The Story Hunter

by Lindsay A. Franklin

  He shook his head and didn’t look up.

  “I’m so sorry. I’m sorry that all happened.”

  “They were like my family once.”

  “I know.” And truly, I did. I could imagine how I would feel if I had to fight the Corsyth weavers.

  “Was I ever like that, Tannie?” he asked. “So mercenary?”

  “Not as long as I’ve known you.” I placed my hand on his back. “And I don’t think before that either. From what Venewth said, seems like you always had standards. Fought for good causes, and such.”

  “I guess.”

  And then I realized he wasn’t just thinking about himself. He was also thinking about Diggy—his actual family. His baby sister, who he’d watched kill a man. Maybe wondering if the same vicious streak ran through them both. If he could even save her from herself.

  “We’re going to find her,” I promised him. “We’re going to find her, rescue Braith, save everyone, and then we’ll help her. Diggy, I mean. We’ll help her put all her pieces back together.”

  He turned to me, a small smile on his lips. “You’re awfully optimistic, you know.”

  “My sunshiny personality is why you love me.” I froze. “I mean . . . not that you love me. I just meant that’s—I mean . . .”

  He grinned, then leaned forward and kissed my forehead.

  Hopefully he wouldn’t burn his lips on my mortification.

  Karlith interrupted, “Mor, how is your wound?”

  “Sore.” He pulled back his shirt so she could see his stitched-up mountainbeast scratches.

  She tsked and began to apply salve.

  “If you’re all quite rested now,” Dray drawled, “I believe it’s time for me to do my part.”

  Zel raised an eyebrow. “Oh?”

  “We have three strands now. You wanted eleven, but we know at least one is already claimed by another team. Best to get these three to the Master, don’t you think?”

  “He’s right,” Father said, though it seemed to pain him to agree with Dray. “We want to make sure we get to the Master before anyone else delivers any strands to her.” He leveled a sharp gaze at Dray. “You know the way?”

  “I haven’t lost track of the markings.” He motioned to the ceiling. “I think we’re close.”

  They were right. There was no time to lick our wounds and rest our weary spirits.

  It was time to rescue Queen Braith.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

  BRAC

  My foot caught on some unseen crevice in the tunnel floor, and I lurched forward. “Oof!”

  Celyn caught my arm before I fell completely. “Honestly. Do you want to hold the lantern? Would it even matter? I don’t recall you being so clumsy.”

  I allowed her to help me get my legs beneath me. “Don’t be unkind,” I grouched.

  She smiled in the lantern light. “Just being honest.”

  “Ain’t that the same thing half the time?”

  She chuckled, then hushed me. “I’m going to lose count.”

  “Count of what?”

  “We’re supposed to meet the others in another ten minutes. I’ve been trying to keep count of the time passing in my head.”

  Sakes. We’d been at this for almost an hour. Stumbling through pitch-black tunnels and poking our heads into caverns. How Celyn managed to count anything while doing that was beyond me. But I was glad of it and glad to have her along.

  We had split up into pairs to search the caves, but we were careful to meet back often so no one got lost. Then we’d all push forward together and search a new section. Seemed we’d been at it for moons, but it had only been one full day and half of another by my reckoning.

  There’d been no sign of Tannie. We had run across a mountainbeast carcass, but I didn’t think Tannie had a hand in that.

  And if she had, I didn’t know the lass anymore. Which was possible, I realized. She had been adventuring and fighting and doing all kinds of things I knew nothing about for moons now. And I’d certainly been on some kind of path myself, one I’d likely never be able to fully explain to her. We didn’t know each other anymore.

  But that didn’t matter. My mission was the same, either way.

  “What are you thinking of, Brac?” Celyn’s question startled me.

  “Hey, you just shushed me so I wouldn’t distract you.”

  She laughed.

  “Just thinking about that mountainbeast.”

  “It sure was something else, wasn’t it?” Celyn shook her head. “Never seen anything so big in my life.”

  “I saw a marsh-grazer once. At the time, I thought that had to be the biggest animal to breathe. It was nothing compared to that mountainbeast.”

  “That was three summers ago, wasn’t it?”

  “Aye, I think.”

  “Brac?” She slowed and looked at me, serious hazel eyes fixed on my face again in that way she had that made me feel bumbly and like my insides weren’t quite in the right places.

  “Aye, Celyn?”

  “Do you remember what else happened three summers ago?”

  I did. Of course I did.

  But it seemed I’d swallowed my tongue. “I . . .”

  “You kissed me behind my father’s barn at the summer-harvest celebration.”

  Aye, I had. Tannie had never let me forget it either. “I . . .”

  “I know we might not make it out of this alive.” She put a hand on my arm to silence me before I could say anything. “I knew that going in. My risk, remember? But I didn’t want things to end like that without ever telling you.”

  “Te-telling me what?”

  She smiled. “I didn’t hate that kiss.” She began walking again, her head lowered. “We’ve got two more minutes.”

  Aye, brilliant. Is two minutes enough time for a person’s insides to turn solid again?

  “We should go back,” she said.

  “Oh, aye. Right.”

  Just as we turned, a noise sounded further down the tunnel. Maybe it was just my ears playing tricks on me in the blasted caves again. But I was almost sure . . .

  I grabbed Celyn’s arm, and we stood, listening. After a moment, I turned back and peered into the darkness. “Ho, there?”

  Movement flashed, and before I had a chance to speak another word, a lass sprang out of nowhere, pulled two daggers from her hips, and held them out—one at my throat, one at Celyn’s.

  I heard Celyn gasp.

  “No!” The word felt so feeble, but what else could I do? “Don’t hurt her, please!”

  The lass snarled like an animal, but then her eyes lit in surprise. “You!”

  And then my mind caught up. Because, of course, I knew her and her wild dark hair and the crazy markings all over her arms. She’d stood beside Tannie in the throne room at the palace.

  The pirate’s sister.

  She didn’t take her daggers away from our throats. She pressed in closer and hissed, “What are you doing here?”

  “We’re here for Tannie and Braith.” I leaned away from her blade so I wouldn’t accidentally get a shave I didn’t want. “I swear it.”

  She glanced over our shoulders, then back to me. “Aye? No green-suited thugs with you, steward?”

  “I’m not the steward anymore. I left and came here. To help. Please, where’s Tannie?”

  Her only reply was a snort.

  I tried again. “Please. I need to know where to find them. I have to warn them. It’s the former queen. The Master is the former queen.” I wasn’t making much sense. I had no idea what Tannie and her friends knew. “Not Braith. I mean Frenhin.”

  “What’s all this?” the voice of Uncle Rawn cut in from behind us.

  Oh difflesnouts.

  “Hey!” That was Farmer Wenth.

  “Stay where you are,” the lass said. “I have blades enough for you all, I promise.” She studied me. “You’re telling the truth, aren’t you?”

  “Aye.”

  “You truly no longer serve the high pr
iest?”

  “Aye.”

  “Master Frenhin will want to speak with you.” She squeezed her blades tighter to our throats.

  “Ma . . . what?” Had she said Master Frenhin?

  The lass’s gaze slid between each of us. One side of her mouth curled upward. “Are you ready to die today?”

  CHAPTER FORTY

  TANWEN

  Dray pressed himself against the tunnel wall and peered around the corner. We didn’t need a lantern now. Torches in brackets had dotted the walls for the past half hour of our journey. We were within the bounds of the Master’s lair.

  And when Dray turned back around, I knew we’d found it at last.

  He pointed to a marking on the ceiling. “That’s the one. See the flame there? It points this direction because her chambers are this way.”

  “What’s the plan?” Warmil scowled. “I don’t like these conditions one bit. She’ll have complete advantage no matter how we approach.”

  “Perhaps,” Father conceded. “But if we can maintain the element of—”

  “Halt!” A soldier dressed in a dark-gray uniform appeared before us, drawing his sword.

  “—surprise,” Father finished dryly. “Ah well.” He held up his hands. “We’re a Hunt team. We’re here to see your Master.”

  The soldier paused and sized up the situation. Nine of us—several of us armed and at least one of us able to shoot strands out of our hands.

  He lowered his sword slightly. “All right, then.” He craned his neck to look down the corridor. “Oi! A little help here, please.”

  Another gray-uniformed soldier appeared from down the hallway, then reared back at the sight of us. “What’s this?”

  “Hunters here to see the Master.”

  “They ain’t supposed to be here, I thought.” The second soldier surveyed us.

  “Aye, but they are now.”

  After a pause, the second soldier said, “They shouldn’t have found their way here. Master will want to talk to them, I wager.”

  He drew his weapon and pushed past our little party to guard us from behind. The first soldier led us down the hall.

  At long last, we were walking into the Master’s lair.

  My stomach lurched.

  Two more soldiers guarded an archway unlike the rough-hewn, natural openings that led to tunnels all throughout the caverns. This one had been shaped, polished smooth into a beautiful curve. A wooden door with iron fittings had been installed at some point, and I could see that a few other doors lay further down the corridor.

  “Wait here,” the first soldier said, and he disappeared through the door.

  So this was it. This was where she lived and plotted and held the true queen captive.

  My mind somersaulted over itself. How would we rescue Braith without also surrendering the strands? Perhaps we would surrender them at first, then fight to get them back. But what if the strands weren’t enough? What if she would only trade Braith for me, Mor, and Zel?

  That’s what she wanted—the three of us. I knew it was. She had been after us for moons now, first on the Cethorelle, then on Kanac, and now with the Strand Hunt in progress.

  Three strands. Three storytellers.

  I drew a full breath and steeled my nerves. If that’s what it took, that’s what we would do. We would do whatever was necessary to rescue the queen. And we would figure the rest out later.

  That seemed to be our custom.

  I almost smiled. Especially when I felt a leather-clad hand lace its fingers with mine. I looked up at Mor.

  “Together?” he whispered.

  “Always.”

  The soldier returned. “She will see you now.”

  And we followed him through the doors, probably to our doom.

  My eyes were not ready for the light. After so many days spent in darkness with the barest lantern light or Diggy’s star speckles cast upon the cave walls or the sporadic torches dotting the lair, the blaze of many torches illuminating the cavernous room felt like an assault on my senses.

  I blinked. Squinted. Shielded myself from the attack.

  “Well, this is a surprise.” Dray ground to a halt, his eyebrows raised, true astonishment marking his features.

  He was staring at the other side of the room where a woman in a fine gown stood.

  My mind crashed.

  Surely my eyes were lying to me. It couldn’t possibly . . . I had to be mistaken. I couldn’t actually be seeing . . .

  “Frenhin Ma-Gareth,” Father said, his voice numb, tone flat.

  The pale lady approached. Smiled. Stretched her arms wide. “You have found me at last.” She moved closer to Father—but not within range of his sword. It was in its scabbard at his hip, in any case.

  “Oh, Yestin,” she said, and fry me if her eyes didn’t fill with tears. “It has been many years, old adversary.”

  “I . . .” Father’s voice faltered. “I had not realized we were enemies.”

  “You never suspected?” Her eyes crinkled at the corners as though she were genuinely delighted. “Am I the first person to fool Yestin Bo-Arthio?”

  “I never suspected until you called for the Hunt.”

  “Ah yes. It was a risk. A bold one, though, don’t you think? Bold and timely. After all, it is almost time to reveal myself to the people of Tir as their ruler again.”

  “It is almost the end,” Karlith said softly, her head bowed.

  And it was then that I heard a quiet sob behind me. I turned and gasped.

  “Braith!” I ran for her—my queen, chained against the darkest stretch of wall like an animal.

  A guard caught my arm before I could reach her. I repelled him with a burst of light from my palms. He stumbled backward and fell on his rear.

  “Queen Braith!” I dropped to my knees beside her. “You’re alive!”

  Raw sores ringed her wrists where the irons had bitten into her. She looked like she hadn’t eaten a proper meal or had a real bath since she had been taken.

  And the man chained to the same wall but shoved in the far corner hadn’t fared better. It had to be Kharn Bo-Candryd. He seemed to have suffered a beating or two.

  Or twenty.

  “Oh, Tanwen.” Braith’s bony frame shook. “Why have you come here, my friend?”

  “It’s going to be all right,” I told her, although I knew I didn’t have any such assurance. “We’re here now, and we’re going to get you out.”

  “My, what big promises you make,” Frenhin said lightly.

  I tried my hardest to glare holes into her. “You will release Braith and Kharn to us. We have what you want.”

  “Ah, small correction.” Dray stepped away from the rest of the group.

  A guard shadowed him.

  “Yes, please do.” Dray ushered the guard between himself and the weavers. “I should like the extra protection, if you don’t mind.” Then he turned to me. “You do not have what Frenhin wants. I do.” He held up the jar with the three strands of white lightning inside.

  Dylun made an unintelligible sound and yanked his pack off his shoulders.

  “Bo-Ino, you got careless.” Dray shook his head. “Comfortable. It was as simple as could be, really.”

  Dylun’s face filled with anguish as he pushed his arm through a hole that had been cut in the side of his pack. Must have happened as we all pressed together in the hallway outside.

  Simple as could be. Just as Dray said. He had sliced the pack and pulled out the jar.

  “This has been your plan all along?” Anger radiated from Mor.

  “Plans are a fluid concept, lad. I adjust as needed to suit the current circumstances.” Dray smirked. “A bit of a pirate myself, I suppose.”

  Frenhin laughed. “This gets better and better.” She held out her hand. “Here now, Dray, dear. Hand it over.”

  “Not so fast.” He pulled the jar to his chest, out of her reach. “I have some demands.”

  “Of course you do.” Frenhin’s smile slipped as sh
e eyed the jar of strands that squirmed beneath her stare. Lust flared in her gaze. “What do you want?”

  “Braith’s hand in marriage, naturally.”

  “My, my.” Frenhin held a hand to her heart. “So he wants the lady, not just her throne. Braith, I had no idea you netted so many suitors. I rather thought it would be like courting a cold fish, but to each his own.”

  Dray flashed an icy smile. “You can keep your insults to yourself, Frenhin. Release Braith to my care, and you may have the strands. Those are my terms.”

  “No.” Braith’s voice was strangled. Choked and full of despair. “I will never go with you.”

  “Darling, really.” Dray rolled his eyes. “Saving your life here.”

  “I don’t know, Dray.” Frenhin examined her nails. “Three little strands for one whole pretender queen? That doesn’t seem a fair trade. What else have you to offer?”

  Dray gestured to the remaining eight members of our team. “Them.”

  Father growled low in his throat. “You might have at least pretended you had to think about it.”

  Dray shrugged. “I thought we might dispense with any charade.” He swung back to Frenhin. “You give Braith to me, and we will disappear from your life forever. I swear it. You can have the strands and these rebels, and I’ll leave you to it. They will prove most useful to you, I’m sure. And your daughter will never darken your doorstep again.”

  Frenhin tapped a finger to her chin. “Now that . . . that idea has merit. Three strands, plus a band of traitorous rebels, including three weavers to wield my new strands. And best of all, Yestin Bo-Arthio, to use as I might.” She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. “Oh, how I have longed for this moment.” Her eyes snapped open and fixed on my father. “I have big plans for you.”

  “Then we have an accord?” Dray held out the jar of strands.

  “We have an accord.”

  “No!” Braith thrashed against her bonds. “Dray, no! Don’t!”

  I tried to help. Searched for some kind of weakness in the metal, some way to free her and keep her away from that snake. I willed fire to pour from my hands, but it refused to come.

  There was nothing.

  Braith let out a wail. She turned to Kharn.