The windows here stood a startling contrast to those below. From the first floor through the third, there were only arrow slits. The fourth and fifth had small but respectable arched, glass windows. Perhaps as wide as Aefric’s forearm was long.

  But here in the training area, the windows were large enough for Aefric and all his knights to stand abreast without any of them feeling crowded.

  When they stood near the library, they could look down over the city and the river, with the harbor off to the left. When they looked out of the windows near the stairs, their view encompassed much of the city, as well as the city walls, and the foothills to the south.

  A main hall split off from the center of the training area, and looked to travel the breadth of the castle.

  “Which direction, your grace?” Ser Yrsa asked, with an expression that made clear Aefric shouldn’t raise the idea of splitting the group.

  Not that he intended to. As an adventurer, he’d learned the folly of splitting the party when exploring new territory. And as duke, he’d seen the same problems play out on their very first day here at Hrafnvigi.

  He had no intention of letting his knights get injured again. At least, not in his own castle.

  “Towards the latent magic, I assume?” Ser Deirdre asked eagerly, standing near the entrance to the hall that would take them that way.

  “No,” Aefric said. “That’ll keep for last, just in case it’s a false lead.”

  They started down the hallway the opposite direction then.

  The main hallway here was as wide as Aefric had come to expect, after the fourth and fifth floors. But this one was far better appointed. Cherry hardwood flooring on the white stone, and plastered walls painted a red so pale it was almost pink.

  A series of paintings depicted past Hrafntonn patriarchs and matriarchs. A vicious looking crew.

  Small iron statues of warriors — each no more than two hands tall — graced marble pillars between the paintings.

  Two sitting rooms, very well appointed. Then a series of guest apartments. Each with multiple chambers, and furnishings fine enough to house visiting royalty.

  Some of his knights gave small whistles of appreciation at the furnishings in those apartments, and at the rich clothes in the closets. Even with all the dust, it still made an impressive sight.

  At the end of the hall, a small, undecorated side passage ran from the back of the castle to the front.

  A series of small rooms here were clearly for the favored servants. Or perhaps for the servants of those visiting nobles and royals who were staying in the guest rooms here on this floor.

  Aefric and his knights did find doors leading from the sitting rooms and guest rooms of this floor into that network of secret passages. But Aefric didn’t allow exploring of those passages here and now.

  At each end of this smaller hallway, a door in the corner led to stairs up to the tower above.

  “Shall we check the towers?” Ser Deirdre asked eagerly.

  Aefric nodded.

  They started at the front of the castle, going first up into that tower.

  Two more small floors here, each perhaps five strides across. The first floor housed a guard station, and the second was split into two rooms. One held four bunks for those guards, in two bunk beds. The other stored a good deal of ballista ammo, which looked like arrows taller than Aefric.

  Arrows big and sharp enough to test dragon scales.

  More stairs let up onto the top of the tower, where they found the great ballista that needed such ammo. Its drawstring had been cut, and would need replacing. But when in good repair, this ballista could probably hit a target hundreds of yards away. Possibly reaching targets on the far banks of the river.

  The whipping wind carried the saltwater scent of the Risen Sea. An impressive view, from up here. The whole of the city, and out beyond the walls, as well.

  The second tower matched the first, both in contents, and in the way its ballista had been disabled.

  No magic so far.

  Aefric and his knights returned to one of the sitting rooms for lunch. They sat on thickly padded couches upholstered with fine silk in dark colors. They snacked on provisions provided by Ashling’s kitchen. Leftover boar from dinner — not quite ready to melt in Aefric’s mouth today, but still quite good — along with fresh nava fruit and honeyed oat bread, all washed down with water.

  Thus refreshed, they started down the last hall.

  No paintings or statues on this side. Tapestries. Old ones, that depicted scenes from what looked like Malimfar’s history. One likely their discovery of the Indecisive River Valley. Two others were sea battles, and two more land battles. The last involved a castle that could have rivaled Water’s End in its size and brilliance.

  All of these scenes must’ve involved the Hrafntonn family. Otherwise, why have them? Or at least, why have them here? But if so, the scenes and the people in them were not identified.

  Starting from the training room, they found one sitting room down this hall, just as fine as the others on this floor. Facing it, the family armory.

  At least, Aefric assumed it was the family armory. The weapons and armor here were of much finer quality than any he’d found in the other armories, save perhaps for the hidden one, behind the dais with the thrones.

  These weapons — swords and spears, maces and great hammers, longbows and crossbows and complicated recurve bows — were decorated with gold and gems. The armor was similarly embellished. The suits of chainmail were gold-washed, and the suits of plate mail etched with the Hrafntonn sigil in red gold.

  Fine as those weapons were though, Aefric spotted no magic among them.

  Empty spaces along the walls indicated that about half of the weapons and armor were missing.

  “Likely the missing weapons were up on Frozen Ridge with the family members from the fourth and fifth floors,” Ser Beornric said. “Probably their best weapons, too.”

  “That’s the way to bet,” Ser Yrsa said distractedly. “I know the Hrafntonns weren’t allowed to leave with them.”

  “What are you thinking, General?” Aefric asked.

  “This is not a family that surrenders, your grace,” Ser Yrsa said. “Consider the artwork we’ve seen. The training room here that’s clearly for family and treasured guests only. The sheer number of armories.”

  She frowned at Aefric. “They’re very militant.”

  “I agree,” Ser Deirdre said. “Must’ve driven them crazy to be ordered to surrender their keep and leave with only the clothes on their backs.”

  “That’s just it,” Ser Yrsa said, turning to Aefric. “I have a great deal of trouble believing that they accepted the surrender order and simply vacated.”

  “But clearly they did,” Ser Beornric said. “They’re not here now. And they did leave a few surprises for the next occupants.”

  “Nevertheless,” Ser Yrsa said, gesturing vaguely around. “This is a very defendable castle. They could have held here. Sent for reinforcements. And they’d’ve had at least two great ballistae to use against occupying forces when Malimfar’s armies arrived to retake Kivash.”

  “Perhaps they feared his grace’s magic,” Ser Deirdre said. “Frozen Ridge must’ve made quite an impression.”

  “Perhaps,” Ser Yrsa said, unconvinced. “The problem there, though, is that word couldn’t have reached them ahead of Armyr’s armies. Or not by much. By all accounts, Armyr caught Kivash completely off-guard.”

  “Perhaps they feared retribution against the rest of the city, if they tried to hold out?” Aefric asked.

  Ser Yrsa scoffed. “Your grace would consider that. These people would not.”

  “I see one possibility,” Ser Beornric said. “Perhaps all of their best warriors and strategists were up on Frozen Ridge. Perhaps those who remained behind weren’t up to holding off a siege.”

  Ser Yrsa nodded. “Could be.”

  “We know they had a court wizard,” Aefric said. “And we know that court wizard had enough time to prepare a few traps.”

  “You think their wizard was in touch with whoever they had up on Frozen Ridge?” Ser Deirdre asked.

  “They’d know reinforcements weren’t coming,” Aefric said. “They could fight and die — meaning more Hrafntonn dead, on top of whoever they lost at Frozen Ridge — or they could leave and live. Even the most militant family would put survival of their house ahead of any one piece of land.”

  “Told you he’s starting to think like a duke,” Ser Beornric said with a smile.

  Several of Aefric’s other knights joined that smile.

  “That makes more sense,” Ser Yrsa said. “It also suggests that the Hrafntonns had both some dead and at least one survivor up on Frozen Ridge.”

  “And that they’ll come back,” Ser Beornric said. “As soon as they can convince King Eadred to risk it.”

  “Possibly on their own,” Ser Yrsa said. “We’ll need to track the escape route down under the castle. Find where it comes out and make sure we control it.”

  Ser Deirdre whistled, low and long.

  Everyone looked at her. She smiled at Aefric.

  “Excuse me, your grace,” she said. “I was just thinking. Mad as the Hrafntonns must be at us for taking the castle, how much angrier must they be at King Eadred?”

  True. The loss of Kivash and Hrafnvigi went back to King Eadred’s ill-fated attempt to invade Armyr.

  “She has a point,” Ser Yrsa said softly. “Not sure how it helps us, though.”

  “I have an idea on that,” Aefric said, “but it’ll have to wait. We’ve more castle to cover.”

  Beyond the armory and sitting room, down that side of the castle, there were only two more sets of double-doors before the small passage at the end of the hall.

  Aefric checked them and pronounced them real doors, and free from traps. And while he was checking, he made sure that there weren’t any hidden doors long the hallway itself.

  There were not.

  Ser Beornric found the keys then, and behind those sets of double-doors were the best appointed apartments in the castle. Even the floorboards in these apartments were of calinwood. Each had a sumptuous bedroom, a private bath with the tub filled and heated by magic, multiple closets — including one closet each just for jewelry.

  Sitting rooms, with sets for chess and other strategy games. Private meeting rooms. Each even had a private, personal armory behind a hidden door.

  Those two armories had been emptied, suggesting that the occupants had been at Frozen Ridge.

  Frozen Ridge.

  Aefric realized with a sigh, as he went through those rooms with his knights, that he’d come to accept that shorthand term for what he’d done that day this past spring.

  Didn’t mean he had to like it.

  The secret passages had hidden doors in the sitting rooms of these apartments, but Aefric held off exploring them just a little longer.

  Small bits of magic throughout these apartments, mostly involving comfort and convenience. Mattresses that could heat with a command word. Mirrors that could retain and display any image they’d reflected in the past … half-hour or so. Possibly for comparing outfits.

  Aefric did find an interesting twist off of the message spell he knew, on one of the nightstands in the bedroom nearest the river. It was a small statue of a servant.

  Anyone could touch that statue and speak, and his or her words would be carried to another room in the castle. Likely a servants’ waiting room, or similar.

  Ser Deirdre spotted one bit of tactical magic in the apartments. One meeting room held a mirror and map of Kivash and environs that proved to be a scrying device.

  Touching any spot the map beneath the mirror caused the mirror to show an aerial view of that region from about two hundred feet above the ground.

  Nifty bit of work. Aefric would have to study it at some point, so he could develop something similar for Water’s End. And perhaps Behal.

  Otherwise, of course, the main magic through those two apartments was scry wards.

  The bedrooms of these two apartments also had trapdoor shafts that looked to lead down to an escape passage beneath the keep. The shafts were angled and looked smooth, but Aefric hoped they had a lot of padding at the bottom.

  The shafts could wait though. Something else was bothering him about all this opulence.

  Aefric was looking over a cloth-of-gold bedroom curtain that shaded out the afternoon sun, when he asked a question.

  “Could this have been the Hrafntonn family’s primary residence?”

  “I doubt it,” Ser Yrsa said. “I’d expect their primary residence to be in their own lands, well south of here. Or perhaps near the capital at Svarturvigi. Why do you ask?”

  Aefric gestured around him. “Magic for convenience and comfort. Furniture with gold scrollwork. Entire closets full of expensive jewelry. Elbar’s Blood, there’s a calinwood chest in here filled with enough gold coins to buy a warship. Who invests this much in a secondary residence?”

  “Someone rich enough to afford more,” Ser Arras said. “Or perhaps someone who comes here to make an impression.”

  “Why here?” Aefric asked. “We’re a long way from Svarturvigi.”

  “Ah,” Ser Arras said, smiling. And in that smile, Aefric wondered if he saw an echo of Duchess Arinda. “But here is where they can meet with merchant families from all over Qorunn. Without necessarily involving the royal family.”

  “Interesting idea,” Aefric said.

  “Suggests they might use that back entrance for more than just indulging their kinks,” Ser Deirdre said.

  “It makes sense,” Ser Beornric said. “They’d been in Kivash for a long time. They’d want to maintain a strong level of influence here, and money and appearances help that.”

  “Suggesting,” Aefric said, “that they lost more in the war than a castle and some lives. This castle may contain most of their family wealth.”

  “Yes,” Ser Yrsa said, “but they can’t recover that loss without getting Kivash back first. Coming after us here wouldn’t help. Not as long as Duchess Ashling holds the city.”

  After a survey of those apartments that took longer than Aefric wanted it to — mostly to make sure they didn’t miss anything important — Aefric and his knights continued down to the smaller, cross passage at the end of the hall.

  More doors for more servants quarters here, each connected to the secret passages that networked the castle. Though one of those rooms was a waiting area with passable couches and simple pinewood tables. In the center of the main table in that room, a small statue of a servant. The delivery portion of that message spell.

  At each end of the smaller hall, doors that doubtless led to the towers above.

  One tower, the one nearer the harbor, was like the first two. Guard post, guard bunks, and a ballista with its drawstring cut.

  The door to the other tower, though, was spell-locked.

  “Now we’re getting somewhere,” Ser Deirdre said, rubbing her hands together.

  Ser Deirdre, of course, wanted to go straight after the spell lock.

  Aefric called her back. Made his knights stand aside.

  He shifted his focus outward and into the flows of Qorunn’s magic. From there, he shifted his attention to the spell lock, and past it. He could tell there was more magic nearby, but…

  Not close to the door. Good. He’d been worried that there might’ve been more of that strange latent magic behind this spell lock as well, but no.

  It was just as spell-locked door.

  He quickly confirmed then through the yellow diamond of the Brightstaff that the door wasn’t trapped.

  “It’s safe,” he said.

  Ser Deirdre gave Aefric a hopeful look. “May I, your grace?”

  Aefric nodded.

  For Aefric, picking a spell lock was a matter of mental effort and a small gesture. Apparently, the process worked differently for Ser Deirdre.

  Her right hand seemed to wave bonelessly as she used it to trace a sigil in the air. Maroon power followed her hand, scorching the air in its wake, and carrying the scent of burnt berries.

  The first one must’ve been wrong, because she swore softly, shook her head, and wiped away the sigil.

  The second was no better. And this time, she gritted her teeth. The other knights made restless noises. Ser Yrsa did nothing more demonstrative than drawing a single breath, but it somehow felt impatient.

  Ser Deirdre’s gaze flicked quickly to Aefric, as though determined that he not see her fail.

  She huffed a deep breath and tried a third time, sketching in the air a more elaborate maroon sigil. And this time, the burning berry smell had a distinctly blackberry flavor to it.

  “Hah!” she said, thrusting her hand through the center of the sigil, which flared and broke apart, while the door itself echoed the maroon flare.

  Sure enough, the spell lock was now gone.

  “Tricky little bastard, but I got it,” Ser Deirdre said, shooting Aefric a smile. “May I go first, your grace? In case there’s more magic?”

  “Slowly and carefully,” Aefric said.

  “Why should she start now?” Ser Yrsa muttered.

  But Ser Deirdre winked at Aefric, drew her rapier, and opened the door.

  Stairs going up. One flight.

  Door at the top of the stairs. Not locked, because Ser Deirdre opened it.

  “Next time let me check for traps first,” Aefric said.

  “Of course, your grace,” Ser Deirdre said. “Plenty of magic here.”

  Aefric fought not to push past Sers Yrsa and Beornric, who used their armored bulk to make sure Aefric stayed on the stairs, while Ser Yrsa made placating gestures.

  “Let her check it out,” she said softly. “Deirdre’s a good hand at this.”

  Waiting for Ser Deirdre seemed to take forever. And she didn’t help the wait, by oohing and aahing at everything she found, without saying what she was finding.