Prince and the Throne (Fedosian Wars #2)

13. Charlatans and Buffoons

thirteen

Charlatans and Buffoons

Was it still the same night or another night? Had Lev slept too little or a whole day? He turned and Semyon wasn’t there, so he really didn’t know. The fire had been stoked and the room was warm for a change as he swung his legs over the bed and stepped on the—

“What the fuck!” Lev leaped up and clung onto the bedpost like a flailing cat, sliding down due to not possessing claws. He looked at the floor and there was a bearskin. It hadn’t been there before.

It hideously clashed with the rest of the décor, but he didn’t mind it because bearskins were warm, and he could always use warm. Now that he knew it was there, the fur was a pleasant texture under his bare feet.

Semyon burst in with a great purpose. It was either too early or too late for so much energy—Lev felt tired putting on his slippers.

“The next time you bring a dead thing into my bedchamber, please tell me.” Lev yawned.

Semyon opened the curtains and afternoon sunlight blasted Lev. So, it hadn’t been night. The bed creaked with the weight as a blond bear in full armor plunged onto it. “Are you awake, Lev? We have some bad news.”

“Isn’t that just news at this point?” Lev rubbed his eyes. “So, tell me what terrible new thing happened?”

“Apraksin scouts spotted Grigori. The trail he was on, he was headed to the Ivory Fortress.”

Semyon and Vasily had this theory Grigori might be responsible for the deaths of Menshikov since he’d been seen in Bone Country around the time. They’d been ‘spotting’ him for months and had been on a goose chase with the elusive one.

“Leave it alone,” Lev grumbled. “He’s a charlatan who tricked the mad queen into believing he is a mage. He’s not one. He studied under no one. None of the real mages knew him and no one has seen him cast a single spell.” Lev blew a raspberry. “His patron monarch is dead. He’s probably looking for another fool to leech off for another decade.” He looked at the cold porridge on the table, looked at his warm bed, and chose the bed.

“You don’t think he’s carrying a message from the prince to the Pulyazin?” Semyon asked. “I think we should capture and question him.”

“Don’t join Lev Guard, or you’ll starve this winter. There, I saved you time.” Lev laid his head on the pillow. “He’s a straggler. Leave him be, Syoma.”

“ Something happened to the Menshikov. Maybe he knows.”

“Leave it be,” Lev whispered as he closed his eyes. “We have enough trouble on this side of the dver. Don’t poke darkness with a stick. Maybe it bites.”

“But you’re the guardian of light.”

Lev scoffed. “That was the archmage and he’s dead.”

Semyon stepped out. Lev went back to sleep and by the time he was staggering about—just tired, not drunk—looking for food, dinner had already been served.

He sat alone at the long table for fifty and composed another letter for Soful which she’d never get. The servants lit the candles as the day fell, darkness coming earlier with each passing day, and the cook reheated some mutton for him. They’d been saving him food because he never ate when it was being served.

Hello, Soful.

How have you been? I miss you much. Father, too. It’s the darndest thing, the memories that stay with us the brightest. With you, it’s always us hiding under the covers during the lightning storm. They’re so loud, thunder, I mean. The cover didn’t help at all, but you did.

With Uncle, it’s when he got me a miniature pony. And Father…

Lev set the quill down and held his face in his hands. Lord Pyotr had not been all right for so long that Lev struggled to find a memory in which he wasn’t sad. Soful would tell Lev how his father used to sing for his mother, how they used to be happy together, but as far as he could remember, Mother was always sick and Father always sad. When she passed, Pyotr Guard’s soul died. Father knew the Shield couldn’t have killed the archmage, he must have, he wasn’t stupid. Instigating a conflict with the House of Steel, he was looking for a way to go to his wife.

Father, did you think it was dignified, the way you went out? It was not. You killed yourself and left me holding the bag of shit. I hate you.

He hated the archmage too. His ego was too big and caused his demise. There was a running theme with the men in his family—suicide.

“My lord.”

Lev looked up. “Yes, Konstantin.”

“They shouldn’t be out after dark. Do you want us to search for them?”

“Who’s they?” Lev frowned. He thought Dariy had been called back home.

“Vasily Apraksin and Lord Skuratov, my lord,” said the knight, then perhaps seeing Lev’s confusion, he asked, “Did you not send them to find Mage Grigori?”

“No,” groaned Lev. “Matter of fact, I said the opposite.” He got up and marched to the window. It was so dark he couldn’t even see the courtyard. “They’re going to get lost and freeze to death, aren’t they? Fucken buffoons.” His shoulders slumped and he pressed his forehead against the cold glass. “Please take the hounds and go find them.”

“It’s Usolya, my lord. We didn’t bring the hounds.” He had to clarify things like this because when Lev was inebriated he’d forget where he was and ask for his father. “But their tracks are still fresh. It shouldn’t be too hard,” said Konstantin.

“Yeah, do that. Thank you.”

“How many should I take?” Konstantin wasn’t used to being the captain and would run all his decisions by Lev. Good old Clodt, the kind giant who’d captained the knights for three decades, was another casualty of Father’s suicide stand at White Palace.

How many should I take, the man asked as though Lev had hundreds of knights. He did not. They all died at the White Palace. Father, you killed them.

“Saints,” Lev breathed. “All eleven of you, I suppose, or is that too many? Do you think we’ll disturb the wildlife unfairly with the thundering of our hooves?”

“I’d rather not leave the fortress unguarded, my lord… Will six men suffice?”

“They all left?” Lev threw up his arms. “For a single old man?”

“They wanted to comb the area and not miss the mage. Lord Skuratov seemed to believe it was important they captured the mage.”

“Stop calling him a mage, Konstantin. Uncle was a mage. Father could have been a mage. I am a mage. Grigori is a charlatan. I only care that Skuratov is going to freeze his balls off and get eaten by the mountain. It’s unforgiving out here, and the boy from Black Ore doesn’t seem to understand that. Take your men, all of them, and go find Semyon. The Apraksin are from here. This is their terrain. They’ll manage.”

“Yes, my lord,” he said but hesitated.

“We have a drawbridge, Konstantin,” Lev said. “I’ll pull it up after you leave. Besides, who the fuck is going to come here in this weather?”

“Yes, my lord.”

“And Captain, take more gold than you need. Whatever ate the Menshikov is still out there. Gold, I can spare. Knights, I cannot.”

“Yes, my lord.”

Lev stood at the gate and watched his knights ride off into the dark void. Their torches, like fireflies, vanished once entering the trees. He told the men to raise the bridge, waited to see that it was done, and strode through the gatehouse.

“Lock up,” he told the gatekeepers. “And you do not open the gate for anyone without telling me first. Understood? I don’t care if it’s your mother or a naked whore. You do not let anyone in without me here, yes?”

“Yes, my lord.”

Then for good measure, because plain men were superstitious, he said, “There are spirits out there. Evil lurks in the darkness and takes the form familiar to you. That,” he pointed at the Guard crest above the door, “protects you. Evil can’t cross it and must use trickery to be invited in. Understood?”

“Yes, my lord.”

Then he scared them with the tale of two-headed Bogdan, which was purposefully botched alchemy and not an evil spirit, but it seemed to do the job as men pulled out their protection amulets and wore them over their cloaks.

He climbed the never ending stairs to the battlement and stood there with the men, thankful for the calm weather. Later, he walked the allure which didn’t have to be manned too heavily because Usolya sat on a small island inside a grand lake, the drawbridge connecting to the narrow strip of land stretching from the bank like the reaching arm of a friend. The lake was frozen now, but a few vials of Wrath would break the ice easily and dunk anyone foolish enough to try to cross it that way.

He joined a card game with the soldiers, purposefully lost a few coppers which seemed to make them so happy, realized that was infectious—happiness—and smiled as he continued his wall walk.

The difference between a soldier and a knight was the use of alchemy, not birthright. Having access to gold helped, having a father who could teach you alchemy helped, of course, and most Guard knights were legacy, but that didn’t stop the plain soldiers from fiddling with the light codex, trying to unravel the thing, thinking it would better their lives. In theory, anyone could make a knight, but life was just a little different.

But Lev thought to award their effort and helped a group of soldiers when he found them with a page of a codex, trying to learn basic alchemy. Half alchemy, really, they were just trying to start a fire with an alchemy flint. Drawing with a stick on the snow in the courtyard as a crowd gathered around him, he explained what a complete transmutation was, which was necessary to understand half-alchemy. Some stared blankly, some nodded, and Lev gave everyone who wanted one a gold coin so they could practice alchemy.

Gold was rare, sure, but the perceived value only came from its use in magic. One couldn’t eat it, clearly, and couldn’t even make potato with it. Living alchemy was a trade in time. You couldn’t create a potato, but you could make the plant grow faster—time, and for that, the dver only accepted time in return, meaning it shortened your life by the equivalent number of months or years.

It was illegal for commoners to possess gold, and though curious, the men were wary at first, but Lev said to return it to him after they were done practicing, and they left better. A little girl tried reaching for the thing glittering in the firelight, and her mother slapped her hand, so Lev gave them silver instead.

“Buy something good when we get out of here, yeah?” he said.

“Are you going to be the tsar, Lord Lev?” the girl asked while her mother bowed, profusely apologizing.

The whole of the Guard household had been lost during the fall of the White Palace, and the servants here were from the Bone Country. When he first arrived, they’d flocked to him like pigeons to a handful of grain. Many had come to pray because they thought a Guard meant a saint, and Lev had hired more people than he needed because they appeared to be starving and he had food. Not enough to feed the Pulyazin, but enough to sustain Usolya for the winter even stuffed to the brim, which it wasn’t.

So he did that, killed time without getting trashed because he was worried for Semyon, and didn’t want to be drunk in case he had to go look for him in the dark.

When dawn neared and the men hadn’t returned, Lev played cards with the soldiers in the watchtower. Any shouting in the courtyard, real or imagined, made him pop up and rush to the arrow slits. Soldiers talked about whores a lot, even the ones with families, and one asked Lev about the courtesans at court.

‘I don’t pay for sex,’ he wanted to say but didn’t want to sound condescending because they’d been talking about just that, and went instead with, “They’re all right. Not worth the money, though, especially sentinels.”

“Aren’t sentinels… men, my lord?” asked one, and his friend elbowed him. They cleared their throats.

“I was courting Zoya Chartorisky,” Lev said.

“Ah.” They nodded.

Lev had been with Zoya. So had Semyon. They were just high. Raven balls, good times, Lev sighed.

“Oy, a pigeon.” The soldier pointed behind Lev.

Lev didn’t understand why that was noteworthy and drew a card.

“Oy, another pigeon.”

Yes, he could hear the cooing as though they were having a flock gathering out there, but—

“They don’t live here, do they?” It finally occurred to him, and he got up.

They were church homing pigeons, he realized at once, couriers, but there were so many! They flocked to the tower and crowded the railings and the ledges. Lev reached out through the arrow slit and caught a pigeon. Because they were used to being handled, the bird let him hold it and pet it.

“It’s freezing outside,” Lev mumbled. “Do we have a birdkeeper?” he asked, knowing they didn’t. Usolya hadn’t been used in years and he’d seen the empty aviary when he first arrived.

Yet these pigeons must have been raised here and they were returning home because someone let them out.

“Oh, holy fuck,” he realized, once he saw they were carrying message capsules.

He took the one from the pigeon he held, releasing the bird afterward. Running a finger over the archmage’s seal, for a brief moment he was a boy receiving a miniature pony from his uncle. He let that go with a long exhale and opened the scroll which wasn’t from the archmage… and it was addressed to a count he’d never heard of.

Then he got another pigeon, the same message and not addressed to him, either.

The Chartorisky port burns. The House of Silver is no more. The Boyar Duma are hereby notified Daniil Chartorisky has made an attempt on the prince's life. He is wanted for high treason. If found, kill on sight.

It took him a while because the exceeding stupidity made it harder to understand, but after twelve pigeons or so, Lev realized some brilliant mind at the church must have put all the birds in the same aviary following the archmage’s death. Now they didn’t know which bird was homed where and just released them all. Except they didn’t even know how church couriers worked. There was no need to be addressing little lords and wasting parchment. You notified the church overseeing the area and the local parsons sent couriers, people this time, out to the lords if they found it relevant. Besides, there were only eleven or twelve places in the whole of Fedosia the pigeons were homed to, and all of them were churches and Guard estates.

Twenty pigeons later, Lev even found one addressed to Gavril Illeivich, Sofia’s dead husband.

Luminary Matvey, the donkey who’d signed these, was a charlatan, a failed acolyte parading around as a man of deep faith. He’d assumed control, Lev guessed, because all the mages and acolytes worth their salt were dead, and no Guard was around to call him on his bullshit. He couldn’t even direct pigeons. How was he running the church? Such a thing boiled Lev’s blood because the buffoon was pissing on his family legacy by using the archmage’s seal.

It took him hours to home the pigeons in the aviary, find suitable caretakers, assign people to repair the aviary so the birds didn’t freeze in the winter, and sort through the hundreds of scrolls, making a pile for people close enough he could send riders to.

Then he burned the rest because how was he to deliver the message to House Durnov, a damn Shield ally, not to mention their estate was at the other, the western, end of Fedosia?

The irony of it was that in the hundreds of messages, not a single one was addressed to Lev. Suck my cock, old shriveled fuck.

While he fumed, the Skuratov and the Guard knights arrived safe by the saints’ grace.

“We didn’t find him,” said Semyon, disappointed, when Lev went to the gatehouse to allow them in.

“You shouldn’t have stayed out through the night, Syoma,” Lev scolded the blond bear on a tall horse.

“Yeah. We got separated from the Apraksin and got lost.” He hung his head in shame as he dismounted. “It turned out we were just circling our tail.”

Lev had known they’d get lost too, a foot of snow hid the roads. But he was just glad they’d returned.

“Do you want us to look for the Apraksin, my lord?” Konstantin asked on the bridge.

“Never you mind,” Lev said. The Apraksin lived less than a day’s ride from Usolya. They could manage. “I need your advice on something, come on in.”

“What the fuck is this?” was Semyon’s response to the hundreds of tiny scrolls laid out on the long table of the dining hall.

“Here, this one is for your father.” Lev gave him one scrap. “These are for your brothers and cousins.” Lev handed him a bunch.

“What are these?” he mumbled as he opened them, growing more bewildered about the multitude of scrolls sent to the same household rather than the content of the message.

The knights frowned at the sheer number of messages. Erlan took one, held it open, and scoffed, “You don’t say?”

No one other than Matvey was surprised Duke Rodion would eat the Chartorisky as his first meal after his claim to power. The Chartorisky were rich, played too many games, and depended too greatly on the Shields to protect them, hardly keeping any soldiers. Lev didn’t believe for a single beat that Daniil would have the balls to try assassination.

The Vietinghoff were the same and they were next was Lev’s guess. After the Guards were banished from Krakova, Lev realized the Boyar Duma was a farce.

The other knights read the scrolls as well, and Konstantin remarked, “I thought Duchess Elena was Chartorisky?” He looked at Lev as though he was supposed to know who that was, then clarified, “Duke Rodion’s wife.”

“Oh, the Chartorisky are backstabbing bitches,” said Lev, recalling how Zoya blamed him for cheating at the Royal Cup. “The duchess probably doesn’t care about her house now she’s going to be queen, and her children tsars. Next, they’re going to eat Prince Nikolas, too. I hope Aleksei knows that.”

“But this is good news, my lord,” said Konstantin. “If you’d allow us, my lord, we’d like to deliver some of these messages and make a case for my lord’s cause. Those who were blind to the Shield’s tyranny will perhaps now see the House of Steel will swallow them all. Once the throne starts seizing the lands of its nobles, it will never end. We’ll stop by the churches as well. Rallying the common folks always helps sway their lords.”

“That’s not a bad idea,” Semyon chimed in.

Lev let the knights discuss their plan and divide their tasks and sat at the head of the table, drinking his third bottle of wine. He relaxed after Semyon returned and was making up for the lost time.

Five bottles of wine, and he blew a raspberry hearing Konstantin assign Pulyazin to a knight. “Fuck Fedya. Send a simpleton. Don’t waste your time with him. He’s already knelt, prepared to suck Rodion’s cock.”

Semyon came and snatched the wine away from Lev. “You had enough.”

“Breathe, Syoma. Your corset is wound up too tight.”

“Quit it and go to sleep.”

Lev got kicked out of his own dining hall because men were ‘working’ but he didn’t go to sleep, and strolled to the music room to bang on the piano just so he could be a nuisance. He was happy, though, finding his first sliver of hope since his father’s death. Maybe the knights could corral people to his cause; not Pulyazin, that house was bought and sold, but the east was vast, and they’d been starving long enough. It was time to get up and march on the capital.

He stayed up all night in the music room. No longer trying to be obnoxious, he just played waltz, the music his parents danced to.

Konstantin knocked on the door frame to announce the knights were leaving. Some of them would be gone for months since they meant to travel far and wide, and Lev got up to bid them a safe journey and prayed because his men had asked him to. It didn’t mean shit to him, but it did to them, and if it helped them believe the saints would watch over their journey, it was worth something.

Then he and Semyon fell asleep together, their limbs sprawled and tangled with one another. Lev loved him. He’d been in love since he was thirteen and Semyon eleven, since the blond boy kissed him in the woods behind the White Palace. If life was a circle beginning and ending at the same point, sailed on a small boat in the open waters, Semyon was Lev’s anchor that tethered him to his path, kept him from drifting out into oblivion, and he was the center point Lev circled, the meaning of life when there was none.

“My lord.” A voice called Lev from his dream of warm waters and sunshine into the freezing bedchamber in Usolya where the fire had gone out. “My lord.”

“Stoke the fire.” Lev groaned and sat up.

“Right away,” the servant said, but there was a soldier with him, staring at Semyon sleeping in Lev’s bed.

“What is it?” asked Lev.

“Ah.” The soldier blinked, minding his manners suddenly. “The Apraksin party returned, my lord. Should we open the gate?”