A March of Kings - By Morgan Rice Page 0,46

gain it in death.

Gareth sat there, rubbing his head, trying to think, trying to get to the bottom of something. Something weighed on the dark corners of his consciousness, some message, persistently nagging at him. It was an image; maybe a memory. But he could not recall precisely of what. He knew, though, that it was important.

As he sat there, racking his brain, drying to drown out the laughter of the others, suddenly, it came to him. The other day. In the forest. He had spotted Gareth. With Firth. The two of them, walking. He remembered thinking at the time that it was strange. And he remembered that they had no answer for where they were going, or where they had been.

He suddenly sat upright, electrified. He turned to Akorth.

“Do you remember the other day, in the wood? My brother, Gareth?”

Akorth furrowed his brow, clearly trying to summon it through his drunken haze.

“I remember seeing him walking with that lover boy of his!” Akorth mocked.

“Hand-in-hand, I suspect!” Fulton chimed in, then burst into laughter.

Godfrey tried to concentrate, in no mood for their jokes.

“But do you recall where they were coming from?”

“Where?” Akorth asked, perplexed.

“You asked them, and they didn’t tell you,” Fulton said.

An idea was solidifying in Godfrey’s brain.

“Odd, isn’t it? The two of them walking there, in the middle of nowhere? Do you remember what he was wearing? A cloak and a hood on a hot summer day? Walking so fast, as if he was heading somewhere? Or coming from somewhere?”

Godfrey was convincing himself as he spoke.

Akorth looked at him, puzzled.

“What is it you’re trying to put together?” he asked. “Because if you’re asking me to figure it out, you’ve come to the wrong man, my friend. I would just tell you that if you want to get to the bottom of something, drink another ale!” he shouted, and roared with laughter.

But Godfrey was serious. He was focused. This time, he would not be distracted.

“I think he was going somewhere,” Godfrey added, thinking out loud. “I think they were both going somewhere. And I think it was with ill intent.”

He turned and stared at his two friends.

“And I think it has something to do with my father’s death.”

Akorth and Fulton finally stopped and looked at him, the smiles dropping from their faces.

“That’s quite a leap,” Akorth said.

“Are you accusing your brother and his lover of killing the King?” Fulton asked.

The bartender stopped in his tracks and stared, too.

Godfrey sat there, working it out, his mind reeling, feeling electrified, feeling a sense of purpose, of mission. It was a feeling he wasn’t used to.

“That is exactly what I’m saying,” he finally responded.

“That’s dangerous talk,” the bartender warned. “Your brother is king now. Someone hears you say that, you can go to the clink.”

“My father is King,” Godfrey corrected, steel in his voice, feeling himself overcome with a new strength. “My brother Gareth just had a crown put on his head. He is not a king. He is a prince, just like I. And a failed one at that.”

The bartender slowly shook his head and looked away.

“Where were they going? What is out there, in that wood?” Godfrey asked Akorth with a sudden urgency, grasping his wrist.

“Calm down, my good man, there’s no need to get upset—”

“I said, what is out there?” Godfrey demanded, shouting.

Akorth stared back at him with a look he had never seen before. One of shock. And maybe, even, of respect.

“What’s gotten into you? I don’t have answers for you. I have no idea.”

“Wait a minute, there is something out there,” Fulton said.

Godfrey turned and looked at him.

“Not there, exactly. But near there. Blackwood. A few miles away. There are rumors of a witch’s cottage.”

“A witch’s cottage?” Godfrey repeated, slowly. The thought of it hit him like a spear.

“Yes. So the rumor goes. Do you think that’s where they were going?”

Godfrey stumbled up from his barstool, knocking it over, and hurried across the room. His two friends jumped up, too, hurrying after him.

“Where are you going?” Akorth called out. “Have you lost your mind?”

Godfrey yanked open the door, the harsh morning light hitting his face, making him feel alive for the first time in he did not know how long. He stopped and turned and looked inside the ale house one final time.

“I’m going to find my father’s murderer.”

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

Steffen cowered beneath the whip of his master, bending over and bracing himself as he was lashed across the back yet again. He braced his hands over the