“He still might know more than he admits.”
“I doubt it.” Carlotta sighed impatiently. “I’ve seen more of him in the past two weeks than I ever want to see of anyone. Still, he is the only due we have to the manuscript.”
“But what if his magic does come to life?” Volmar stirred uneasily in his chair. “I don’t like the boy. He’s too ... too ...”
“Honest?” Carlotta’s voice was sly.
“Unpredictable,” the count countered. “I think we should be rid of him now, while we still can.”
“Not yet.” Her glance held a disconcerting hint of contempt. “Volmar, you always were a nervous sort. Let me try to explain this to you as dearly as I can: the boy is not a threat to us.”
“Not yet,” the count echoed darkly.
Carlotta’s eyes flashed. “Challenging my wisdom?” she asked, ever so softly. “Volmar, dear little Volmar, don’t try to cross me. I could destroy you, little man, with a glance.”
The count froze, all at once very much aware of how close Death could be. One wrong word ... “Why, Princess!” He forced the words from a mouth that suddenly seemed too dry for speech. “Have I ever been anything but your loyal ally?”
“To serve your own goals.”
“Well, yes, I won’t lie about that. But in doing so I serve yours as well, for both our sakes! Someday, my princess, you will wrest the throne from that fool—”
“ ‘That fool,’ as you so charmingly put it, is my brother.”
“Your half-brother only. Carlotta, we both know you aren’t bound by any misguided sisterly love. Someday you will take the throne—And when you do, my dear princess, I know you will remember your friends.”
“Friends.” Carlotta’s glance flicked over him. the contempt now only just barely hidden. But then she shrugged. “We shall watch the boy a bit longer. I will make one last effort to win him, body and mind. And if I still cannot subvert him to my side, I give you permission to rid us of him.” She paused. “Even as you did our poor, sweet Charina.”
Volmar waved that off. A girl hadn’t any business being up on the ramparts anyhow, not without even a guard for company, let alone doing something as foolish as leaning over the edge of the crenellations to watch birds fly by. It had almost been too easy to help her join that flight. However briefly. And not a soul could say it had been anything but an accident. “We shouldn’t wait,” the count insisted. “I have a feeling—”
“Come now! Leave prescience to me. We can’t be rid of him just yet. We still may need him to find the manuscript if we cannot.” She shuddered delicately. “ Even if it means I must once more take on the persona of that pretty little fool of a—No, wait ...” The princess straightened in her chair, eyes fierce. “That may not be necessary. The boy has a head full of wild romance. What if ...? Ha, yes, of course! I already laid the groundwork without realizing it when I told him I would go riding alone.”
“My princess, what are you talking about?”
“You’ll learn, soon enough. Yes, I do believe that I shall go riding alone again tomorrow.” Her smile was all at once so alien, so full of dark, sorcerous promise, that Volmar’s heart turned chill. “And then,” Carlotta added softly, “we ... shall see what we shall see.”
More than that, she would not say, leaving Count Volmar cold with nameless dread.
Kevin sat: on a wobbly pile of books, head in hands. He’d searched the library from end to end; the manuscript just wasn’t here!
No one could have taken it. Not even the count knew which manuscript I was copying!
Right. No one had taken the thing. The dust that covered much of the floor showed pretty clearly that, save for that one brief visit by Charina, no one other than he had even been in the library recently: her neat footprints were in a direct line in and out of the room, his were all over the place, but had a distinctive cleft in one sole. If anyone else had entered, they’d done so in mid-air.
This was insane! Nobody around here could fly—but manuscripts didn’t up and vanish all by themselves!
I should have gone riding with Charina, Kevin thought in misery.
He had passed her in the hall—or, rather, she had passed him, on her way for another solitary ride, sweeping regally by with her head in the air as if he hadn’t even existed. Kevin winced, wondering if she would ever even speak to him again. He had been right, of course, painful though it was; he was here to do a job, not enjoy himself with a beautiful young woman—
