Lessons in Etiquette (Schooled in Magic series) (10 page)

“So,” she said. “What happened?”

Alassa’s smile widened. “He had a son, Prince Alexis,” she said. “The prince
loved
playing with his toy soldiers, so much so that his father gave him a whole regiment of
real
soldiers to lead out on pretend manoeuvres. No one seemed to realize that the prince had watched his father’s humiliation and sworn to avenge it, or that he would have the patience to build up an army bit by bit. When he took the throne, the nobles discovered that King Alexis III had a much larger force than any of them–and intended to use it. The three most troublesome noble families were completely exterminated by the King’s forces.”

Emily checked the next few pages in the book. They told the same story, although they also included editorials that claimed that the three exterminated families had deserved to be wiped out to the last man, woman and child. The writer didn’t seem to be bothered by the fact that he’d hinted, earlier, that nothing much had happened during Bryon’s reign, leaving the sudden civil war and slaughter a surprising change. Someone who read it without any other knowledge might conclude that the whole problem had appeared in the early months of King Alexis III’s reign.

“I see,” she said, finally. Reading between the lines, it looked as though there was much more to the story than the writer decided to tell his readers. “And since then…?”

Alassa looked down at her hands. “My father has been trying to keep the barons in check,” she admitted. “I… I may not have been very helpful.”

That
, Emily knew, was one hell of an understatement. Even before Void had passed on his warning, she’d deduced that someone had been working to cripple Alassa’s future. If she’d taken the throne before she’d met Emily, she might not have noticed that her power was being eroded away until it was far too late. The nobles might determine who she married, who became king…

…But it would be harder than that, wouldn’t it? Whoever married Alassa would share her power, in custom if not in law. And if one of the nobles got into that position, he would leave his former allies behind. No, they’d be much more likely to choose a non-entity for the position, someone who posed no threat to them. They wouldn’t want someone from another kingdom, who might bring allies–and armies–to assist his wife.

You don’t know enough
, Emily reminded herself, as she put the book to one side.
Figure out the rest first and then make your judgements
.

“Nightingale is a bit of a crawler,” she said, out loud. “Why do
you
tolerate him?”

“I didn’t select him,” Alassa reminded her. “The post he holds is passed down through his family. It would be difficult to get rid of him unless he was caught committing treason.”

Emily rolled her eyes. Who would have thought that absolute monarchy would be so difficult?

But there was no such thing as an absolute monarchy. Even the worst dictators on Earth had been at the top of a pyramid of allies and people who benefited from their rule. Those who failed to manage their inner circle properly tended to run into trouble. And Kings and queens throughout history had faced the same problem. Charles I of England had tried to rule his country personally. Even with–in theory–absolute power the result had been a slow slide to disaster. Louis of France hadn’t been able to reduce the vast expenditure on the French Court before it had been too late. Those who had won rights–like Nightingale–were jealous of them, protecting them with all the force at their command.

“Maybe you need to give him the task of keeping the privies,” Emily said. “Can you swap his position for the other one?”

“The Keeper of the Royal Privies has been passed down from person to person ever since King Alexis I took the throne,” Alassa pointed out. “It couldn’t be simply given to someone else.”

“Particularly as the person holding the title doesn’t have to actually do anything,” Emily guessed. At least Nightingale seemed to do something useful, even if it
was
just assigning the maids and other servants to Alassa’s bedchamber. The Keeper of the Royal Privies presumably didn’t actually clean them himself. He might have been more willing to surrender the title if he actually had to do the work. “I think you need a cull.”

“My father thinks the same,” Alassa admitted. “It’s making it happen that is the difficult part.”

Emily leaned over and peered out of the window, watching as the farmland slowly turned into forest. She had memorized a couple of maps, but mapmaking wasn’t very detailed in her new world, apart from a handful she’d seen in Martial Magic. One of the books Sergeant Miles had ordered the class to read had detailed problems with basic maps, including the mapmakers leaving off little details like contour lines and hidden sinkholes. According to the book, at least one military operation had gone badly wrong because the pass shown on the map simply didn’t exist.

“We’ll go hunting in the royal woods,” Alassa promised. “You’ve never hunted before?”

Emily shook her head. Hunting wasn’t common where she lived–and besides, she saw little point in chasing harmless creatures with a gun. Jade had talked about his father hunting monsters that had come over the mountains from the Blighted Lands, but those creatures posed a clear and present danger to the civilian population. Rabbits and foxes and whatever else Alassa’s family might hunt weren’t
that
dangerous.

“You’ll love it,” Alassa assured her. “Besides, you learned how to ride really quickly.”

Emily nodded, ruefully. Alassa had insisted on teaching her–and Imaiqah–how to ride, at least partly to get others who could ride out with her, now that her cronies had all been scared away. Emily hadn’t enjoyed the first few rides, but once she’d mastered the trick of controlling the horse she’d found herself enjoying it. And she’d watched in amazement as Alassa had taken care of her own horse. Clearly, Alassa had managed to learn more than Emily had ever realized, even when she’d been a spoilt brat.

“Just you wait until you meet Lady Cecelia,” Alassa added. “She is completely horse-mad. Lives on her own, refuses to marry…spends all of her time in the saddle or in the stable. Even my father doesn’t get as much respect from her as she gives to her horses. She was the one who gave me my first pony.”

She looked down for a long moment. “I wasn’t properly grateful,” she admitted. “She swore never to allow me to buy one of her horses until I admitted to her what I’d done wrong.”

Emily lifted an eyebrow, then realized that Alassa didn’t want to talk about it. But Emily could guess; Alassa might not have realized, at first, that the most important part of owning a pony–or a horse–was taking care of the beast. It was easy to imagine the brat Alassa had been refusing to sweep out the stable, or brush the pony’s coat, or whatever else one had to do to take care of a large animal. If Lady Cecelia was as horse-mad as Alassa suggested, she would have been outraged at such mistreatment. And she clearly wouldn’t have hesitated to give the young princess a piece of her mind.

Alassa might envy Emily, if she knew the truth about her origins. No matter what she did in the future, there were people who would already remember the little brat she’d been as a child. She could never escape the shadow of her past. But Emily had left her past behind when Shadye had brought her into this world. Everything she’d done on Earth seemed almost dreamlike to her–and no one else would truly understand it, no matter how she tried to explain.

She shifted position and watched as the forest grew thicker. The trees were growing closer to the road, she realized, providing no shortage of concealment for bandits who might want to sneak up on the small procession. Sergeant Harkin, in one of his many lectures, had admitted that the borderlands between countries were often lawless, if only because neither country could patrol it without making the other suspect that they intended to launch an invasion. Besides, the poor bastards who actually lived there, he’d added, found themselves visited by tax collectors from both countries. Was it any wonder, Emily had asked herself, that they might turn to raiding?

The forest vanished suddenly, to be replaced by a wooden fort that seemed to have come out of the Wild West. Emily stared at it, unable to understand why they’d even bothered to build it when a single fire-spell would turn it into an inferno. Some of the fortress designs they’d studied in Martial Magic had been designed to force attacking magicians to waste power, but they’d been composed of stone and warded to make it harder to break them down. This fort was stupid and senseless.

“Border forts are rarely well-designed, unless they’re at a chokepoint,” Alassa said, when Emily asked her what the fort was designed to
do
. “They are always the first targets when someone comes storming over the borders, so no one invests much in them. And wood is cheap out here.”

“That actually makes sense,” Emily said, shaking her head. “How did you know
that
?”

Alassa stuck out her tongue. “My father is the King, my Uncle is a duke and one of my protectors is a Man at Arms,” she said. “I often heard them talking about our borders when I was younger.”

There was a rap on the door, followed rapidly by the sound of someone trying to open it. The lock clicked and the door opened, allowing Lady Barb to stick her head into the carriage. “We’re staying here long enough to change the horses,” she said. “If either of you want to answer the call of nature, now is the time.”

Emily made a face. One thing she
did
miss from Earth were proper toilets. Whitehall
did
have plumbing, but hardly anywhere else did, particularly out in the wild. She’d lost a great deal of modesty in Martial Magic, yet she didn’t particularly want to do her business in front of a horde of strangers.

“It’s a good idea to go,” Alassa said, standing up. “You never know when you might have the chance to go again.”

Emily sighed and followed her out of the carriage. The fort smelt funny to her, a faint mixture of burnt wood and oil. And horses, dozens of horses. There was a field behind the fort where several dozen horses were kept, ready for the next courier who needed to change animals. Several of them were being led out to replace the ones pulling the carriages; Emily couldn’t help but notice the stirrups the riders were using.
That
had been her idea, one of the concepts she’d introduced. They’d clearly spread further than she had realized.

The next part of the journey passed quickly, once they finished at the fort and headed back on to the roads. Emily found herself staring out of the window as the procession passed through a series of small hamlets, each one barely large enough to support more than twenty people. Or maybe there were other houses hidden away in the undergrowth. There was no time to do more than pick up impressions before they were past the hamlet and heading back down an empty road.

She felt the carriage slow down as they entered a larger town, with massive buildings built out of stone. There was a large crowd cheering them, although Emily had the private suspicion that some of them were there because they hadn’t been given any choice. But others seemed more than willing to welcome the Princess of Zangaria and invite her to marry their Prince. Emily was still shaking her head as they left the town behind and headed onwards. Did they really think that Alassa would make her choice based on who shouted the loudest?

“I can’t marry the crown prince of another kingdom,” Alassa explained, “and Alluvia has too many other princes. If I married one and took him away…”

Understanding clicked in Emily’s mind. “It reduces the risk of civil war,” she said. “They’d be glad of that, wouldn’t they?”

“If I had a brother, he would be the heir and I would be the spare,” Alassa said. She looked oddly wistful for a long moment. “If I had two brothers, the younger might try to overthrow the older. And I would be sent off to marry someone to seal a treaty. But I am alone.”

She looked up as the carriage rattled over a bridge. “But we’re almost at the castle,” she added. “And then we have to get dressed.
Before
we are formally presented to the king…”

They shared a groan. “You’re lucky,” Alassa added. “You won’t have it so bad.”

E
MILY SUCKED IN HER BREATH SHARPLY
as the carriage rumbled towards Castle Alluvia. It was a massive structure, seemingly larger than Whitehall, perched on a craggy rock that allowed it to dominate the city below. The city itself was much smaller than Dragon’s Den, somehow giving the impression of being
compact
, as if thousands of people had been jammed into a relatively small space. It had no walls, something that puzzled Emily as the carriage started to head up the street towards the castle. But then, if someone
did
attack, the population could be herded into the castle or–more likely–told to flee into the countryside and fend for themselves.

The street was lined by cheering people, who waved at the carriage as the small procession drifted past. Emily had to smile as she realized that most of them grew less enthusiastic once the golden carriage had passed, even though
Alassa
hadn’t passed yet. But it did prove that the diversion was working and no one knew where the royal princess actually was. The wards surrounding the vehicles would make it harder for magic to be used to target her. Emily settled back as the road circled the castle, before finally reaching the gatehouse. She felt a tingle as they passed through an outer set of wards–weaker than Whitehall’s wards–and came to a halt in the courtyard.