The Charnel Prince - J. Gregory Keyes [131]
“Austra—”
“I’m tired now.”
Austra rolled over so her back was to Anne.
Anne watched, helpless, her eyes wet. How could she tell Austra about her visions? How could she burden her best friend with trying to decide whether Anne had gone mad, or whether she was so important to the world that if she did not become queen it would end? How could she tell anyone about the man in the woods?
She didn’t believe it herself, after the visions had faded.
Anyway, it would make breaking her promise harder to do, and Austra would try to come with her. She hadn’t lied just now when she told Austra that she’d been right about running away the first time. But things were different now. Now Austra had Cazio to protect her. This time she wasn’t running from her duty, she was running toward it, and if the Faiths were so insistent that she must be queen, they could bloody well protect her until she was.
She wouldn’t have her friends dying for her anymore.
Because Austra was right. They wouldn’t stop. They would never stop. And though it would hurt Austra when she left again, Austra would live, and she would be protected.
Resolved to that, she went back up abovedecks to see whom else she had killed, and to find out whether any of them would live through the night.
She found the ship still following, and getting closer. As night fell, clouds rolled in, and the dark that followed was complete. Malconio put the ship through a series of turns as the wind quickened. There was no cheering now, because the only thing their enemies might have to follow was sound.
Anne returned to her cabin to try and sleep, but was awakened a few bells later by an explosion. Throwing on her dressing gown, she ran back up on the deck, fearing the ship had somehow found them.
But the ship hadn’t found them—a storm had.
CHAPTER TEN
CANALS
LEOFF AWOKE TO A splitting headache and a small voice in his ear.
“Get up sir,” it said. “Please don’t be dead.”
The voice was nearly drowned out by a background cacophony of shouting and stamping feet. With an effort, Leoff opened his eyes. At first he saw only a blur, which, as it sharpened, became Mery’s small face.
“What’s happening?” he groaned.
“You aren’t dead!” she exclaimed.
“No,” he agreed, “though I might be soon.” He felt the side of his head, and his fingers came away sticky with blood. That didn’t seem like a good sign.
“Hurry,” Mery urged, “before the soldiers get here.” He realized she was tugging at his hand.
He tried to rise, but a wave of dizziness went through him.
“No, don’t stand up,” she said. “Just follow me.”
He crawled on hands and knees, following Mery through the pandemonium. He figured that he must have been unconscious for only a few seconds.
Mery vanished behind a tapestry and he followed, wondering what he was doing and why.
When he got behind the tapestry, he saw the blue fringe of Mery’s dress as it vanished through a narrow slit in the wall. The slit went for about a kingsyard and then opened into a larger, torch-lit corridor.
“Wait,” Mery cautioned, waving him back. “Not yet.”
He waited, his head feeling huge, swollen with pain.
“Now, quickly.”
She stood and darted across the hall, to an open doorway there. He followed, making it somewhat shakily to his feet, and saw, down the hall, several men in the king’s colors standing in front of a much larger door, brandishing swords and spears at those in the ballroom. They seemed far to busy to notice him.
“Good,” Mery said. “I don’t think they saw us.”
“What’s happening?”
“I don’t know,” she said. “Come on.”
His head felt a little better, but he sincerely hoped Mery knew what she was doing, because after a few moments in the darkened maze of the manse he knew he would never find his way back. Mery never hesitated, however, taking turn after turn, leading him through huge rooms and tiny compartments. It was as if the entire building were a sort of magic chest, with ever smaller and cleverer boxes nested within. The din of the ballroom was well behind them.
He concluded by touch that the cut on his head wasn