Veretian clothing.
It was a clear message. The long, drawn-out frustration of the last day meant that he almost couldn’t absorb it, couldn’t trust it. He bent slowly to pick the clothes up. The pants resembled those he had found in the training arena, but were very soft and very fine, of a quality well beyond that of the threadbare pair he had hurried into that night. The shirt was made to fit. The boots looked like riding boots.
He looked back at Radel.
‘Well? Change,’ said Radel.
He put a hand to the fastening at his waist, and felt a bemused curve tug at his mouth as Radel somewhat awkwardly averted his eyes.
Radel only interrupted once, ‘No, not like that,’ and shooed his hands away, gesturing for a servant to step forward and retie some idiotic piece of lacing.
‘Are we—?’ Damen began, as the last lace was tied to Radel’s satisfaction.
‘The Prince ordered you brought down into the courtyard, dressed to ride. You’ll be fitted for the rest there.’
‘The rest?’ Dryly. He looked down at himself. It was already more clothing than he had worn at any one time since his capture in Akielos.
Radel didn’t answer, just made a sharp gesture for him to follow.
After a moment, Damen did, feeling a strange awareness of the lack of restraints.
The rest? he’d asked. He did not think much about that, as they wound their way through the palace to emerge in an outer courtyard near the stables. Even if he had, he would not have come up with the answer. It was so unlikely that it simply didn’t occur to him—until he saw with his own eyes—and even then, he almost didn’t believe it. He almost laughed aloud. The servant who came forward to meet them had his arms full of leather, straps and buckles, and some larger, hardened leather pieces, the largest with chest mouldings.
It was armour.
The courtyard by the stables was filled with the activity of servants and armourers, stableboys and pages, the shout of orders, the chinking sounds of saddlery. Punctuating these was the discharge of breath through equine nostrils, and the occasional strike of a hoof against paving.
Damen recognised several faces. There were the men who had guarded him in stony-faced twos throughout his confinement. There was the physician who had tended his back, now out of his floor-length robes and dressed for riding. There was Jord who had waved Herode’s medallion in the alleyway and saved his life. He saw a familiar servant ducking riskily under the belly of one of the horses on some errand, and across the courtyard he caught a glimpse of a man with a black moustache who he knew from the hunt as a horse-master.
The predawn air was cool, but soon it would warm. The season was ripening from spring into summer: a good time for a campaign. In the south, of course, it would be hotter. He flexed his fingers and deliberately straightened his back, let the feeling of freedom sink down into him, a powerful physical sensation. He was not particularly thinking of escape. He would after all be riding with a contingent of heavily armed men, and besides, there was now another urgent priority. For now it was enough that he was unshackled and outside in the open air, and that very soon the sun would rise, warming leather and skin, and they would mount up, and ride.
It was light riding armour, with enough nonessential decoration that he took it to be parade armour. The servant told him, yes, they would properly equip at Chastillon. His fitting took place by the stable doors, near to a water pump.
The last buckle was tightened. Then, startlingly, he was given a sword belt. Even more startlingly, he was given a sword to put in it.
It was a good sword. Under the decoration, it was good armour, though not what he was used to. It felt . . . foreign. He touched the starburst pattern at his shoulder. He was dressed in Laurent’s colours, and bearing his insignia. That was a strange feeling. He never thought he’d ride out under a Veretian banner.
Radel, who had departed on some errand, now returned, to give him a list of duties.
Damen listened with part of his mind. He was to be a functional member of the company, he would report to his ranking senior, who would report to the Captain of the Guard, who in turn would report to the Prince. He was to serve and obey, as any man. He would also have the additional duties of attendant. In that capacity, he would report directly to the Prince. The duties described to him seemed to be a mixture of man at arms, adjutant and bed slave—ensuring the Prince’s safety, attending to his personal comfort, sleeping in his tent—Damen’s whole attention swung back to Radel.
‘Sleeping in his tent?’
‘Where else?’
He passed a hand over his face. Laurent had agreed to this?
The list continued. Sleeping in his tent, carrying his messages, attending to his needs. He would be paying for any relative freedom with a period of enforced proximity to Laurent.
With the other part of his mind, Damen surveyed the activity in the courtyard. It was not a large group. When you looked past the ruckus, it was the supplies for perhaps fifty men, armed to the teeth. At most, seventy five, more lightly armed.
Those he recognised were Prince’s Guard. The majority of them, at least, would be loyal. Not all of them. This was Vere. Damen drew in a breath and let it out, looking at each of the faces, and wondering which of them had been coaxed or coerced into the employ of the Regent.
How the taint of this place had sunk down into his bones: he was certain betrayal would come, he was only unsure from where.
He thought logistically about what it would take to ambush and slaughter this number of men. It would not be discreet, but it would also not be difficult. At all.
‘This can’t be everyone,’ said Damen.