The Complete Marked Series Box Set

by March McCarron

  Yarrow frowned. “That is my fear.”

  The carriage halted before the King’s Repose, and Bray alighted with haste, envisioning the soft embrace of her bed.

  As they walked up to the inn she fell in beside Yarrow. “I’m sorry you had to kill,” she said quietly. “I know you weren’t keen on the idea.”

  He slowed his steps and she matched his pace, letting the others outstrip them. The wetness of the air clung to her bare arms.

  “That’s the thing,” he said. “I didn’t kill him, just left him unconscious. It must have been Arlow…but why?”

  Bray shrugged, not terribly concerned over the fate of a hired gun. “Perhaps he roused and Arlow was defending himself.”

  “Perhaps…”

  “I meant to ask,” Bray opened the front door. “What tipped you off to the assassins? You were too far away to hear Adearre. Did you see them?”

  They trudged slowly up the stairs.

  “No,” he said through a yawn. “You tipped me off—your alarm.”

  She nodded, too sleepy to think. They said good night. Bray entered her room, unlaced the dress with difficulty, and shimmied free, leaving it pooled on the floor like a gleaming emerald puddle. She collapsed into the soft plush of her mattress, clung to a great soft pillow like a lover.

  It was as sleep stole over her that Yarrow’s words finally hit home. He had been tipped off by her alarm. He knew how she felt. And that meant…

  She slept as soundly as the dead, a small smile on her lips.

  Part III

  Chapter Nineteen

  Yarrow and Bray reentered the inn early the next morning and joined their other companions for breakfast.

  “That was fast,” Ko-Jin said through a mouthful of rice.

  “She wasn’t there.” Yarrow sank into a seat across from his friend. “She and her things were gone. The innkeeper said he didn’t see her leave.”

  Ko-Jin swallowed and set down his chopsticks. “That’s strange…”

  “Yes,” Yarrow agreed. “I’m worried about her. If she’s in some kind of trouble, it would kill Dedrre…”

  Yarrow could hear Dedrre’s mood—his feelings twanged mildly with interest in something or other, probably a new mechanical project.

  “She’s Chisanta though,” Peer said. His temple was still bandaged, a nasty maroon bruise creeping out from beneath the gauze. “Can’t be in danger, can she? Even Cosanta hold their own in a fight.”

  “The King’s guard were all drugged,” Adearre reminded them, “and Yarrow tells us it was her sedatives which were stolen. I imagine an unconscious Chisanta is as easy to overpower as any other unconscious man.”

  “Or woman,” Bray added.

  “We should go to Che Mire,” Yarrow said. “All the clues point in that direction.”

  Bray leaned back in her chair, her expression contemplative.

  “Not all the clues,” Adearre said. “Remember that the grouping of the fires suggests a headquarters in the east of Daland.”

  The Chaskuan breakfast Yarrow had requested arrived: pickled vegetables, spicy soup, and rice. He took several bites, then pushed the tray away. It tasted wrong—reminded him he was far from home.

  Once they had all eaten and the table had been cleared, Bray extracted the information the head constable had sent. She read quietly, turning the pages with care, as Yarrow drummed his fingers on the table and fidgeted in his chair. When she finished with a section, she slid the file across the table to Adearre.

  “Well?” Peer asked at last.

  “Hm? Oh…” Bray said, without looking up. “The fires are consistent with the one in Greystone—multiple starting points, no survivors.”

  “Can we be sure there were marked children involved?” Yarrow asked.

  “Not for a fact.” Bray thumbed through the papers. “But three of the four definitely involved a child aged fourteen.”

  She opened a fourth folder and silence fell again. Yarrow watched her face closely, admiring her focus and intensity. He saw her eyes widen and her lips part in confusion.

  “This is unbelievable,” she said, setting down one sheaf and picking up another.

  “What is it?” Yarrow asked.

  “This fire, the one that happened last year, involved a boy who had lost one of his hands working in a cotton factory, but the coroner’s report said that all of the remains had two hands.”

  “So one body was missing?” Yarrow asked.

  “No.” Bray held out the page so he could see for himself. “They were all there, but the one consistent with the age and gender of that boy had two hands.”

  “So it must have been someone else, a different child,” Peer said.

  “Was it the fourteen-year-old?” Ko-Jin asked.

  Bray nodded. “Yes.”

  “There is another explanation then,” Ko-Jin said seriously. “If he managed to get into the Aeght a Seve before he died he could have been gifted physically, as I was…”

  They were quiet for a moment, processing this possibility.

  “How would an untrained boy get to the Aeght a Seve?” Peer asked.

  “It’s not as unlikely as it sounds.” Yarrow scooted his chair in closer. “There are many documented cases of Chisanta going to the Aeght a Seve in the moments before they die without the aid of Ada Chae or Tearre, as a kind of mental refuge.”

  “But we get the gift we’re needing. Why would the lad gain a hand when what he’s truly needing is fire resistance?” Peer challenged.

  Yarrow handed the file to Adearre, who read the words hungrily. “There are many theories that the first gift works differently than the latter four. Those are certainly determined by the need of the moment, but the first, as it requires no sacrifice, seems to function differently.”

  “That could be true,” Bray gestured towards Peer. “Like you—you could have been taught to read. At the moment of your first gift your circumstances had changed, but you still received the thing you had wanted for years before.”

  Peer flushed and dug his fingernail into the grain of the wooden table. “Not exactly. It wasn’t that I lacked the chance to learn reading as a boy—it’s just that the letters always got mixed up on the page. I just couldn’t do it, no matter how hard my foster mother tried to teach me. Don’t think a Chisanta would have had any better luck.”

  “Well,” Adearre said, changing the subject casually, “we cannot know for sure one way or the other, but there were no other missing boys in the neighborhood to account for an extra body. It says so in the report.”

  A knock at the door interrupted Yarrow’s contemplation. A telegram boy scurried into the room and Bray held out her hand to accept the small roll.

  “Dolla again?” Peer asked, as Bray unrolled the message and read, her brow creased in confusion.

  She stood. “Boy,” she called to the departing back of the deliverer, “is there a way to tell where or who this is from?”

  “Not who—but where, yes. If you come down to the post office and speak to Mr. Grants.”

  “Thank you,” Bray said, and the boy retreated.

  Peer’s blue eyes followed Bray with interest. “You all right?”

  “It says ‘Che Mire is false trail. Answers at Easterly Point ruin,’” Bray read.

  “And it isn’t signed?” Ko-Jin asked.

  “No,” Bray said. She handed the roll to Peer on her right, who read it and passed it on to Adearre.

  “What kind of ruin is at Easterly Point?” Adearre asked.

  “An old Chisanta temple,” Yarrow said. “It hasn’t been used for five hundred years, at least.”

  “So…what are we going to do?” Ko-Jin asked.

  Bray’s lips thinned. “I’m not sure. We’ve now got two leads, neither terribly sound.” She stood up and began to pace about the dining room. “This anonymous tip could be a misdirection. But, then again, so could the telegram in the assassin’s pocket…”

  “You’ve a point there,” Ko-Jin said slowly.
“I hadn’t thought before, but what kind of hitman carries around rendezvous information?”

  “Good thing the two places are so nearby,” Peer said with thick sarcasm. Yarrow frowned—he was right. If they chose wrongly, it would send them weeks in the wrong direction.

  “We could split the party and investigate both leads,” Ko-Jin suggested.

  “We could…” Bray chewed on her lip for a moment. “Well, before we do anything, I want to head down to the post office to see if we can find out a bit more about this.” She held up the telegram.

  Yarrow and the others stood to join her and they walked out into the sunny common room.

  Bray paused. “Yarrow, can I have a word?”

  “Sure.”

  They slipped into an alcove between the kitchens and the common room for privacy. He hadn’t been this close to her since they fought. She smelt good, like herbs and leather.

  “I know you think we should go to Che Mire,” she said. Yarrow nodded. Vendra could be in danger—how could they even consider ignoring that? Bray pressed on, “I just wish we had a bit more to go on. I was wondering if you’ve worked at all on what we talked about a few days ago—about using your gift?”

  “Well…” Yarrow said. In truth he hadn’t thought of it at all since his conversation with Adearre. His mind had been otherwise occupied. “A bit.”

  “I was thinking—if you could manage to tap into Vendra’s feelings, you’d probably be able to tell if she’s in trouble. You two seemed like you were…close. So—”

  “I hardly know her,” Yarrow cut across, sensing Bray’s pang of jealousy and wanting to ease it. “Her grandfather is a good friend of mine, that’s all. But I can try.”

  Bray smiled, her emotions ratcheting back to a normal, happy equilibrium.

  “At this point, how well do you know your siblings?” she asked.

  Yarrow took a moment to digest this. She was entirely right, he didn’t know his brothers and sisters well at all. His youngest sister had been a baby when he left. He didn’t know a single thing about the girl she was now. Yet, he felt all of them in his mind, they thrummed with their constant frustrations, joys, and fears.

  “The people who you’ve come to love since receiving the gift, can you remember the moment they popped into your mind? What were you thinking? What was happening? I’d consider that. We’ll go question the telegraph worker. There is no sense in rushing off to the wrong place with only partial information.” Bray reached for his hand and gave it a squeeze. “Good luck.”

  Yarrow’s heart pounded at the intimacy of her touch. His skin seemed to tingle where it had met hers.

  She left then, clearly unaware of the effect she had on him.

  Yarrow wandered back up the stairs to his room and kicked his shoes off out of habit. It seemed as good a place as any to conduct this strange experiment. To ease the whirling of his mind—the worry and self-doubt—he began to perform the Ada Chae. His limbs formed each stance of their own accord. His senses began to drift as his body relaxed, allowing the Aeght a Seve to take him.

  The Place of Five was, as ever, warm, dry, and bright. The grass blew against his legs and the leaves of the single great tree rustled in the breeze. Aside from the wind, the place stood silent. Unnaturally silent—no bird songs, no insects droning, no people.

  Yarrow decided to stay a while and meandered towards the tree. Perhaps the place that gave him his gift would help him to open it further.

  Its bark looked strange up close, as smooth as driftwood. The sunshine hit its polished surface in overlapping smears of light, giving the impression of a watercolor painting. Not for the first time, Yarrow wondered what the Aeght a Seve really was. Did it truly exist somewhere?

  He sank down onto the grass and leaned his weight against the trunk of the tree. Idly, he pricked the palm of his hand against the stiff tips of grass, while he focused his mind—love.

  What is love, really? Yarrow laughed quietly to himself. What a ridiculous, hackneyed question. One he was utterly unqualified to answer.

  But he had promised Bray he would make an effort, so make an effort he would. Her prompt had been a good one—Yarrow decided to review in his mind those three significant occasions. The first had been Ko-Jin. Yarrow closed his eyes and tried to relive the moment.

  They had been living at the Cape for about a month at the time. Ko-Jin had been in high spirits that day. It had been his fifteenth birthday and he had won a sparring match against a much older Cosanta. They had walked from the library to the dining hall when a telegram boy had entered the hall and given Ko-Jin the familiar slip of paper. Ko-Jin, a smile still on his face, had unrolled the message and read. Yarrow could remember with perfect clarity how his friend’s face had crumpled. He stood stock still, despite the bustle around him, staring at that telegram, as if hoping the words upon it would change.

  “What’s happened?” Yarrow had asked.

  “It’s my step-father.” His voice hitched as he spoke. “He died—his ship foundered in last night’s storm.”

  Yarrow had felt such a pang of sympathy for Ko-Jin, imagining how horrible it must be to lose a family member. Then, quite suddenly, he didn’t have to imagine any longer. He could feel Ko-Jin’s pain like a sharp lance through his own heart. He pulled Ko-Jin into a tight embrace and his friend had cried onto his shoulder. Yarrow’s own eyes had not been dry.

  Mentally, Yarrow jumped forward nearly a year in his mind, to the day he had first felt Arlow. He, too, had received news about a relative—good news. He’d learned that his uncle had been knighted and asked to remain at court. Arlow had looked as though he would explode with happiness.

  “You know what this means, of course?” he had asked, enthusiasm spilling over. “When I turn eighteen, I shall have an introduction to the royal family!”

  Arlow had looked into Yarrow’s face with an expression of such wild joy—and despite the fact that the happenings of court were of no interest whatsoever to Yarrow himself—he couldn’t help but feel overjoyed on his friend’s behalf. That had been the moment. Arlow’s exultation drummed in his own mind.

  The third case, Yarrow abruptly realized, was much the same. It had been the week before Dedrre’s sixty-fifth birthday. Yarrow had come for tea.

  “I’m so glad I’ll finally get to meet Vendra,” Yarrow had said, as Dedrre sliced their cake. “I’ve never heard so much about a person without actually meeting them.”

  “I’m afraid you’ll have to wait on that pleasure, lad,” Dedrre had said. Yarrow noticed the way his mustache drooped, the carefully casual tone in his voice. He had been looking forward to seeing his granddaughter with great excitement. She was so continually abroad, he barely ever saw her.

  “Work keeping her away?” Yarrow had asked.

  “Yes.” Dedrre cleared his throat. “You know how hardworking she is.”

  Yarrow felt a pang of such pity that—pop!—Dedrre’s emotions burst into his mind.

  Returning to the present, Yarrow opened his eyes and got to his feet. He began to pace, plowing a groove in the long grass.

  Each of these three occasions were prompted not by the person doing something for him, but by him feeling an intense sense of empathy with them. However, the answer could not be that simple. After all, he felt for people all the time. He certainly wasn’t cold-hearted or callous in nature. So what about these three cases were different? Was it merely a matter of intensity?

  Yarrow’s throat clenched with a sudden wave of nausea and he was overcome with lightheadedness. He found this puzzling until he remembered that he had not actually eaten much yet that day, or, for that matter, the night before. He decided that the common room would be as good a place as any to continue this contemplation, and perhaps with a full stomach the answer would present itself.

  He refocused on his body, still performing the Ada Chae in his bedroom, and pulled himself back to reality.

  The common room bustled, especially considering it was that odd time betwee
n lunch and dinner. Yarrow took a seat in the corner.

  A sweet-faced girl in a snowy white apron came to take his order.

  “The beef stew and an ale,” Yarrow said. He smiled, but the girl was too embarrassed to meet his eye. She curtsied and hustled away, returning with commendable speed bearing a cold mug and a loaf of bread. Yarrow thanked her and took a deep draught, letting the murmur of chatting patrons wash over him.

  His thoughts swirled in pointless circles, like a dog chasing its own tail. He had felt wretched for Ko-Jin, pleased for Arlow, and disappointed for Dedrre. But these emotions, in and of themselves, could not possibly be love, could they? No, he had felt all three for other people and not been any the wiser of their emotional state. It must be something else…something more.

  The serving girl interrupted his introspection with a platter of piping stew. She blushed scarlet and asked the grain in the table if it would be needing anything else.

  “No, that’s all, thank you,” Yarrow answered on the table’s behalf.

  He watched the girl as she scurried off to the other side of the room. She seemed embarrassed—perhaps because he was a Chisanta, or because he was a man. Maybe she thought him intimidating…or handsome? She ran drinks to a group of well-dressed women. Yarrow focused all of his attention on her, trying to empathize. How unpleasant it must be to work such a post, having to serve the wealthy set. He could only imagine the attitude they offered their waitstaff. But these reflections were to no effect. He didn’t know anything about her, not her fears or hopes—Spirits, not even her name.

  He frowned, and retracted his gaze. She wasn’t his target anyway.

  With a mouthful of stew, he focused his mind on Vendra—on the fear that she might now be experiencing. She was in trouble, he knew it deep down. He refused to think that she might be dead. No, certainly not dead.

  He summoned the full force of his mind, generating a blazing concern for her. He feared, pitied, worried, and lamented with such intensity, he thought his nose might bleed from the effort. But it was to no effect—Vendra’s feelings remained as uncertain as ever.