Jack Frost: King of Thieves

CHAPTER XXI: The Signet Ring

Daylight poured into the throne room of the Far Tower through high arched windows, flooding the chamber. Hans sat upon his throne, resplendent in a robe of embroidered blue velvet, toying with an emerald necklace, and wearing the golden crown of the Southern Isles' kings. His mother, Elinor, stood to the king's left, eschewing the throne beside him, and looking austere in a simple blue gown and white wimple. Dymas Phrygians stood before the throne dais looking every bit the warrior in his armour, his sword hanging from his belt, the white in his mane of hair illuminated by the sun, accenting his age. To the king's right sat Princess Grimhilde, looking lovely in a satin dress that shone like pearls. She said nothing but watched the others with a wary eye.

Pitch chose to do the same, at least for the moment. He stood in a shadowed recess to the side of the thrones where he could see and hear everything, but where the others were less likely to take notice of him. For now, he would play the role of spider and allow Elinor and Dymas to buzz around the king's head, harrying him. He was sure it wouldn't be long before they managed to get themselves tangled in Hans' pride and stubbornness and uncertainty. When they did, Pitch would be ready.

Guards stood at attention on either side of the dais, a trio of Elinor's ladies stood off to the side, as did the Exchequer and other members of the Privy Council, who attended the king and hung on his every word, as bound to him as the dogs leashed and held by Hans' sentries.

"Manny's army is coming home," Hans said, still playing with the necklace, and sounding both bored and petulant. "To keep it together costs money. Phrygians, you speak for the money."

"I do, Sire, and there's not much to speak of."

Phrygians didn't flinch from the truth. Pitch had to give him that. But the great knight was too used to serving men like Willaim and Manny. The truth wouldn't get him far with Hans.

"But to disband the army," Phrygians went on, "could cost more than to keep it."

Pitch suppressed a smile, amused by what he saw on the king's face. Hans was as easy to read as a child. He heard the truth in what Phrygians was telling him. Whatever else Hans might have been, he wasn't stupid. He had too much of his father in him to be oblivious to what was happening in the realm. But while he already knew much of what Phrygians had told him, he didn't wish to admit as much, either to the knight or to himself. And he surely didn't want to acknowledge it in front of his mother.

Grimhilde, on the other hand, appeared puzzled by what Phrygians had said, and unlike Hans' wife, the Countess of Arendelle, whom she had displaced, she had just enough nerve and confidence to inject herself into the conversation despite her ignorance.

"Pourquoi, Chancellor?" she asked. Why, Chancellor?

Pitch could see that the question itself infuriated Elinor, who had yet to accept this woman as a proper consort for her son. She glared at the girl as if she might will her from the chamber with her eyes. Dymas appeared to be just as offended by the presence of the Alsace-Lorraine princess. His eyes flicked in her direction for an instant, but he refused to dignify her question by answering.

All of this Pitch saw. All of it worked to his benefit. For he could see as well the resentment building in Hans' eyes: anger at his mother for not honoring his decision to throw Grimhilde aside and take this Alsace-Lorraine princess as his wife; distrust of Phrygians, who Hans believed remained more devoted to Elinor and the memory of Manny than to the current occupant of the throne. Pitch understood all of this, Phrygians none of it; which was why the old Knight didn't stand a chance.