A Flight of Ravens by John Conroe (thriller books to read TXT) 📗

“I’ll just have to meet her.  When?” she asked, serious as hell.  I couldn’t hold back a grin.  Yes, it made sense to add extra security as soon as possible, but really, this was her curiosity more than anything. I moved three of the crates to the garden entrance, then came back.

She frowned at me, eyes on my grin.  “I can bring her by anytime you say,” I said.  “Sooner would be better.”

She thought about it, tapping her ruby lips with a work-gloved finger.  “Just after the noon meal, I’ll be in my office, working on accounts.  Bring her yourself.  My secretary will give you grief about interrupting me.  Be insistent—but don’t be an ass about it!” she warned, the gloved finger now held in front of my face.  “She’ll check with me and I’ll agree, grudgingly.  You have information for me and just happen to have this Rose with you.  How does she dress when she’s playing messenger?”

“Depends on how official it is.  If it’s to a business or High Family house, we have them wear a kind of uniform.  Dark jacket, cap, and trousers, with clean, well-made boots.”

“Have her wear that.  Hair up and under the cap.  As boyish as possible,” Brona said, the wheels already clearly turning.

“Well, as I said, she’s a pretty one.  You want us to mask that?”

“Yeah.  Don’t go crazy but make it hard to tell if she’s a girl or boy, at least at first glance. Enough so that if she was in a dress and made up the next time anyone saw her, they would have a hard time knowing it was the same person.”

She already had a plan and there was no way in hell she’d tell me.  Payback’s a bitch, as they say.

“Have Brent report to the castle seneschal today.  We’ll put him to work as a page for my father within the next day or so.  In the meantime, I would like you to think about who our bad seed might be.”

I stacked the last crates with the others.

“You must have gotten up pretty early to have harvested all of this by this time of morning,” I said.

“Yeah, couldn’t sleep.  Dreams that my closest confidant and partner was hiding pretty young girls in his workplace,” she said with a mock glare.

“I was up early too.  Thinking about Ash and the others.”

“That’s actually what woke me.  Wondering what the Paul did to our people.  We need to get a hold of that as well.”

“Let’s get this extra security in place while we come up with a plan to find the hidden agent. I’ve got every Shadow and Shadow asset on alert for anything to do with the Paul.”

“As do Father and Neil.  Now, I’ve got to ready some of these beds for winter and I don’t have much time before my first appointment.  Scram, Shadow,” she said.  Then she leaned close and kissed me on the lips.  She had a spot of dirt on the tip of her nose and I pointed to my own to warn her.  With a cute frown, she wiped her nose and then made a shooing motion with her hand.

We call our stray young thief Rose because of her looks, sharp knife, and quick, thorny wit, but when Brona was a young girl, the staff all called her Razor, at least among themselves.  So sharp, of wit, intellect, and tongue that you could easily be cut to the quick.  I’m told, by some of those same servants, that after I left for Drodacia, she changed and the nickname faded away, replaced by simply Her Highness, or in private, Herself.  Soshi’s protegee and Brona might just have some things in common despite the vast differences in their stations.

Chapter 4

“You’re getting fat,” I said.

A single black ear briefly flicked my way before returning to its previous position.

“Oh, you’re okay with that are you?” I asked.

Tipton snorted in reply.  He has very expressive snorts.  Most are various ways of saying he’s happy.  This one was pretty sarcastic.

“Fine, be that way.  As a friend, I’m just trying to look out for you,” I said.  Both ears flicked back toward me, then went forward.  His walk might have picked up a little speed.

I talk to Tipton because I’ve had him most of my life and he’s one of my few constants.  I also talk to him when my mind is working on difficult problems and I need to distract myself.  Sometimes when I do this, new ideas or answers pop up all on their own.  It wasn’t working this morning.

Brona’s information had disturbed me right to my core.  If one of the three men she’d listed was a traitor, the kingdom was in trouble.  Putting a pair of teenagers near my princess and king was not the ideal solution, no matter how well trained they were or how dedicated.  My first instinct was to abduct all three men and question them at length, preferably with eslling help.

It was a bad instinct for at least three reasons.  First, it would totally alienate one or all of them to begin with.  It would be just like the Paul to send an agent with a false idea of a buried traitor just to get us fighting among ourselves.  Each of the three played a vital role in the kingdom, jobs for which they had been handpicked.  They were replaceable, but it would be a waste of enormous talent and possibly send the wrong messages to those around the king and princess, those who were loyal and dedicated.

Secondly, exposing a traitor was a wasted opportunity, at least according to Jella.  My battlemaster trainer always looked to make an opportunity out of every problem.  Feeding false information back to the Paul would be a tremendous help in weakening his plans.  I mentally check marked this point to circle back to, as there was something there even without knowing who or if a spy was among us.

The