by Barb Hendee
Brot’ân’duivé shook his head once. They must be spread thin, and have grown desperate, to put a scout in such an obvious position. It would be so easy to eliminate one more of them.
From his crouched position, at first he could not identify the one. He did not know all who traveled with Dänvârfij and Fréthfâre, even after following them for a year. The one suddenly scuttled to the roof’s edge and hung its head over.
Brot’ân’duivé rose a little, wary of betraying his own presence against the city’s skyline. Almost immediately, the one on the roof returned to the side facing the castle. Brot’ân’duivé did not need to know more. He took off north across the roofs, running in plain sight.
Someone else had passed by in the street below, checking in with the watcher on the roof. When he reached the last roof’s side over Old Procession Road, he flattened as he peered over the edge.
A slender, tall form walked away in the early dawn. It wore a plain cloak, but that hid nothing from him. He saw its soft leather boots, dyed forest gray, and pant legs that matched. The way the figure moved, each step planted in a silent, flat step, was unmistakable.
Brot’ân’duivé watched Dänvârfij slip along the northwest run of Old Bailey Road, heading for some side street. She peered up toward the other one still on top of the roof.
Brot’ân’duivé could now see that the other figure was male. When that anmaglâhk shifted on the roof’s edge, on hands and knees, the male kept his right knee off the roof’s shakes.
Brot’ân’duivé realized it was Eywodan, likely the oldest member of the anmaglâhk here in this city. Years ago, Eywodan had assisted flood victims of Brot’ân’duivé’s own clan. Eywodan’s knee had been broken by rushing debris when he had waded into the swelling river. Brot’ân’duivé had carried him to a healer.
Brot’ân’duivé pushed away that memory and any sickness it brought. Eywodan was now the enemy, as well as Dänvârfij, Fréthfâre, and all of Most Aged Father’s loyalists. Any who still followed that twisted, maddened patriarch could no longer be seen in any other way. But Brot’ân’duivé lingered, for an enemy was sometimes made so by the actions of another—by his action. One mistake made in fury and hatred had led to all of this, though it had been spurred by Most Aged Father’s fanaticism.
Brot’ân’duivé had made that mistake. There was no changing it now, and he would not succumb to regret.
He watched until Eywodan looked the other way in scanning the guild’s castle and the loop of street around it. With the street below clear and empty, Brot’ân’duivé dropped over the edge to land silently upon the cobblestones. He ran through the alleys and cutways, searching for a vantage point to catch sight of Dänvârfij. When he spotted her around a street corner in the early, dim dawn, he stalled.
She had doubled back beyond the castle and was heading south.
In scouting ventures with Léshil, Brot’ân’duivé had discovered there were not many inns or way houses in the southern district. That area did hold one of the city’s landside exits. Could Dänvârfij simply be checking on another sentry? Had she placed someone to watch that exit?
It seemed unlikely, unwise, to spread their numbers so thin and still search for Magiere. Or had they given up the search and now merely waited and watched?
The sun had fully crested the rooftops in the east when Brot’ân’duivé finally watched Dänvârfij walk along a city thoroughfare and out the city’s southern exit. He waited but a few moments and then followed, lingering inside the great gate’s arch.
She only traveled a short way before stepping off the road into a grove of fir and pine trees.
This was what Brot’ân’duivé had hoped for. He waited until she was out of sight for three breaths, and then he walked out of the city before drawing his blades, keeping them under the folds of his dangling cloak.
Dänvârfij sank to her knees before a tall fir tree, its lowest branches high enough to hang above her bent head. She dreaded making this report, and yet she longed for guidance. Reaching inside the front of her forest gray tunic, she withdrew an elongated oval of smooth, tawny wood no bigger than her palm. She reached out and pressed the word-wood against the tree’s trunk and whispered.
“Father?”
I am here, daughter.
Most Aged Father’s voice filled her mind with welcome calm. She should have reported sooner and not let shame keep her from him.
“I have much to report,” she said. “The white woman is here. We have seen her, and she has seen us, but we have not captured her yet.”
What is the delay?
Dänvârfij closed her eyes. “Brot’ân’duivé now protects the woman and her companions. He has taken Wy’lanvi and Owain from us. Counting Fréthfâre, we are now six. I have allowed the others only a quarter day or night of sleep between search or watch duty. But we are spread thin in a human city of such size.”
She did not wish to sound as if she were making excuses for their lack of success. She simply wished him to know the true situation. No immediate response came, though she had not expected one. The loss of two more at the hands of the traitor would strike him hard. Even the thought of a greimasg’äh killing other anmaglâhk was so unthinkable.
So he is still there, in the city?
“And another,” she answered, though this part was not something easy to tell him. “The faltering one, Osha, is with him. There is also the last survivor of Sgäilsheilleache’s family . . . Leanâlhâm.”
Osha . . . and Leanâlhâm . . . in a land of humans? What are they doing with the traitor?
His tone was so shocked that Dänvârfij wished she had not been the one to deliver such news. The rent in her caste was deepening. It had become more than just a few among the people sympathizing with dissidents both inside or outside of the caste. Osha was no longer anmaglâhk, and Leanâlhâm was just an orphan, and yet both had stepped into this civil war.
Dänvârfij ached, thinking of her people and wondering how much worse things had become since she had left home. She could not ask.
Do you have a plan?
The abrupt shift caught her off guard but was welcome.
“Of a kind. Our quarry has been trying to reach the sage, Wynn Hygeorht. That woman may hold something of importance. She has been imprisoned by her own kind, and it is my hope that Magiere and Brot’ân’duivé will try to free her before fleeing the city. When they come for the sage, above all else, Brot’ân’duivé will die, and we will capture the others.”
You have sentries on all city exits?
“No, only on the port and the guild’s castle. The others are sweeping the city, trying to gain a location.”
Pull in everyone. Focus on the guild and all ways out of the city. You will not find Brot’ân’duivé until he chooses to show himself. Wait, and take your quarry in the open, once they are encumbered with too many to protect. This is the only way to keep the traitor from slipping away.
“Yes, Father.”
His guidance made her settle at ease once more. Perhaps now was a chance to ask how he was, how efforts at home progressed . . . but a shadow shifted among the branches around her arm.
Dänvârfij’s heart hammered as a shimmering white stiletto thrust through the branches for her heart. She twisted out of its path at the last instant. A booted foot shattered the branches and smashed the side of her head.
She rolled blindly away, trying to regain her feet. In her blurred sight, she saw a glint and kicked out as she rose on one knee. Her foot never connected, though that spark on white metal vanished.
Lunging backward and up to her feet, she reached for her own blades. She knew whom she faced even before her sight cleared, and she could not help being afraid. The very shadows of the fir’s branches appeared to cling and glide over a tall, broad form like a second cloak as it—he—stepped out from between the trees.
Brot’ân’duivé, the traitor, stood fully in the dawn’s light.
This was the first time in the long,
dark journey from Dänvârfij’s homeland that she had seen him face-to-face, seen those scars that skipped over his right eye. She was no match for him. Another greimasg’äh might not have taken him.
Brot’ân’duivé took another silent step, not even disturbing the leaves and needles on the earth.
She jerked out her stilettos and almost instantly realized her failure. As much as the traitor had been killing her brethren, killing her was not truly why he had come, for she held a stiletto in both hands.
Dänvârfij had dropped her word-wood at the tree. That was what he had come for.
Her life would be only a secondary gain next to that. She had lost even before she had a chance to strike at him. Her thoughts raced to scavenge anything from this moment.
Dänvârfij did not fear death; she feared failure of purpose, of her people . . . of her beloved patriarch, Most Aged Father. What was life to her other than service in silence and in shadow?
She quickly backed all the way to the open road and stood there in plain sight of any guards at the city gate. Even dull-witted humans would fix on a fight on the open road. Brot’ân’duivé would never call such attention to himself.
The greimasg’äh followed only to the last tree off the road and came no farther into the open.
Dänvârfij grew sick inside for her loss but sheathed her weapons, jerked off her face scarf, and pulled her hood back. With her face fully exposed, like any other visitor to the city, she turned and walked slowly toward the gates.
For a moment, she almost expected to hear a blade spinning through air.
It never came, and one military guard merely smiled at her as she passed through, into the city.
Now there was only Fréthfâre’s word-wood, and it had to be guarded. Without it, they would be cut off from Most Aged Father and lost alone in this foreign land far from home.
Brot’ân’duivé watched through a tree’s branches as Dänvârfij slipped back into the city. Killing her would have been an additional advantage. He did not admire her wisdom of retreat. He noted only that she was after all an anmaglâhk; she knew when, where, and how to cut her losses.
Turning back through the trees, he crouched beneath the branches of that one fir. There upon the needle-coated ground at its base lay the tawny oval of word-wood. He picked it up, prepared to destroy it, and then hesitated. There had been too many times in the past year when he had failed within himself, as he did so now when his spite and fury rose.
Brot’ân’duivé pressed the word-wood against the fir’s trunk.
“Do you hear me, old worm in the wood of my people?” he whispered. “One day, I will come for you . . . again!”
No voice entered his thoughts, and after the longest moment, he was about to pull the word-wood from the bark and crack it.
Unlikely . . . but if ever, then I will be waiting again, dog . . . in the dark.
CHAPTER 22
TWO MORNINGS LATER, before the sun had risen, Wynn knelt by the back door of Nattie’s inn and fastened a note to Shade’s collar. Chane stood right behind both of them.
“Remember, give it only to Rodian,” she said, and stroked Shade’s neck as she drew up memories of the captain and the second castle of Calm Seatt. “Try to find him at the barracks first.”
She wished Shade didn’t have to be the one to put events in motion. Hopefully the dog could locate the captain somewhere other than the guild, as that place was likely watched by anmaglâhk.
Shade huffed and scratched the door.
With reluctance, Wynn cracked it open, and Shade slipped out and took off up the alley. When Wynn turned about, Chane looked troubled.
Dawn was close, and he needed to get back to their room.
Chane had a cloak—provided earlier by Brot’an—draped over his arm. It was not the drab cloak that the master anmaglâhk had been wearing as his traveler’s disguise, but instead, it was the forest gray cloak of an anmaglâhk. Wynn didn’t want to know where Brot’an had gotten it.
“Is everything else set?” Chane asked. “The trunks, the wagons . . . the inserts for the boots?”
“Yes, yes,” she answered, nervous now that the first step had been taken. “Ore-Locks arranged everything and kept me out of sight. I wish he was coming with us tonight, but he can’t risk being seen in the middle of all this. There can be no oddities to put off the anmaglâhk.”
“I will be there,” he reminded her. And then he added grudgingly, “Leesil’s plan should work, though he should not have involved you.”
Wynn stifled a sigh. Chane had been fretting enough for both of them about her part in what was to come. But yes, the plan should work. Getting Rodian to agree to what she asked in Shade’s message would help in that. All they could do now was wait.
“We should get you to the room,” she said.
Chane didn’t move.
“What’s wrong?” she asked.
“There is something I haven’t told you. Shade knows . . . but for some reason, she did not pass you any memories or try to tell you of it.”
“Tell me what?”
Chane glanced away, and then blurted out, “I have managed to create a concoction, a potion, that allows me to remain awake during the day. I cannot go outside, but I will not fall dormant. I wish to be awake today, to help with preparations.”
Wynn stared at him. “A potion? What . . . how long have you . . . ?
He raised one hand to ward off questions. “For some time. I feared telling you because some of the components are questionable, and I based my experiments on a sample I obtained from Welstiel.” He looked her straight in the eye before she could say anything about the last part. “You are the one who said we can no longer afford to refuse help on our side . . . from wherever it is offered. My being awake today will be helpful.”
Wynn just stood there, taking this in. Chane could be awake during the day?
Once, she would’ve exploded at him for touching anything, using anything, that had ever belonged to Welstiel. She couldn’t deny that the pack of toys Chane had taken from Magiere’s undead half brother had been of some use. From the brass ring he now wore to the etched steel hoop that conjured heat, there had been more than one moment when they wouldn’t have succeeded in past endeavors. But the thought of Chane re-creating anything uncovered by Welstiel and then consuming it . . .
To her surprise, though she was concerned, she wasn’t angry. She’d never admit it, but the thought of having his help all day brought relief. One part was almost unbelievable, though.
“Shade has known about this?” Wynn asked.
“For a short while, just after she and I escaped from the guild.”
“Why would Shade ever keep a secret for you?”
“I have wondered,” he said. “It might be the ways of the majay-hì. Or . . . she’s more pragmatic than you know.”
Wynn started slightly as the implications sank in. “So, yesterday, all day, you were just lying there on the floor, pretending to . . . sleep . . . and she knew it?”
Chane nodded once. Of all that Chane or Shade had ever done in Wynn’s company, this struck her as the most unsettling. They’d both been a pain in her backside with their separate overprotectiveness. Now they were in actual collusion about it.
“And there are side effects to this potion, aren’t there?” she said. “That’s what all that hiding away on the sea voyage to the Lhoin’na was about. You were . . . sick . . . every time you finally came out of your cabin.”
He didn’t—couldn’t—deny it.
“It is nothing that will hinder me,” he replied. “I am accustomed to it now, so long as I do not prolong its use too far. I simply wanted you to know.”
Shade was well on her way to Rodian, and right now, they had a great deal to accomplish. Wynn walked past Chane and headed for the stairs.
“Let’s get to work on those boots.”
But soon enough, Wynn was going to make Chane show her everything—including anything else he was hiding in We
lstiel’s pack of twisted little toys. And Shade had better not be in on any more of it.
* * *
Rodian stepped from the barracks that housed his office and walked out into the courtyard of the second castle that housed Malourné’s military. The sun was just cresting the keep’s forward wall, and he knew it was too early to check in with the High Advocate.
It was the morning of the third day since he’d been summoned before Prince Leäfrich, and he hadn’t slept all night.
So far, Rodian had been unable to convince the High Advocate to grant him a general warrant, but this didn’t surprise him. The prospect of Shyldfälches pounding on doors was disruptive to the peace, yet Rodian hadn’t given up. Last evening, he’d succeeded in convincing the advocate to send word to the royal family about his request. He had a feeling it would be granted.
Prince Leäfrich was likely under great pressure from the Premin Council to find Wynn.
Rodian slowed as he passed through the courtyard and watched the shadows of the keep’s wall creep away as the sun rose higher. Even without the warrant, he’d not been idle.
His men swept the city on double duty, even gaining some of the military’s regulars for assistance. All district constabularies had been alerted and given descriptions of Wynn Hygeorht and her wolfish black dog, with orders to detain either. So far, it seemed as if the little, precocious sage had just vanished.
Rodian rubbed his tired eyes, and then the sound of barking cut through his overburdened thoughts.
“Here! Stop that!” someone shouted. “Wait . . . isn’t that . . . ? Get it!”
The barking only increased, mixed with snarls that echoed up the gatehouse tunnel.
It took only an instant before Rodian bolted into the tunnel.
The outer portcullis was already raised, and he doubled his pace. As he rushed out the tunnel’s other end, he found three of the regulars trying to encircle a tall, charcoal black dog, which was snarling and snapping as it evaded them.
