Alpennia: Teasers for The Mystic Marriage (ch 14)

The night of the New Year's Court was a time of revelry and pageantry. It was also said that more duels of honor were fought that night than any other, more drunken heads cracked, and more adventurous young men made sadder but wiser. It was not a good night for the sheltered fourteen-year-old son of the Dowager Princess Elisebet to go missing in the wake of his cousin Efriturik's rowdy celebrations. And Barbara was not pleased at being deputized to go off in all her ballroom finery to seek him in a south-bank tavern.

* * *

Barbara pushed a finger into Efriturik’s chest demanding, “Where is Aukustin?”

The bewildered look deepened. “Chustin? Is that what this is about? I sent him about his business before we ever left the palace grounds. Look for him wherever he goes to sulk, for he was none too pleased about it.”

Barbara leaned back with a relieved sigh. She awkwardly sheathed the thin, decorative sword she was still holding and then rapped on the roof of the carriage for the driver to start.

There was silence for a block or two then Efriturik burst out, “Do you think I’m so great a villain as to take a boy his age to that place?”

“And yet,” Barbara said coldly, “You’re so great a fool as to go there yourself unaccompanied.”