Chapter 4: The Third Glass

"That's what he said to the man before me, my lord," Corwin answered.

"I've let him think he still owns me for two years, so he'd keep telling me his plans."

Leander came down the last steps.

He stopped close enough that Corwin could smell the soap on his throat.

"Give me the vial."

Corwin put it in his palm.

Leander held it to the light, and his lips went thin, and he did not look surprised.

"Ten drops," Leander said.

"In the third glass."

"Do exactly that."

Corwin stared at him.

"My lord, the whole point is that you don't drink it."

"I won't.

"Someone else will hold it in front of two hundred people."

Leander gave the vial back.

"Do you understand?"

Corwin did, and he felt his own mouth curve.

"Yes, my lord," he said.

"He can't refuse his own host's toast."

"Not in front of the Crown Prince," said Leander.

By nine that night, Dauntrey House blazed with light.

Four hundred candles were lit in the long hall.

Two hundred guests moved under them in silk and jewels, and a quartet played in the gallery.

The Crown Prince arrived at ten.

Dorian Wyke was twenty-four, tall and fair, in a white and gold uniform.

He had a handsome, composed face and the careless ease of a man no one had ever told no.

Behind him walked a young man in a plain physician's coat, freckled, with wind-flattened red-brown curls.

He looked at the four hundred candles and the three tiers of cake.

Tobias Reeve.

Corwin had read about him for a year.

Tobias already had a smear of cream on his cuff and a pastry in one hand, and Corwin liked him on sight.

Leander greeted them in the receiving line without the smallest crack in his face.

"Your Highness.

"Doctor."

Dorian said, "Happy birthday, Leander."

Leander said, "You came."

Neither of them said anything else, but the silence ran longer than the words needed.

Keep reading free with an account. Start The Villain Duke's Butler Served Him Too Well from Chapter 1, then sign up free to read the rest of this chapter.