Free The Thief's Daughter by Jeff Wheeler

her, but now they looked a peaceful blue. Maybe she was a water sprite, as Mancini had often joked. All Owen knew was that she had some kind of magic that made him ache inside.
    “I’m glad you are safe,” Evie whispered, looking at him with brooding, worried eyes.
    He almost brought her fingers to his lips, but a soldier opened the front door of the inn just then, and Owen saw Severn striding toward it. The king’s boots were mud-spattered, but he looked elated at the victory at Blackpool.
    Owen used those last moments before the king entered the room to squeeze Evie’s fingers gently and give her a tender smile. “You were brilliant,” he confessed, winking at her.
    She flushed with pleasure at the compliment and turned to curtsy to King Severn. Owen bowed formally beside her.
    “My lord,” Evie said. “You are the true sovereign of Ceredigion. Your people were faithful to you. I wish I could have delivered up the pretender in person, but he was too afraid to come ashore and face me in battle. ’Tis a pity, for I would have liked to beat him. In the language of Wizr, I believe the threat has been blocked .”
    The king looked at her with satisfaction; his gray eyes were lit with gratitude. “Well done, Lady Mortimer. Lady Elysabeth Victoria Mortimer, pardon me,” he added, seeing she was about to correct him. “You’ve shown great sense, bravery, and pluck, and you will be rewarded. I promise you that. To also use the parlance of Wizr, you have proven you are more than a pawn. I best make good use of you then. Tell me all that happened. Leave nothing out.”

The Duke of North Cumbria oversees a vast land in Northern Ceredigion. It is a land of towering mountains wreathed with snow and ice. There are glaciers there that are older than time and riddled with ice caves from the melt. I have spoken to the palace mapmaker, who informs me that the river feeding Kingfountain comes from this land of ice and snow. The winters in North Cumbria are harsh, and there is little travel in or out during those months. The people are used to it. They are hardy folk with a queer dialect not dissimilar to that of Atabyrion. There is belief that Atabyrion was once part of Ceredigion. The lands are only separated by narrow gaps of water. The Dukes of the North have been loyal to the Argentines for generations. King Severn himself was raised in the North when his uncle Warrewik governed the land from the mighty stronghold of the North. The fortress is called Dundrennan.
     
    —Polidoro Urbino, Court Historian of Kingfountain

CHAPTER EIGHT
    Dundrennan

    Owen could hear the fire in the hearth crackling and feel the warmth of its flames on his shoulders. But his eyes were fixed on the Wizr board. It was the beautiful, handcrafted set that King Severn had given to him when he was eight years old. And this time he was playing the king himself.
    Severn’s eyes were as gray as storms as he bent over the board, his gaze intense and his lips pressed hard together. He was losing. Again. Owen knew it rankled the king that a seventeen-year-old could best him half the time. Sometimes Owen let him win and the king would look at him suspiciously, never certain if his victory had been hard-won or yielded out of graciousness.
    “Hold nothing back,” Severn admonished him, bringing forward a piece shaped like a knight on horseback. The king’s free hand fidgeted with his dagger. “If I win, I want to earn it.”
    The king let go of the piece.
    When Owen played Wizr, he deliberately kept his face neutral. He had learned from playing with Evie that he tended to smile when his opponent was about to make a mistake. She used to keep watch on his mouth from start to finish, which had lost him plenty of games. He had trained himself not to give anything away.
    Owen lifted his hand and moved his Wizr piece forward from across the board. “Threat and . . . defeat.” Then he smiled.
    The king’s face darkened with a scowl. “By the Fountain!” he