Ruff whined at him.
“Yes, I am a member of the nobility too. But poor and useless at it.”
Kill them all?
The guards looked nervous and shuffled their feet and pikes.
Calm. Calm. John counted to one hundred.
There really was no time to waste. His brother was in dire trouble.
And so, he, THE HERO took a deep breath, and another one, then he killed his way in. To his credit, he did a detour around the gate guards. Sometimes, he found it distasteful to kill people he knew.
Okay, scratch that dream.
He turned, looked the gate guards up and down, slowly, so they knew he was not a man to be rushed. “Who do I have to speak with to get a pass?” he asked them.
“The advisor to the realm and ex-chancellor of the exchequer,” the left-hand one said, tersely. “He’s down the street. The big red building. If you hurry, he might not have left for home yet.”
“Thank you.” John bowed.
He hurried, and the man was indeed about to leave, but thirty minutes later he was back at the gate with a pass, then he was through and walking down that road, up the stairs, and into the palace. Passed from guard to valet to guard to maid to guard, he was patient. By the time he was ushered through a door into a small foyer, he had counted to one hundred a hundred times. At some point, probably by the front steps, Ruff had vanished.
If he and Xander had been identical twins, he might have tricked his way in, instead of this crap.
“This is the princess’s study, sir.” The maid opened the double doors then stayed in the entrance, with her back to the frame, her hands folded meekly to her front. Two guards, armed with swords, stood at attention on either side of the door.
John went through. The princess sat in a window seat, half a mile across the room.
The corridors of the palace he’d travelled were quiet, with not a scream to be heard. A pity. His insides were gnawing at themselves in worry over Xander. His hand itched for the sword and daggers he’d had to leave with the majordomo at the palace entrance.
He stalked across, his tread silent on the thick rugs.
The day drew to a close. The shadows grew long. The high white curtains concealing the windows leading to a balcony were partially closed but swayed in a breeze. The ceiling in here was of average height, for royalty. Fall while plastering it, and you would break your neck. No mold was evident, nor peeling paint, unlike at the Geurre manor.
The princess sat reading by lamplight and the last of the sun, dressed in a green silk gown that would suit a banquet. The desk a few feet from her toes was covered in books, as was the floor in between. Several of the tomes appeared to feature mathematics.
John scowled.
How ridiculous was this? How had she not noticed him? Was he now invisible?
John stamped his boot. “I have a brother to find and rescue. Your future husband.”
“I know you’re there. Here.” She closed her book, after placing a bookmark inside it, one with a pretty tassel. “Where is he? Is he in danger?”
Through her eyes had widened, and she seemed startled, a mask of statesmanship fell over her face. A princess was trained in diplomacy and deception, as well as how to rule in general. It still irked him. Surely, she should have gasped, at least once?
True love? He was tempted to laugh.
He’d never before thought Xander gullible.
“Yes, I believe so. We need to send out scouts and assemble a force to reckon with his kidnappers—a sizeable force, equipped with the best mounts, your best soldiers, and clever people. And probably you should scour the harbor for foreign ships, the city for suspicious men, and so on.”
She blinked at him, and said in a steady if husky voice, “First. Tell me what has happened.”
Even the perfect curls of her red hair annoyed him… those slim wrists, the heave of her bosom, the sculpted shape of her red lips. How dare she have seduced his bro.
Of course they had been going to remove her from power and send her to a small padded room to do embroidery, once the throne was secure.
Family was family, and she was merely… sexy, beddable, and powerful.
Providing the bed was first swept for dangerous things like math books. His lip curled.
He told her what had happened, though the Storyteller wasn’t mentioned by name, because his name was not going to help, and his trip to Hell became merely being felled and knocked unconscious. She sat for a while, breathing a little harder than seemed normal.
“I will call my hussars and scouts to search the kingdom for this group of ruffians.”
“And detectives?”
“Yes, of course. Detectives. Please, you may wait outside while this is done.”
John frowned. He’d expected more passion, less serenity, and a bit of female squeaking or wailing.
Even so, he waited, being fed tea and cakes while the scouts galloped to the edges of this smallish kingdom, and sent semaphore messages to the outermost furthest outposts, while ships were boarded and searched, and foreigners questioned, or so he was informed. While detectives, did detectiving too.
He slept in a small room he was offered, wishing he were out there galloping and looking, yet knowing he must wait. He could not match the resources of the kingdom.
The next afternoon, late, he was recalled to Princess Po. She was outside on the balcony, where a wind had risen to tease her hair from its bun, fluttering strands of scarlet sideways, wrapping them over her full lips, where they stuck as if entranced by
