Osian had knelt, then risen, and presented his sword with all the steadiness and beauty of a prince of fables. Meilyr had fought not to wring his hands, not to tug at the too-tight collar of his most formal whites, not to feel every gaze that continued to turn to him. To suspect him.
Now in the open, the clerics moved along the ranks of crownsworn with their incense and their chanting. At a silent command from Harlan, Osian – flanked by Aldreda and Wystan, Meilyr and Demelza and Edeva – made his way down the steps. Meilyr focused solely on not tripping.
The heirs’ white cloaks trailed behind them, heavy in the puddles, bleeding grey. Aldreda had told their attendants to leave them.
As they reached the plateau, each section of crownsworn placed their hands over their hearts and bowed in a silent salute. A gesture repeated by those nobles and courtiers and staff who stood behind them, filling the courtyard. Some of the crownsworn’s horses were palpably agitated, sensing the tension.
Meilyr could taste it at the back of his mouth. He swallowed, ignoring it, just as he tried to ignore the hatred that dripped from Captain Radnor, stood before the first ranks they passed. The way he tried to ignore the knowledge of the concealed archers on every battlement and in almost every window overlooking the space, armed with blood-steel arrows and bolts.
Lord Gelens was somewhere behind them, descending the steps with the court nobles who had been permitted in the chapel.
Every step was agonising. The cloy of the incense worse. They made it almost halfway, before Edeva – scooped into Demelza’s arms – burst loudly into tears.
The royal procession slowed, and Aldreda stepped out of line. ‘There, darling.’ She pulled her child close from an apologetic and exhausted Demelza, who had barely slept since Osian’s poisoning. ‘Mama’s got you,’ Aldreda soothed, touching Demelza’s arm, before adjusting her sheathed sword and moving past Meilyr, towards her original position. ‘As you were, everyone.’ Fond chuckles from some of the knights and crownsworn. ‘Children are—’
There are few things more terrible than the sound of an animal in pain.
Ahead, one of the crownsworn’s horsesscreamed, and bolted. Its rider tumbled backwards, thudding to the wet cobbles amongst the clerics. Another two crownsworn leapt from their saddles to run to them, all others in the courtyard halting and turning.
‘What happened?’ Osian barked.
Past the prince’s shoulder, Meilyr could see the face of the crownsworn who had fallen as one of the others started to help them up. They were familiar, breathing hard and shaking.
‘On your feet,’ the other crownsworn said. ‘Come on—’
They dropped their friend with a cry – as thick, barbed stems burst from the fallen crownsworn’s sternum. Their flesh convulsed as the stems speared upwards, curled around, and roots clawed free from their spine. Tangled around their torso. Crawled outwards towards their limbs, their head, and bloomed in trumpet-shaped golden flowers.
Cries and shrieks of panic. A great retreating of white as lines upon lines hauled backwards from the horror.
Osian drew his sword. ‘Find the sorcerer! Bar the gate!’
Meilyr stepped after him – but Demelza firmly caught his arm, one hand clutched at her chest in alarm.
The courtyard was awash with panicked nobles and shying horses. Only Osian strode closer, dirtied cloak sweeping behind him.
The crownsworn was encased in prickly foliage. Stems that twisted tighter, bloomed fiercer. Took shape until their appearance was no longer human but almostlupine. What had been a crownsworn picked itself up on four writhing, disjointed limbs.
Osian stopped as the creature shuddered and looked down the aisle – directly at him.
There were no eyes in its knotted head. Only wet, winding stems. Dripping flowers.
Beside it, another crownsworn drew their sword.
The creature lunged sideways, towards them. Stems snapped at stone to propel it with sickening speed to its target. Its mouth and front limbsengulfedthe crownsworn, bearing them to the ground with only a muffled scream and the rough, useless sound of metal skimming greenery. Far louder was the puncture of flesh, over and over, roiling into a singular stream of sound.
Osian broke through the terror that petrified them all like the sea breaking over rock.
His cloak snapped in the speed of his motion, and he drove his sword straight down – into the heart of the horror. Without hesitation, he heaved the blade out with a cry of effort and a splinter of stem-bits, and plunged down again.
Golden flowers twitched and shivered.
‘Get them free!’ Osian shouted. ‘Get themout!’
Pedr – Pedr, who had drawn their sword and stepped in front of Meilyr – loosed like an arrow to their prince, skidded to their knees, sword clattering as they drew their dagger to carve away at stems with one hand, the other delving, ripping, clutching at any part of the attacked crownsworn they could reach beneath the flesh-tight mess.
It took both of them to carve the mutilated body free. There was no doubt they were dead, but Pedr still dragged them clear, knelt as Osian stood, breathing hard over what had become of the creature that had once been a person.
Nothing but congealed lumps of severed, silent plant matter, rain-mingled sap and blood.