Castle & Key

  Castle & Key

  A Two Monarchies Novel

  W.R. Gingell

  Copyright © 2022 by W.R. Gingell

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Cover by Seedlings Design Studio

  Created with Vellum

  In the Two Monarchies Sequence

  #1: Spindle

  #2: Blackfoot

  #3: Staff and Crown

  #4: Clockwork Magician

  #5: Masque

  #6: Castle and Key

  Wolfskin

  For everyone still caught in the little box they came in, desperately trying to escape.

  Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Acknowledgments

  Prologue

  “Well now, this may be my fault,” said Susan.

  Five horselords turned varied looks of gloom, incredulity, and annoyance on her. An elite force in the kingdom of Glause’s mounted army, they were familiar with war, skirmish, and the odd bandit attack. They were also by now quite familiar with the vagaries of their New Civetan attaché, Susan Farrah, by whose aid they had gotten into—and often out of—a greater number of sticky situations than they might otherwise have encountered.

  Overwhelmingly superior numbers and a breakdown of diplomatic processes had seen to their present position today. Miryum, her short-spear and buckler tossed carelessly atop the other confiscated weapons, had been tied in an uncomfortable curve. Her wrists were lashed tightly behind her, and a short length of rope connected her bound ankles to her bound wrists, a testament to her fighting prowess while tied the first time. Katrina and Curran were bound back-to-back and far too tightly to breathe with any comfort, and Brennan had been wrapped in a coil of rope as long as it was strong. Emmett, bound with a similar spiral of rope, had the additional discomfort of being strung by his ankles to the main support pole of the conical tent. He was looking slightly flushed, but as taciturn as ever.

  Miryum asked, “What on earth did you do to these people, Susan?”

  “It’s more what I wouldn’t do, actually. When we met, the chieftain decided that I’d make him a wonderful wife—he’s been trying to convince me of as much every time we meet. I thought he’d have gotten over it by now.”

  “Got news for you,” said Brennan. “He hasn’t.”

  “No, he’s pretty determined, isn’t he? The first time, he only posted guards on the tent.”

  “The first time?” said Katrina, rather breathlessly.

  Curran said, “Sit still, my darling: your exertions are making me light-headed.”

  “Well, yes,” explained Susan. “He does this quite a lot; he’s under the impression that my escaping is maidenly coyness. I must say, he does seem to have learned from our encounters, though.”

  “Not enough,” said Emmett, flexing his shoulders. Susan hadn’t seen him wriggling, but he’d managed to loosen the spiral of rope that sausaged him, and it uncurled in slow, lazy coils as he flexed. Her own bindings were quickly loosening due to a small knife that she’d pinched from the chieftain.

  “If he had any sense, he would’ve spelled the ropes as well,” agreed Brennan. “Go around kissing stray chieftains who want to marry you, do you?”

  “Of course!” said Susan cheerfully, wriggling her shoulders free. “How else was I supposed to get his knife? Besides, he’s a good kisser.”

  “We noticed,” said Miryum dryly.

  Emmett made an unimpressed sort of grunt as he curled up to unhook his feet and dropped lightly into the dirt. He silently approached Susan as she delicately flicked her stolen knife at the knots that bound her ankles, and she let him take the knife, watching without flinching as he wrenched it through rope a mere hairsbreadth from her skin.

  “A bit raw, but nothing too bad,” she said, observing her bare ankles. There was quite a bit of her bare at the moment: the chieftain was a firm believer in the traditional wedding garb of his people. That meant that Susan had been dressed in silky blue pantaloons that were distressingly thin and buttoned only just below her knees, leaving her calves quite bare. The bodice of the ensemble was scarcely better: her stomach was covered, true, but the neckline scooped low and wide, and her arms had also been left bare. Silky blue ribbons fluttered from her shoulders and tickled her calves when she walked, the exact colour of the desert sky if they could have seen it above them.

  Emmett batted the ribbons away and lifted one of her feet for inspection.

  “They’re fine, lummox,” said Susan.

  He ignored her, but after running a thumb over the slight damage, he seemed to come to the same conclusion and released her. Susan grinned and resisted saying ‘I told you, didn’t I?’ because she was well aware that she would have done the same for him regardless of assurances.

  “We’re fine too,” said Brennan. “Thanks for asking. Just peachy.”

  Susan said amiably, “Oh, shut up,” and untied him, which kindness he repaid by wriggling his eyebrows at her wedding garb.

  “Very nice, Su!”

  Emmett gave him a casual backhand in passing, with the immediate effect of laying him out in the dirt again, and went on to untie Miryum. Susan smirked and untied Curran and Katrina, and by the time everyone had gathered together in the centre of the tent, Brennan was also once more on his feet.

  To Susan’s amusement, Miryum and Emmett exchanged glances—one of their coded communications that always made them seem as though they shared a single brain—and then Miryum translated for the others.

  “Do you want to try and sneak out, or hit hard and run fast? We could probably get out if we hit hard and run fast, but it won’t do much for our diplomatic relations; the king will understand, but if we kill anyone—”

  “I’m all for sneaking,” said Susan, bright and sanguine.

  She knew the chieftain rather better than any of her companions did, and if the group could only sneak away without anyone noticing for long enough, everything would come out exactly as it was meant to. As a matter of fact, Susan had counted on that when she brought the horselords to meet with this particular Lacunan chieftain on a mission from the Glausian King. She was quite sure that the king had also counted on it.

  “Oh, sneaking without a doubt!” agreed Curran, and Katrina nodded.

  Susan had seen the glance that passed between him and Katrina while Miryum spoke, but unlike Emmett and Miryum’s unspoken communications, their secret language was opaque to her.

  “Sneaking it is, then,” said Miryum.

  “What about the agreements?” Emmett asked briefly. “Won’t they try to destroy them?”

  “We’ll have to pinch them, of course,” Susan said. “And I’d like to see them try to destroy a sheaf of twenty double-spelled spellpapers in a single night!”

  “No need for all of that,” Brennan said. “And I’m not being shoved under a tent again, so—”

  “You’re the slenderest,” pointed out Susan.

  Miryum looked up from checking her weapons. “Don’t complain, Brennan; if you don’t want to be pushed through windows and holes in tents, you should eat a bit more.”


  “I’m naturally slender, you overgrown set of beanpoles!”

  “My friend,” said Curran, putting a hand on his shoulder, “resign yourself to being hefted through or under any necessary obstacles, and put on a happy smile!”

  “I won’t, you know,” Brennan said.

  Susan looked at him suspiciously. “What do you know that we don’t know?”

  Brennan flourished a set of papers at her. “Already got them,” he said. “Figured it was a good idea if something went wrong. Knew that if we were working with you, something was bound to go wrong.”

  “How appallingly rude!” said Susan, grinning. “You know things only go wrong when I mean them to go wrong!”

  Brennan eyed her gloomily. “Yes. Knew that too. It’s why I pinched the perishing things!”

  “Aren’t we all working well together these days!” Susan said. “Won’t the king be pleased! All right, if someone’s got a good bit of muffle magic, I can make sure anyone who looks at us thinks we’re just the breeze passing through camp and flapping the canvas.”

  “Be the first time any of you lot were mistaken for a zephyr,” remarked Brennan, and expertly dodged two swings and one attempted kick. “Careful! You’ll make me drop the papers, you perishing long-shanks.”

  “I’ll muffle our steps,” said Emmett, his eyes amused. “Weave your spell, stripling.”

  * * *

  They found their horses waiting patiently exactly where they’d left them, half a day and a few decent struggles ago.

  Susan, who had somehow never had her own horse and hadn’t thought to ask for one in this case either, as usual travelled along pillion behind Emmett. She had asked for a horse the first time she went out with the horselords, of course: no horse had shown up for one reason or another, and Susan had scrambled up behind Emmett on his huge, grey horse with a cheerful, “Coming up, lummox!” at him.

  Emmett had gone quite still, which made her think at first that she’d done something wrong, but the other horselords had only grinned and set off at a sprawling sort of jog-trot that settled into a more cohesive canter while Susan clapped Emmett on the shoulder and asked, “Are we stopping or going?”

  “Going,” he had said briefly, and urged his big, dappled grey after the other horselords.

  After that, there hadn’t ever been a question of Susan getting her own horse. It was taken for granted that her place was behind Emmett, and since she was more than happy to have her hands free while lacking the horsemanship to ride thus by herself, everyone was content. It was also pleasant to be able to rest her head against Emmett’s broad back and yawn at the swiftly closing day around them as they moved steadily through the desert.

  “I suppose we’ll have to hustle home?” asked Miryum, when the patchy bushes began to show more often between stretches of red sand and the air itself began to feel less scorching. The horses, finding more solid ground, had begun to move more quickly despite the heat. “We can leave the horses to rest and feed in the closest town once we’re back on solid ground, but—”

  “Oh no!” said Suzan breezily. She was quite well aware of how close they were to safety. “No need to leave the horses! We’re nearly on the border, and he won’t come after us once we’re past that: fair is fair, and I’ve gotten away again. He’ll just refuse to treat with anyone but me—and he’ll be better prepared next time.”

  Emmett’s voice sounded for the first time since they’d set out. “He’ll have to treat with someone else next time.”

  Susan said comfortingly, “No need for that, lummox: I’m not worried about having to marry any time soon. I’m quite sure the chieftain would regret it intensely if he did manage to marry me, and I have other ideas about marriage anyway.”

  “Marry anyone you want,” said Brennan, squinting toward the reaching shadows of the approaching treeline in the last light of the highest sun. “Poor fellow! Point is, none of us like being tied up like sausages, so if you want to do this sort of lark, I’d rather you did it alone.”

  “A lie if ever I heard it,” Curran said lightly. “None of us would let you do this alone, Su.”

  “Well, no,” Brennan admitted. “But she ought to think of the rest of us.”

  “That’s fair,” said Susan. “Sorry, Brenners. I’ll buy you an ice in the closest town, all right? And we’ll talk to the king about all of this when we get back.”

  “Lights ahead,” said Emmett, his back humming against Susan’s cheek as she yawned.

  She stretched to look around him and caught sight of a faint glow of colour toward the horizon. “How nice!” she said. “We can have a bath and something good to eat.”

  “Just in time,” said Miryum. “I don’t want to push the horses too much further.”

  “Especially not Emmett’s horse,” muttered Brennan.

  “Anything nearer by? Or even a little further off?” enquired Curran. “I’ve a feeling that those lights are from a town by the name of Way Back Wells.”

  “Odd name,” Brennan said suspiciously.

  “A suspicious place, or so I’ve heard,” said Curran lightly. “Just quietly, word is to stay away from the town—there are no explanations as to why.”

  “I vote to stay away,” Brennan said. “Awful places, towns. Nasty little secrets lying around and popping up when you least expect ’em. People expecting you to eat potatoes.”

  Miryum and Emmett exchanged a glance and seemed to come to a silent agreement, which Miryum spoke. “The horses need rest and a rub-down, and we need food—and there’s nothing else on the map for another half-day’s journey in any direction. We’ll stay for the night and keep going as soon as we breakfast.”

  “As you wish,” said Curran mildly. “But if I’m murdered, I’ll haunt you.”

  “I thought you were going to haunt me for the rest of my life,” Katrina said, shooting him a meditative look.

  “My love, undoubtedly you’ll be slain attempting to save my wretched life; we’ll haunt Miryum together.”

  “And if it makes you feel better, I doubt that you’ll be made to eat potatoes,” added Susan. “If I’m not wrong, the main food group around these parts is sheep, followed by beef. Probably not even a sniff of a potato. It’s all the volcanic soil as soon as you get away from the desert—grass everywhere.”

  “There are always potatoes,” Brennan said gloomily. “And if I get bitten by a small dog, I’m disowning the lot of you.”

  One

  From the size of the town as they rode in—a reasonably sprawling and well-built town in the midst of a fertile valley that sat on the red, volcanic soil Susan had mentioned earlier—Susan had expected less staring. She was clothed in her normal tunic and riding breeches again by now, so her appearance shouldn’t have been contributing to the staring, at least.

  “Lambs to the slaughter, or amusement second only to the fair passing through?” wondered Brennan, with no lessening of gloom. “Never seen so many noses in m’life.”

  There were a lot of noses poking through curtains, thought Susan in amusement. She was shielded from the full extent of the staring by Emmett’s immensely broad back, but she caught sight of enough shifting fabric, outright jaw-drops, and double-takes to be aware that whatever else this town was used to, it was not visitors.

  She felt Emmett shift slightly in the saddle and said quietly in his ear, “Regretting it, lummox? Should we keep going?”

  After a few moments of silent deliberation, he said, “No. We’ll stay one night.”

  “That’s the spirit!” Susan said bracingly. “What can happen in one night, after all?”

  “Inn ahead!” called Curran gaily. “How delightful to know that dinner and beer are only a half-hour away!”

  Much to their surprise, however, the innkeeper greeted them at the door with folded arms, an impassive face, and the news that there was no room for them.

  “How appallingly unfortunate!” said Susan, letting her gaze linger on the windows, through which she could see the entirel
y empty taproom—and then the stables, which were likewise empty. “I suppose this is your busy time of year.”

  The innkeeper went very faintly red about the ears, but said stoutly, “Very busy. I doubt you’ll find a room in the town.”

  “A bustling metropolis, in fact,” said Curran, nodding.

  “There’ll be a procession passing through tonight; there’s no room for visitors.”

  “We’ll try further on,” Miryum said shortly, but Susan was quite sure she didn’t miss the raised brow of the innkeeper that seemed to say, Aye, and we’ll see about that.

  As they walked the horses sedately down the street, Curran said softly, “It’s an odd procession that leaves an inn empty by passing through.”

  “Told you,” said Brennan gloomily. “Secrets. Never stop in little towns.”

  “There’s another inn further down,” Katrina said. “Don’t get too comfortable in your glooms just yet, Brennan!”

  But the next inn, silent and sullen in the street with its lack of guests, also refused them. The only other two inns within fifteen minutes’ walk also turned them away—the second innkeeper going so far as to peek at them from between his curtains without venturing out or even answering their calls. By the time Katrina and Curran had gone ahead to scout out any other possible places to stay in the deepening night, it was beginning to look as though they would have to sleep in the streets.

  “At least we’ll have a good view of the procession,” said Susan, with a soupçon of cheerful sarcasm. “And you’re nice and warm to curl up against, lummox. Otherwise, I’d freeze my bones this close to the desert.”