“Not today?” Leopold gave his best wide-eyed look, the one that had persuaded a variety of young men to come tumbling into his bed over the years.
Mattias ignored it, immune after half a lifetime. “Not today. I have work to do, and you have far too much correspondence to ignore it any longer. It won’t kill you to wait until tomorrow.”
Easy for him to say.
After Mattias had taken his leave, Leopold heaved a resigned sigh and flicked through the important but mind-numbing paperwork that was stacked on his desk in an accusing pile.
There were, indeed, several proposals. They weren’tpresentedas proposals, of course. There was an etiquette to these things. One was an invitation to a ball in a neighbouring kingdom to celebrate the princess’s coming of age, and one was a letter informing him that Princess Sophia, heir to the throne of Evergreen, was traveling his way. It came with an invitation to host her and her retinue for a week while she passed through Lilleforth, which of course came with the unspoken assumption that Leopold would host a banquet for his royal guests.
Leopold tipped his head back and gave a long exhale. Turning down the first invitation was easy enough, but the second one was trickier. He had no good reason to refuse visitors, and it would be nothing short of a slap in the face not to host an event to welcome his guests. Leo had to hand it to whoever was in charge at Evergreen; they were clever. It looked like just this once, Leopold might have to actually meet the princess he was planning on rejecting.
Princess Sophia was older than many of the princesses who sought to court Leopold, having reached her mid-twenties unwed. She had a reputation for dismissing her suitors out of hand, much like Leopold did. He could only assume that, also like him, she was under pressure to find a suitable partner—and Leopold was eminently suitable, even if he did say so himself.
Leopold put the letter to one side to discuss with Mattias later.
He ploughed through half the pile of correspondence, but his heart wasn’t in it and his concentration wandered. Eventually, after reading the same paragraph four times and failing to make head or tail of it, he threw down the document and stood, pacing up and down restlessly as he ruminated on the unfairness of it all. He was the head of theentirecountryand perfectly capable of looking after himself, yet here he was confined to the castle and forced to write letters as if he were a naughty child with unfinished lessons.
Well, he’d never stayed in his rooms for lessons when he was a child either, and the one time hehadgotten lost, it had turned out perfectly fine. Better than fine, even, because he’d gotten Mattias out of it.
Did a kingreallyneed permission from his chancellor to go riding on his own lands?
No, Leopold decided. He didn’t.
He was the king, and he didn’t need permission or guards just to go out for an hour or two and clear his head. If he wanted to go riding, he’d go, regardless of what that mother hen Mattias had to say about it.
Still, he made sure the coast was clear before he slipped out of his office.
ChapterThree
Felix wiped the sweat from his brow with a rag, rolled his neck, and then tipped the last two buckets into the horse troughs, which were now filled with fresh, clear water. The stone sides had been scrubbed clean, and they were free of all traces of the slime and muck that inevitably gathered.
“Since when does the king’s groom take care of the troughs? That’s what the lads are for.”
Felix turned to find the stable master, Mother Jones, leaning against the fence and watching him with a raised eyebrow. Mother—there’d been some sort of a mix-up on his birth certificate, apparently—was somewhere in his late forties, all long and lean and whipcord muscle that spoke of a lifetime of hard work. He had been the stable master for approximately forever and Felix had fond memories of his own time as a junior stable hand working under the man.
It was Mother who, at Mattias’s request, had arranged for Felix’s placement in Fortescue. The man was devoted to his horses and good at his job, although it seemed that wrangling their newest hire, Davin, was proving to be something of a challenge. Davin often disappeared for hours at a time, and no matter how often he was told an honest day’s work wouldn’t kill him, he didn’t seem inclined to take the risk.
Felix shrugged. “I’ve already taken care of Blackbird and Shadow and the water was getting low. Ollie’s out working with the yearling and Davin’s wandered off again, so it was easier to do the job myself than try and track the little bugger down.”
Mother threw his head back and gazed at the heavens as if praying for strength. “Slack little shit. When I find him, I’m sending him to you, and you can give him something to do that’ll make him regret dodging his duties.”
Felix grinned. “I’m sure there’s a pile of shit somewhere that needs shovelling.”
Mother’s answering smile showed off crooked teeth. “There’s always shit that needs shovelling.”
“I recall a pile that Davin was meant to move the day before yesterday, and it’s been uncommonly warm,” Felix said, “so it should be properly ripe. He can start with that.”
Mother hummed and gave a nod. “I swear, that boy doesn’t seem to know one end of a shovel from the other, but I’m sure with enough practice he’ll figure it out.”
Technically Felix held no power over the stable boys, but in practical terms, he was the king’s groom, and the position carried an innate sort of authority. On Felix’s first day there, Mother had told the lads that they were to obey any orders from Felix as if they came from Mother himself. Then he’d told Felix to feel free to give the lads a clip around the ears if he caught them shirking.
Felix had nodded, even though he had no intention of clipping any ears—well, not unless it was really and truly deserved.
Hells, it wasn’t that he didn’t understand the desire to slack off. It didn’t seem that long since he was sixteen himself, and he’d been guilty of sneaking away for the afternoon more than once. The difference between him and Davin, though, was that he’d always, always made sure he’d completed his tasks first. Then again, Davin was barely fifteen, and it wasn’t that he was lazy so much as he was easily distracted, and as Mother had mentioned, he genuinely seemed clueless. Felix was confident that, given time and enough shovelling, they’d get Davin to realise that the animals were reliant on him for their basic needs, and that would motivate him to do his job.
At least nobody was relying on the stable lads to take care of the king’s horse—that job was Felix’s alone, and he did it gladly.
Based on the last few days, he could see himself settling into his role well enough. His cottage was well appointed, far nicer than anywhere he had stayed in Fortescue, he got along with Mother and the lads, and best of all, in Felix’s opinion, was the bond he was starting to build with the king’s horse, Blackbird.
