King of Thorns by Mark Lawrence Read Free Book Online Page A

the look of the Ancraths about you. As dark a branch of the Steward tree as ever grew. You’re all still killing each other so I hear?”
    “That’s King Jorg to you,” I said, knowing I sounded like a spoiled child and unable to help it. Something in Orrin’s calm humour, in the light of him, cast a shadow over me.
    “King? Ah, yes, because of Ancrath, and Gelleth,” he said. “But I’m told your father has named young Prince Degran his heir. So perhaps…” He spread his hands and smiled.
    The smile felt like a slap in the face. So Father had named the new son he’d made with his Scorron whore. And gifted him my birthright. “And you’re thinking to give him the Highlands too?” I asked. Keeping the savage grin on my face however much it wanted to slide away. “You should know that there are a hundred of my Watch hidden in the rocks ready to slot arrows through the gaps in that fancy armour, Prince.” It might even be true. I knew that at least some of the Watch would be tracking the knights.
    “I’d say it was closer to twenty,” Prince Orrin said. “I don’t think they’re mountain men, are they? Did you bring them out of Ancrath, Jorg, when you ran? They’re skilled enough, but proper mountain men would be harder to spot.”
    He knew too much, this prince. It was seriously starting to annoy. And as you know, being angry makes me angry.
    “In any case,” he carried on as if I weren’t about to explode, as if I weren’t about to ram my sword entirely through his body, “I won’t kill you for the same reason you won’t kill me. It would replace two weak kingdoms with a stronger one. When the road to the empire throne, to my throne, leads me here, I would rather find you and your colourful friendsterrorizing the peasants and getting drunk, than find your father or Baron Kennick keeping order. And I hope that by the time I arrive you will have grown wiser as well as taller, and open your lands to me as emperor.”
    I jumped from my rock and the hound stood in my path quicker than quick, still no growl but way too many teeth on display, all gleaming with slobber. I fixed its eyes, which is a good way to get your face bitten off, but I meant to threaten the beast. Holding my sword by hilt and blade, flat side forward, I took another step, a snarl rising in me. I had a hound once, a good one that I loved, before such soft words were taken from me, and I had no wish to kill this one. But I would. “Back.” More growl than word. My eyes on his.
    And with ears flat to its head the beast whimpered and skulked back between the horses’ legs. I think it sensed the death in me. A bitter meal, that necromancer’s heart. Another step away from the world. It sometimes seems I stand three steps outside the lives of other men. One for the heart. One for the thorn bush. And perhaps the first for that dog I remember in dreams.
    I call him mine but the hound belonged to my brother William and me. A wolf-hound of some kind, huger than the two of us, a charger fit for two young knights. He could take William on his back, Will being just four, but if I leapt on too he would shake us both off and nip my leg. We called him Justice.
    “Impressive,” said Prince Orrin, looking anything but impressed. “If you’re finished with my dog then we’ll be on our way. I plan to cross through to Orlanth via High Pass, or Blue Moon Pass if it’s clear, and pay a call on Earl Samsar.”
    “You’ll be on your way when I say so,” I told him, still aching for…something. Fear maybe? Perhaps just a measure of respect would do it. “And by whatever route I allow.” I didn’t like the way he seemed to know the lie of my land better than I did.
    He raised an eyebrow at that, keeping a smile at bay and irking me more than smiling would have. “And what then is your judgment in this matter, King Jorg?”
    Every fibre of me ached to hurt him. In any other man his words would sound smug, arrogant, but here on this cold