Prologue

PROLOGUE

ROLAND

The hostile glares of the rest of the regents' council greeted Roland as he entered.

They were all here waiting for him then. Of course they were.

Three senior regents and three minor – that was how it worked. Three to govern in the queen's absence and three to advise. In theory anyway.

Two of the minor members were constantly changing depending on the whims of the other regents – Ylena, and Sassone. Urdel had been Ylena's favourite for some time now, while Leyborne was a newcomer, the earl's man to the core.

Regent was a role Roland had never asked for. Rather it had been thrust on him as Grandmaster in the chaos following the war. He didn't believe in using a role on the council as a reward. His representative here, Yvain of Goalais, sat still and silent, as watchful as Roland himself, his right-hand and trusted compatriot ever since Dain had died in battle.

Lady Ylena's expression was unreadable. She'd seemed so relieved to see Elodie return to Pelias that Roland felt sure it was real. People had been cheering in the streets, laughing and crying. They had been throwing flowers, for the love of the light. Ylena herself had embraced Elodie like a long-lost child.

The coldness in her now was something else, something that belied the performance she'd put on in the courtyard that day. Her white hair was elaborately dressed and she wore a chain of office from the royal treasury. Sister to the former queen, aunt to the current one, her life had been a study of power, living one step away from the throne, until Elodie had vanished.

Roland wondered if she intended to take that step back now. It didn't look like it.

And as for the Earl of Sassone…

Foremost noble of the kingdom, and descended of men who would have been kings in their own right had the Aurum not chosen Elodie's family instead. The line of Tarryn threaded itself around the royal family like a vine, always there, defending the city in the same way the Knights of the Aurum defended the crown and the kingdom. If the crown held the kingdom of Asteroth then the earls of Sassone held Pelias. Some said it was balance, some said a threat.

The current earl was Anselm's father but that mattered little. Roland had been more of a father to the young knight over the years. Thickset and heavy, with shoulders of corded muscle, and a bald head, Sassone resented everything about Roland. That much had been clear for many years now.

‘Your report, Grandmaster,' Ylena said.

He pushed aside his thoughts. ‘The girl, Wren, was discovered by Finnian Ward and rescued from an Ilanthian incursion force.' A force led by the crown prince Leander, who had been intent on killing his half-brother. A detail he didn't bother going into for now. They had been turned back, Leander fleeing with his tail between his legs.

‘The queen had been in hiding with Wren in Cellandre, a remote area seldom visited.' No need to say how she had been earning her living. The outrage that would cause wasn't worth it. A lowly hedge witch, indeed. ‘Queen Aeryn deigned to return with us.'

‘ Deigned ,' Sassone interrupted, his tone scathing.

He had a point. Elodie hadn't spoken to Roland since they'd left Knightsford. She probably never would again. They had once loved each other far more than was wise. But she had fled the city when she defeated the Nox, leaving them all to war and destruction, and unbeknownst to him taking with her their child.

Wren was a miracle, one he had never thought to experience. He really did not know what to do about her.

He pushed on, not wanting to mention his daughter again right now.

‘The queen is with the Maidens of the Aurum, under their care until such time as we decide?—'

‘Until her trial and conviction,' Sassone cut in again. ‘Let's not beat about the bush. She deserted us in our time of need, flung her people to the Ilanthian wolves and forsook her vows before the Aurum. The flames are too good for her.'

A brittle silence met this outburst.

Roland glared at him, but what could he say in response? Sassone wasn't exactly wrong. The charges would have to be answered. Lesser transgressions had seen monarchs judged guilty by the Aurum and given to the fire.

The thought of it though, of Elodie, his Elodie, burning…

He forced himself to uncurl his clenched fists. She wasn't his Elodie anymore, hadn't been for years. But she was his queen.

‘Perhaps she had good reason,' said Ylena softly. ‘It will be decided. There will be a trial. A fair trial.' She turned her icy gaze from Sassone back to Roland until both of them subsided. ‘And she brings with us her heir. That is something to be celebrated. I hear the girl raised a beacon and touched the Aurum. She is powerful. Perhaps even more powerful than Aeryn.'

The girl. It made her sound like an infant, not a grown woman in her own right. And yet Roland couldn't help thinking of Wren as a girl himself, which wasn't fair. She had summoned the light of Aurum into the knights, giving them strength and speed unmatched in years. She had channelled the Aurum and saved Finn's life with its power. There was more than that though, something which had bound the two of them together, a love so powerful that it couldn't be natural. Roland had raised Finn as his own son. He couldn't bear the thought of the same kind of enchantment that had claimed Roland, ensnaring his ward too.

He had saved Finn from the dark fate the Ilanthians had for him. He wasn't going to just hand him over to another form of magic.

‘Indeed, Princess Wren is a talented witch in her own right,' he found himself saying, in tones far calmer than he'd expected. Someone whispered something. Someone else laughed under their breath, hurriedly silencing themselves.

Oh, let them gossip. They knew nothing. Better they talked about him as a gullible fool than Wren as a…a what? A by-blow? His child born out of wedlock to another man's wife? The witch-queen's bastard?

Yvain cleared his throat. ‘I have no doubt many of us there in Knightsford owe her our lives. Certainly our victory.'

Yvain had been the commander of the Knightsford garrison when the shadow kin had attacked. He had fought at Roland's side, his brother-in-arms, and every inch the Paladin Roland was. He knew better than most how many lives had been saved that day due to Wren's raising of the Aurum's light in their blood.

Not least Finn's life. And as a prince of Ilanthus, even one held hostage and raised in Asteroth, Finn's death would have caused a war. Did no one else see that?

Ylena smiled. ‘Then there is hope no matter what. The trial date will be set and all traditions followed.'

Lord Leyborne cleared his throat nervously. He was Sassone's man to the core. ‘ All of them, my lady regent?'

Ylena didn't flinch. ‘Of course,' she snapped. ‘We are not so far fallen that we will not follow our most sacred traditions. Delegations will be invited, our neighbours will see that our law applies fairly to all?—'

‘You're going to invite the Ilanthians?' Roland asked, unable to stop himself blurting it out in his surprise.

Ylena's face didn't change but her eyes hardened. ‘That is what is expected and that is what we will do. No exceptions. Not even for Queen Aeryn.'

‘How can we—' Sassone thundered and for once Roland agreed with him.

‘Enough!' Ylena slammed her hand down on the table. ‘This is how it is done, my lords, and this is what we will do. It is written. If you will try a queen and a Chosen of the Aurum, it must be seen to be fair. There are steps that must be taken and witnesses who must be here. None of them will come anyway. Why would they? Except perhaps to gloat. It doesn't matter. What we are talking about is the gravest of situations and I will have this done correctly. Now, are there any more complaints?'

No one said a word. No one wanted to cross her. The anger in her voice was unprecedented. The bravest among them held their tongues.

Elodie had betrayed her too, Roland thought. She had loved the queen as her own daughter, perhaps even more than her own daughter, truth be told. She had helped negotiate Elodie's marriage to Evander which had ended in such disaster.

How was Elodie even to hope to have a fair trial here in Pelias? How was Wren to hope to have any kind of life?

Elodie had begged him to let them go back to the forest, her and Wren, to forget he had ever found them. He should have listened.