road beside him.

His palm remained on the plate.

“You have no authority here,” he said.

The words carried power.

For a heartbeat, my feet felt fixed beneath me, as though the road itself had accepted the claim.

Then winter spread through the mud.

I broke the pressure with a step and caught his wrist.

“Let go.”

He smiled.

The note from Fenrir's cage rose.

I struck the man's elbow with the pommel of my sword and pulled his hand free before he could turn the pain into another command.

The sound stopped.

He sagged against the wagon.

Two soldiers took him from me.

I left the plate untouched.

Caldris would need to see it.

Then I heard a voice from beneath the canvas.

“Don't… break it.”

Deep. Rough. Barely more than breath.

I turned.

Aurethar had pulled the covering back.

Fenrir filled the cage in a way that made the cage seem smaller than the drawings had suggested.

Grey fur was matted beneath the bands. One foreleg lay at an awkward angle, held short by a chain attached to the roof. His neck restraint had pressed the fur flat around a line of damaged skin.

His eyes were open.

Watching us.

Thor came beside Aurethar and stopped.

“Fenrir.”

The wolf's gaze moved to her.

“Loud,” he whispered.

Thor let out a sound that might have been a laugh if it had not caught halfway through.

“You can complain properly once you're out.”

His eyes shifted toward the chain linking the wagons.

“Second cage. Takes… what the first releases.”

Caldris looked up from the case.

“A transfer.”

Fenrir closed his eyes once.

Yes.

We had nearly mistaken an empty prison for spare equipment.

The last fighting ended before the restraints did.

Several escorts surrendered when they saw their leaders taken. Two had fled north. Eliza's soldiers followed far enough to make certain they did not circle back, then returned to the wagons.

We had wounded.

One soldier's cheek had been cut beneath his helmet. Another held an arm tight against his ribs. A scout had taken a glancing blow from a horse and needed help sitting down.

The healers went to them while Caldris studied the two cages as one working.

The case contained a narrow metal instrument set with pale stones.

He did not remove it.

“The first cage binds him,” he said. “The second is prepared to receive what is drawn through the connecting chain.”

Thor's hand tightened around her hammer.

“His power?”

“At least. Perhaps more, once the instrument is used.”

I looked at Fenrir.

His breathing was shallow, but his eyes had opened again.

He had understood where they were taking him.

He had spent the journey listening to the wheels.

Caldris made the instrument safe before touching the bands.

It required time we had not wanted to spend on an exposed road.

Elyan checked both approaches. Thor stood beyond the wagons with lightning crawling slowly across her knuckles. Avarn organized the guards around the hollow while Vaerun cleared the air beneath the remaining canvas.

I stayed beside Fenrir.

“Water?” I asked.

His eyes moved toward the skin in my hand.

I poured a little into a shallow wooden bowl and held it where he could reach without pulling against the neck band.

He drank slowly.

Then stopped, exhausted by the effort.

“Greykeep?” he asked.

“Yes.”

“Aurelia?”

“She's there.”

His gaze remained on me.

“You… winter.”

“And storms.”

After a pause, one corner of his mouth shifted enough to reveal a tooth.

“Noticed.”

I found myself smiling.

Then held the bowl while he drank again.

We did not free him completely on the road.

We stopped the transfer, separated the second cage without activating it, and loosened the restraints enough for Fenrir to lower his foreleg and lift his head.

The remaining working needed a protected place and more help.

He accepted that with a slow movement of his eyes toward Caldris.

The cage door opened only after its hinges had been stripped of the hidden command woven through them.

Fenrir could not stand.

No one asked him to try.

We padded the wagon floor, removed the roof sections that no longer needed to remain, and turned the team toward the route home.

Aurethar rode beside him.

Thor remained close enough that Fenrir could see her whenever he opened his eyes.

Elyan went ahead with word for Greykeep.

I walked for the first part of the journey, listening to the wagon wheels and making certain their sound was carrying him away from Othellos.

Mary met us in the receiving court hours later.

She had cleared the old exercise pavilion near the inner gardens. Its doors were wide enough for the wagon, its floor strong, and its position allowed Castellan to separate the temporary protections from the city's main wards.

Aurelia waited there with Evelyn and the binding specialists.

Fenrir's eyes opened when he heard Aurelia's voice.

She stood where he could see her and did not touch him until he moved his head toward her hand.

Thor turned away then.

Only for a moment.

Mary gave the attendants their assignments, checked that the captured instrument had been taken to the secured chamber, and sent someone to find clean blankets for the wounded soldiers.

Prince Corvin appeared carrying them.

He looked at the great wolf, went pale, and kept walking.

Mary took the top blanket and nodded toward the benches.

“Those people first. Dry ones are coming for the pavilion.”

He obeyed without asking a question.

I saw him again late that afternoon outside Mary's office.

He had washed the mud from his sleeves and was holding two cups of tea.

Mary was inside, writing.

“Is this a delivery?” I asked.

Corvin glanced at the cups.

“Partly.”

“The second part may require more courage.”

He gave me a rueful smile.

“I had noticed.”

Before I could reply, Mary called from the office.

“If you're both standing there discussing me, come in or move along.”

Corvin nearly spilled one cup.

I took it from him before he could.

“For Mary,” he said quickly.

“Then you should keep that one.”

I exchanged them and stepped aside.

He entered.

I had a report to deliver, so I followed far enough to leave it on the table.

That was how I heard the question.

“Lady Mary,” Corvin began, “would you permit me to court you?”

Her pen stopped.

I considered whether leaving immediately would be kinder or more conspicuous.

Mary solved that by looking directly at the prince.

“I am much too busy for courtship.”

He flushed, but did not retreat behind a joke.

“I thought you might say that.”

“Then you have been paying attention.”

“I have.”

Something in the way he answered made her look at him again.

He set the tea down where it would not threaten her papers.

“I know you have responsibilities. I didn't mean to add another demand to them.”

“And you know Melody and I are together?”

“Yes.”

Mary waited.

“I wasn't asking you to set her aside,” he said. “I would rather be clear than spend the next month inventing reasons to carry things past your office.”

Mary's ears tilted forward.

I became extremely interested in the report I had already put down.

“That would be an inefficient use of your time,” she said.

“Mine, certainly.”

Her mouth moved at one corner.

Corvin took a breath.

“Would you have dinner with me, then? Without treating your answer as a promise of anything beyond dinner.”

Mary looked at the clock.

Then at the stack of unfinished work.

“I eat dinner.”

“So I'm told.”

“Not always at the correct hour.”

“I can be flexible.”

She gave him a look.

“Do not say that until you've met my schedule.”

He smiled.

For a moment, she studied him with the same direct attention she gave a proposal that might contain an overlooked difficulty.

Then she put down her pen.

“Yes. I will have dinner with you.”

Corvin's expression changed before he could contain it.

Mary lifted one finger.

“One evening. After the receiving reports are settled. And no elaborate arrangements requiring my staff to lose half a day.”

“Agreed.”

“Now take this note to the kitchen if you want to be useful.”

He accepted it with a smile that survived all the way to the door.

Mary watched him leave.

Then looked at me.

“You have been finished with that report for some time.”

“I was about to go.”

“Then enjoy the novelty of doing so.”

Melody heard about the invitation from Mary that evening.

I was at the other end of the sitting room with Eleanor, discussing the pavilion floor, when Melody laughed.

“That explains the blankets.”

Mary looked at her.

“He was helping.”

“He has been helping wherever you happen to be standing.”

“He carried them to the correct place eventually.”

Melody leaned closer, her voice softening.

“Do you want to have dinner with him?”

Mary glanced at the closed book in her lap.

“Yes. I think I do.”

“Then have dinner.”

Mary reached for her hand.

“You aren't being displaced from your evenings by a prince.”

“I should hope not. I've invested too much effort in teaching you to stop working through all of them.”

Mary smiled properly then.

Melody kissed her cheek and added, “Let him find out what happens when someone arrives late with inaccurate figures.”

“That is not dinner conversation.”

“For most people.”

The dinner took place the next evening in a small room overlooking the inner garden.

Corvin had chosen ordinary food, a modest table, and flowers low enough not to interfere with seeing the person opposite him.

He had evidently asked sensible questions somewhere.

Mary arrived only a little late.

She carried her book.

From the passage, I saw her consider it, then put it on the side table instead of beside her plate.

Corvin noticed.

He wisely did not comment.

I continued toward the pavilion, where Fenrir was awake again.

There were enough other things in Greykeep that required my attention without my supervising a dinner Mary had agreed to attend.

When she told Melody about it afterward, her account contained fewer complaints than I expected.

Corvin had asked what she enjoyed when she was not organizing other people's survival.

Mary had taken some time to answer.

Then asked him a question in return.

Apparently they had discovered that both disliked ceremonial hunts, both preferred quiet rooms to crowded receptions, and neither trusted a person who described an impossible deadline as inspiring.

“A promising basis for conversation,” Melody said.

Mary gave her a warning look.

It lacked conviction.

Fenrir's neck band came free that night.

The last release required Aurelia's strength, Caldris's precision, and Fenrir himself remaining conscious long enough to pull his own power away from the working that had been feeding on it.

I stood near the door when the metal opened.

It did not glow.

It simply ceased to belong around his throat.

Thor lifted it away and set it on the stone table prepared for it.

Fenrir breathed.

Deeply, painfully, and without the restraint tightening in answer.

For several moments, that was the only sound in the pavilion.

Then he opened his eyes and looked at us.

“He has others.”

Aurelia's hand remained against his fur.

“Othellos?”

“Names. Summons. Places prepared.”

His breathing roughened.

Evelyn moved closer.

“You can tell us when you've rested.”

Fenrir's eyes shifted toward the removed band.

“Don't let him call them alone.”

“We're warning them,” I said.

He studied me for a long moment.

Then lowered his head.

I found Mary outside the pavilion afterward.

She had come to confirm the arrangements for the night attendants. Her book was open again, but a small wrapped parcel rested beneath it.

“Dinner?” I asked.

“Pleasant.”

“And the parcel?”

“Cake. Corvin asked the kitchen to send some for Melody.”

I smiled.

Mary closed her book.

“Do not begin.”

“I said nothing.”

“You've learned to do quite a lot without speaking.”

Inside, Thor pulled a chair beside Fenrir and sat where he could see her if he woke.

Mary watched for a moment.

Then she tucked the parcel carefully beneath her arm.

“I am still much too busy for courtship,” she said.

“Of course.”

She gave me one final look and went to find Melody.

For once, she left the next morning's papers until the next morning.