Wintertide

by Michael J. Sullivan

  To her surprise, the knight did not laugh. He merely asked, “And you think no knight will carry your favor because you are of common blood?”

  “Well, that and about a dozen other reasons. I hear the whispers sometimes.”

  Sir Breckton dropped to one knee and bowed his head. “Please, Lady Amilia, I beseech you. Give me the honor of carrying your token in the joust.”

  She just stood there.

  The knight looked up. “I’ve offended you, haven’t I? I am too bold! Forgive my impudence. I had no intention to participate, as I deem such contests the unnecessary endangerment of good men’s lives for vanity and foolish entertainment. Now, however, after meeting you, I realize I must compete, for more is at stake. The honor of any lady should be defended and you are no ordinary lady, but rather the Chosen of Maribor. For you, I would slay a thousand men to bring justice to those blackguards who would soil your good name! My sword and lance are yours, dear lady, if you will but grant me your favor.”

  Dumbstruck, Amilia did not realize she had agreed until after walking away. She was numb and could not stop smiling for the rest of her trip up the stairs.

  ***

  Reaching Modina’s room, Amilia’s spirits were still soaring. It had been a good day, perhaps the best of her life. She had discovered her family was alive and thriving. The wedding was proceeding under the command of an experienced and gracious man. And a handsome knight had knelt before her and asked for her token. Amilia grasped the latch, excited to share the good news with Modina, but all was forgotten the moment the door swung open.

  As usual, Modina sat before the window, dressed in her thin, white nightgown, staring out at the brilliance of the snow in the moonlight. Next to her was a full-length, intricately-carved oval mirror mounted with brass fittings on a beautiful wooden swivel.

  “Where did that come from?” Amilia asked, shocked.

  The empress did not answer.

  “How did it get here?”

  Modina glanced at the mirror. “It’s pretty, isn’t it? A pity they brought such a nice one. I suppose they wanted to please me.”

  Amilia approached the mirror and ran her fingers along the polished edge. “How long have you had it?”

  “They brought it in this morning.”

  “I’m surprised it survived the day.” Amilia turned her back on the mirror to face the empress.

  “I’m in no hurry, Amilia. I still have some weeks yet.”

  “So you’ve decided to wait for your wedding?”

  “Yes. At first I didn’t think it would matter, but then I realized it could reflect badly on you. If I wait, it will appear to be Ethelred’s fault. Everyone will assume I couldn’t stand the thought of him touching me.”

  “Is that the reason?”

  “No, I have no feelings about him or anything. Well, except for you. But you’ll be all right.” Modina turned to look at Amilia. “I can’t even cry any more. I never even wept when they captured Arista…not a single tear. I watched the whole thing from this window. I saw Saldur and the seret go in and knew what that meant. They came back out, but she never has. She’s down there right now in that horrible dark place. Just like I once was. When she was here, I had a purpose, but now there is nothing left. It’s time for this ghost to fade away. I have served the regents’ purpose by helping them build the Empire. I’ve given you a better life, and not even Saldur will harm you now. I tried to help Arista, but I failed. Now it’s time for me to leave.”

  Amilia knelt down next to Modina, gently drew back the hair from her face, and kissed her cheek. “Don’t speak that way. You were happy once, weren’t you? You can be again.”

  Modina shook her head. “A girl named Thrace was happy. She lived with the family she loved in a small village near a river. Surrounded by friends, she played in the woods and fields. That girl believed in a better tomorrow. She looked forward to gifts Maribor would bring. Only instead of gifts, He sent darkness and horror.”

  “Modina, there is always room for hope. Please, you must believe.”

  “There was one day, when you were getting the clerk to order some cloth, that I saw a man from my past. He was hope. He saved Thrace once. For a moment, one very brief moment, I thought he had come to save me, too, only he didn’t. When he walked away, I knew he was just a memory from a time when I was alive.”

  Amilia’s hands found Modina’s and cradled them as she might hold a dying bird. Amilia was having trouble breathing. As her lower lip began to tremble, she looked back at the mirror. “You’re right. It is a shame they brought such a pretty one.” She put her arms around Modina and began to cry.

  Chapter 5

  Footprints in the Snow

  Several miles from Medford, Royce saw the smoke and prepared himself for the worst. Crossing the Galewyr used to mean entering the bustling streets of the capital, but on that day, as he raced across the bridge, he found only a charred expanse of blackened posts and scorched stone. The city he had known was gone.

  Royce never called anywhere home. To him the word meant a mythical place like paradise or fairyland, but Wayward Street had been the closest thing he ever found. A recent snowfall covered the city like a sheet that nature had drawn over a corpse. Not a building remained undamaged, and many were nothing but charcoal and ash. The castle’s gates were shattered, portions of the walls collapsed. Even the trees in Gentry Square were gone.

  Medford House, in the Lower Quarter, was a pile of smoldering beams. Nothing remained across the street except a gutted foundation and a burned sign displaying the hint of a rose in blistered paint.

  He dismounted and moved to the rubble of the House. Where Gwen’s office used to be, he caught a glimpse of pale fingers beneath a collapsed wall. His legs turned weak and his feet foolish as he stumbled over the wreckage. Smoke caught in his throat, and he drew up the scarf to cover his nose and mouth. Reaching the edge of the wall, he bent and tried to lift it. The edge broke away, but it was enough to reveal what was underneath.

  A cream-colored glove.

  Royce stepped back from the smoke. Sitting on the blackened porch, he noticed he was shaking. He was unaccustomed to being scared. Over the years, he had given up caring if he lived or died, figuring that a quick demise spared him the pain of living in a world so miserly that it begrudged an orphan boy a life. He had always been ready for death, gambling with it, waging bets against it. Royce had been satisfied in the knowledge that his risks were sound because he had nothing of value to lose—nothing to fear.

  Gwen changed everything.

  He was an idiot and never should have left her alone.

  Why did I wait?

  They could have been safe in Avempartha, where only he held the key. The New Empire could beat themselves senseless against its walls and never reach him or his family.

  A block away, a noisy flock of crows took flight. Royce stood and listened, hearing voices on the wind. Noticing his horse wandering down the street, he cursed himself for not tying her up. By the time he caught the reins, he spotted a patrol of imperial soldiers passing the charred ruins of Mason Grumon’s place.

  “Halt!” the leader shouted.

  Royce leapt on his mare and kicked her just as he heard a dull thwack. His horse lurched then collapsed with a bolt lodged deep in her flank. Royce jumped free before being crushed. He tumbled in the snow and came up on his feet, his dagger, Alverstone, drawn. Six soldiers hurried toward him. Only one had a crossbow, and he was busy ratcheting the string for his next shot.

  Royce turned and ran.

  He slipped into an alley filled with debris and vaulted over the shattered remains of the Rose and Thorn. Crossing the sewer near the inn’s stable, he was surprised to find the plank bridge still there. Shouts rose behind him, but they were distant and muffled by the snow. The old feed store was still standing, and with a leap, he caught the lower windowsill on the second story. If they tracked him through the alley, the soldiers would be briefly baffled at his disappearance. That w
as all the head start Royce needed. Pulling himself to the roof, he crossed it and climbed down the far side. He took one last moment to obscure his tracks before heading west.

  ***

  Royce stood at the edge of the forest trying to decide between the road and the more direct route through the trees. Snow started to fall again, and the wind swept the flakes at an angle. The white curtain muted colors, turning the world a hazy gray. The thief flexed his hands. He had lost feeling in his fingers again. In his haste to find Gwen, he had once more neglected to purchase winter gloves. He pulled his hood tight and wrapped the scarf around his face. The northwest gale tore at his cloak, cracking the edges like a whip. He hooked it in his belt several times but eventually gave up—the wind insisted.

  The distance to the Winds Abbey was a long day’s ride in summer, a day and a half in winter, but Royce had no idea how long it would take him on foot through snow. Without proper gear, it was likely he would not make it at all. Almost everything he had was lost with his horse including his blanket, food, and water. He did not even have the means to start a fire. The prudent choice would be the road. The walking would be easier, and he would at least have the chance of encountering other travelers. Still, it was the longer route. He chose the shortcut through the forest. He hoped Gwen had kept her promise and gone to the monastery, but there was only one way to be certain, and his need to see her had grown desperate.

  As night fell, the stars shone brightly above a glistening world of white. Struggling to navigate around logs and rocks hidden beneath the snow, Royce halted when he came upon a fresh line of tracks—footprints. He listened but heard only the wind blowing through the snow-burdened trees.

  With an agile jump he leapt on a partially fallen tree and nimbly sprinted up its length until he was several feet off the ground. Royce scanned the tracks in the snow below him. They were only as deep as his own, too shallow for a man weighed down by even light armor.

  Who can possibly be traveling on foot here tonight besides me?

  Given that the footprints were headed the direction he was going, and Royce wanted to keep the owner in front of him, he followed. The going was less difficult and Royce was thankful for the ease in his route.

  When he reached the top of a ridge, the tracks veered right, apparently circling back the way he had come.

  “Sorry to see you go,” Royce muttered. His breath puffed out in a moonlit fog.

  As he climbed down the slope, he recalled this ravine from the trip he had taken three years earlier with Hadrian and Prince Alric. Then, as now, he had difficulty finding a decent route and struggled to work his way to the valley below. The snow made travel a challenge, and once he reached level ground he found it deep with drifts. He had not made more than a hundred feet of headway before encountering the footprints once more. Again he followed them, and found the way easier.

  Reaching the far side of the valley, he faced the steep slope back up. The footprints turned to the right. This time Royce paused. Slightly to the left he could see an easy route. A V-shaped ravine, cleared and leveled by runoff, was inviting. He considered going that way but noticed that directly in front of him, carved in the bark of a spruce tree, was an arrow-shaped marker pointing to the right. The trailblazer’s footprints were sprinkled with woodchips.

  “So you want me to keep following you,” Royce whispered to himself. “That’s only marginally more disturbing than you knowing I’m following you at all.”

  He glanced around. There was no one he could see. The only movement was the falling snow. The stillness felt both eerie and peaceful, as if the wood waited for him to decide.

  His legs were weak, his feet and hands numb. Royce never liked invitations, but he guessed following the prints would once again be the easier route. He looked up at the slope and sighed. After following the tracks only a few hundred feet more, he spotted a pair of fur mittens dangling from the branch of a tree. Royce slipped them on and found they were still warm.

  “Okay, that’s creepy,” Royce said aloud. He raised his voice and added, “I’d love a skin of water, a hot steak with onions, and perhaps some fresh baked bread with butter.”

  All around him was the tranquil silence of a dark wood in falling snow. Royce shrugged and continued onward. The trail eventually hooked left, but by then the steep bluff was little more than a mild incline. Royce half expected to find a dinner waiting for him when he reached the crest, but the hilltop was bare. In the distance was a light, and the footprints headed straight toward it.

  Royce ticked through the possibilities and concluded nothing. There was no chance imperial soldiers were leading him through the forest, and he was too far from Windermere for it to be monks. Dozens of legends spoke of fairies and ghosts inhabiting the woods of western Melengar, but none mentioned denizens that left footprints and warm mittens.

  No matter how he ran the scenarios, he could find no way to justify an impending trap. Still, Royce gripped the handle of Alverstone and trudged forward. As he closed the distance, he saw that the light came from a small house built high in the limbs of a large oak tree. Below the tree house a livestock pen was surrounded by a ring of thick evergreens, where a dark horse pawed the snow beside a wooden lean-to.

  “Hello?” Royce called.

  “Climb up,” a voice yelled down. “If you’re not too tired.”

  “Who are you?”

  “I’m a friend. An old friend—or rather, you’re mine.”

  “What’s your name…friend?” Royce stared up at the opening on the underside of the tree house.

  “Ryn.”

  “Now see, that’s a bit odd as I have few friends, and none of them is called Ryn.”

  “I never told you my name. Now, are you going to come up and have some food or simply steal my horse and ride off? Personally, I suggest a bite to eat first.”

  Royce looked at the horse for a long moment before grabbing the knotted rope dangling along the side of the tree trunk and pulled himself up. Reaching the floor of the house, he peeked inside. The space was larger than he expected, oven warm, and smelled of meat stew. Branches reached out in all directions, each one rubbed smooth as a banister. Pots and scarves hung from the limbs, and several layers of mats and blankets hid the wooden floor.

  In a chair crafted from branches, a slim figure smoked a pipe. “Welcome, Mr. Royce,” Ryn said with a smile.

  He wore crudely stitched clothes made from rough, treated hides. On his head was a hat that looked like an old, flopped sack. Even with his ears hidden, his slanted eyes and high cheekbones betrayed his elven heritage.

  On the other side of the room, a woman and small boy chopped mushrooms and placed them in a battered pot suspended in a small fireplace made of what looked to be river stones. They, too, were mir—a half-breed mix of human and elf—like Royce himself. Neither said a word, but they glanced over at him from time to time while adding vegetables to the pot.

  “You know my name?” Royce asked.

  “Of course. It isn’t a name I could easily forget. Please, come in. My home is yours.”

  “How do you know me?” Royce pulled up his legs and closed the door.

  “Three autumns ago, just after Amrath’s murder, you were at the Silver Pitcher.”

  Royce thought back. The hat!

  “They were sick.” Ryn tilted his head toward his family. “Fever—the both of them. We were out of food and I spent my last coin on some old bread and a turnip from Mr. Hall. I knew it wouldn’t be enough, but there was nothing else I could do.”

  “You were the elf that they accused of thieving. They pulled your hat off.”

  Ryn nodded. He puffed on his pipe and said, “You and your friend were organizing a group of men to save the Prince of Melengar. You asked me to join. You promised a reward—a fair share.”

  Royce shrugged. “We needed anyone willing to help.”

  “I didn’t believe you. Who of my kind would? No one ever gave fair shares of anything to an elf, but I was despe
rate. When it was over, Drake refused to pay me just as I expected. But you kept your word and forced him to give me an equal share—and a horse. You threatened to kill the whole lot of them if they didn’t.” He allowed himself a little smile. “Drake handed over the gelding with full tack and never even checked it. I think he just wanted to get rid of me. I left before they could change their minds. I was miles away before I finally got a chance to look in the saddlebags. Fruits, nuts, meat, cheese, a pint of whiskey, a skin of cider, those would’ve been treasure enough. But I also found warm blankets, fine clothes, a hand axe, flint and steel, a knife—and the purse. There were gold tenants in that bag—twenty-two of them.”

  “Gold tenants? You got Baron Trumbul’s horse?”

  Ryn nodded. “There was more than enough gold to buy medicine, and with the horse I got back in time. I prayed I would be able to thank you before I died, and today I got my chance. I saw you in the city but could do nothing there. I am so glad I persuaded you to visit.”

  “The mittens were a nice touch.”

  “Please sit and be my guest for dinner.”

  Royce hung his scarf alongside his cloak on one of the branches and set his boots to warm near the fire. The four ate together with little conversation.

  After she had taken his empty bowl, Ryn’s wife spoke for the first time. “You look tired, Mr. Royce. Can we make you a bed for the night?”

  “No. Sorry. I can’t stay.” Royce said while getting up, pleased to feel his feet again.

  “You’re in a hurry?” Ryn asked.

  “You could say that.”

  “In that case, you will take my horse, Hivenlyn,” Ryn said.

  An hour earlier, Royce would have stolen a horse from anyone he happened upon, so he was surprised to hear himself say, “No. I mean, thanks, but no.”

  “I insist. I named him Hivenlyn because of you. It means unexpected gift in Elvish. So you see, you must take him. He knows every path in this wood and will get you safely wherever you need to go.” Ryn nodded toward the boy, who nimbly slipped out the trap door.