Kat curtseyed before the throne. She wanted to bow, but she worried about getting a disapproving glare from His Majesty.
“Welcome, Katherine of Tall Glen,” King Clarran said.
“I prefer Kat, Your Majesty,” she said.
“I’m sure you do.”
“Will you call me by that name, Your Majesty?”
“You’re a bold one, aren’t you?”
Kat managed a nod.
This wasn’t the first time she’d been in the throne room in Bright Glade Castle, the seat of power for the whole of the Kingdom of Bright Glade. Not that she was a frequent visitor to the castle, much less the throne room. Tall Glen was one of the eastern baronies. It had taken her six days, and on horseback, to journey here. By coach wagon or foot it took longer.
But though she’d been here perhaps six or seven times in the last ten years, she didn’t feel quite out of her element. Partly that was due to who she was. Sons and daughters of Barons tended to have a certain boldness about them. What experience she had with other adult children of the nobility told her she had a little more than average.
Mostly, though, she didn’t feel lost because King Clarran had decorated the throne room much like her father had decorated his. There were bright curtains on the windows, which were pulled back to bring in plenty of sunlight. The three walls without windows had tapestries. Instead of depicting battle scenes, those tapestries displayed the kingdom and its bounties, as did those in the throne room back home. There was a thin carpet on the floor, but it was more to keep in heat than to show how wealthy the King was.
This throne room was for a King, not a Baron, but it was for a man who preferred comfort over showing his position. In that it was just like home.
“Your father finds you a most troublesome young lady.”
“He does indeed, Your Majesty.”
“You dress like a man. You fight like a man, at times. You argue with him about your place in Tall Glen. Nothing to do with the title, I trust?”
“No, Your Majesty.”
Her father was Baron Kevin. She was the youngest of his three children as well as his only daughter. She hadn’t thought she’d ever have to follow her father. As she grew up she chose not to even try.
She didn’t want to be Baroness of Tall Glen, nor Baron for that matter. She was just better at the manly arts than the womanly arts. She was on the tall side of average. She liked rough-housing with her brothers. It was just who she was.
“No young man at home who wants to tame you?” the King asked.
“Ha!” Kat let out an embarrassed cough an instant later. “No, Your Majesty.”
“None you want to tame?”
She smiled slightly. “No, Your Majesty.”
She’d known since she came into womanhood that there was something odd about her, aside from her desire to pursue the manly arts. She had no eye for men. Her father thought that was due to her unnatural pursuits. But she didn’t have that much of an eye for women, either. She didn’t know if there was something wrong with her, or if no one had yet caught her eye, man or woman. All she knew was that love wasn’t a feeling she’d had just yet.
“If I asked if you wished an introduction, what would you say?” King Clarran asked.
Kat shrugged. “I suppose that would depend on who you wanted to introduce me to, Your Majesty.”
“A political answer?”
“An honest answer.”
“Interesting.”
“May I ask why?”
The King gave Kat a slight smile. “Tell me, if I asked you to swear to the Gods that you wished no formal introduction from me, would you swear?”
Kat thought for a moment, then nodded.
“Not even to me?”
Kat raised an eyebrow. “Her Majesty is alive, Your Majesty. And as I understand, quite pregnant.”
“Quite so. You’d refuse to be a King’s mistress?”
“Indeed I would.”
“Because it would be immoral?”
“Absolutely.”
She did think King Clarran was handsome. He was a little taller than she, with a kind face and a strong build. He was also only ten years or so older than she was. The age difference wouldn’t make any affair too unsavory. But it wouldn’t just be wrong for her to want to cheat on the Queen with the King, it would be mean. She believed that if there was no reason to be mean to someone, there was no need to behave that way.
“What other matters do you find immoral?” the King asked. “Slavery?”
“Yes, Your Majesty.”
“Why?”
“Treating people as property makes us cruel. The Gods tell us that.”
“Those of Warhold don’t interpret the word of the Gods in that way.”
“They interpret the word of the Gods in ways that benefit them, Your Majesty.”
“How do you know that?”
“We do get the odd merchant or traveler who comes from there to Tall Glen, Your Majesty. We know what those folk are like.” Kat smiled. “Do you wish something done to them?”
King Clarran shook his head. “No, and even if I did, I wouldn’t ask that of you.”
“Why not?” Kat bowed her head. “Forgive me, Your Majesty.”
The King gave her a smile that reassured her. “No, dear Kat, you’re right to ask. I wouldn’t ask because, as a woman, even if you do dress as a man, you’d have less freedom of movement in Warhold than a man would. You could disguise yourself, but that would put one secret on top of another.”
“That would be bad, Your Majesty?”
“Not just bad, but dangerous. The more secrets one is burdened with, the greater the risk to all of them of having just one secret exposed.”
Kat thought about it, then nodded. “I believe I understand, Your Majesty.”
“Good. Tell me, if you could help your kingdom in another way, help us against Warhold, would you do so?”
“Indeed I would, Your Majesty.”
“Even if it meant not fighting?”
“I suppose so.”
“Even if you had to keep just one secret?”
“Yes, Your Majesty.”
King Clarran nodded. It seemed to Kat that he nodded as much to himself as to her. “Your father doesn’t know what to do with you. Yet you’re not a destructive young lady. Unusual, certainly, but hardly a force for chaos. Your father has also told me of your morals. If not for those, I wouldn’t have summoned you here.”
“Summoned, Your Majesty, to do what?”
“I think your unusual skills and typical morals makes you the ideal young woman for a mission I wish to have carried out.”
Kat sucked in a breath. “A mission, Your Majesty?”
“Yes. Look to your left.”
Kat looked. She’d seen two women standing to one side of the throne room. One was older, somewhere between her own age and her father’s. She had brown hair and brown eyes that, as soon as Kat looked her way, made Kat feel as though the Goddess was staring at her. The woman wore a crimson gown trimmed in white.
The other women was younger, close to Kat’s age. She was a little shorter than average, and had dark hair and pale skin. She might have been pretty if she wasn’t wearing a torn and dirty brown gown. She walked beside the older woman with deference bordering on shyness.
“Have you not met Naomi, the Royal Witch?” King Clarran asked.
Kat looked again then nodded. “Yes. You look older, My Lady.”
“I believe that’s because I am older, Kat,” Naomi replied. She touched the shoulder of the woman next to her. “This young lady is named Mary.”
“Hello.”
Mary gave Kat a stiff nod.
“You’ll forgive her appearance,” Naomi said, “but as it happens, you arrived a day before she has.”
Kat turned to the King. He nodded towards Naomi. Kat turned back to the witch. “Is that important, My Lady?”
“It is,” Naomi answered. “A message about her came here several days ago.”
“It’s why you were summoned,” King Clarran added.
“But now that Mary is here, we’ve been able to hear her tale more completely, from her own mouth, and with her own words.”
“May I ask what tale that is?”
“Indeed. You know of the Moonlight Master, yes?”
“Absolutely!”
His tales excited Kat to no end. No one knew who he was, though she was certain the King and the Royal Witch knew who he was. He was a man in a mask who, with a small band of followers, raided into the kingdom of Warhold and its close neighbors. The Moonlight Master struck at those moving slaves across the kingdom, be they slave traders or merchants. They liberated the slaves then brought them across Bright Glade south to the small kingdom of Robin’s Nest.
What was most thrilling to her was that the Moonlight Master rarely fought battles with those of Warhold. Every so often he and his men had to scrap to free slaves. Most of the time, though, they employed surprise and deception to steal slaves away. One tale said they drove wild deer through a camp and used the confusion to get the slaves out. Others said the knocked out guards, tied everyone up, then just walked away. Another said they bought slaves with false silver coins.
As much as she liked fighting, Kat also wanted to be clever. She’d never taken to reading, and at times she took more to action than thought. Trying to think more and be less impulsive was one virtue she was attempting to gain. She might never join the Moonlight Master’s band, but she could at least be a little more like him.
“Mary here was recently freed by him,” Naomi said. “She told the Moonlight Master something most interesting.” The witch turned to the former slave. “Tell this young woman what you told him, and what you’ve told us.”
Mary gave Naomi a tiny nod then turned to Kat. “Some of us are kept for the pleasure of soldiers, My Lady,” she said in a warm but halting voice.
Kat smiled to her. “I’m not a lady.”
“Yes, My Lady. I mean, forgive me.” She bowed her head.
“That’s all right. Go on.”
“Those of us kept for pleasure come to fear bedding men.”
“Why is that?”
“Because they’re forced to,” Naomi added. “One of the evils of keeping slaves.”
Kat had heard of men forcing themselves onto women. It hadn’t happened to anyone she knew, for it was against the law, and her father was a good man who enforced the law. Her father had told her once that some Barons might look the other way if such a crime happened if the woman had a poor reputation, either because she was casual with her affections or spent too much time with criminals. Kat wasn’t sure if a woman’s reputation or acquaintances made such things acceptable, but she’d chosen to keep her tongue still so as not to provoke another argument with her father.
“I see,” Kat said. She turned back to Mary. “Please, do continue.”
Mary nodded. “None of us gets love from men, you see.” She swallowed. “Well, we only tend to get it from other women.”
“Other women?”
“Yes.”
Kat looked at Mary, then Naomi, then turned back to the King. “Your Majesty?”
“It’s strange, I know,” he said. “Naomi, can you explain it to the young lady?”
Naomi gave the King a nod as Kat looked back to her. “I believe these young women, as slaves, quickly associate bedding a man with pain and suffering, rather than love and pleasure,” she said to Kat. “If men are not forcing themselves onto these women, then they are being forced to breed children with men who are slaves.”
“Breed?” Kat asked. “Like animals?”
“Just like that, yes. We’ve long known that the value those in Warhold place on slaves is only in their ability to work and to create more slaves. That said, women who are barren are taken care of, but only for the pleasure their owners can gain from them.”
“I see.”
“This, I think, leads to why you were summoned here.”
“It does?” Kat turned back to the King. “Your Majesty?”
“That’s so,” he said to her. “Slaves go south to the little kingdom of Robin’s Nest. I’m sure you know that, but I think it will be important to repeat that later. There they are able to live free lives. Marry whom they choose. Have as many or as few children as they want.”
“Your Majesty, may I ask why we don’t allow these slaves to remain here?”
“Indeed you may. We don’t because the Kings and Barons of Warhold view slaves as property. You do understand that, yes?”
“Yes.”
“Then, in their eyes, if slaves are freed and allowed to live here, then we are harboring stolen property. They could act upon that.”
“And they don’t?”
Kat was surprised to see the King grin. “A bit of the law a friend explained to me, young lady. If the slaves go to another land, one with no border with Warhold, then for men of that kingdom to pursue these slaves, they’d have to get permission from the domains between Warhold and, say, Robin’s Nest. Do you understand that?”
“I do, Your Majesty.”
“Clearly no one wants soldiers of Warhold in their land.”
Kat gasped. “Why, no. They might scout us for attack.”
“Just so. Therefore, if these slaves are some distance away, and not close to Warhold, they cannot be pursued.”
“I suppose not, Your Majesty. But they are being taken from their owners, yes?”
“Why, yes they are.” The King gave Kat a rather grand frown. “It’s most regrettable that whoever is liberating, that is, stealing these slaves, cannot be found. My soldiers cannot seem to find this Moonlight Master anywhere.”
Kat arched an eyebrow. “No?”
The King shook his head. “No. It would be easier if descriptions were provided of these men, but they are always masked. I simply cannot round up men at random and arrest them because someone, somewhere, thinks they might be outlaws. That’s just not done.”
“I suppose not.” Kat was starting to feel confused.
“It’s something of a scheme, young lady. If I don’t know who the Moonlight Master is, then I can’t arrest him, can I?”
“No, Your Majesty, but don’t you know someone who knows him?”
“I know someone who might know who he is, but that someone knows several men. And more than a few women, at that. Any of them could be this Moonlight Master. However, the law of the kingdom is quite clear. No man or woman can be arrested without a fair amount of proof that they have committed a crime. Suspicion and rumor are not proof. Otherwise every one of my subjects might be in jail.”
Kat finally thought she saw the reasoning in what the King was telling her. If there was distance between the King, his soldiers, his Barons, and the Moonlight Master, King Clarran couldn’t lie to the King of Warhold if asked who the man was. The King and his men could look, but without a name, a true location, or a description of a face, they were helpless to act. Thus they could do nothing while probably giving quiet support to the “outlaw.”
“I trust this is now clear to you, Kat?” the King asked.
“Yes, Your Majesty,” she answered, the corners of her mouth turning upward.
“Good. Now to the matter for which you were summoned. As was said, Mary’s tale was sent here before she arrived herself. Naomi and I talked over this tale. You see, King Darren of Robin’s Nest has reported that not all of the women slaves who were freed and moved there married. Some are quite determined not to marry, so he says.
“We here in the castle weren’t certain to believe that report. Yet King Darren is an honest ruler and his kingdom an ally of ours. It seems the Gods have finally delivered to us the truth of his report. We know to believe him. We suspect we know why these marriages aren’t happening.”
“But what about me, Your Majesty?” Kat asked.
“I, like my father before me, is willing to listen to those who aren’t of the nobility, or even of the merchant class. That would include listening to freed slaves like Mary here. I’m not sure King Darren is doing that. I worry that, by him not asking, he’s causing a little difficulty for himself and his kingdom. Nothing dire, of course. But sometimes little difficulties grow into large and terrible ones.
“I should like you to visit Robin’s Nest, Kat of Tall Glen. I should like you to learn more of what Mary has to say. I want you to speak with these women in that kingdom, the ones refusing to marry. Find out if what she says is why they don’t wish to marry. If that’s so, you can explain it to His Majesty.”
“Why me, Your Majesty?”
“Naomi thinks, and I now agree, that these women are more likely to confide such sentiments to a woman instead of to a man. Yet it will take some time to get there. I don’t have a daughter, and there really isn’t a young woman close by I could send.”
“But because I know how to ride and fight, I’m the best for this mission, Your Majesty?”
“I think you will be, young lady. You and Mary will be alone on the road. You’ll have time to get to know her. You can protect her. Then, when you arrive, I trust you’ll use your persistence to uncover the truth of the matter.”
“I shall try, Your Majesty,” Kat said somberly.
“Good.” The King turned from her to Naomi. “Would you show Mary out, please?”
“Certainly, Your Majesty,” the witch said with a smile. She took Mary by the hand and led her out of the throne room.
Kat was nervous about being left in the room with King Clarran and no one else. She had nothing to fear from the King. He was a good and kind man. So was her father, but when he asked to speak with her in private, it was usually to give her a proper lashing with his tongue.
“Am I in trouble, Your Majesty?” she asked, feeling skittish.
His amused smile didn’t reassure her. “No, but you might be.”
“What did I do now?”
“It’s not what you’ve done, Kat, but what you’re going to do.”
“What am I going to do?”
“You need to make certain that Mary understands that you’re not the daughter of a Baron.”
“No? What am I?”
“A young cousin of one of the men serving under the Moonlight Master.”
Kat’s eyes narrowed. “Why, Your Majesty?”
“King Darren is a good ruler, but it’s not as though he and I are friends. It wasn’t that long ago he was Baron of Robin’s Nest. Because of that he’s been reluctant to sign any sort of treaty with me or with Bright Glade. We have an alliance of words, Kat, but nothing formal for all our subjects to see. I’d like to know if that’s due to caution, or if something more is going on.”
“You can’t ask him?”
“If he’s merely cautious, asking might bother him. It might seem to him like less of a request and more of a demand. I’d rather not make demands on my allies and friends.”
“Is that so?”
He smirked at her. “Indeed. I can only truly make demands on my subjects.”
“Of course.”
“It could also be, Kat, that King Darren is reluctant for other reasons. Less noble reasons. I don’t think that’s so, but he is something like twenty days away from here. If something dire was going on, we’d never know until it happened.”
She sighed. “I suppose not.”
“Honestly, that’s not likely. But I do think, for myself and for the kingdom, it would be helpful to have regular reports on what goes on in Robin’s Nest. To that end, Naomi has worked out a spell to resolve that matter.”
“A spell? What spell?”
“A communication spell. I’m not sure exactly how it works, but I do know that it works. The spell is cast on two objects. Another spell ties the objects to each other. One man or woman speaks into one object, and can be heard by the other holding the other object.”
“Like a conversation?”
The King shook his head. “Only a brief conversation. Moments instead of an hour.”
“How far do these spells go?”
“Naomi has tried them at all ends of the kingdom. They work from one end to another.”
She started to smile. “So, I could keep in contact with her? While she’s here and I’m in Robin’s Nest?”
“That’s our hope, Kat. You will report to Naomi to obtain this enchanted object. She’ll tell you how often the magic will allow you to report here. You’ll communicate with her, and through her to me. Is that understood?”
“Yes, Your Majesty.”
“Good.”
“May I ask a question, Your Majesty?”
“Certainly.”
“I would be a spy, yes?”
“Of a sort, yes.”
“Is it right to spy on an ally our our kingdom?”
“Distance permits only letters, Kat, and a month or two passes between letters. There’s only such much paper to use for letters, so letters must be short. There could be much going on in Robin’s Nest that would be important for us to know.”
“Such as?”
“How are the slaves doing? King Darren can speak broadly, but it might help to know details. How are his relations with the baronies to his west? How much trade comes up from the south of his land? What’s said there about the Moonlight Master?
“Give it thought while on the road, Kat. What would you wish to know about a distant land? What would you want to tell your King about that land? What do you see that’s different? What do you see that’s the same as where you’re from? What lies between similar and different, and are such things important? What can be said about the folk of that land?
“Keep such questions in your mind. Write them down, if you must. At first you might think to report on all you see and hear. Remember, though, that magic isn’t all-powerful. Spells use up magic, and take time to refresh themselves. Use up the magic too fast and the spell will vanish. Naomi will tell you that spells can fade if they’re too strong and used too quickly. Have a care as to how you use what she gives you.”
“Yes, Your Majesty.”
“All that said, I think the young lady who learned to fight and ride like a man will figure out what to do.” The King shook his head again. “You won’t need those skills on this mission. But you will have to be brave and resourceful. You’ll have to observe and be persistent.”
“I’ll try, Your Majesty.”
He smiled at her. “Good. And don’t worry about failure.”
“No?”
“No. For now, all you’re going to be doing is answering questions. You’ll answer them for King Darren with Mary, and you’ll be answering mine on your own through Naomi. There’s nothing else you need to do.”
“What if I don’t find answers?”
“I believe every question has an answer. It might take time to find that answer. It might take hard work. It might take going at the matter in an unusual way.” He grinned. “That shouldn’t be too strange for the Baron’s daughter who learned to fight, now should it?”
She smiled back. “I suppose not, Your Majesty. I suppose not.”
Katherine, the daughter of the Baron of Tall Glen, prefers manly pursuits like riding and being able to fight. Her King enlists Kat in a secret mission to travel to a neighboring kingdom. There she will help freed slaves and keep an eye on that land. Kat finds herself in an adventure she didn’t expect, and experiencing feelings she didn’t think she’d feel.
Thanks for reading!
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