After a series of frustrating delays due to the dregs of an especially hard winter, he made it through the mountains in time to meet spring as it climbed the western slopes.
Hal methodically stripped off layers of clothing as the snows thinned, then disappeared from all but the shadiest spots. After a year in Delphi, and his winter travels through the frozen north, the scent of earth and flowers went to his head like the ten-year brandy his father reserved for special occasions.
His desert horse Bosley seemed as pleased as Hal to be leaving the cold mountains behind.
Now Hal looked down over the valley that he’d called home from birth. Though he hadn’t spent much time here since he’d left for the army at the age of eleven, it was still the center of his personal compass. He scanned the scene below, looking for signs of disorder.
The river was out of its banks, but that wasn’t unusual this time of year, when the melting snows in the mountains sent waterfalls roaring down the lower slopes of the Heartfangs. The runoff fed the northern branch of the Ardenswater that joined her southern sister on the way to the sea.
From the looks of things, the tenants had already been working the close-in shares. New crops greened the better allotments near the river. But other, less fertile fields lay fallow, suggesting that some who normally worked the fields might have been turned to bloodier work.
At least the keep wasn’t ringed by armies flying the red hawk, and the manor house still stood intact amid his lady mother’s gardens. The dying sun colored the low hills to the west and smoke curled from the kitchens that would be preparing the evening meal. The joy of homecoming was tempered by the knowledge that his mother and sister weren’t there.
Nudging his horse into motion, Hal began his descent. He’d only just reached the flatlands at the bottom when he saw horsemen riding hard toward him. Hal rested his hand on his curved sword until the riders were close enough that he could see that they wore the spreading oak signia pinned to their clothes. Militia, then, not his father’s regulars. Hal didn’t see any familiar faces.
Nobody seemed to recognize Hal, either. And why would they? He was a scruffy stranger on a stolen horse carrying an exotic blade.
The horses were motley, and the riders were, too, so Hal guessed they were farmers and farmers’ sons, called into service. All except for their officer, a corporal who rode a fine horse with elaborate trappings and looked to be about twelve years old. He wore a different signia than the others—the shield and cross. Hal racked his brain, trying to recall what house that was.
“State your name and business,” the baby officer said. “You’ve crossed into Lord Matelon’s holdings.”
Before Delphi, Hal would have freely volunteered his name and business at the border of his father’s lands to people wearing his signia. But he did not know for sure who these people were and he’d developed some skills at staying alive off the battlefield as well as on it.
“I’m here to see Lord Matelon,” Hal said, holding on to his own name for the moment.
“Is that so?” The corporal looked him up and down, taking in Hal’s stubble of beard and his travel-stained clothing. “Why would he want to meet with you?”
“That’s between me and Matelon,” Hal said.
“Then you should know that he’s not here.”
Then where is he? Hal was tempted to say. Instead, he said, “Of course he’s not here. He’s going to meet me here in two days’ time.”
“Then come back in two days,” the boy said.
“What’s your name, Corporal?” Hal barked it with enough authority that the boy replied before he thought it through.
“It’s Rolande DeLacroix,” he said.
“Son of Pascal?”
The boy blinked at Hal, as if surprised he would know the name. “Yes, he’s my father.”
That was it, the shield and cross belonged to the DeLacroix, though a bunch of grapes and a cask would be more accurate. They were a family of wine merchants, originally from Tamron, highly skilled at avoiding any actual service in the war, which was why Hal hadn’t recognized their signia at first.
There was something else, though. Hal tightened his grip on the hilt of his sword. “Brother to Estelle, then?”
Estelle DeLacroix was mistress to King Gerard, and her family had prospered when she became his favorite. Hal usually didn’t follow court gossip, but he knew all this courtesy of his mother’s and sister’s newsy letters while he was in exile in Delphi.
The letters had stopped, of course, when Delphi fell and the Matelon women were taken hostage, so he was no longer up to date.
Rolande flushed scarlet. “Estelle was my sister, yes, until swiving King Gerard executed her for treason. Like she would try to kill him by putting an adder in her own bed. How stupid would that be?” Rolande clapped his mouth shut then, as if realizing how much he was revealing to this scruffy stranger and a dozen onlooking farmers.
“I’m sorry to hear about your sister,” Hal said, and meant it. “So, what are you doing here? Has your family allied with White Oaks?”
“White Oaks has allied with us,” Rolande said loftily. “I’ve been charged with organizing local forces to protect the keeps in the area while my father and his allies march on the capital.”
Your father’s with them, then? Hal wanted to say. That would be a first. Has anyone explained which end of the sword to stick them with?
Instead, he said, “Have you heard any news about Lady Matelon and the other hostages?”
Rolande shook his head. “If you want my opinion, they’re all dead,” he said. “How foolish was that, to gather in the capital like that, with their families? They were sitting ducks. As soon as things went sour with Estelle, we
