He sat down and reached for the copper jug. 'Now, Ukarres, do I run to court like a whistled dog? Or do lock up my daughter and tell the king to--' He stopped. 'Well?'
There was a thoughtful silence. Ninomar remembered that he had orders to escort Elosa and began to sweat even harder than before.
'Aurolron is gone,' Ukarres said. 'How long until they find out?'
Who?
'He will not know of that,' the duke said. 'Vindax did not. Do I write or dare I go in person and warn him?'
'He will not believe,' Ukarres said. 'It will be Schagarn all over again.'
What? Where?
The door began to open even as someone knocked on it. Vak Vonimor came bursting in, panting, his straggly gray hair awry, his shirt half out of his belt. He was too out of breath to speak and just stood there, gasping, pointing behind him.
Ninomar felt suddenly less drunk.
'Well?' the duke demanded.
'Shadow...' Vonimor said.
Ninomar laid down his tankard. If Shadow had not gone to Piatorra...if Shadow had returned...
'He's back?' Foan asked, frowning.
Vonimor nodded. 'Up in the aerie...wants to speak to you...and Vice-Marshal...'
'Then invite him here,' the duke said, folding his arms and crossing his ankles. 'I am not summoned to my own aerie.'
The eagler shook his head. 'I did, Your Grace. He won't come.'
Foan scowled. 'Bring him.'
'I daren't...I can't...' A few more pants, and Vonimor said what Ninomar had been dreading. 'He says he has a message from the prince.'
Halfway to the aerie, Lord Ninomar concluded that he should properly have waited for the duke to move first, but it was a little late by then. Word had spread throughout the castle, and there seemed to be runners everywhere. He passed the duchess, tall and bundled in a burgundy robe with her gray hair flying loose; he was himself passed by Lady Elosa, still wearing the pink dress she had worn at dinner but with her black hair also unfastened and streaming behind her.
He went up all those hundreds of steps faster than he had run up an aerie since he was a cadet.
If the prince was alive, then there were two claimants to the throne...a proclamation of bastardy against one, which meant high treason against the queen dowager...and he had orders to find Vindax and take him to Ramo...and also orders which effectively told him to arrest the duke of Foan also and take him...He ran.
He emerged gasping and panting in the brilliant sunlight, blinked, and pushed past a line of silent men. And stopped--like them, frozen.
There, certainly, was Shadow.
He was outside the bars--in fact, he was standing on the perching wall, with no safety belt visible, in a gap between the birds, but he was at one side of the gap, right next to Lady Elosa's silver, and he was keeping his balance by leaning a hand against her wing.
Ninomar felt suddenly sick.
The bird had turned her head to watch the crowd gathering within the cage and was apparently ignoring the vulnerable human being beside her. He looked tiny in comparison; she towered over him.
A line of giant eagles and one tiny man. No hood?
It was impossible--Shadow's head should be inside her crop already.
'Good sky to you, Vice-Marshal,' Shadow said. 'I see you have a new pretty.' The star had fallen out of the tunic.
Ninomar was beyond speech. He could only pant and gape at this miracle. He heard more feet on the stairs behind him.
Shadow was on the darkward side of the aerie, so the sun was shining through on him. He had unfastened the front of his flying suit, and his bony chest was shiny with sweat, but that must be from the heat of the sun only. He was showing no other sign of fear in spite of the terrible danger of his position. He held his helmet in his free hand, and he had a bandage over one ear. There were healing scars on his face, and that face held something that had not been there before: a hardness or wariness. It was not fear. It was perhaps anger or the stain of an ordeal.
Even if the bird did not bite his head off, she could topple him backward off that wall with the slightest movement. Ninomar thought of the drop and shuddered. Ukarres had talked of a table smashed halfway to Allaban.
There was something odd about that flying suit: some object fastened to the back of it and thick straps dangling down the front. Ninomar wondered vaguely what they were for, but mostly he was waiting for that eagle to strike.
The duke had pushed in beside him, and two gasping footmen were setting down Ukarres.
'Come off there!' Ninomar said quietly, not able or daring to shout. 'You're out of your mind.'
'I prefer to remain, Vice-Marshal,' Shadow said. 'Thank you.' In his brown flying suit he seemed to glow against the dark sky behind him.
'Obviously you have been to Allaban,' Ukarres said calmly. Having been carried, he was the only one not out of breath.
'Obviously,' Shadow said. 'I understand, Keeper, that King Aurolron is dead.'
The duke nodded. The stairs were quiet now, but the entire population of the castle must be crowded in behind him, every one tongue-tied.
'He was murdered by King Shadow.'
'That story I deem worthy of careful review,' Shadow said. 'God save King Vindax!'
There was silence.
'I was told you brought a message from...Vindax,' the duke said.
Shadow nodded toward one side of the group. 'Tuy Rorin has it.'
The groom edged sideways toward the duke, unable to take his eyes off Shadow. He held out a parchment. The duke snatched it.
'This should be discussed in private. Come down to my study. I promise you safe conduct.'
The younger man shook his head angrily. 'Your hospitality is flawed, Keeper. I stay here. Please read that out; it concerns the vice-marshal, also--and everybody, I suppose. I can quote it from memory, if you prefer.'
The duke hesitated. 'Very well.' He raised his voice. 'I shall read this document, but you will all understand that I am merely reading it and not making any judgment on it. Whatever it is, it may be total rubbish and a forgery. I quote:
''Crown Prince Vindax of Rantorra to his cousin, the duke of Foan, etc., and to whomever else it may concern: Greetings. Know that I am alive and in good hands, although I have suffered serious injury from the...'' His voice trailed off.
'Read it, Keeper!' Shadow said. 'Or I shall tell them what it says anyway.'
The duke glared at him briefly and then continued. ''...serious injury from the attempt on my life, made by a person known to you. Please forward this letter to my royal parents at once, so that their worries may be relieved, and see to it that the would-be assassin is brought to justice. I shall remain here until I am well enough to travel, but this may be a hectoday or longer. I have been assured by the persons exercising authority here that no constraint will be put upon me. I am also assured by them that I shall not be required to recognize in any way their status, nor abrogate nor diminish in any fashion the claims of my mother or my father or ultimately of myself as their heir, in Allaban. Sealed by my hand in Allaban, this nine thousand two hundred and fifty-third day of the reign of Aurolron XX. Vindax P.''
'God save King Vindax!' Shadow said again, quietly, and again there was silence.
'This proves nothing!' the duke snapped, crumpling the parchment.
'It is his signet,' Shadow replied. 'At least it proves that I found him. Or his body. Right?'
Ninomar took the crumpled ball from the duke and straightened it. 'It is the correct signet,' he said.
