‘I don’t know. That’s your problem. I’m afraid until there is something real that I can see or touch or even understand, Master Fynch, I shall leave it to Chancellor Reynard to use his instincts and to keep me briefed.’ She’d stood. ‘Good day, gentlemen,’ and she had swept from the room, feeling fractionally hollow for having dismissed him.
Master Fynch began to haunt her thoughts; his warning invaded her dreams; his name resonated deep in her recollections … back to her childhood to the legend of a boy called Fynch, who rode with a dragon and was friends with an emperor.
And the chancellor had been absent since that meeting, leaving his day-to-day duties to Burrage. It was strange. Reynard had been at her side since she’d begun her reign and now he’d left her without a word. She’d assumed at first that he was attending to imperial matters but it was not at all like him. And then when he had not appeared and could not be found, a sinister pall had laid itself over his disappearance. Privately, Florentyna was certain that Reynard believed in Fynch and was angry at her for not trusting him also. Had he gone off on some journey of discovery of his own — or even with Fynch — to bring her proof of the threat that she had demanded?
When Florentyna had finally broached with Darcelle the subject of the stranger and his claim, her sister had tossed her golden hair and looked at Florentyna as though she’d gone soft in her mind. Darcelle had ridiculed Fynch as a luna-fool.
‘He probably howls at the night sky when the tides are high,’ she gibed. She’d not let the chancellor off lightly either, taking the opportunity to tell Florentyna exactly what she thought of the interfering old man.
‘I’m glad he’s finally given you some space to breathe. I know you’re very close to him, Florentyna, but perhaps you don’t see his oily ways as clearly as others do.’
Florentyna blinked, stung. Her trait was not to react too quickly to criticism so she held her tongue, but Darcelle didn’t pause to even take a breath.
‘You should banish both, dear sister. Neither is good for you. Everything is well for our land, especially now that I’ve strengthened our ties with Tamas. I’m the one you should be grateful to. Not silly old men scared of their own shadows and preaching doom and gloom. In fact, I live in your shadow and yet I’m the one doing the work of a queen. I attend the formal occasions that you should, I charm at parties, I deliver your messages in the most eloquent of ways and now I make your realm safe for you.’
Darcelle had clearly forgotten herself but behind this stupidity Florentyna could hear Saria; it was obvious her sister had paid a visit to her stepmother recently. Darcelle loved the role she played for the Crown; it not only gave her purpose but it employed her strengths, showed off her talents. It was beyond belief that Darcelle would complain or consider herself ‘used’ by the Crown. No, it took a far more devious and malicious mind to come up with that slant.
She’d needed Reynard’s counsel but the chancellor had not been seen again and neither had Master Fynch. Had she offended her senior aide or had he met some terrible end? It was a mystery that was increasingly making her feel anxious and she’d begun to convince herself that if she could see a dead body she’d have a better time accepting his wordless disappearance. And what kept returning to her was that something in Master Fynch’s gaze had told her he had come as a friend, that he was telling her the truth.
ELEVEN
Cassien was seated in a chair while an old woman with few teeth was sucking her lips and lathering up his face with a huge soft bristle brush and gritty soap.
‘Widow Nance is the local herbwoman. She makes up floral charms,’ Ham explained. ‘She’s very busy at the moment.’
‘Is there a feast day?’ Cassien wondered aloud as she slopped on still more lather.
‘Be still,’ Nance warned, reaching for a lethal-looking blade.
Her fingers trembled as the blade approached and Cassien baulked.
Ham laughed. ‘Don’t, Nance. He’s new to these parts.’
She cackled, enjoying her joke. ‘I can clean up your chin blindfolded with one arm tied behind my back,’ she said, slapping Cassien’s shoulder. ‘Now be still, handsome, and let me get this done.’
‘It’s blood month,’ Ham continued. ‘Widow Nance is doing up orders of special red wreaths and posies to hang in all the houses for luck, and especially for food, through the long winter ahead.’
Nance had already trimmed his hair so he no longer looked shaggy and now he could feel the satisfying scrape of the blade over his jaw. Ham had done well to bring him to this place for she was not even vaguely curious about him or his weapons. Soon she was pressing a steaming towel to his face and telling him he was done.
‘Well, Ham,’ she grunted at the boy nearby. ‘You’ve brought me a welcome one this time. Very tasty, indeed. I’m sure the girls at the brothel will fight over you,’ she said, grinning at Cassien. As he opened his mouth, she waved a hand. ‘And don’t deny it either. All you young bucks head straight there. Although those girls charge a pretty penny now for something you can get right here.’ She began to lift her skirts and Cassien leapt from the chair as if stung.
‘No, Widow Nance!’ he all but begged, and this won a guffaw from Hamelyn and a huge wheeze of a laugh from the old girl.
‘I used to be a beauty when I was your age — you’d have accepted me then — but the years have punished me.’ She laughed again at his anxious expression. ‘Touchy, isn’t he? No sense of humour, Ham. You’d better find him one if he’s to survive in this town.’
‘I won’t be staying long,’ Cassien assured.
‘Then you should take your chances when you can, because I don’t make the offer lightly,’ she said, again beginning to lift her skirts.
He grinned this time, didn’t shrink back and of course she only pulled them high enough to reveal wrinkled knees.
‘Now there you are; you learn fast and you’re even more likely to win a kiss when you smile like that,’ she said. Then switching topics rapidly she poked Cassien in the chest. ‘Ham’s a good boy. Don’t you take liberties with him or you’ll answer to me.’
Cassien pressed a silver coin into her crooked fingers, gnarled by the bone-ache, and surprised her again by leaning down and planting a kiss on her hollow cheek. ‘Thank you.’ Beneath his lips her skin felt leathery but she giggled like a young girl.
‘Go on with you, stranger, flirting with an old woman like me.’ She gave a tutting sound to match her arch expression.
Cassien smiled wider and rubbed his naked chin. ‘You give a good shave, Nance.’
‘Don’t you forget it. Now go find yourself a young plaything to help you forget the world for a bit. I feel only a gloom in my waters.’
Cassien glanced up from tying on his cloak. ‘Oh? Why gloom?’
‘Widow Nance has visions now and then,’ Ham explained hurriedly. ‘Pay no attention.’
‘Ignore me at your peril, young man.’ She shook a crooked finger at Ham. ‘Who warned the village folk in the surrounding hamlets that the mouth rot was coming to their cows?’
‘You did, Nance,’ he said obediently.
She nodded. ‘I saw the death of our king … Shar grant him peace,’ she said, touching her hand to her forehead in respect at naming the god. ‘It was a shock for the whole realm, the empire even … but not to me. I saw it in my dreams. And now we have a slip of a girl on the throne.’
‘Have you seen her?’
His two companions shook their heads.
‘Her sister’s very beautiful, though,’ Ham said, eyes widening in memory. ‘She visited Orkyld last summer on official royal business. Golden … like an angel, she was,’ he recalled in a dreamy voice.
‘And a heart like ice, child.’
‘What makes you say that, Nance?’ Cassien asked.
She gave a shiver. ‘Oh, I don’t know. She has enough beauty for several girls but there was something very cold about her.’
‘You spoke about sensing gloom, though.’
Ham gurgled a laugh.
‘He makes fun of me, silly boy. He’ll find out soon enough. Watch yourself, Ham. Stick close to this one. He looks like he can handle a blade well.’
But Cassien didn’t want to let it go; he knew Fynch wouldn’t. ‘What’s coming, Nance?’
She blinked in surprise. ‘No-one ever wants to know what I think. Why should you?’
‘Because I trust instincts. They can serve us well. They’ve been around a lot longer than religion.’
‘Ooh, you heathen,’ she said, touching both hands to her ears.
Cassien couldn’t help but like the quirky old woman. ‘I’m not heathen; I simply believe we should all trust what we see and hear, what we can touch, taste … and especially what we feel.’
She gave him a toothless grin. ‘I do too, but most don’t set much store by what those of us who are touched by Shar can sense.’
He flipped her another coin. ‘Tell me.’
‘I don’t take payment for my visions.’
‘It’s not for your visions. I’d like to buy a posy of dried flowers.’
‘Then take your pick from those behind you there. As for my instincts, they’re telling me a bad wind is going to blow through Morgravia.’
‘More of the devil’s work?’ he asked cryptically, sensing that she preferred to talk indirectly when it came to her visions.
‘Perhaps,’ she said, glancing at the boy. Her tone said he’d guessed right.
‘I’ll see you outside, Ham,’ he said and the youngster readily obeyed, lifting a hand in farewell to Nance.
‘You’re a good boy, Ham. Come visit me again soon.’
She returned her attention to Cassien. ‘The boy and I have an understanding. We’re both touched lightly by something, and so I suppose you could call us kindred souls. But who are you?’
‘Someone who doesn’t fear the devil,’ he said, without hesitating.
Her gaze narrowed as she regarded him.
‘Where will this dark wind blow?’ he asked.
She shook her head. ‘Pearlis, I think, though I see nothing specific pointing there, other than that the dragon has awoken and the cathedral stirs from its sleep.’
Nance was becoming more cryptic by the moment.
‘The dragon?’
‘Beast of royals. The king.’
‘Why has the dragon woken?’
‘He knows what’s coming. He will warn whomever he can,’ she said, her gaze unfocused.
‘Is the throne in jeopardy?’ he asked, astonished that she was in a similar mindset to Fynch.
She shook her head. ‘I can’t tell. But if the dragon is involved …’ Her words trailed off.
Cassien frowned. ‘What do you mean about the cathedral?’
‘The beasts awake,’ she said tonelessly, her gaze drifting faraway. ‘They sense the danger. An ancient danger. A cunning one. They’ve seen this magic before — the magic that defies death.’ She snapped back her attention to him and she was alert again. ‘Forgive me, I … I forget myself sometimes.’
‘Nothing to forgive.’
‘Don’t speak of this to the boy … to anyone. Keep him safe.’
‘I promise I will. And I have no-one to speak to about what you’ve told me anyway. I walk alone.’
She nodded. ‘Yes, you’re him but you’re not alone.’
He stared at her. ‘Him? Who am I?’
‘One of few.’
‘I told you, I walk alone.’
‘Nevertheless.’
‘I don’t understand.’
She smiled. ‘The dragon has spoken to you.’
In that heartbeat, he thought he saw Romaine reflected in the glass of Nance’s tiny window. He blinked and the notion was gone but he was left with a fresh gust of worry for Fynch. ‘You’re speaking in riddles, Nance.’
The old girl shrugged. ‘I told you, no-one pays me any attention. You shouldn’t either.’
He frowned deeper, could see she’d shut down in her mind and would give him no more. ‘Thank you for telling me.’
She nodded, turned away, looking suddenly fatigued. ‘Don’t forget your posy,’ she said over her shoulder.
He took the nearest one, a tiny heart wreath made of twisted twigs and a few leaves intertwined with red rose hips. He liked its simplicity. It reminded him of the forest and its pristine white wildwood rose.
Emerging from Nance’s tiny shop he found Ham kicking his heels in the dust.
‘Ready for the inn?’ Ham asked. ‘Innkeeper told me she said not to be late.’
‘I’m ready. Ham?’
The boy turned back.
‘Who is Nance? I mean, what’s her background?’
‘She told me once, said it was not something she shared with others … that I was special.’
‘Will you tell me? It’s important,’ Cassien said.
Ham’s forehead creased in concern as he considered the request. He nodded once his decision was made. ‘She was a nun, but she fell from grace because she loved a man, had a child with him. The man and the child died soon after its birth. I don’t know the details but she said to me that it was her punishment. Shar was making her live her penance, rather than perform it through prayer or good deed.’
‘She obviously likes you.’
‘She likes few people and she’s not terribly popular anyway because she used to share her visions. They were always bleak, so the townsfolk hated it and shunned her. Now she keeps them to herself and shares them only now and then. She was right about the livestock and the king. I don’t know how much else she sees. I’m surprised she was so open with you. Maybe she saw something in you.’
‘Like she saw something in you, you mean?’ he asked carefully.
Ham squirmed. ‘She says I’m touched.’
‘By what?’
‘She’s never said,’ he replied with a shrug. ‘She did tell me that she came to Orkyld because it cleaved to the old ways, accepted magic.’
‘Perhaps people who are more in tune with the spiritual world come here because of it.’
‘I was born here,’ Ham admitted. ‘I had no choice.’
Perhaps your parents did, Cassien thought, but kept that to himself. ‘Come on then, to the Yew Inn we go.’
‘Will your guest be staying the … er, night?’
‘No. Are you happy to wait downstairs for me?’
Ham scratched his head. ‘Am I now travelling with you?’ Cassien stopped. ‘I mean, are you employing me to be at your side at all times?’
He smiled. ‘Yes, I am. Are you comfortable with that?’
‘I’m leaving the orphanage?’
‘Do you want to think about it?’
Ham shook his head. ‘No!’ he said vehemently, startling Cassien. ‘I want to travel with you, wherever you go.’
Cassien grinned. ‘Right, then. Get yourself some food. Let Innkeeper Erris know you have my permission to put it on my tab. There’s a second cot in my room, anyway. I’ll pay for the use of it. Here’s some coin for you. You should not be without.’
Ham looked at the money as though Cassien had just placed several gold sovereigns in his palm.
‘Be my ears and eyes when I’m not around,’ Cassien said, his tone grave. ‘Tomorrow we go to Wevyr’s.’ He was intrigued to see the boy squirm. ‘Now, we need to hide my weapons. Any thoughts?’ He wondered if Ham would be curious as to why. If he was, he didn’t show it.
‘Wait here,’ the boy said and ducked into a nearby stable, returning shortly with a sack. ‘Put your blades in here. I’ll keep them hidden until you need them. I know the stableboy and checked. That stable is going to be empty for the next two nights on the orders of one of the nobles, whose unfriendly horse is usually stabled there. He’s away but pays for that stall to be kept free — it’s the end stall. I can hide them under the hay. I can even sleep there if you want.’ He shrugged. ‘I’m used to it.’
/>
‘No need for that.’ Cassien frowned. ‘You’re sure you can keep them safe?’
Ham nodded solemnly. ‘My friend Joch can be trusted.’
As they entered there was no immediate sign of the innkeeper, although the inn itself was filling fast and the sounds dragged him back to his early childhood. He’d forgotten how loud men drinking could be. Sporadic bursts of raucous laughter permeated a convivial atmosphere of talk and the clank of pewter mugs. At trestle tables around the room a few people were already eating and the fire at one end burned steadily. Hanging softly overhead was a thin cloud of smoke drifting from the clay pipes of a few of the older men, who sat closest to the fire, chewing the cud of winters past, no doubt.
‘Will you be all right?’ Cassien asked.
‘I’ll eat in the kitchen. I know some of the girls,’ Ham said.
Cassien grinned. ‘Is there anyone you don’t know in this town, Ham?’ he said, as he moved toward the back stairs. ‘I’ll see you shortly.’
‘Have fun,’ Ham said, and Cassien raised an eyebrow as Ham hastily departed.
‘Ah, there you are, sir,’ Erris said, arriving from the kitchens and hurrying along three serving girls. ‘Those are for the merchants from Briavel.’ The first girl nodded and the others pushed past. ‘Tell them the ale is with my compliments,’ he called after them, returning his gaze to Cassien. ‘Your visitor was shown upstairs not long ago.’
Cassien climbed the stairs thinking on the ugly task ahead. If he could depend on her silence he would, but he doubted any whore could be entirely relied upon. He would kill her if he had to. He opened the door quietly, fully expecting to find her rummaging through the room to see if he’d hidden anything beneath loose floorboards or behind the sparse furniture. Instead he found her sitting by a window, her cloak tied around her throat. There was something still about her that immediately captivated him. She cocked her head to one side and regarded him closely.
He might have smiled, if not for feeling suddenly and intensely annoyed. ‘I am Cassien,’ he said evenly.
‘Yes, I presumed that.’ Her voice was slightly raspy in a pleasant way.
‘You’re not Penely, are you?’
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