Warrior's Ransom (The First Argentines #2) - Jeff Wheeler Page 0,113
still not wearing any armor. Ransom was surprised to see him. He’d expected the king would ride up to the castle.
“My lord,” Ransom said in concern.
The king gripped Ransom by the shoulders, his big hands grasping the dented armor. “You fought like ten men out there,” he said, beaming with pride. “I’m agog at what I saw. You are Fountain-blessed. I’ve no doubt on that any longer.”
“I did my best,” Ransom said. “The smoke will hold them back for a while, but we need to guard all the gates.”
The king shook his head. “This is the strongest one. The others will fall, and we can’t defend them all at the same time.”
Ransom’s stomach shriveled. “What do we do?”
The king shook his head. “I didn’t think they’d get past the river so quickly. You saw what happened. We must abandon Dunmanis. There might be a way into the castle we don’t know about. I don’t trust that it’s safe.” The king grunted, his face blanching with pain. “My guts are flaming again. If they lay siege, I will die in this place.” His eyes burned fiercely. “And I do not want to die here. I’m taking my son and riding out of here. You’re coming too.”
Ransom lowered his head. He wanted to argue, but there was logic in the king’s strategy. If they went to the castle, they’d be trapped inside. At that point, it would only be a matter of time and suffering.
“You were right,” the king said, hooking his hand around Ransom’s neck. “You were right about the armor. I should have listened to you. This pain has made my mind a fog. I don’t have the strength to flee all the way to Kingfountain.”
“Let’s go to Glosstyr,” Ransom said. “We can take a ship from there.”
The king’s expression turned dark, brooding. “I hate this,” he said. “Everything I’ve built is crumbling. It’s slipping through my fingers.”
Ransom suppressed a coughing fit, his throat sore and rough from all the smoke. “I understand what that feels like, my lord.”
The king pursed his lips, eyeing Ransom with a look of wisdom. “Defeat is worse than poison. I’d forgotten its bitter taste. Let’s round up those who are still loyal outside the castle. We must go while we still can.”
The king mounted his horse, and Ransom lifted himself into Chauvigny’s saddle. His mesnie gathered around him, even Dawson, who had returned after hearing about the fight raging in town. Guivret looked particularly worried.
“We ride with the king,” he told his men.
“What about the gate?” Dearley asked.
Ransom shook his head. “Leave it.”
As they rode up the street, Ransom took in the disorder and chaos. People were dragging things from their homes and shops, frantic to save their possessions. Smoke filled the air.
The king gazed at the wretched conditions, his expression bleak. “The fire spread within the gates,” he said to no one in particular. “There will be nothing left here by morning. Everything I touch bursts into flames.”
Truth is rarely pure and never simple. There was a commotion at one of the city gates last night. A group of merchants who were feeling the pinch of confinement, which spoiled the cabbages in their carts, thought to break through the gate and flee Kingfountain. There were enough to make a mob, but it was quickly quelled by the night watch. They care not who rules them. Their only wish is for the gates to be open. Nothing will drive a man madder than uncertainty.
—Claire de Murrow, Duchess of Glosstyr
(on the consequence of spoiling cabbages)
CHAPTER THIRTY
The Fate of Choice
There was so much smoke in the air that the sun looked like a shield of pale bone in the haze. Flames scoured the city relentlessly, and the townsfolk were drawing buckets from the wells to douse the houses and shops that had not been burned yet, to prevent them from being lost to the fire. Dunmanis would be left desolate.
Ransom sat astride his new destrier, the one taken from Chauvigny, holding a fresh lance in one hand and the horse’s reins in the other. The Elder King coughed into his fist, his lungs plagued by the smoke. His son Jon-Landon sat astride his own horse, his expression that of a greensick lad. A few other nobles had gathered with them at the rear gates of the city.
Dearley suddenly appeared through the gloom, his face blackened with smudges from where he’d rubbed his face. When he reached them, he shook his head.