For a few moments, Wil saw her more clearly. Sweat sheened her face, and she breathed hard. She smiled.
—I know her, Wil realized with a shock.—
Her visit inside the gaol only took a few minutes. She emerged again and left. Half a candlemark later, Vehs returned.—
• • •
Wil released the moments, reorienting back into the now.
“Are you all right, Herald?”
Wil looked up at the Guard, the one who’d been waking the others, digging to remember her name. Sergeant Bergen. She’d been the first Guard Vehs had found. She had a stern, square face, close-cropped graying hair, and the lean frame of a career military woman.
“We’re looking for a woman, about so high.” He held his hand up to his shoulder. “Dark green cloak, curly golden hair, pale skin.”
The Guard’s eyes lit up. “We’ll start looking.”
“Be careful,” he said. “I don’t know how . . . but she seems to have some sort of . . .”
He hesitated. He didn’t want to say “magic.” Magic didn’t happen in Valdemar . . . Or that’s what we all said before Hardorn summoned demons and Herald-Captain Kerowyn came along . . .
Still. This could be a Gift. But the idea that one of the Gifted would carry this out . . . “Some sort of . . . sway,” he said at last. “Maybe a drug or toxin. Just . . . be careful.”
Bergen looked confused by this, but she saluted and went off to assemble a search detail.
Wil took a lantern and walked back into the gaol. He strode down the hallway and past the other empty cells. Two of Ferrin’s accomplices had been here until a couple nights ago—Wil had been able to determine they knew relatively little, and he passed sentence for the Guards to carry out. Probably a good thing, too. He had no doubt that if they’d still been here, they would have received the same treatment as Ferrin.
Back in the dead Bard’s cell, Wil held a handkerchief to his mouth. Then he set the lantern in the doorway and stepped into the cell. Doing his best not to touch the blood, he sat on Ferrin’s cot.
:Okay, Vehs. One more time.:
:I’m here.:
He took a lungful of fetid air and flung himself back across the candlemarks. The smell of blood vanished, and in his mind the cell appeared again, the same room with a completely different setting—
• • •
—Ferrin tossed and turned on his cot, sleep clearly eluding him.
This didn’t go on for long. There came the heavy iron chunk of the hallway’s bolt sliding back and the rattle of keys.
Ferrin sat up at the first sound and had stumbled to his feet by the second. He stood frozen in the patch of moonlight streaming in through the cell’s lone, high window. Before the door opened, he’d set his face in a practiced half-sneer.—
—Expecting me, Wil thought.—
—But a Herald wasn’t who stepped inside. The sneer melted briefly into wide-eyed shock, then settled into a fixed smile.
“Hello, Ferrin,” she said.
“M-Madra!” The frozen smile stretched wide, and a lilt crept into his voice that Wil recognized as the Bard trying to exercise his Gift on her. “Get me out of here!”
Her smile curved higher as her hand moved within the depths of her cloak. “Oh . . . definitely not.”
Something gleaming peeked out from the folds of the cloak. Machinery whirred, and a bolt burst through Ferrin’s chest with alarming force for what must have been a small weapon. Viscera and blood splattered. The Bard grunted, surprise and alarm on his face as he stumbled backward.
“Lord Dark sends regards,” Madra said, shaking her cloak back into place before walking away. Limited by his current position, Wil could only watch her go.
Ferrin collapsed forward, gurgling.—
• • •
Wil bore witness a little longer, then released the moments back to the past.
He sat there in the gloom, turning over this new information.
Madra.
She hadn’t been Madra when he’d last seen her. But names could change.
That smile . . .
Wil didn’t get up immediately. He sipped from his flask and let his nerves settle before hauling himself off the cot and back out to where Vehs waited.
He leaned his forehead against his Companion’s neck.
:You need to rest,: Vehs said.
:No.: Wil pulled himself into the saddle. :We need to look for Madra.:
• • •
Wil draped against Vehs’s neck, utterly spent.
They’d spent two candlemarks searching for Madra, and he’d finally yielded to exhaustion after nearly falling out of the saddle. The Guards would keep hunting—not that he had any confidence they would find her. She was probably halfway to Zoe by now. Or Forst Reach. Or Qorthes. They wouldn’t find her. Not like this.
That face. That voice. I know it.
The smell of Ferrin’s slaughter and his murderer’s identity conjured an old memory. So long ago, before Lelia died and before Ivy lived. On a blood-soaked battlefield near the Hardorn border, though not amongst the dead and wounded. Lelia lying on a cot in an airy tent as a Healer finished looking her over. Wil had paced, powerless to help.
This hadn’t been the first time they’d seen what Ancar’s Mages could weave. That had been the first war. This, the second, had had its own horrors. Hardorn had withdrawn two days ago, but that didn’t mean an end to the work. Not for the army and certainly not for the Healers and Heralds. Even Bards had their jobs, circulating amongst the convalescing and soothing them with their music.
Lelia had been doing just that when she’d collapsed. No one had needed to tell him. He’d just known. Sometimes his Gift could be useful all on its own.
“Exhaustion,” the Healer said, not hiding her annoyance. “She shouldn’t be doing what she’s doing anyway.”
Wil frowned. “Why not?”
She tucked a lock of raival-gold hair behind her ear. “Honestly, it’s not my place to tell you. I shouldn’t even be here, dealing with—” She gestured at Lelia. “—this. People are dying every second I talk to you.”
“Should I grovel, Your Highness, or will you tell me what’s wrong?”
Her eyes narrowed, and she opened her mouth to respond, but Lelia beat her to it.
“Don’t need . . . a Healer,” she said, her eyes sliding half open. “Thank you . . . Androa. Tell Grier thanks . . . too.”
The Healer looked down on her. “I take it you know.”
“Yes.” Lelia’s eyes flicked over to Wil. Then she smiled, very slightly, and told him.
Of course, it had been so very like Lelia to announce her pregnancy on a battlefield. But the memory now had another significance, because that surly Healer—the one who’d wanted to rub into his face how grateful he should be that she’d deigned to attend to Lelia—looked an awful lot like Madra.
He’d known her as Androa Baireschild, the sister of Healer Grier and Herald Kemoc Baireschild.
:You’re sure?: Vehs asked.
:No. We’ll need more. But maybe we can salvage something out of this mess. Like—how’d she get here so fast? How’d she even know?:
:Has she been here the whole time?:
:Maybe.:
:By the way—we’re here.:
Wil hadn’t even noticed his Companion’s arrival at the stable. Bad. Sloppy. How could he protect himself—much less Ivy—if he wasn’t even aware of his own surroundings?
He dismounted and wearily slipped the girth on Vehs’ saddle. He wanted to sleep, but he stank of sweat and carnage, and the last thing he wanted to do was subject his daughter to that. He trudged to his room for fresh clothes, then to the bathhouse to rinse off.
:I stopped her trying to get out again,: Aubryn said.
Wil paused in the doorway of t
he bathhouse, drooping. :I should remove the ladder.:
:That would only encourage her to jump down. Escape is what children do.:
Wil sighed and stepped into the bathhouse, running the pump to fill a bucket with cold well water. The Companion had a point.
:You should give her more to do,: she said.
Wil stripped naked and scooped cold water on his head and shoulders. It did little to wake him.
:She’s a little girl with an active imagination and energy to spare,: Aubryn continued. :She’s going to cause trouble from time to time. Children want to explore. And you do no favors protecting her from that, or by trying to shelter her from every nameable harm.:
:What do you suggest? Advanced grappling techniques?:
:Simple escapes and some basic self-defense wouldn’t be a bad start.:
:That’s crazy. She’s four!:
:She’s also riding Circuit with her father. You’re deluding yourself if you think you and I and Vehs can protect her from everything. I know all about you, Herald. You’re scared of losing her. As you lost Lelia and your sister—:
:Okay, we’re done,: he said. :Bad enough I have one Companion lodged in my skull—:
:Hey!: Vehs protested.
:No offense. But I need my own thoughts for a little while.:
He could all but hear Aubryn’s snort coming from the stables, but her thoughts receded.
Back at the loft, Wil flopped over the lip of the platform and onto his back, staring into the darkness as he wiggled off his boots.
Ivy crawled over and wrapped her arms around him. “Dada,” she said solemnly.
“Ivy. You need to go to sleep.”
“My snails. They’re cold, Dada.”
“Your snails are fine.”
“No-o-o. I need to put a blanket on them.”
Wil kissed her forehead. “Your snails are sleeping. So should you.”
“Not tired,” she said, but Wil rubbed her back, and her breathing grew deep and even. Only then did he let out a long, exasperated sigh that perfectly summed up his day. Night. He didn’t even know what time it was anymore.
Wil forced himself to relax, to release the tight muscles in his shoulders. His thoughts blurred, sliding into the borderland between consciousness and sleep, where the absurd seemed perfectly rational.
He wandered through mist and shadow, stars appearing and disappearing overhead. At one point, Lelia appeared and put her arm around his waist. Their stroll seemed no different from any other they’d taken together in Companion’s Field.
A woman in midnight blue crossed their path, her black hair in small braids. Amber beads dangled from the ends, clicking softly. Her blue eyes regarded him with a mix of caution and curiosity. Lelia slid away, and the two women wandered off together, speaking so low he couldn’t make out the words.
In the curious way of the borderlands, Wil then found himself back in Ferrin’s cell, lit clear as day. Ferrin was there, but also someone else—lurking at the edges of his vision, never quite fully manifesting. Wil saw a white-toothed grin and remembered another murderer with a crossbow from years ago.
Ferrin sat on his cot, the bolt still sticking out from his chest.
He touched the protrusion, then looked at Wil and said, “Such a small—”
“Quarrel!” Wil gasped, sitting up, heart racing. Ivy stirred beside him but didn’t wake. A brief Mindtouch on Vehs revealed the Companion also slept.
He launched himself down the ladder. Aubryn turned to watch him.
“Do you ever sleep?” he asked as he pulled on his boots.
She snorted.
“I need to do something,” he said. “Won’t take a candlemark. Let Vehs sleep. He needs it.”
:And you don’t?:
Wil shook his head. “Can’t now.”
He jogged out of the stable, heading back to the stockade.
• • •
Wil walked out of the gaol and sat down against a wall, contemplating his gruesome prize.
Sergeant Bergen approached, a bucket and a handful of rags swinging from her fist; she dropped them at his feet. “Find what you need, Herald?”
Wil held up the quarrel, turning it between his blood-streaked thumb and forefinger. It both fascinated and terrified him. Hollow, light, but extremely hard, with a flanged tip. It hadn’t distorted at all, despite splintering Ferrin’s sternum.
The device she used fit inside her cloak. So small. So destructive. Very worrying.
“You ever seen anything like this, Sergeant?” he asked.
Bergen squinted at the bolt. “Not in my Queen’s army. Tedrel, maybe?”
“Let’s find out.” Wil closed his hand over the bolt, shifted into a cross-legged position, and stepped through time’s door.
Fragments of vision jerked him roughly between past and present. He saw himself holding the quarrel, Madra’s hands lifting it from a leather pouch—and he sensed something more, some weight of memory attached to the bolt. He pushed for it, strained, tried to claw past Madra’s hands—but—
No good. He came back to now and dropped the quarrel into the water, rubbing until the blood came off. He raised it into the light just flooding over the horizon. There—a series of characters stamped into the shaft. A craftsman’s seal.
“Not Tedrel,” he said, washing his own hands off, the cool water steadying and grounding him. “These look like Shin’a’in symbols.” He slipped the quarrel into a pouch and hung it around his neck.
“You look a bit pale,” Bergen said.
“It’s the Whites.”
She raised a brow. “You ain’t wearing Whites.”
He looked down at his blood-spattered beige garments. “Hunh.”
He slid up the wall to stand, using it for support until he got to his feet. Taking a couple of deep breaths, he started forward.
To his surprise, Bergen took his elbow. “Come on.”
Together, they walked slowly back through the streets. At some point he cleared his throat and said, “I don’t really need an escort.”
“We lost Ferrin on my watch,” she said. “I won’t lose you, too.”
“It wasn’t your fault, Sergeant. Ferrin should have been on his way to Forst Reach days ago. Bad weather and bad luck are the only things that kept that from happening.”
“I wasn’t trained to assume things would always go according to plan.”
“Really, it was my fault for letting Vehs leave.”
“You’re assuming this miscreant didn’t have plans for him, too.”
Wil felt a shiver go down his spine. “Companions are hard to kill.”
“There you go assuming.” She glanced at him. “You have a daughter.”
“That I do.”
“You love her?”
“More than you could ever know.”
“Well, there ain’t enough of that in the world. So if it’s all right with you, I’m your escort this morning, Herald.”
Wil nodded. “Thank you.”
“Though, being a Herald, I know it’s only a matter of time before you decide to throw yourself on a bonfire to save a twig.”
He smirked. “I like to think I’d throw a bucket of water on it first.”
“Well, maybe that’s because you have your child riding Circuit at your side.”
They rounded the curve in the road that revealed the Crown. Bergen shuffled to a stop and let go of his arm.
“Take care, Herald,” she said.
“You too, Sergeant.”
“You don’t report to me. Call me Bergen.”
“Well then, I’m Wil.”
She afforded a smile. “Wil.”
Wil limped the last few steps alone. When he got within stone’s throw of the stable, he heard, :I thought Bards were more your style.:
&nb
sp; Wil started a bit. :Aren’t you sleeping?:
:I was,: Vehs said. :Then someone decided to take a rough ride through history.:
:Hunh. And you didn’t come get me?:
A mental yawn. :Walking builds character.:
:I once again require a change of clothes.:
:And get some sleep.:
:Maybe . . .:
:We can watch the wee one. Sleep.:
Wil passed through the kitchen, waving to Ystell, who waved back over a half-finished pie. He swiped some cheese and bread before heading back to his room, devouring it as he undressed.
:We’ll be leaving soon,: he told Vehs.
:You know where we’re headed next?:
:No.: He touched the last thing on him, the pouch holding the quarrel. He had no intention of taking it off. :But I’ll make this tell us.:
• • •
Rest and buckets of willowbark tea worked wonders.
Wil spread out a map of Valdemar on the table. He sat and drummed his fingers as his eyes ran over it, one corner weighed down by the pouch with the quarrel inside. His eyes flicked to it, then back to the map. Shin’a’in. He couldn’t read it, but he remembered the distinctive alphabet from his language classes, so different from the scripts of Valdemar and its neighboring countries.
He swept his fingers along the southwestern border of Valdemar. If he took the quarrel on face value, that it had come from the Dhorisha Plains or that direction, then one of the southern routes would have to be its mode of entry into the kingdom.
The Baireschild estates are in the south . . .
Kemoc had been in line for the throne once. Then Elspeth had been Chosen. How much had that upset the Baireschild family?
Wouldn’t be the first time someone close to a potential heir has committed treason to get what they wanted.
Wil focused again on the quarrel. :So. How’d this get into Valdemar?:
:A gryphon flew it in?: Vehs said.
:If we want to start conjuring imaginary gryphon couriers, might as well ask if there’s a tunnel under the country or magic doors between Katashin’a’in and the Forest of Sorrows.: He scratched his cheek. :Though it might help explain how Madra found the time to get to Highjorune and arrange an assassination . . . :
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