Tuesdays at the Castle (8 page)

Pogue’s eyes went wide. “But if something happens to Rolf …”

“We’ll have a Vhervhish king,” Rolf finished for him.

Chapter

14

T
hey thought about letting Pogue get cleaned up and into fresh clothes before braving the Council, but Rolf decided that it would look more dramatic if he was still sweaty and dusty, and Pogue agreed. He also said, with faint embarrassment, that he was afraid if he did go home for clean clothes he’d collapse from exhaustion when he saw his bed. So, with a filthy Pogue in tow, they marched into the throne room. Prince Khelsh was there, and so was the Emissary. Celie almost stuck her tongue out at them both; she was so tired of their whispering in corners and causing problems.

Rolf waved a hand at their bodyguards. “Why don’t you wait out here with Prince Khelsh’s guards?” The guards took up positions just outside the throne room, forcing Prince Khelsh’s guards to do the same. The Vhervhish guards slunk out of the throne room with dark looks and much muttering.

Celie accidentally stepped on one of their feet on her way past, which probably hurt her more than the guard, since she was wearing thin leather slippers and he had a heavy boot on. But he gave her a startled look, and she was pleased with her little act of defiance all the same. She raised her eyebrows and the man ducked his head and apologized for being in her way.

Pogue closed the doors behind them all, and folded his arms. Though not quite as broad as his father, his pose strained his tunic at the shoulders, and the sweat-streaked dirt on his face made him look positively menacing.

“Excellent news,” Rolf told the Emissary and Prince Khelsh brightly. He strode up to the dais and then took off the crown. He rested it on the seat of the throne and then turned to face the prince and the Emissary with a broad smile. “I won’t be needing that anymore!”

“You are … give up crown, yes?” Prince Khelsh had to struggle to find the right words, but he looked very eager all the same.

“Abdicating, you mean?” Rolf shook his head. “Not hardly. But I won’t need to wear the crown, or sit on the throne,
since my father is still alive.
” He put his fists to his hips and watched the Emissary and Prince Khelsh carefully, as Celie, Pogue, and Lilah did.

“Now, Your Majesty,” said the Emissary with a sigh. “We’ve been through this. There has been a thorough search of the area, and there is no way that your parents are still alive—”

“According to the College of Wizardry, they are very much alive,” Rolf interjected smoothly. He gestured at Pogue. “Master Parry has just brought the news. They found their tracks leading away from the ambush site: Father, Mother, and Bran.” Again the bright smile. “I’m about to summon Sergeant Avery and send him with a regiment to search the area again, with the help of the wizards. I’m sure that together they will be able to find my parents and brother in no time.”

Prince Khelsh and the Emissary exchanged looks, and Celie clenched her fists. She knew that whatever they were about to say would sound nice on the surface, but be dripping with nastiness inside. Glancing over, she saw that Pogue’s jaw was set and he also had his hands clenched. Rolf had bit the inside of his lip, and Lilah was already drawing a breath to snap back at them.

“Now, now, King Glower,” the Emissary said. “There is no need to get all excited. If you wish to send a few men out on another search, then by all means do so. But as one of your regents, and I’m sure the prince here agrees with me, I don’t think it’s wise to raise everyone’s hopes. Not to mention how vulnerable that leaves the Castle in this delicate time, if the soldiers are off beating the bushes for ghosts.”

“But you aren’t my regent,” Rolf explained again. “I am not the king. My father is still the king, something we all should have known when the Castle kept his chambers exactly as they always were.” Rolf’s anger showed in the intensity of his voice, and Celie clenched her fists harder, hoping that her brother wouldn’t lose his temper. It would only make the Emissary more smug, and Prince Khelsh more amused.

“You were crowned yesterday,” the Emissary said, a smile on his face that was very nasty indeed, “and the prince and I and the rest of the Council were legally made your regents. If your father is still alive, why has he sent no messages, made no attempt to contact us? Rather than force the kingdom of Sleyne to wither without leadership, we have crowned you. You are the king, and the Council is here to guard your actions. And right now, two of your guardians are telling you that it is futile to persist in looking for your parents.”

“Once I announce to the people that my parents are still alive, you will find that your regency is very short-lived, and your time on the Council will be over just as swiftly,” Rolf said, still controlling his anger.

The Emissary stopped being oily. “And you’ll find it very difficult to act like a petulant little boy when your sisters are locked up in the Hostages’ Tower,” he snarled.

“Go, go!” Pogue grabbed Celie and Lilah by the shoulders and pushed them back toward the door.

Celie turned to run, and there was only a large arch—the doors were gone—leaving the guards standing with startled expressions. She snatched up Lilah’s hand and pulled her older sister through the arch. They darted between the guards to another arch that had opened on the far side of the main hall. It closed behind them with a crash of stone, sealing the guards out, and the sisters looked around to find themselves in Celie’s room. Through another arch they could see Lilah’s room, and the other way out was the narrow staircase to the Spyglass Tower.

Celie spun around, staring at the sudden changes. “How did the Castle … this was never …”

“We don’t have time,” Lilah panted. “Grab some of your things and get up to the Tower.”

“What about Rolf and Pogue?”

“If the Castle’s helping us, I’ll wager it’s helping them,” Lilah said, hurrying through the arch into her bedroom.

Celie forced herself to stop staring and think. “I’m going to bring my pillows and blankets, too,” she said.

Her stomach was a horrible, aching hole. She’d known that the Emissary was going to do something nasty. They should never have let Rolf go to the throne room. They should have just gotten horses and ridden straight to the hills to look for Mummy and Daddy themselves. Tears ran down her nose and dripped onto the bedclothes.

“Do you have anything to eat in your room?” Lilah called through the archway. “The only thing I’ve seen to eat in the Tower is those awful hard biscuits.”

“No,” Celie said, and her voice came out choked.

“What’s the matter?” Lilah came to the archway, a questioning look on her face, then she saw that Celie was crying and came all the way into the room. “Celie darling, what’s wrong?”

“When will it end?” Celie threw herself on her sister’s neck. “I keep waiting and waiting for Daddy to come through the gates and stop all this … this nastiness from happening, but he never does! What will we do now? Isn’t anyone going to help us?”

“I don’t know, I don’t know,” Lilah said, wetting Celie’s head with her own tears. “I don’t know, darling.”

“You’re not helping, either,” Celie sobbed.

“I’m sorry,” Lilah said, and half laughed, half sobbed. “But listen to me,” she said after a moment. She pulled away so that she could look Celie straight in the eyes. “I know that this will all turn out all right, and do you know why?”

Celie shook her head.

“Because we have something that Prince Khelsh and the Emissary don’t have: the Castle. The Castle is on our side, Celie. I don’t know how it’s happened, or why it’s happening now, but the Castle is on our side. I really think it loves you, and I feel like it loves me and Rolf and Mummy and Daddy and Bran, and even Pogue! The Castle will help us, and we will beat them!”

“Are you sure, or are you just telling me that so that I’ll stop crying?” Celie asked.

“I’m sure,” Lilah said, giving her a little shake. “I know that Rolf and I have been saying some things lately to make you feel better. But this isn’t one of those things. I believe that the Castle can help us, and I believe that we will win. Mother and Father and Bran are alive, Celie, I know it’s true now. I wasn’t certain before, but now I am. We just have to hold the Castle until they get back.”

“Hold the Castle?”

Lilah nodded. “It’s up to us to make certain that the Council doesn’t do anything more horrible to anyone. We have to make sure that Rolf and Pogue are all right. That Khelsh doesn’t take over, that everything and everyone in the Castle is protected until Daddy gets back and kicks the Council out on their old, wrinkly … bums!”

“Lilah!” Celie put one hand to her mouth, a little shocked, and then she giggled.

“You heard me,” Lilah said, with a militant light in her eye that Celie had never seen before. “Now get your things and let’s get up to the Spyglass Tower.”

Celie piled her pillows and folded blankets into her velvet coverlet and then tied the whole thing into an enormous bundle. She wasn’t sure if the Castle was going to close the door to her room permanently once she and Lilah got to the Tower, so she just threw the bundle as far up the steps as she could. Then she went back and grabbed her old gray gown, her nightgown, some underthings, stockings, and slippers, and piled those on the stairs. She took her atlas, the Vhervhish phrase book, some paper and pens and ink; at the last minute she snatched Rufus from the back of her wardrobe.

Rufus was a stuffed cloth lion she had had since she was a baby. Rolf had started teasing her about still sleeping with Rufus when she was eight, so she had reluctantly put him in the back of the wardrobe. But she still pulled him out when no one was around and she was feeling sad or sick. He was saggy now, and sort of grayish, rather than plump and cheerfully yellow, but that was all right with Celie. She stuck him into her bundle of bedclothes just as Lilah arrived with her own things.

All of Lilah’s gowns were neatly folded and wrapped in a cloak, and she was carrying her bedding in a large basket. She frowned at the mess Celie had made, but didn’t say anything.

As soon as they were both on the stairs, lugging their burdens, the door to Celie’s room sealed behind them. Once they got to the top, the stairs disappeared as well. The two sisters looked at each other for a moment, and Celie thought that she might cry again.

“What about Rolf and Pogue?” she asked.

“We have to trust the Castle,” Lilah said simply.

She nodded, and did her best not to cry. Soon Lilah had her busy arranging her bedding on one side of the room. Lilah put her things next to Celie’s, and helped her spread her gowns on top of one of the trunks against another wall.

When they turned around, another doorway had opened just beside them, making Lilah jump. It was a small dark stairway that Celie recognized as the one that led to the Council’s private chamber. The sound-muffling cloak was just inside the entrance, hanging from a hook.

“Where does this go?” Lilah poked her head into the opening, and looked at the cloak suspiciously.

“The Council’s privy chamber,” Celie said. She reached around Lilah and plucked the cloak off the wall. “I’ll go find out what’s happening.”

“I’d better come with you,” Lilah said.

“I think you should stay,” Celie said. “There’s just one cloak. It makes it so you don’t make any noise and can spy on people.”

Now it was Lilah’s turn to look near tears. “But I don’t just want to sit here alone,” she said.

“You could watch out the windows, and see if another search party gets sent out,” Celie suggested. “That will mean that someone is actually listening to Rolf. And someone should wait to see if Rolf and Pogue make it up here.”

“All right,” Lilah said meekly. She sighed. “You’d think all that food we ate last night would have stayed with us longer, but I’m starving. I’ll have to eat some of these hard biscuits.”

“Don’t eat them all, you’ll break a tooth,” Celie said with mock severity. She pulled on the cloak and put up the hood. She stomped her feet, but they made no noise. “Do you see?”

Lilah gaped as Celie’s mouth moved, but no sound reached her. “Amazing,” she said. “Now hurry!”

Celie hurried as much as she dared on the narrow, dark stairs. They seemed to go on a lot longer then she remembered from the first time. At last she came to the little slit in the wall, behind the tapestry, and peeped through.

The entire Council wasn’t there, but Prince Khelsh, Lord Feen, and three others were sitting around the heavy table. The prince was sitting in an enormous chair that looked enough like a throne to make Celie grit her teeth. He was leaning back, his hands on the carved arms of the chair, a smug look on his face. The Councilors were looking at one another uneasily, and Celie guessed that Khelsh had just finished telling them what had happened that morning.

“If there’s any chance that His Majesty is still alive,” one of the Councilors said, “then we should certainly look for him. And the queen and prince!”

“Impossible,” Khelsh said. “They are made dead, the wizards must lying be.”

“But if their magic has revealed that Prince Bran, at least, is still alive, we must send someone to search,” the Councilor protested. “The wizards know how to find one of their own!”

“If alive, why not here?” Prince Khelsh asked. “He could have to the Castle walked.” He shrugged. “Is dead.”

“You seem very sure of yourself,” Lord Feen said.

“I sure? Yes!” Khelsh laughed loudly. “My best assassins did I send.”

Celie let out a small scream.

Lord Feen and the other Councilors looked variously ill or outraged.

“What devilry is this?” The Councilor—it was Lord Sefton, Celie saw—was on his feet. “What have you done?”

“I make sure what I want,” Prince Khelsh said. He was still slumped in the chair as though completely relaxed, but Celie could see that he was gripping the arms ever so slightly, and there was a tension to his legs that said he could leap to his feet at any moment.

“You were behind the ambush!” Sefton pointed a long, shaking finger at Prince Khelsh. “Those were your men!”

“Yes,” Khelsh admitted with a shrug. “As I plan wif Emissary.”

“The Emissary?” Sefton was the color of dried paste now. “And now these men continue to hunt the king and queen and their son?”