My Ruthless Prince by Gaelen Foley Read Free Book Online

he has entrusted to me," James replied, "to be used at my discretion, at the appropriate time."
    Glasse shrugged. "Obviously, he is a valuable asset."
    James nodded. "His perspective will be crucial in our quest to defeat the Order once and for all."
    "Unless all this is a trick," the Russian novelist chimed in. The highborn writer's books and plays had enchanted the young, impressionable Czar.
    "I am not that brave, sir." Drake gazed at him, allowing the fashionable leader of Russian intellectual circles to stare into his eyes, as if to probe his motives for himself, boring into his very soul.
    "You see?" James murmured proudly at length. "I told you, my friends, it would be a waste to kill him, that I could bring him round. Drake is on the true path now. Besides, if my bodyguard has proved his loyalty to me, then nobody else has cause to question him."
    "Very well, old friend," Glasse murmured to James. "If you are satisfied, then so are we, of course."
    The cardinal shrugged in agreement. "Better he should be for us than against us."
    "Precisely."
    "So, tell us, Falkirk, why have you called this gathering of the Council?" the Austrian general inquired. "You indicated it was a matter of the utmost consequence."
    "Ah, but we are missing someone," the French duke interjected with a faint, sly smile.
    "Indeed," James answered with a low laugh. "No doubt you all are wondering why Malcolm isn't here." James looked around at them for a long moment.
    Meanwhile, ever so subtly, Drake's hand moved closer to the hilt of his weapon. If any man objected to James's scheme, he was ready.
    "The truth is," James admitted, glancing around at him, "our dear leader Malcolm wasn't invited. I didn't feel he was ready to see the wonder that I have called you together to show you, my friends. Drake--the box, please."
    Drake stepped back, turned around, and retrieved the ancient kingwood case from where it sat on the nearby sideboard.
    He brought it over and set it on the table, then glanced at James in question. The old man nodded, and Drake dutifully opened the box.
    James stood, tilting the box so that the others could see inside. "Behold, gentlemen. The lost scrolls of Valerian the Alchemist, the greatest of our forefathers."
    "The Alchemist's Scrolls!" the men exclaimed, rising from their seats to lean closer, staring at the yellowed medieval documents.
    "Are these truly the authentic--?"
    "But where on earth did you find them?"
    "It's a treasure trove . . . is there anything in these scrolls to help us now?"
    "Much." James looked around soberly at them, and the men settled back in their seats, amazed. "Gentlemen, allow me to be blunt. The current head of the Council has failed us. Badly. We must face the facts.
    "Malcolm pays no more than lip service to the old gods. He thinks the dark wisdom is no more than fairy tales. He mocks the princes of the air and the unseen powers of this world, the very forces that sustained Valerian and have inspired our forefathers since the Middle Ages."
    James planted his hands on the table and looked around at them. "If our so-called leader were truly one of us, we would not have met with our recent bitter failure. Look at the priceless opportunity he let slip through our fingers.
    "Napoleon's empire gave us our greatest opportunity since Charlemagne to bring all the peoples of Europe together as one. Think of the chance that is gone. One language, one currency, no more wars, no more hunger. Who can say? In time, we might have extended our rule across the Mediterranean to overtake the Ottoman Empire, and across the water, as well, to the Americas.
    "For decades we worked, spent untold fortunes inserting our loyal believers into every royal court, patiently, carefully, waiting for our moment. And then it came. In the person of the brilliant Napoleon Bonaparte, that muse of fire, a perfect tool wrought for us by the hands of the gods.
    "We were useful to him, but he was even more useful to us without even