Kell shrugged the new coat on and tucked the letters deep into one of the pockets (they were lined with softened wool instead of silk), blew out a plume of warm breath, and marked the icy wall with the blood from his hand. But then, as he was reaching for the cord of tokens around his neck, something tugged at his attention. He paused and looked around, considering the garden. He was alone, truly alone, and he found himself wanting to savor it. Aside from one trip north when he and Rhy were boys, this was the farthest Kell ever strayed from the city. He’d always been watched, but he’d felt more confined in the past four months than in the nearly twenty years he’d served the crown. Kell used to feel like a possession. Now he felt like a prisoner.
Perhaps he should have run when he’d had the chance.
You could still run, said a voice in his ear. It sounded suspiciously like Lila.
In the end, she had escaped. Could he? He didn’t have to run to another world. What if he simply … walked away? Away from the garden and the village, away from the city. He could take a coach, or a boat to the ocean, and then … what? How far would he make it with almost no money of his own and an eye that marked him as an Antari?
You could take what you need, said the voice.
It was a very big world. And he’d never even seen it.
If he stayed in Ames, he would eventually be found. And if he fled into Faro, or Vesk? The Faroans saw his eye as a mark of strength, nothing more, but Kell had heard his name paired with a Veskan word—crat’a—pillar. As if he alone held up the Arnesian empire. And if either empire got their hands on him …
Kell stared down at his blood-streaked hand. Saints, how could he actually consider running away?
It was madness, the idea that he could—that he would—abandon his city. His king and queen. His brother. He’d betrayed them once—well, one crime, albeit committed many times—and it had nearly cost him everything. He wouldn’t forsake them again, no matter what restlessness had been awakened in him.
You could be free, insisted the voice.
But that was the thing. Kell would never be free. No matter how far he fled. He’d given up freedom with his life, when he handed it to Rhy.
“Enough,” he said aloud, silencing the doubts as he dug the proper cord out from under his collar and tugged it over his head. On the strap hung a copper coin, the face rubbed smooth from years of use. Enough, he thought, and then he brought his bloody hand to the garden wall. He had a job to do.
“As travars.”
Travel.
The world began to bend around the words and the blood and the magic, and Kell stepped forward, hoping to leave behind his troubles with his London, trade them for a few minutes with the king.
But as soon as his boots settled on the castle carpet, he realized that his problems were just beginning. Instantly, Kell knew that something was wrong.
Windsor was too quiet. Too dark.
The bowl of water that usually waited for him in the antechamber was empty, the candles to either side unlit. When he listened for the sound of steps, he heard them, distantly, in the halls behind him, but from the chamber ahead he was met with silence.
Dread crept in as he made his way into the king’s sitting room, hoping to see his withered frame sleeping in his high-backed chair, or hear his frail, melodic voice. But the room was empty. The windows were fastened shut against the snow, and there was no fire going in the hearth. The room was cold and dark in a closed-up way.
Kell went to the fireplace and held out his hands, as if to warm them, and an instant later flames licked up across the empty grate. The fire wouldn’t last long, fueled by nothing more than air and magic, but in its light Kell crossed through the space, searching for signs of recent occupation. Cold tea. A cast-off shawl. But the room felt abandoned, un-lived-in.
And then his gaze caught on the letter.
If it could be called a letter.
A single piece of crisp cream paper, folded and propped on the tray before the fire, with his name written on the front in the prince regent’s steady, confident script.
Kell took up the note, knowing what he would find before he unfolded the page, but he still felt ill as the words danced in the enchanted fire’s light.
The king is dead.
II
The four words hit him like a blow.
The king is dead.
Kell reeled; he wasn’t accustomed to loss. He feared death—he always had—now more than ever, with the prince’s life bound to his, but until the Black Night, Kell had never lost someone he knew. Someone he liked. He had always been fond of the ailing king, even in his later years, when madness and blindness stole most of his dignity and all of his power.
And now the king was gone. A sum returned to parts, as Tieren would say.
Below, the prince regent had added a postscript.
Step into the hall. Someone will bring you to my rooms.
Kell hesitated, looking around at the empty chamber. And then, reluctantly, he closed his hand into a fist, plunging the fire in the hearth back into nothing and the room back into shadow, and left. Out past the antechamber into the hallways beyond.
It was like stepping into another world.
Windsor wasn’t as opulent as St. James, but it wasn’t nearly so grim as the old king’s chamber made it out to be. Tapestries and carpets warmed the halls. Gold and silver glinted from candlestick and plate. Lamps burned in wall sconces and voices and music carried like a draft.
Someone cleared their throat, and Kell turned to find a well-dressed attendant waiting.
“Ah, sir, very good, this way,” said the man with a bow, and then, without waiting, he set off down the hall.