Sisters Three (Completed)

47. Brenna (2/3)

Her two guards just seemed irritated as she marched through the palace with the familiarity of a woman living there for decades instead of a few months. She ignored them, though, heading straight for the back courtyard that eventually lead to the barracks.

To reach the barracks they had to pass through an alley between two of the buildings that housed servants. Unfortunately, while it was almost as wide as a street, it was long. Windows spotted the walls to either side, and from these windows there came a torrent of garbage and some pebbles. Brenna yelped and ducked to the side, covering her head with one arm. The guards, untouched, simply side-stepped and looked up at the offending window.

"Move on!" one shouted, though he wasn't that enthusiastic about it.

A moment later and the sound of the window slamming shut let Brenna and Hannara know they could slink away from the bricks.

Not all the servants in the palace were as loyal as they should be, and some found the new war just as unenjoyable as the soldiers. She's known they had problems with the staff from time to time, but nothing as bad as outright assaulting her with garbage. Those guards had hardly done anything to stop it, either. She shivered to think what might have happened if the rotten vegetables and sweepings had been arrows and rocks. They desperately needed to gain control over those in the palace, yet how could she even hope to placate those who had the most to lose from yet another war?

Not wishing to let on more than she already had that she was shaken, Brenna tossed her hair over her shoulder and plastered her imperial face on. Nose tilted up, lips thinned, eyes slightly narrowed and hooked on her prize. She blasted by her two guards and out of the alley, leaving it to them to catch up to her.

However, when Brenna entered the soldiers' living quarters, she nearly backed right back out. She had chosen the common area to make her entrance, which was where the palace folk would come down for some fine ale and card games, but that meant that not only were the devious of her household washed up in its vile shores, but the soldiers still awake at such an hour as well. This was a collection of everyone that wouldn't want to see a royal, yet this was where she knew she'd find Robbin.

Scooping a handful of her skirts off the dirty floor, Brenna picked her way around the heavy wooden tables and their occupants, heading for the back where the fireplace's dingy light couldn't quite reach. The smoke from so many pipes and cigars obscured her vision even more, so that when she did stumble across Robbin's table, she almost didn't even see him.

Beer and ale wet the tabletop, soaking into the crumbs of some long forgotten dinner. The window behind him was shuttered, and the stifling heat of the close room seemed to have found its way to this one corner. Robbin sat slumped over in his seat, elbows on the table, head in hands. He looked uncomfortably hot, which would be a combination of his constant fevers and the stifling room. His hair curled from sweat and whatever else he'd accidentally gotten onto himself, because she could tell even from a few feet away that he was drunk.

Brenna turned to Hannara, stopping her and the guards a few feet back. Hannara stood with her arms pinned to her sides, hovering by the firelight, trying not to make eye contact with the soldiers that grinned at her from the dark.

"Stay there. I'll be just a moment," Brenna said. Before any of them could protest, she spun and marched the rest of the way to Robbin.

The wooden bench was slightly sticky even through her skirt, and she wrinkled her nose as she sat. Robbin didn't so much as flinch at her arrival, and she wondered if he was even aware of his surroundings. He had no guards with him, which seemed astoundingly foolish for Robbin. Normally he was flanked by them, but none of the soldiers off duty in the barracks seemed to be attached to him at all. She wondered if any of them had even recognized him until she came in. He did look startlingly ordinary in rumpled and dirty clothes that any peasant would have owned, and his hair a mess.

"I'd like it if you alerted me to when you left the palace," Brenna said, keeping her hands in her lap. She already knew her skirts would be ruined, but she didn't want her blouse or shawl to suffer the same fate.

Robbin didn't answer at first, his face still buried in his hands, but she saw his breathing pick up. Finally, his voice came out muffled and droning. "I'm still in the palace."

"The barracks don't count as the palace."

"They do."

Brenna sniffed and pursed her lips. "At any rate, you shouldn't be down here by yourself. You know the danger."

Robbin's shoulders shook as he laughed. "Oh, yes." He stretched out the end of the word.

"You're sodding drunk. Perfect." Brenna crossed her arms. "We need to get you back to the palace before anything bad happens, as I'm sure it will. It seems ill-fortune follows you as faithfully as a dog."

She got up and came to his side of the table, placing a hand on his shoulder and trying to push him to his feet.

"I don't want to go back," Robbin said. It wasn't a whine, but it was close.

"Robbin. Stop," she said, fighting against his resistance. She tried hooking him under the arm in order to get better leverage, but failed when he lunged away from her and toward the wall. She sighed and placed her hands on her hips. "You're making a scene."

Robbin laughed, a desperate sound. He stared at his open hands in front of him, as if somehow they were the ones talking to him. His jaw worked for a moment as he seemed to be talking silently to himself, and then his eyes cut slowly to Brenna. With a shock she realized they were brimming with tears and swollen.

He'd been crying. For a long time, judging by the mottled red of his cheeks and eyes. His face looked unbearably damp and miserable, and Brenna quickly cast a glance around the room to see if anyone had spotted them. A few men were looking, but quickly averted their gaze when they saw they were caught. Brenna burned with embarrassment. This was the king, her husband, and she couldn't have him sobbing in a disgusting pub while slobbering drunk.