they would have easily controlled the ragtag peasants. But nothing was ordinary about this scene-for the mob was too wild and uncontrolled, for these were people with absolutely nothing left to lose: people who would even, at some basic level, prefer the lance of an Allheart knight now compared to the slow and agonizing death they were facing. Also, the knights themselves didn't attack with vigor, for they understood that these were plague victims, walking poison. To strike one was to wear the blood of one; and then even a noble Allheart knight could find himself on the other side of this line.
'Run him again, and swiftly!' Duke Kalas called to Constance. Before the stunned and emotionally wounded King Danube could begin to react, quick-thinking Kalas grabbed the King's horse's bridle and pulled the beast in a turn with his own, then reached back and swatted Danube's horse a sharp crack on the rump.
Off they flew, all three, running fast for the southern gate of Castle Ursal, leaving the mob behind, and approaching, Danube saw to his dismay, a line of archers preparing their deadly volley.
' Bobbed arrows alone!' he commanded, referring to the practice, headless arrows the archers often used in Castle Ursal's wide courtyard.
' But, my King-' the leader of the brigade began to protest. Danube shot him such a scowl that the words stuck in his throat.
Satisfied that the brigade would do as he commanded, Danube thundered away for the southern gate, urging his horse into a rough lope and running purposely on the cobblestones now, the sound of the hooves drowning out plaintive and angry cries from the field behind.
An upset and dejected Danube sat on his throne later that day, his hands out before his face, fingers tapping.
'Only a handful were seriously injured,' remarked Duke Kalas, sitting next to him. 'Only one peasant was killed.'
'Your AUhearts performed with their usual brilliance,' Danube offered, but that recognition hardly seemed to brighten his mood. 'Though I fear we'll not know the full extent of the disaster until weeks have passed,' he added, a clear reference to the fact that several of those Allheart knights might have become exposed to the rosy plague in the riot.
And all of it, both men understood too clearly, was due to the fact that the King merely wanted a day out in the sunshine, a day out of the tomb that Castle Ursal had become.
'We should be looking to the greater fortune of the day,' said Constance, standing a short distance away. Behind her, Merwick and Torrence played in the bliss of youthful ignorance, making toys out of relics, smudging priceless tapestries, laughing and crying with equally fervent passion. 'Had we not reacted as swiftly as we did, it is possible that all three of us would have found ourselves in the midst of the plagueridden.'
'They would not have unhorsed us,' Duke Kalas said with a fierce and determined look.
'Would they have had to? ' Constance answered. 'Or would the King of Honce-the-Bear soon be facing the same executioner as they? '
It was true enough, and no one had an answer against it. The plague victims had come close to the King himself, far too close.
'We will not be able to do such a thing again,' Danube announced. Kalas, whose stress had grown with each passing day, scowled all the more. 'We were foolish even to go out there at this time.'
'The plague has never been thicker about Ursal's streets,' Duke Kalas admitted grimly.
'And whether we take chances or not, there remains the possibility of its finding a way into our house,' Constance added. Both Kalas and Danube eyed her curiously, for her tone showed that her statement was leading to something more.
'These are dangerous times,' she said, moving closer, but pointedly glancing back at her two children as she did, 'more dangerous to the Throne of the kingdom, I would argue, than ever was the dactyl or its evil minions.'
King Danube nodded, but wasn't so certain of that. Of course, he had never shared the little secret of Father Abbot Markwart's vengeful spirit making several threatening visits to his private bedchambers. On the surface though, and except for that one point, Constance's argument was well taken. The dactyl's war, for all its terror and trouble, never got anywhere near Ursal, but remained in the northern reaches of the kingdom.
The plague, on the other hand, loomed all about Castle Ursal's walls.
'I am not certain that this latest plague is not another manifestation oi the dactyl's evil minions,' King Danube did argue.
'For all of our cautions,' Constance went on, 'for all the soldiers lining the walls, and for all the thickness of those walls themselves, we cannoi guarantee that the plague will not find us, any of us. And if it does, even if i is you, my King, then all the monks in all the world will likely prove useles; against its workings.'
Duke Kalas snorted loudly at that statement, for he had long ago deter mined the Abellican monks to be useless against any sort of illness. Was i not a disease, after all, and one far less powerful than the rosy plague, tha had killed young Queen Vivian? And that right before the eyes of Abbo Je'howith? 'I thank you for the cheerful warning,' Danube said dryly. 'But in all truth, Constance, this danger has been known to us since the beginning.'
'Then why have you taken no steps to solidify the kingdom in its event? ' the woman bluntly asked.
A puzzled King Danube stared at her.
'Merwick and Torrence,' Duke Kalas said quietly, catching on, and before King Danube could pick up on that, he went on. 'The line of succession is already in place. Have you forgotten Prince Midalis of Vanguard? '
'We do not even know if my brother is alive,' Danube admitted before Constance could reply. 'We have had no word from Vanguard in many months.'
'Surely if he had fallen, then word would have been passed south,' Kalas argued.
Danube nodded. 'Probably,' he admitted, 'but we cannot be certain, nor can we be certain that my brother is not now lying feverish in a bed, heavy with plague.'
Kalas sighed.
'It is the truth, if an unpleasant one,' King Danube added, then he turned to Constance. 'What solution do you see?' he asked, though it was obvious to him and to Kalas what she was hinting at.
Constance eyed the King directly, then turned her gaze, taking his with her, toward her-toward their-two children.
Duke Kalas gave a laugh. 'How fortunate,' he muttered sarcastically.
But King Danube wasn't seeing things that way at all. 'How fortunate indeed,' he echoed, but in a very different tone. 'And our experience this day reminded me of how fragile is our existence.' He rose from his chair and walked deliberately toward Constance. 'You are my witness in this, Duke Kalas,' he said solemnly.
'Yes, my King,' came the obedient answer, for even stubborn Kalas knew when he could not push the boundaries with his friend.
'In the event of my death, the throne passes to my brother, Prince Midalis of Vanguard,' Danube said formally. 'In the event that Prince Midalis is unable to ascend the throne, then Merwick, son of Constance, son of King Danube Brock Ursal, shall be crowned King of Honce-the-Bear, and a regent shall be appointed from the dukes of the land to oversee the kingdom until he is old enough and trained enough to assume the responsibilities of the Throne.
'Beyond Merwick, the title and claim lie with young Torrence, again under the tutelage of a properly appointed regent. And I should like you, my friend Kalas, to serve as that regent if you are able.'
Constance beamed but said nothing; nor did Duke Kalas, who wore a very different expression, somewhat of a cross between amusement and disgust. 'Go and fetch the royal scribe,' Danube instructed Constance, 'and the abbot of St. Honce and any of the other noblemen who are about the castle. We will make this proclamation again, in full witness and with all the propriety demanded of such a solemn occasion.'
Constance was gone in the blink of an eye.
'I hope she made you as happy in the moment of conceiving the children as you made her now,' Duke Kalas remarked. Danube turned a dangerous stare on him, warning him that he might again be crossing the very thin line that separated the words of a friend to a friend from the words of a Duke to his King.
'I am weary of the road, my friend,' Prince Midalis told Andacanavar as the two at last came into the more familiar reaches of Vanguard, nearing home. 'I do not understand how you can live such a nomadic life.'
'It is the way of my people,' Andacanavar explained. 'We move to follow the caribou herds and the elk, to
