king studied her carefully, then raised one eyebrow. “No.”
“Then I’m all yours.”
“Your majesty!” Croy objected. “I—I can’t believe that—”
But then he stopped. He couldn’t finish that thought out loud. He wasn’t a knight errant anymore. He had lost certain freedoms the moment he was recommissioned. Questioning the king’s word was one of them. “I beg your pardon, Majesty. I will be silent now.”
“That’ll be a nice change of pace,” the king told him. “Very good. Milady Balint, you’ll report to the keep. Sir Goris is the master of the armory there—tell him I want a full inventory of every trebuchet, battering ram and mantlet in our possession, and how many more of the same can be constructed in short order. Goris is a fool of parts. He knows the difference between a besagew and a rerebrace, but I’m not sure he can tell his hundreds from his thousands, so double check every number he gives you. We’ll have much to discuss later, so stay close by.”
Balint bowed low and said, “Your majesty.”
“One thing,” the king said, before dismissing her. “Sir Croy may be an idiot but all the same if he says someone’s not to be trusted he’s probably right. Serve me well and we’ll forget about your indiscretions. Betray me and I’ll send you back to the dwarven kingdom sealed up in a barrel like salt pork. Do you understand?”
Balint nodded agreeably. Then she marched out of the room with her chin up. She couldn’t resist giving an evil snicker as she walked past Croy.
“Now, this one—your name is Malden, is that right? And you’re a thief?”
“My name is Malden, your majesty,” Malden said, glancing over at Croy and Cythera. He pleaded silently with his eyes.
Yet what could Croy do? If he tried to free Malden now, he’d be breaking his promise to the king. And that was unthinkable.
“Sir Hew took you into custody this morning. Ordinarily he would have sent you to the magistrates, but he told me there was something special about your case, and of course, my time is valued so little around here that he insisted I judge you personally. Apparently you were in possession, at the time of your arrest, of one of the famous swords. The blasted Ancient Blades.”
“The one called Acidtongue, highness,” Malden confirmed.
“A rather valuable piece of iron.” The king frowned. His eye took in Malden’s cheap cloak, the lack of flesh on his bones. “Look, lad, it’s clear that you stole the blade. You’re no more a swordsman than I’m a fishwife. So I’ll give you the same choice I plan on giving every criminal and vagrant in this city. You can go back to the gaol and wait until I have time to hang you properly. Or—if you prefer—I can enlist you in my army as a foot soldier, and you can earn forgiveness through military service. Assuming you survive.”
“Begging your majesty’s pardon, I like neither of those options,” Malden said.
“No, I don’t suppose you would. But that’s what I’m offering.”
“To a guilty man, yes. But I am innocent. I did not steal the sword. It was given to me freely by its rightful owner—Sir Croy.”
Every eye in the room turned to stare at the knight.
CHAPTER TWELVE
“Is this true, Croy?” the king demanded. “Did you—in fact—make a gift of a priceless and irreplaceable, aye, a magical sword … to what is clearly a piece of gutter trash from the most base dungpit in Ness?”
Croy was still on his knees. It was not appropriate to drop prostrate before the king, but he considered it. “It is true,” he said.
The king frowned. “I was under the impression that you already had an Ancient Blade. Yes, I see it there on your belt—Ghostcutter, I believe. Hmm. The last time I saw Acidtongue, it was in the possession of Sir Bikker. Wasn’t it?”
“Sir Bikker is dead, Majesty,” Croy said. He had to swallow thickly before he could go on. “I slew him in a duel of honor. With his dying breath he gave Acidtongue to me, and bade me find another to wield it. That is the way of our order, that we each choose our successors. And I chose this man—Malden—as the next to wield Acidtongue.”
“There weren’t any better candidates available? I have a nephew, for instance, who is absolutely useless at organizing his farms, but who loves nothing better than to whack away at the quintain all day with a wooden sword. He reminds me of you quite a bit, Croy. His head’s just as full of fancies and notions of honor and chivalry.” The king sighed. “Absolutely bloody useless. You can’t give Acidtongue to him?”
Croy couldn’t just say no. One did not gainsay the king. Yet he certainly could not say yes, either. He knew the nephew in question. Like every knight in the kingdom, he was distantly related to the king himself, and the nephew was his second cousin, once or twice removed. He couldn’t remember which. The boy had always struck him as a simpleton. Then there was the fact that Croy had already given the sword to Malden. Once an Ancient Blade passed to its next wielder, it could not be taken back. The only way that could happen was if Croy decided Malden had broken his vows as an Ancient Blade. Then Croy would be required to kill Malden to secure the blade. The king might demand he do just that (and Croy would be required to comply), but even there was a problem. There had been no time for Croy to train Malden as an Ancient Blade—and thus Malden had never taken the sacred vows. He couldn’t very well be said to have broken them since he had never even heard them spoken, much less repeated them.
There had to be a way to convince the king that Croy had made the right choice. “Your majesty, Malden may be lowborn, but his heart is strong. He is a natural wonder at footwork and quickness. I believed that with a few years of proper training and a strict physical regimen, he could be made into a swordsman.”
Malden’s chains rattled. Croy looked over and saw the thief pointing at his own face. He mouthed the word, “Me?” as if he couldn’t believe it. Yet surely, when Croy had given him the sword, Malden must have understood that this was to be his destiny. Surely …
The king rose from his chair and strode briskly across the room. Going to the door, he waved one hand into the hallway. In a moment Sir Hew came in, carrying Acidtongue in its special glass-lined scabbard.
“You heard something of this?” the king asked.
“Yes, your majesty. I heard all. And I’ll swear all of it is true. I’ve never known Croy to lie, not even to save his own skin. Much less that of a street rat like this Malden. The boy is a weakling, but he’s quick on his feet as a tomcat. As for his heart, Croy would be the best judge.”
The king pulled wearily at his beard. “Fine, fine, give the boy his sword. Unchain him. Then the three of you go stand against that wall. If I’m to be beset by three Ancient Blades at once, at least they can make themselves useful.”
It was done quickly. When they were against the wall, Croy and Hew grasped forearms with great fondness. It had been a long time since they’d seen each other. “You wear the king’s crown on your chest,” Croy said, looking down at Hew’s tabard. “I am so glad to see you, old friend—yet not a little surprised!”
Hew shrugged. “After we were disbanded I tried being a knight
