She thanked him and moved in,
and then locked the door behind her and eyed the large bed enviously. She shook her head. Alto was resting with a rock as a pillow; how dare she look to the niceties of royalty?
A knock at her door distracted her from her thoughts. She turned and went to it
and then opened the door. A girl younger than she stood outside with a silver platter loaded with wine, sausage, cheese, and some sweet breads. "My lady, I was sent to tend to your needs."
Patrina frowned. She was no stranger to servants
; it just seemed that this was a poor way of hiding her presence. "The baron sent you?"
She named off the
baron's aide instead. "Master Victor did, my lady."
Patrina let out a very un-ladylike grunt.
She took the tray from the serving girl and said, "Some water to wash with is all I need, thank you."
She bowed and hurried away,
giving Patrina a chance to sample the wine and food. She found she was starving and had to force herself to leave the food alone and cover her head with her hood again when the girl returned. Patrina opened the door to allow her to lug the bucket filled with water in. She dipped a washing bowl from Patrina's table into it and left it on the table. "Will there be—"
"No, thank you," Patrina said. She smiled to soften the blow but with her hood up and the serving girl's eyes cast down
, the effect was lost.
"I was told to tell you there are guards posted at the end of the hall if you need me for anything."
"Thank you. That will be all."
The servant left, allowing Patrina to lock the doors and move to the table. She glanced around the room a final time
and then began to disrobe so she could wash herself. The water was cold but refreshing. A far cry from a proper bath but those were luxuries only allowed during peaceful times of leisure at Holgasford.
Patrina finished off the cup of win
e and sat on the bed to make getting dressed easier. She finished tying her boots and then found herself falling back on the bed. Her thoughts drifted even as she told herself she should be getting up and checking with the others. Fully intending to rouse herself after a few more moments of respite, Patrina fell asleep.
* * * *
Patrina awoke to a banging on her door. She groaned and sat up, and then fell back on the bed and groaned again. Her tongue was swollen and as dry as the hull of a ship that had been beached. Her head hurt with every thought, let alone the agony sitting up had caused her. Someone banged on the door again, reminding her that even something as simple as a sound could hurt.
Patrina forced herself up as the
lock released with a click and the door burst open. Four armed men wearing chain armor spilled through the open doorway. Patrina's eyes went to her armor and sword but the men rushed forward with drawn swords to surround the bed. A fifth man walked in dressed in plate armor with an embossed dragon on his breastplate.
Patrina gasped and look at his face, expecting to see Beck. Instead
, she saw a taller man with a red mustache and beard. "Lady Patrina," he said in a voice that reminded her of gravel. "A pleasure to finally meet you."
Patrina stared at the tray with the leftover food and her own cup of wine. She'd been poisoned
. Baron Mackay was a dead man. She turned back to look at the knight. "The pleasure's all yours."
He chuckled. "My apologies
. I'm Sir Harad, of the Order of the Silver Dragon."
"I met one of your brothers," Patrina said. "He was a dog and a coward. He died facing a better man."
Harad shook his head. "Now, now, it's not polite to speak ill of the dead. Sir Beck was a passionate man who sometimes took things further than he should have."
"And he paid the price for it," Patrina pointed out.
"It seems he has."
"Your order and my nation seem to be at odds with
each other. I can't see a reason why our meeting will turn out to be a good thing," Patrina said. She nodded at his lackeys and added, "Especially with drawn steel pointing at me."
"A regrettable precaution. I feared you would not hear me out first," he explained.
"Well, it seems I've little choice in the matter now."
Sir Harad smirked. "So it seems. From what I've heard
, it would appear that we have something in common."
Patrina made a rude noise before she could stop herself.
The knight raised an eyebrow and went on. "We're both looking for a man who appears to be lost in the mountains."
"Alto," she said.
"Yes."
"The last knight
who went looking for him didn't end up so well," she reminded him.
"That's why I've come to speak with you, not make an example."
Patrina stiffened. She looked at her sword again and wondered if she were to yank the blanket off the bed if she could slow her opponents long enough to reach it.
"I am a man of my word. My fellow knight was zealous and rash
. I seek only to minimize the harm that will come. I want your help in finding Alto and making him see reason."
"Reason?" Patrina spat out at him. She took a step towards him, earning a shuffling of feet from the four armed men. "He will defy you with every last breath in his body! Now more than ever. You seek to overrun his nation and mine, murdering and pillaging along the way. How can you minimize that?"
Harad opened his mouth and then closed it. He sighed. "Conviction is an admirable trait. Difficult to deal with, but no less respectable for it. I truly hoped to avoid any harm coming to any of yours because of this. Even Alto. For all the harm he has done, he fights with honor and valor, more admirable traits."
"And now he's gutting your forces and you can't find him or stop him!" Patrina said with a laugh. "He'll carve his way through your army and find your precious Sarya, then he'll gut her too!"
Harad stiffened and advanced on her until he stepped through the ring of men surrounding her. He raised his gauntleted hand to point a steel-clad finger at her. "Do not speak of such things again."
"Why? Afraid that she's not so great and powerful after all? That a man who was once a farmer can rise up and expose her as not being unstoppable?"
"Enough!" Harad shouted. He stepped forward faster than Patrina could ready herself for and grabbed her around the throat.
Patrina tried to cough from the sudden choking but only succeeded in opening her mouth so he could reach in and grab her tongue with his other hand. She swatted at him with her hands and tried to push away but his brutal holds on her prevented her from escaping.
"Bring a knife! Cut out her insolent tongue!"
One of the men
-at-arms approached with a dagger and offered it. "Sir Harad, if she can't talk, how can she call out to him?"
Harad stared at the knife and then nodded to the man. He let go of Patrina's tongue and pushed her away so that she fell with a yelp back onto her bed. He stared at her and took a few breaths to calm himself. "It seems you and your friends bring out rash behavior in the best of people," he said. He turned to the others and said, "Bind and gag her, then gather her things and bring her.
We'll take her back with us until he shows his face."
Sir Harad left the room while Patrina was bound and gagged. Struggling in vain, she was dragged out into the hall and taken
in the opposite direction of where they'd been led in. Her captors took her down some stairs and then threw a bag over her head before adding a heavy cloak. She heard a door open and then felt a cold wind picking at her clothing. She counted less than thirty paces before she was grabbed roughly and hoisted off her feet and then up and onto the back of a horse.
She cried out and screamed threats and promises but they came out as muffled groans. The horse she'd been loaded on shifted and then started forward. She grunted with each jarring step of the horse's shod hooves on the cobblestone streets. She lost track of time as the horse walked through the city until she felt a strong blast of cold wind tug at her. Less than a minute later
, the sound of the horse's hooves changed as they struck the ground. She'd left the city, that much she knew, but where she was being taken remained a mystery.
* * * *
"Saints! I didn't know I was so tired," Tristam groaned when he opened the door to his room and stepped out into the hallway. He saw Namitus standing outside Patrina's room and waiting. "Anybody else up and about?"
"We all are," Kar grumbled, stepping out of his own room. "Well, all except Patrina, it seems."
Garrick walked up from where he'd been talking to the guards. He scowled and said, "Those two said to stay put. The lady wanted privacy so we're to stay here and they'll send for someone."
"They're still standing there," Kar pointed out.
Garrick grunted. Karthor emerged from his room and looked up and down the hall, trying to figure out what was going on.
Namitus beat harder on Patrina's door.
"What's keeping her?" Tristam wondered. He walked down and stood next to the rogue before beating on the door himself. When there was no answer, he reached for the handle and found her door unlocked. He glanced at Namitus and then lifted the latch and pushed it open.
"Where'd she go?" Namitus blurted out. Her bed was made and the room looked like she'd never set foot in it.
"You make up for being short by sleeping long?" Garrick asked as Mordrim emerged from his room.
"Bah, I was up before any of you!"
the dwarf said. "You seen me in the hall earlier!"
"Must have overlooked you."
Mordrim reached for his hammer.
"Stop it! Patrina's gone," Tristam snapped.
"Where'd she go?" Mordrim asked.
"Let's ask those two," Tristam said while walking down the hall towards the guards at the end of it
. He led the procession to the end of the guest rooms. "Either of you see a woman leave this way?"
The guards looked at each other before looking back to him. "Just your
big friend, but we've only been here a couple of hours."
"The men here before didn't say anything?"
Both guards shook their heads.
"Well
, we need to find her, damn it," Tristam growled.
"We heard you was to stay here
, out of prying eyes," one of the guards said. "We can send for Master Victor if you'd like?"
"You said that to me a minute ago," Garrick said.
"You never told us whether we should do it or not," the other guard defended while staring up at Garrick.
"Well, do it!" the barbarian bellowed. Both guards recoiled and looked at each other.
"No." Tristam stopped them. "Our friend was the one desiring secrecy. We'll ask the questions ourselves."
"I don't know if you should leave. We've got our orders," the first guard ventured.
"There's two of you and five of us," Tristam pointed out. The guards looked past him with furrowed brows. To clarify the bad math, Tristam added, "Then there's Garrick—he's big enough he counts as another three men by himself. You still thinking to stop us?"
"We'll escort you," the second guard said.
Tristam smirked. "Good idea. I'd hate to get lost, what with all this rebuilding since we saved this damn city in the first place!"
The guards did a double take but neither said anything. Tristam snorted and fell in behind them as they led the way back through the palace to the office of the baron's aid
e. One of the guards reached to knock on the door but it opened before he could open it, revealing Master Victor about to emerge.
"Ho there!" Master Victor said in surprise. His eyes went to Tristam and the other Blades before he said, "What's this? I thought you were staying in the guest wing."
"One of us is missing," Tristam said. "The woman who rode in with us."
The aid
e frowned and looked to the guards. Both of them shrugged and shook their heads. "I'll have to look into this. I know nothing about it."
"Do that," Tristam said. "We'll wait here."
Victor frowned and turned to the guards. "Fetch the men posted the night before. Wake them if you must."
The guards left in search of the predecessors. Tristam and the others remained behind. Tristam went out of his way to force himself into Victor's office. He began to toy with the papers and items on Victor's desk and even adjusted a painting on the aid
e's wall. Master Victor's cheeks grew redder by the minute until the guards returned with two men who claimed to have stood the post the night before.
"You
—did you see a woman leave her room last night?" Victor blurted out when they arrived.
One guard nodded. The other said, "The serving girl, Adell, she came and went a few times. Brought food and drink in."
"That's it?"