“There could be hundreds out there for all I know. Identifying trees is not my main talent.”
“Some poisoner you are.” Errin grins.
“I know what yew looks like,” Stuan says, startling me. I’d forgotten he was there. “It makes good bows.”
Errin and I turn to him. “See. I don’t need to know trees, I have Breena,” I say. “I’ll ask her to go. She’s a bowsmith’s daughter. A bowsmith herself now.”
“She’ll know it,” Stuan says.
“Wait,” Errin interrupts. “Is she making bows for you here?”
I understand. “Oh Gods, I am an idiot.” I shake my head at myself. “We’ll see if Breena has yew here.”
Errin takes a deep breath. “Then this is it. This is really it.”
I look back at her, and then at Stuan. “This is it.”
I leave Errin with Stuan, who is spending less time flinching at her every movement now. Poor Stuan, who seems destined to spend his life guarding one potentially dangerous girl or another. I walk back through the commune, feeling restless. In the courtyard a new set of people is training, and I nod to them as I pass. The air smells thick with baking bread, yeast, and rosemary and that warmth that bread always emits. I call into the kitchen and find Ema working with Trey, the pair of them kneading violently. I go to the larder and snag myself an apple, still crisp, and the bite I take as I enter the gardens is tart, and perfect.
I sit down in the gardens, on the ground, the wool of my dress shielding me from the cold ground. I try to visualize what it will be like here when the spring comes. Then I wonder if I’ll see it—if I’ll see spring at all. The past few days have felt like a whirlwind; after moons of slow planning and seeding, it seems that now the time is coming for the harvest.
I’m not surprised when I hear someone enter the garden, and know without turning that it’s Merek.
“Am I intruding?”
“No.”
He comes to sit with me, lowering himself gingerly, stretching his injured leg out. I finish my apple and dig a small hole, burying the core in the earth. I can feel him watching me again, the weight of his gaze familiar, like a favorite cloak put away for summer and taken out again in time for the winter celebrations. Warm. Safe.
“What’s happening, with us?” he asks finally.
“I don’t know,” I reply immediately. I knew the question was coming, I knew it as soon as he told me he needed to talk to me.
“But something is. It’s not just … It’s not just me again, is it?”
“No,” I admit. “It’s not just you.”
“I was worried … After last time, I can’t … I’m not very good at reading you, as you know.” He shrugs ruefully. “I don’t really trust my own thoughts in that respect anymore. I’ve only been here a few days, and there’s so much happening, and just because things haven’t changed for me …” He trails off. “I don’t know what I’m trying to say. I got it so very wrong last time.”
“You’re not the only one.”
“That’s another thing. I know you said your feelings toward … him have nothing to do with what happened, but …”
“It’s none of your business,” I say gently.
“I know. I suppose at least I know that it’s not all in my head this time. I’m not making something happen that you don’t want.”
“I don’t know entirely what I want.” I’m honest with him—I have to be. “I don’t understand what’s changed for me, or what it might mean. Or if I even want it to mean anything. Yes, something has changed.” I look into his dark eyes. “But I can’t think about it at the moment. I have to think about the war, and Aurek, and defeating him.”
“Of course.” He smiles at me, a soft, real smile, before reaching for my hand and raising it to his lips. “Thank you.”
“For what?”
“For telling me the truth. Now I’m going to go and get some of that rest I keep hearing so much about. I’ll see you later.”
I watch him go, taking a deep breath. Then I turn back to the barren garden and once again sink my fingers into the earth.
* * *
Every morning, I wake up in the hope that today is the day Nia and Kirin, and Hope and Ulrin, will return. At first I know it’s a foolish wish, because not nearly enough time has passed for them to get to their destinations, harvest what they need, and return. But being a fool has never stopped me before, so every time I hear hurried footsteps, I can’t help thinking that it’s someone come to tell me they’re home.
In the meantime, I double not only the men on the caves but send people across Lormere to every camp to reinforce those already there. Serge and Tally send word that men keep coming and going every three days, but they have no idea why, and they don’t believe the children are being harmed. I tell them to keep watching, to report back anything they see, no matter how small. Not knowing what—if anything—it means is a constant tick in my mind. I know I’m missing something.
Errin and Merek work on getting everything ready for the Opus Mortem, as far as they can, with Stuan still watching over Errin, though a lot less vigorously than before. When Merek unbinds her hands fully so she can work unhindered, he barely raises an eyebrow. I think we’ve all stopped worrying that she’s anyone’s puppet now.
Hobb reports that Aurek is still hidden behind what remains of the castle walls, seemingly waiting for Lief to return.
Breena has yew bark to spare, and Errin sets Merek to drying it gently over the fire before calcifying part of it and adding it to the stores. Errin also makes her spagyric tonic, and Merek marvels at the difference between it and the cosmetic version—which she also makes so he can compare them—while I stare at them both blankly because I can neither see nor smell the difference they both assure me is obvious. Errin teaches Merek how to make the Opus Magnum while they have some of the ingredients to hand, and the two of them begin working on remedies and salves for war injuries—just as Errin once promised me, she becomes my apothecary. She makes something she calls firewater, a thick green liquid that gives off an astonishing burst of heat when lit, so powerful I feel it on my face from across the room. When I’m not training with Hobb, or taking my turn in the kitchens, I find myself heading to the laboratory, at peace when I sit and watch them work, even if I don’t understand it.
A heavy, expectant weight starts to fall over all of us as time drags on and nothing moves forward, making us restless. Days become weeks, the deadline for our strike approaches, and yet we’re in stasis. We could not be more ready. Breena has used every scrap of wood, feather, and gut string she’s got to make us bows and arrows. Our swords and knives are so sharp they whistle through the air during training sessions. Errin and Merek can go no further with their work without the quicksilver and the Sal Salis, and they could open their own shop with all the lotions, salves, and potions they’ve been making instead.
Only Hobb is pleased, because every day we have to wait is a day his fighters become a little stronger, and a little better. A little more likely to survive a battle. But when we’re not training, the waiting is like an itch they cannot reach; petty disputes and fights break out daily, and it gets harder to resolve them as everyone stews.
And the longer this nothingness goes on, the tighter my own fears grip me. Hope and Ulrin would have reached Tallith in less than three days on the river, and it shouldn’t have been much more coming back, even traveling against the current. So where are they?
The dreams began the night they left, and the longer they’re away, the worse my night terrors become. Every night I see them dead, Kirin and Nia caught and killed. Traveling on foot through Tregellan, following a road that was dangerous before the Council offered their loyalty to Aurek. In my dreams I see mercenaries smashing their heads in as they sleep. I see turncoat soldiers hanging them before baying crowds. I see the Sisters pinned to the trees on the King’s Road, and at night they wear my friends’ faces, and there is no one to help me get them down. My throat is hoarse
in the morning from screaming, and Errin looks more and more worn from spending her days making potions and her nights dragging me from endless nightmares that keep us both awake.
After two weeks of this, Merek moves quietly, without fuss, into our room, taking Nia’s bed, and Errin moves to his. Then it’s Merek’s calming hand on my forehead when I wake, it’s Merek’s arms I shake and sob in, Merek who tells me I was asleep, it was just a dream, chanting it over and over, stroking my hair, until I calm myself. He holds me until I fall back into a dreamless sleep, my face pressed into his chest, breathing in the smell of him. When I wake, he’s already up and gone, back to the lab.
We never speak of it; it becomes something that happens, something to be endured and then ignored. If it exhausts him, he never shows it. The rest of the commune can tell something is wrong—Errin and Merek are not the only ones woken by me—and they know it’s to do with my missing friends, but they don’t know what the stakes are, how much hinges on their return. I begin to regret that we didn’t all go together. Keeping all these secrets, and being kept in the dark, adds layer upon layer of strain, until my skin feels as though it’s made of paper, and I worry I’m moments away from flying apart.
Finally, four weeks after they left, a night comes when I’m sitting in the armory, putting off going to bed even though it’s long past time, halfheartedly polishing an already gleaming sword, when I hear the footsteps I’ve been waiting for. I throw down my cloth and sheathe the blade, turning expectantly.
Hope stands there, her clothes dusty, purple shadows under her eyes, her skin gray with fatigue.
She crosses the room in three paces and thrusts a pouch into my hands; the stones inside click together as I take it. “Don’t let it touch your skin. It’s toxic.”
Then she throws her arms around me.
I hold her so tightly that she grunts, pushing me away. “I’m all right,” she says. “Bloody boat foundered near Monkham. We had to trek back from there. We ran out of rations a day early.”
“Come,” I say. “Let’s get you some food.”
“I don’t want food,” she says gruffly, unhooking her belt and hanging it on the wall. “I want wine. And my bed. Ulrin snores like a bear. Ymilla is welcome to him. Where are the others?”
“Errin is in the laboratory she set up. I expect everyone else is sleeping.”
Her eyes narrow. “Nia and Kirin?”
“You’ve beaten them back.”
She frowns, and her expression makes my stomach feel as though I’ve swallowed rocks. Every dark vision from my nightmares flashes before my eyes. I wasn’t worrying for nothing. I am right to be afraid.
“I’m sure they’re fine,” Hope says.
But she knows the words are hollow. I should have gone in their place. What happened to the girl who wrote on the walls of Chargate city? Why did I send Nia when I knew she didn’t want to go?
“Wine,” Hope says again firmly. “Then we’ll decide what to do.”
She links her arm through mine, and we step out of the armory, only to come smack straight into Nia as she flies around the corner, sending both Hope and me staggering backward.
“Nia! You’re back!” I gasp, but one look at her pale, tearstained face stops me in my tracks. “What’s happened—?”
Kirin appears behind her, and his face is as grim as hers. “He’s training the children to fight,” he says without preamble. “He’s had his men training them—we saw them, at the camp in Chargate.” His eyes meet mine. “He’s going to make them fight.”
“Slow down,” Hope says, all traces of tiredness vanishing as her spine straightens and she crosses her arms in front of her. “Tell us what you saw. From the beginning.”
“There were roadblocks everywhere; that’s what kept us away so long. Almwyk was a fortress; we had to make a detour south to get into the woods, and the path took us close to the Chargate camp, so we decided to check on it, and Gareld and the men there.” Kirin keeps his tone level, reporting like the soldier he once was. “Gareld told us men had been in and out for days, bringing bags of what they assumed were supplies, and that the latest pair had just left.”
I suck in a deep breath. This is exactly what Merek and I saw at the caves.
“We were suspicious,” Kirin continues. “So when these men came just after lunchtime, we waited until they’d made their delivery, and then we followed them.”
“You what?” Hope says angrily, but I wave her into silence.
“We trailed them back out of the woods, getting as close as we could. We didn’t hear much, but we heard them talking about which boys’ skills were coming on, and which ones they thought were likely to cause problems. One of the men said he would write to the captain that night to let him know the boys would be ready enough to fight soon.”
“They fight with sticks wrapped in cloth,” Nia says. “Just sticks, padded, so there’s little sound. Gareld and the others are too far away to hear it. One of the men complained of being hit, and said how much it hurt, even with the padding. They were laughing about it. They said the boy who did it—Ellis—was coming along nicely. They think he’ll be ready for a blade soon. Him and some others. They talked about getting ready to move them.”
“Move them where?”
“They didn’t say.”
“What about the girls?” I ask.
“Aurek wouldn’t think to teach girls to fight,” Hope says. “He wouldn’t think them capable.”
“He’s going to have a terrible shock in the near future, then, isn’t he?” I say. “We need to wake everyone.”
Hope looks at me. “What do you plan to do?”
“We need to get the children out of the camps. All of them. As soon as we can.”
Hope shakes her head. “Twylla, you yourself said it—we need to be coordinated for this to work. We don’t have the resources for anything but one strike. If we do this—”
“We can’t leave the children there,” I say. “Not now. We have to get them to safety. So this is our one strike.”
“Twylla …”
“If the people find out their children are being prepared for some sort of battle, they’ll riot.” I’m shouting now, my voice echoing back at me. “They’ll riot and be killed, and we’ll be sold out before the sun sets tomorrow and on a gallows by sundown. We need those children out now, and we need to strike immediately after. We have all we need so that Errin can finish the Opus Mortem.” I look at Nia for confirmation that she and Kirin were successful, and she nods. “We send word via the scouts that we’re liberating the camps tomorrow night,” I continue. “And then—we fight.”
“Twylla?” Errin appears, with Stuan shadowing her. Her face lights up when she sees Hope, Nia, and Kirin, but she stops dead a split second later, sensing the dark mood. “Don’t you have it?”
“They have it,” I say before anyone can speak. “But the plan has changed. We have information that Aurek has been training the children to fight. He’s had men teaching them combat. We’re going to be fighting an army of children.”
“We have to get them out,” Errin says immediately, and I could hug her.
“We will,” I say. “Wake everyone. Now.”
Hope and Kirin look at each other. “Wait,” Hope says. “Let’s get more information. Then we can decide what to do …”
“I’ve already decided,” I snap. “I am not leaving children there to be trained as soldiers and used as weapons. This is it. Whether we like it or not.”
Hope’s lips thin. “Where’s Merek?” she says. “He needs to hear this, too.”
I give a short nod. “He’s probably in my room,” I say, turning crimson when Hope, Nia, and Kirin all stare at me.
“I’ll go,” Kirin says, darting off down the corridor.
The rest of the commune has heard the commotion, and people are emerging, their anger at being woken turning to relief, then confusion.
“What’s the matter?” Ema asks, rubbing her eyes.
; “Anyone still asleep, rouse them,” I say.
“Twylla …” Hope warns me for a third time.
I turn to her and lower my voice. “If you were them, and you discovered we kept this from you—even for one night—would you forgive us? Some of those children are their children.”
Finally, she nods her agreement.
“We need everyone in the refectory,” I say. “Now. It’s urgent.”
“What’s happening?” Ymilla asks, looking between all of us. “Are we under attack?”
“No. But we need to begin our offensive sooner than planned.”
“When?”
“Tomorrow night,” I say. “The first wave of the attacks will begin tomorrow night.”
I can feel Nia, Hope—everyone—staring at me as though I’ve lost my mind. For a whole minute, there is perfect silence as everyone waits for me to … what? Laugh, as if I was joking? Tell them I’ve changed my mind? Finally they understand I mean it. I see the way the realization ripples through the crowd like water; faces become stony, or slacken, color heightens, or leaches away. They look at one another, hands reaching out for other hands, to grip arms, shoulders, around waists.
“I will explain everything to you. But for now, please wake everyone who isn’t up, get dressed, and go to the refectory.” When they begin to move back into their rooms, I seek out Trey. “Go to the lookout guards on the posts and summon them here,” I tell him.
“All of them?” he asks.
“All of them.”
He nods and vanishes immediately.
Then I turn to Nia. “You have the salt?”
She nods and shrugs a bag from her shoulder. When I look at Errin, she reaches for it.
“Go and finish the Opus Mortem,” I tell her. “I’ll come to you as soon as I’m finished.”
Errin swallows, her jaw set firmly as she turns in the direction of her laboratory. Hope puts an arm around Nia and gives me a resolute smile before leading her toward the refectory.
The Scarecrow Queen Page 25
