It was the first thing he had wanted to do since he had come through the Palace gates. Well, besides eat.
Perhaps you had something else you wished to do? Like becoming a merchant, or a guildmaster? When Kel turned sixteen, the Orfelinat would eject him, penniless, into the world. It existed to help children—and only children. Untrained, largely untutored, on the streets of Castellane, there would be nothing for him. Even sailors were trained from a young age. He could scrape by as a lamplighter, or a ship’s boy if he was lucky, and would be poor as dirt. Or he could be a criminal—pick pockets or join the Crawlers, the highest he had ever dared to dream—and wind up dangling from the gallows of the Tully.
He took a deep breath. “Extraordinary, you say?”
And Conor began to smile.
CHAPTER ONE
I don’t see why I have to get married now,” complained Conor Darash Aurelian, Crown Prince of Castellane, Duke of Marakand （an honorary title he had inherited from his mother）， and Potentate of Sarema （a small, deserted island near Taprobana that had been claimed by Castellane some decades ago when a merchant ship planted the lion flag upon its few feet of shoreline; as far as anyone knew, the flag was still there, leaving Castellane’s claim to the rocky protuberance uncontested）。
Kel just smiled. Conor was looking dramatically aggrieved, which did not actually mean he was feeling dramatically aggrieved. Kel knew Conor’s expressions better than he knew his own. Conor might be annoyed about the pressure to get married, or he might be annoyed about the speech the Queen had ordered him to give in Valerian Square today （the reason he and Conor were currently jammed into a carriage with blacked-out windows, boiling hot and squashed between velvet cushions, with Jolivet and Mayesh glaring at them from the opposite seats）。 Or he might not be annoyed at all, and simply be indulging his flair for the dramatic.
Either way, it wasn’t Kel’s problem. He wasn’t the one trying to talk Conor into a politically advantageous match. In fact, he was against the whole idea. He was quite comfortable with the way things were, and Conor marrying would upset the balance.
“Then don’t get married,” growled Jolivet. He was dour as ever despite being decked out in full uniform—miles of gold braid, scarlet tunic and trousers, and a helmet so profoundly ceremonial that while he was currently carrying it in his lap, the plumes brushed his chin. Mayesh Bensimon, beside him, looked like a ragged gray crow by comparison: He wore his plain Counselor’s robes, his curling white hair spilling over the collar. But then, as an Ashkar, he was only permitted to wear blue or gray in public, which vastly limited any potential sartorial splendor. “That cousin of yours in Detmarch can be King of Castellane, and you can take yourself off to head up the army. Give General Archambault a rest on the border.”
Kel held in a laugh. It was true that when a Castellani royal family had more than one heir, the second was usually trained up to become the leader of the army. If Conor had had a sibling, he could have swapped places with them, though Kel could not imagine Conor doing any such thing, even in theory. He hated insects and dirt, and the army, as far as Kel understood, involved a great deal of both. Besides, he was young—only twenty-three—and had years to get married and produce an heir. Mayesh and Jolivet were just being anxious, like clucking old hens.
Conor raised an eyebrow. “Nonsense,” he said. “I am far too good looking to risk spoiling my looks in battle.”
“Scars can be charming,” Kel noted. “Look at Montfaucon. Always surrounded by adoring courtiers.”
“If only one could be assured one would go off to fight and return only with a dashing cut on the cheek,” said Conor. “The more likely outcome—a pike to the face—is less attractive. Anyway, it’s not as if there’s a war going on now.” Conor always moved his hands expressively when he spoke—a habit Kel had spent years learning and copying. The little bit of light in the carriage glinted off Conor’s rings as he gestured. He was richly dressed, as befitted a prince about to address his people. Third-best crown—a gold circlet etched with wings—fine wool trousers, and tooled-leather jerkin, the leather cut out in small diamond shapes to show the silk and metallic thread of the shirt beneath. It was horrendously hot, which Kel knew since he was wearing the same thing.
“There is no war currently,” said Mayesh. “And consolidating alliances with other countries via marital connection is one way of making sure it stays that way.” He opened the leather notebook on his lap. Inside were dozens of portraits and sketches done on various kinds of paper, all sent from hopeful courts and holdings across Dannemore and beyond. “Princess Aimada d’Eon of Sarthe. Twenty years old, speaks six languages, mother was a famous beauty, docile—”
“Docile means dull,” said Conor. He had pulled off one of his rings and was tossing it from hand to hand. It sparked in the dimness of the carriage as it flew, like a colorful firefly. “And what do I care what her mother looks like?”
“Perhaps they are offering two for the price of one,” suggested Kel, and saw Conor smile. There were various aspects to the job of being Sword Catcher that went beyond Kel simply putting himself between the Crown Prince and possible harm. Conor was usually surrounded by people telling him what to do in a fearfully serious manner; Kel felt himself tasked with providing some balance.
Mayesh was not amused. “I believe,” he said, “the suggestion is that the daughter, like her mother the Queen, will one day also be a great beauty.”
“Is she not one now?” Conor took the paper from Mayesh. “Red hair,” he said. “I loathe red hair. Besides. Sarthe.”
Jolivet snorted. Before Castellane had gained its independence, it had been the port city of Magna Callatis, a vast Empire now split into the three separate kingdoms of Sarthe, Valderan, and Castellane. Valderan had been its verdant south, and even now contained most of the farms from which Castellane sourced its food. Castellane had been its shipyard and harbor. And Sarthe had been its capital, containing the once Imperial city of Aquila. It was common knowledge that Sarthe yearned to build the old Empire up again. They longed especially for Castellane’s harbor, for they were landlocked, forced to pay steep fees to Valderan for access to the coast.
“He has a point,” said Jolivet. “Why give Sarthe a foothold here?”
“Why, indeed?” Mayesh drew out another sheet of paper. “Here we have Princess Elsabet Belmany, of Malgasi.”
“Malgasi,” Jolivet said, thoughtfully. “A useful ally. Especially since your father fostered at their Court.”
“They trade richly in spices, fur, and silks, with reserves of arable land that would mean we were no longer dependent on trade with Valderan for crops,” Mayesh noted, though there was a curious lack of enthusiasm in his voice.
“Arable land,” said Conor. “Never have more romantic words been spoken. So many ballads written about beautiful women with vast tracts of arable land.”
“If that’s what they’re calling it now,” said Kel, and Conor grinned before taking the sheet of parchment from Mayesh.
“You needn’t talk about land as if it’s nothing,” grumbled Jolivet. “In trade we are indeed a great power. But in land, we are only a few square miles of city and marsh.”