“Goof,” Melita chuckled roughly. “Levi, this is Drayce Ladon, and this asshole is Eno Bevyn.”
“What?” Levi demanded.
“Kid, this here is the king’s personal bodyguard,” Melita wheezed with a breathless laugh. “Our asses got saved by a professional.”
“Holy shit! No way! Does that mean he’s back?” Levi asked.
Eno’s eyes slid over to Drayce, who for once had the good sense to keep his mouth shut. In the end, there was no point in denying it. If they could use Caelan to give these fighters hope, he was going to do it.
“He is. Let’s first find some better cover before we discuss anything else,” Eno said.
Melita nodded and shoved to her feet from where she’d been leaning heavily on the wall. “One of the bases we’ve established in East Ward isn’t far from here. We can talk safely there.”
They pushed off, with Eno bringing up the rear, double-checking that they hadn’t been discovered by New Rosanthe yet. There were few Erya citizens on the streets. All but a couple of stores were shut up and the windows on all the homes they passed were covered despite the beautiful sunshine that was pouring down from a blue sky. It would have been a perfect summer day if not for the New Rosanthe occupation.
After nearly half an hour of sneaking through the city, they entered a three-story town house through the back. It looked as though they were in a normal residential neighborhood with neat little yards and window boxes filled with colorful flowers. But instead of happy families following their everyday routines of work and school, this town house was filled with more than a dozen fighters, most nursing a variety of injuries.
“Chief!” one of the men shouted as Melita came through the door with Levi’s help. The two men helped Melita to drop into an open seat at a breakfast table in a nook off the small kitchen.
“All right. All right,” Melita grumbled. “I’ll live. Someone just see if the bullet went through or it’s stuck in me. Everything hurts like hell and I can’t tell.”
Levi leaned around, checking Melita’s shoulder. “It’s a through and through.”
“Fine. Just bandage me up while I talk to Lord Bevyn here.”
That name-drop managed to get everyone in the room to stop exactly where they were and stare at him in breathless wonder. Eno had plenty of experience with that happening to Caelan, but never to him. He was the prince’s dark shadow, never the center of attention.
He shouldn’t have been surprised, though. He’d been Caelan’s bodyguard for several years now. In many circles, he was well known.
He pulled out a chair and dropped into it next to Melita. “What’s going on, Melita? Where’s Tomas? We arrived in Stormbreak about three days ago. I’ve been trying to reach Tomas but have had no luck.”
Melita nodded, not looking all that surprised. “I saw him briefly two days ago. Cabbage Port. He’s been working with the soldiers there to keep Spirit Road under our control. He’s been sending families out and trying to sneak soldiers and supplies in through the chaos. He gave me a squad of fighters and tasked us with chipping away at the defenses of Green Gate so we can feed people.”
“But he didn’t give you enough men to accomplish the job,” Drayce grumbled from where he stood behind Eno.
Melita flashed Drayce a half smile. “He gave me what he could spare. That was our third run at them in two days. We lose some, they lose some. Unfortunately, they’ve got more soldiers to spare than I do.”
“And it has forced New Rosanthe to keep a considerable number of its soldiers on Green Gate rather than moving more men to deal with Tomas and Spirit Road,” Eno observed. It was a dangerous ploy, but they didn’t have many options when it came to dealing with the Empire right now.
Melita nodded and started to say something, but the words were stopped in her throat when Levi tightened the bandage around her shoulder. Melita was a tall, fierce woman with high cheekbones and rich black hair. She was a member of an elite squad with the Royal Guard with impressive skills. And it would take someone with her training to hold together this ragtag bunch of soldiers and civilians in the face of some daunting odds.
“What about King Caelan? He’s here with you?”
Eno nodded. He opened his mouth, but Levi cut him off.
“Where the hell has he been?”
“Boy! You keep a civil tongue when talking about the king,” Melita snapped and Levi immediately hung his head, shoulders slumped.
“Sorry,” Levi mumbled.
“It’s okay,” Eno said. “We were sent on a diplomatic mission to Caspagir. We were already across the border when we got word of the attack. King Caelan secured an alliance with Queen Noemi to help with the Empire problem.”