novelraw Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Thirteen
Nadia tapped her foot while Pell droned on about missing tithes. Normally, she’d be more concerned. Missing tithes could mean a traitor within the ranks or that a rival was luring away members. And she was concerned, but she wanted to meet her nephew more. She’d been preparing to use the passage up to the palace to do just that when Pell knocked.
“At least pretend to listen, Nadia.”
She met Pell’s irritated glare. “I’m listening.”
He lifted an eyebrow, his frown deepening. “There is a difference between hearing and listening. You’ve had your head in the clouds for two days. Really listen or I’ll let you figure out where the missing tithes are yourself.”
Nadia narrowed her eyes. She hated being given an ultimatum. “I have a better idea, Teniente. Why don’t you take that sour tongue you’ve been sharpening on me and everyone else in Vromia Guild and go figure out how to sweeten it back up.”
Pell’s pale face flushed red at her reminder of his inferior rank. “Yes, Capitán.”
“Was there anything else besides the missing tithes?”
“Lord Gregor Cyrene, Commander of Prince Stefan’s personal guard and newly returned from his family lands in the north, has been inquiring about you.”
Nadia, who’d been tapping her foot impatiently, froze. “Inquiring? In what way?”
“I believe he’s the contact for the prince you met during the festival of the sun”—his gaze narrowed as heat crawled up her face, and she knew it’d be staining her cheeks a faint pink—“but you already knew that, didn’t you.”
Nadia shrugged. “I met him at the betrothal ball and suspected.”
“Is this who you’ve been daydreaming about? Is he why you spurned my advances?”
“I have little time for any man, not that it’s any of your business.” She stood and pulled a guard’s uniform from her armoire.
He opened his mouth to respond, met her cold stare and shut his mouth without uttering a word. She pulled the jacket on over the plain white tunic she wore.
“Shouldn’t you wait until you’ve breached the palace walls before you don the royal guards’ uniform?”
She crossed her arms over her chest. “Had I not needed to avoid you and your temper the last few days, you’d know why I no longer need worry.”
He stiffened. “I’m sorry my feelings make you uncomfortable.”
Nadia sighed and put a hand on his shoulder. “This is why I don’t want to complicate things with a relationship. Sex messes everything up. I love you like I love Geeta and Jon. You’re family.” She squeezed his shoulder. “Can we please put this behind us? I want the friend back that I’ve been missing the last few days.”
He inhaled, his tight jaw relaxing as he exhaled. “I’m sorry for the way I’ve been acting. I’ve missed us, too.”
She pulled him into a hug. “Friends?”
He stood stiffly in her embrace, his hand awkwardly patting her on the back. “Of course.” He pulled back and eyed the uniform. “Now tell me why you aren’t worried about being seen in this uniform outside of the palace.”
She turned and strode across the room. “Because I found another way,” she said and pulled back the tapestry which now hid the new wooden door Jon had installed the day before.
Pell stepped forward. “Another cave?”
“More than that.” She pulled the new key hanging from the chain of keys at her neck and unlocked the door Jon had only finished installing that morning. “Come.”
They entered the gate room, and Pell gasped. “It looks like the gate in the Gate Keeper’s palace in Diomere.” His eyes widened as he noticed the two golden doors. “Do those lead to Thuno’s Gate Keeper’s palace?”
“That one does.” She crossed over to the other gold door. “And the other one leads to a secret entrance to the castle, among other things.”
“This is quite a discovery.” He eyed her uniform again. “And why are you sneaking into the palace this time?”
She followed him back through door into her chamber. “I’m going to introduce myself to my nephew.”
Pell’s brows rose high on his forehead. “And you think that’s wise? What if he isn’t really our prince? Or if he is, what if he doesn’t believe you and calls for his guards?”
“I’ll be careful.”
“You chance our safety?”
“I’ll be careful.”
His gaze darkened. “I think this is a bad idea.”
“Your opinion is noted.”
Pell frowned his disapproval and turned to leave. “Just be careful.”
The door clicked closed, and Nadia slumped forward. Sometimes she wished Pell hadn’t volunteered to go into exile with her. He’d been the one to tell her about her ex-betrothed’s humiliating stories about Nadia’s inadequacies in bed. Her sister, Arriana, swore he’d only told her in hopes that her broken heart would push her into his arms and that he’d followed her into exile for the same reason.
Nadia snorted. His cool head often kept her from making rash decisions in anger. She’d have been hard-pressed to stay so close on her nephew’s trail all these years without him. No, she shook her head, Arriana was wrong. Pell had told her about her ex-betrothed’s betrayal out of loyalty as her friend, nothing else.
She sighed. “I need to find my nephew so we can all return home.”
Reminded of her interrupted plans, she finished buttoning the jacket, careful to tuck her braid into the jacket’s neck, then grabbed a lantern and started through the hidden caves. Jon had cleared the cobwebs from the steep stairway, so she started up the stairs without hesitation. Her quick pace soon slowed as her leg muscles began to burn. Each step carved higher than the average stair made her wonder about the ones responsible for carving them. She knew, on average, that the peoples of Mondami were typically taller than the humans of Saimond.
The few A’mi descendants remaining in Diomere, with the exception of her sister, Arriana, were much taller than those of their sex among the Sa’i. Unbidden, an image of Gregor flashed before her eyes. She’d been even with men in height or taller her entire life. Looking up into Gregor’s face had been a vulnerable, yet arousing experience. Her body warmed.
Blushing at what she’d almost done with him and where, she shoved the infuriating man from her thoughts and concentrated on the seemingly never-ending stairs. Finally, feet sore in the boots she’d borrowed from another guard, she reached the top and a seeming dead end.
She pressed her ear to the wall, listening for any sounds. Hearing nothing, she reached for the seam along the top of the wall. A shallow indention, exactly where Jon said he’d found it, had a notch she slid her fingernail under. A panel pulled forward, revealing a lever, which she pulled. The door slid back an inch with a soft click.
Holding her breath, she pulled the door open a crack. Peeking through, she saw that the door opened into another dark chamber. She stood frozen in place, listening for any sound in the silence. When she was sure no one waited on the other side, she pulled the door all the way open so the light from the nearest lightbox lit the room.
She stepped into a storage room which held a variety of broken furniture covered in a thick layer of dust. The dirty debris covered every inch of the floor. Sighing, she began to clear a path. She moved aside chairs that looked to have been crushed in a brawl, lanterns with missing glass, tables cracked across their tops, and rolled up carpets that smelled like urine. She reached the door and looked down at her jacket in dismay. The once pristine fabric was dull with dirt and grime. Pulling it off, she shook the dust from the material until it was once again its original bright green and gold.
Satisfied that she’d be able to walk the halls of the palace without calling attention to herself, she pushed the passage door most of the way closed and set a chair in front of it. Using a broken broom, she swept away her dusty footprints then crossed to the door leading farther into the palace. She pulled on the latch and sighed when it didn’t budge. Locked. She fished her lock-picking tools from her pocket.
The lock released with a click. She stood and cracked the door open, revealing the castle’s cellar hall. Marshall Torin, the royal steward, stood next to the butler watching his men roll barrels of ale through the door to the palace buttery. She waited for them to finish up and leave, then slipped into the hallway and quickly moved toward the stairs. She peeked into the palace’s busy kitchens. As a group of servants weighed down with platters passed the cellar opening, she slipped out and followed the group out of the kitchen. She split off from the group at the first intersecting hall, then straightened her shoulders and moved through the palace at a pace quick enough to discourage interruption, but not so fast as to invite curiosity.
She passed nobles and courtiers headed to the great hall to take the evening meal with the king, having chosen the time when she’d be able to traipse the halls without calling suspicion. She’d intercepted a report from one of the priests who ran Prince Reis’ school for the city’s street urchins. The bastard prince had a soft spot for outcasts like himself, it seemed.
Though confined to his rooms by his brother for his own safety, Prince Reis still kept in constant contact with the charitable organizations he’d helped establish. If the boy was truly her missing nephew, his care for the poorest citizens would bode well for his rule in Diomere. It would be a vast improvement to his father’s more hands-off approach which saw those like her father get richer while the poor struggled to get by.
Nadia climbed the stairs to Prince Stefan’s wing of the palace where the bastard prince had been given rooms as soon as he was old enough to leave the nursery. The crown prince’s personal guard, dressed in navy blue and gold uniforms, stepped into her path.
She raised the report. “I have a missive for Prince Reis from Father Darryn.”
The guard held out a gloved hand. “I’ll see that he gets it.”
Nadia bit her lip and shuffled from foot to foot. “But I was ordered to give it to Prince Reis and Prince Reis only,” she said, letting her voice go high with worry.
The guard scowled down at her. “No one not on my list of approved visitors is allowed in this wing of the palace. Those are my orders.”
Nadia let her eyes widen, and she shrank back. “If I could just stand within viewing distance of you as you hand the report to the prince, I can say with all truthfulness that I made sure the prince personally received it.”
The guard’s face turned red, and he crossed his arms across his chest. “No one not on the approved list goes into this wing of the palace. Either give it to me or leave. Otherwise, I’m tempted to throw your scrawny ass down the stairs, corporal.”
Disappointment heavy in her stomach, Nadia shifted from foot to foot as if unsure while she was putting together a different plan.
“Is all well down there, Sergeant Zaan?” Gregor’s voice called from deeper in the prince’s wing of the palace.
Remembering how her glamour had failed the night before, Nadia shoved the missive into the guard’s hand. “Make sure Prince Reis gets this.”
She turned and all but ran down the stairs.
****
Gregor stepped out onto the landing which led from the stairs into Stefan’s wing of the palace, his heart pounding in his chest. He’d recognized Nadia’s voice, even in that whiny tone, and had come to investigate.
He looked at the back of the rapidly retreating figure in the king’s colors. “I thought I heard raised voices.”
Sergeant Zaan scowled at the king’s soldier who turned the corner without looking back. “One of the king’s corporals had a delivery for Prince Reis from Father Darryn. Wanted to argue with me about delivering it personally,” the big man growled.
Gregor raised his brows. “Tell me exactly what sh”—he shook his head—“what he said. Every word. Prince Stefan wants no chances taken with his brother’s life.”
“There’s really not much to tell. Said he was ordered to deliver this missive”—Sergeant Zaan held up the envelope sealed with the seal of the holy order of Asha—“to Prince Reis, and only Prince Reis. I told him that wasn’t going to happen, and he got a nervous, scared look on his pretty little face and asked if he could just stand within viewing distance as I handed it to Prince Reis. That’s all.”
“What did he look like? Any easily recognizable features or scars that we can add to our list of suspicious people to keep an eye out for?” Gregor asked as he reached for the envelope the sergeant held out to him.
“He was a right pretty one, he was. Dark brown or black hair, darker eyes with lashes like a woman’s, high cheekbones, baby smooth skin that doesn’t look like it’s ever known a razor. If he had any scars or identifying marks, I didn’t see ’em. He kept trying to see past me into the prince’s wing, so I didn’t get a good look at the left side of his face.”
Gregor nodded, processing what he’d been told and what he thought he’d heard. “Good job, Sergeant. Remember, no matter how trivial it seems, I want to know about anyone who wants access to this wing, especially when it concerns Prince Reis.”
“Yes, my lord Commander.”
Gregor glanced down the stairs thoughtfully. The description fit the woman. It was too bad Zaan hadn’t seen the left side of her face. And if it had been Lady Nadia, why? Did she wish Prince Reis ill? Was she testing Gregor’s efforts to keep the prince safe? Unsure what to think, he turned to take Father Darryn’s report to Prince Reis.
Mayhap it was time he arranged a meeting with his pretty little spy.