Chapter 442: The Moon the Commoners Knew

Chapter 441: The Moon the Commoners Knew

There followed a pause.

Then Lucian laughed, a low sound that seemed to surprise even himself.

Alistair grinned.

"Ever the honest one, our large friend," he said.

Evander laughed as well.

"That much is the truth of it," he said. "The Marquess was quite paranoid, if I may venture the observation. And we all know well enough the cause of it, though I must suggest we proceed with rather greater caution, should we undertake such an enterprise again as we did this night."

"There can be no doubt of that," Lucian said. "I have it also upon good authority that the wall is to be repaired."

Alistair sighed. "After all the labour we expended in widening it, that big man and his valet might slip through."

Benedict, too, released a sigh. They had worked hard indeed to widen that particular breach in the wall.

"In any case," Evander said, "what are your plans for the remainder of the day?"

Lucian rose from his chair and moved towards the window. He stood there a moment, watching the hail strike the glass, his own reflection ghostly within the pane.

"I have a certain person to call upon," he said finally.

---

Meanwhile, as the gentlemen conversed in the comfort of Lucian’s chamber, a rather different sort of knowledge was spreading through the depths of the capital.

It was not spoken aloud, and yet it was known. By those who had been aided, and by those who had joined in the aiding — by those who had seen, and those who had merely heard. The storm might keep them confined within doors, might trap them within their cramped dwellings and crowded shelters, but it could not quiet their hearts.

There could be no disputing it, however cleverly they had all been disguised. The people who had come to them in the night, who had offered food and warmth and safety, who had asked nothing whatsoever in return — they had been seen. They had been marked. And though the disguises had proven clever indeed, though scents had been masked and names exchanged for others, there remained certain things that could not be so easily concealed.

The woman who had introduced herself as Lizzy — her stammer had been absent, it was true, but there had been something in the careful manner with which she counted her words, the deliberate cadence with which she spoke, that had betrayed her. Her eyes, too and more than that, the warmth that seemed to radiate from her very presence.

It did not take the commoners long to know her for who she truly was: the Princess Lyria. The illegitimate princess. She whom the Queen had claimed to be the very cause of the commoners being branded traitors.

The gentleman with the spectacles, whose hair had been dyed a rustic brown and who had worn a beard not his own — he had called himself Jules. But there was no mistaking Baron Julian Redwick. The careful manner of his movements, the sharp intelligence evident behind those spectacles, gave him away entirely.

He who had called himself Lucke, with curling red hair not quite the proper shade, and blue eyes altogether unmistakable — Duke Lucian Aurelgrave. No soul could forget those brilliant eyes of his.

He who had called himself Xander, with hair dyed a rare shade of purple seldom seen within the capital — Duke Alistair Thorncrest. The gentleman who laughed with such ease, who spoke with such warmth, who had tended the injured without a single word of complaint.

The large man who had called himself Bennett, his hair cropped short and dyed a deep green — Earl Benedict Hawthorne. He might disguise the colour of his hair, but no soul forgot the very stature of the war hero once beheld.

He of the midnight-black hair, who had been entrusted with the funds, who had gone so far as to give freely even to beggars, precisely as the Princess had done — he had called himself Evan. And though it required little time for any soul to perceive the truth, his false name bearing such resemblance to his own, the knowledge settled into their hearts regardless: Duke Evander Valenridge.

And in the hearts of the commoners, these gentlemen, together with their Princess, had rewritten history entire.

They had done what few commoners should ever forget. How many among the nobility had ever gone so far as to aid citizens wrongfully accused and treated as common criminals?

They had asked no payment. No allegiance. No oath of any kind. They had simply given aid. And in so doing, they had shown the commoners something they had long found difficult to believe — most especially those who dwelt about the capital itself, bound to no other territory, but subject directly to the Crown’s own rule. That perhaps those who held power might yet turn it towards some purpose beyond their own advancement, after all.

When the storm ceased — and cease it must, eventually, for no storm endures forever — the beggars and the thieves upon these streets should grow fewer. Some should remove themselves to whatever territory they might choose, seeking a better life, to lands where one among these gentlemen held rule, where they might find at last the safety and the dignity so long denied them within the capital. They should carry with them the memory of what had been done on their behalf, and should relate it to their children, and to their children’s children in turn — the tale of the night the storm came, and the lords, and the Princess, came with it.

But above every other consideration, to them, the Moon of the Empire was none other than Princess Lyria.

The illegitimate princess.

She who had come to them when no other soul would. She who had counted her words with such care, who had hidden her stammer so carefully, who had risked the whole of herself to save those who possessed nothing whatsoever.

In their hearts, she was neither false nor illegitimate in the smallest degree. She was the truest thing they had ever known.