She trailed off, frowning. “He has a way of signaling me. A way of letting me know when he’s around. I excused myself and found him over by the barn. We headed into the woods for a bit and he asked me questions. Who was there, how many people, what they looked like.” She looked thoughtful.
“Now that I’m thinking of it, I think that was the real test. He wanted to see how observant I was.”
“He almost sounds like a spy,” I mused.
Denna shrugged. “We wandered for about half an hour, talking. Then he heard something and told me to wait for him. He headed off toward the farmhouse and was gone for a long while.”
“How long?”
“Ten minutes?” she shrugged. “You know how it is when you’re waiting for someone. It was dark and I was cold and hungry.” She wrapped her arms around her stomach and leaned forward a little. “Gods, I’m hungry now, too. I wish I would’ve …”
I pulled an apple out of my travelsack and handed it to her. They were gorgeous, red as blood, sweet, and crisp. The sort of apples you dream about all year but can only get for a few weeks during the fall.
Denna gave me a curious look. “I used to travel a lot,” I explained as I took one for myself. “And I used to be hungry a lot. So I usually carry something to eat. I’ll fix you a real dinner when we set camp for the night.”
“And he cooks, too… .” She bit into the apple and took a drink of water to wash it down. “Anyway, I thought I heard shouting, so I headed back in the direction of the farm. When I came out from behind a bluff, I could definitely hear screaming and shouting. Then I got closer and smelled smoke. And I saw the light of the fire through the trees—”
“What color was it?” I asked, my mouth half full of apple.
Denna looked at me sharply, her expression suddenly suspicious. “Why do you ask that?”
“I’m sorry, I interrupted,” I said swallowing my mouthful of apple. “Finish your story first and I’ll tell you afterward.”
“I’ve been talking an awful lot,” she said. “And you haven’t made any mention at all of why you’re up in this little corner of the world.”
“The masters down at the University heard some odd rumors and sent me here to find out if they were true,” I said. There was no awkwardness or hesitation in the lie. I didn’t even plan it, really, it just came out. Forced to make a snap decision, I couldn’t safely tell her the truth about my search for the Chandrian. I couldn’t bear the thought of Denna thinking I was brain-addled.
“The University does that sort of thing?” Denna asked. “I thought you lot just sat around reading books.”
“Some folks read,” I admitted. “But when we hear strange rumors, someone needs to go out and find out what’s really happened. When people get superstitious, they start to look toward the University and think, Who around here is meddling with dark powers better left alone? Who should we toss into a great, blazing bonfire?”
“So you do this sort of thing a lot?” She made a gesture with her half-eaten apple. “Investigate things?”
I shook my head. “I just got on a master’s bad side. He made sure I drew the short straw for this little trip.”
Not a bad lie, considering it was off the cuff. It would even hold up if she did any asking around, as parts of it were true. When necessity demands it, I’m an excellent liar. Not the noblest of skills, but useful. It ties closely to acting and storytelling, and I learned all three from my father, who was a master craftsman.
“You are so full of horseshit,” she said matter-of-factly.
I froze with my teeth halfway into my apple. I pulled back, leaving white impressions in the red skin. “I beg your pardon?”
She shrugged. “If you don’t want to tell me, that’s fine. But don’t fabricate some story out of a misguided desire to pacify or impress me.”
I drew a deep breath, hesitated, and let it out slowly. “I don’t want to lie to you about why I’m here,” I said. “But I worry what you might think if I tell you the truth.”
Denna’s eyes were dark, thoughtful, and gave nothing away. “Fair enough,” she said at last with an almost imperceptible nod. “I believe that.”
She took a bite of her apple and gave me a long look as she chewed, never looking away from my eyes. Her lips were wet and redder than the apple. “I heard some rumors.” I said at last. “And I want to know what happened here. That’s all really. I just …”
“Listen Kvothe, I’m sorry.” Denna sighed and ran a hand through her hair. “I shouldn’t have pushed you. It’s none of my business, really. I know what it’s like to have secrets.”
I almost told her everything then. The whole story about my parents, the Chandrian, the man with black eyes and a nightmare smile. But I worried it might seem like the desperate elaboration of a child caught in a lie. So instead I took the coward’s way out and stayed silent.
“You’ll never find your true love that way,” Denna said.
I snapped out of my reverie, confused. “I’m sorry, what?”
“You eat the core of your apple,” she said, amused. “You eat it all around, then from the bottom to the top. I’ve never seen anyone do that before.”
“Old habit,” I said dismissively, not wanting to tell her the truth. That there had been a time in my life when the core was all of the apple I was likely to find, and I’d been glad of it. “What did you mean before?”
“Didn’t you ever play that game?” she held up her own apple core and grabbed the stem with two fingers. “You think of a letter and twist. If the stem stays on you think of another letter and twist again. When the stem breaks off …” hers did, “… you know the first letter of the name of the person you’re going to fall in love with.”
I looked down at the tiny piece of apple I had left. Not enough to grip and twist. I bit off the last of the apple and tossed the stem. “Looks like I’m destined to be loveless.”
“There you go with seven words again,” she said with a smile. “You do realize you always do that?”
It took me a minute to realize what she was referring to, but before I could respond Denna had moved on. “I heard the seeds are supposed to be bad for you,” she said. “They have arsenic in them.”
“That’s just a wives’ tale,” I said. It was one of the ten thousand questions I’d asked Ben when he’d traveled with the troupe. “It’s not arsenic. It’s cyanide, and there’s not enough to hurt you unless you eat bucketsful.”
“Oh.” Denna gave the remains of her apple a speculative look, then began to eat it from the bottom up.
“You were telling me about what happened to Master Ash before I rudely interrupted,” I prompted gently as I could.
Denna shrugged. “There isn’t much left to tell. I saw the fire, came closer, heard more shouting and commotion… .”
“And the fire?”
She hesitated. “Blue.”
I felt a sort of dark anticipation rise up in me. Excitement at finally being close to answers about the Chandrian, fear at the thought of being close to them. “What did the ones look like who attacked you? How did you get away?”
She gave a bitter laugh. “Nobody attacked me. I saw shapes outlined against the fire and ran like billy-hell.” She lifted her bandaged arm and touched the side of her head. “I must have gone headfirst into a tree and knocked myself out. I woke up in town this morning.
“That’s the other reason I needed to come back,” she said. “I don’t know if Master Ash might still be out here. I didn’t hear anyone in town talking about finding an extra body, but I couldn’t ask without making everyone suspicious… .”
“And he wouldn’t like that,” I said.
Denna nodded. “I don’t doubt he’ll turn this into another test to see how well I can keep my mouth shut.” She gave me a significant look. “Speaking of which …”
“I’ll make a point of being terribly surprised if we find anyone,” I said. “Don’t worry.”
She smiled nervously. “Than
ks. I just hope he’s alive. I’ve invested two whole span trying to win him over.” She took a final drink out of my water bottle and handed it back to me. “Let’s go have a look around, shall we?”
Denna came unsteadily to her feet, and I tucked my water bottle back into my travelsack, watching her out of the corner of my eye. I had worked in the Medica for the better part of a year. Denna had been struck on her left temple hard enough to blacken her eye and bruise her well past her ear into her hairline. Her right arm was bandaged, and from the way she carried herself, I guessed she had some serious bruises along her left side, if not a few broken ribs.
If she had run into a tree, it must have been an oddly shaped tree.
But still, I didn’t make a point of it. Didn’t press her.
How could I? I too knew what it was like to have secrets.
The farm was nowhere near as gruesome as it could have been. The barn was nothing but a jumble of ash and planking. To one side a water trough stood next to a charred windmill. The wind tried to spin the wheel, but it only had three fins left, and it simply swayed back and forth, back and forth.
There were no bodies. Only the deep ruts wagon wheels had cut into the turf when they had come to haul them away.
“How many people were at the wedding?” I asked.
“Twenty-six, counting the bride and groom.” Denna kicked idly at a charred timber half buried in ashes near the remains of the barn. “Good thing it usually rains in the evenings here, or this whole side of the mountain would be on fire by now… .”
“Any simmering feuds lurking around here?” I asked. “Rival families? Another suitor looking for revenge?”
“Of course,” Denna said easily. “Little town like this, that’s what keeps things on an even keel. These folk will carry a grudge for fifty years about what their Tom said about our Kari.” She shook her head. “But nothing of the killing sort. These were normal folks.”
Normal but wealthy, I thought to myself as I walked toward the farmhouse. This was the sort of house only a wealthy family could afford to build. The foundation and the lower walls were solid grey stone. The upper story was plaster and timber with stone reinforcing the corners.
Still, the walls sagged inward on the verge of collapse. The windows and door gaped with dark soot licking out around the edges. I peered through the doorway and saw the grey stone of the walls charred black. There was broken crockery scattered among the remains of furniture and charred floorboards.
“If your things were in there,” I said to Denna. “I think they’re as good as gone. I could go in for a look… .”
“Don’t be stupid,” she said. “This whole thing is about to come down.” She knocked a knuckle against the doorframe. It echoed hollowly.
Curious at the odd sound of it, I went over to look. I picked at the doorpost with a fingernail and a long splinter the size of my palm peeled away with little resistance. “This is more like driftwood than timber,” I said. “After spending all this money, why skimp on the doorframe?”
Denna shrugged. “Maybe the heat of the fire did it?”
I nodded absently and continued to wander around, looking things over. I bent to pick up a piece of charred shingle and muttered a binding under my breath. A brief chill spread up my arms and flame flickered to life along the rough edge of the wood.
“That’s something you don’t see every day,” Denna said. Her voice was calm, but it was a forced calm, as if she was trying hard to sound nonchalant.
It took me a moment to figure out what she was talking about. Simple sympathy like this was so commonplace in the University that I hadn’t even thought about how it would look to someone else.
“Just a little meddling with dark forces better left alone,” I said lightly, holding up the burning shingle. “The fire was blue last night?”
She nodded. “Like a coal-gas flame. Like the lamps they have in Anilen.”
The shingle was burning an ordinary, cheerful orange. No trace of blue about it, but it could have been blue last night. I dropped the shingle and crushed it out with my boot.
I circled the house again. Something was bothering me, but I couldn’t put my finger on it. I wanted to go inside for a look around. “The fire really wasn’t that bad,” I called out to Denna. “What did you end up leaving inside?”
“Not that bad?” she said incredulously, as she came around the corner. “The place is a husk.”
I pointed. “The roof isn’t burned through except right by the chimney. That means the fire probably didn’t damage the second story very much. What of yours was in there?”
“I had some clothes and a lyre Master Ash bought for me.”
“You play lyre?” I was surprised. “How many strings?”
“Seven. I’m just learning.” She gave a brief, humorless laugh. “I was learning. I’m good enough for a country wedding and that’s about it.”
“Don’t waste yourself on the lyre,” I said. “It’s an archaic instrument with no room for subtlety. Not to disparage your choice of instrument,” I said quickly. “It’s just that your voice deserves better accompaniment than a lyre can give you. If you’re looking for a straight-string instrument you can carry with you, go for a half-harp.”
“You’re sweet,” she said. “But I didn’t pick it. Mr. Ash did. I’ll push him for a harp next time.” She looked around aimlessly and sighed. “If he’s still alive.”
I peered in one of the gaping windows to look around, only to have a chunk of the windowsill snap off in my hands when I leaned on it. “This one’s rotten through too.” I said, crumbling it in my hands.
“Exactly,” Denna took hold of my arm and pulled me away from the window. “The place is just waiting to fall in on you. It’s not worth going in. Like you said, it’s just a lyre.”
I let myself be led away. “Your patron’s body might be up there.”
Denna shook her head. “He’s not the sort to run into a burning building and get himself trapped.” She gave me a hard look. “What do you think you’re going to find in there, anyway?”
“I don’t know,” I admitted. “But if I don’t go inside, I don’t know where else to look for clues about what really happened here.”
“What rumors did you hear, anyway?” Denna asked.
“Not much,” I admitted, thinking back to what the bargeman had said. “A bunch of people were killed at a wedding. Everyone dead, torn apart like rag dolls. Blue fire.”
“They weren’t really torn apart,” Denna said. “From what I heard in town, it was a lot of knife and sword work.”
I hadn’t seen anyone wearing so much as a belt knife since I’d been in town. The closest thing had been farmers with sickles and scythes in the fields. I looked back at the sagging farmhouse, sure that I was missing something… .
“So what do you think happened here?” she asked.
“I don’t know,” I said. “I was half expecting to find nothing. You know how rumors get blown out of proportion.” I looked around. “I would have written the blue fire off to rumor if you hadn’t been here to confirm it.”
“Other people saw it last night,” she said. “Things were still smoldering when they came for the bodies and found me.”
I looked around, irritated. I still felt like I was missing something, but I couldn’t think of what in the world it could be. “What do they think in town?” I asked.
“Folk weren’t really talkative around me,” she said bitterly. “But I caught a bit of the conversation between the constable and the mayor. Folk are whispering about demons. The blue fire made sure of that. Some folk were talking about shamble-men. I expect the harvest festival will be more traditional than usual this year. Lots of fires and cider and straw men… .”
I looked around again. The collapsed wreckage of the barn, a windmill with three fins, and a burned-out husk of a house. Frustrated I ran my hands through my hair, still sure I was missing something. I’d expected to find … something. Anything.
; As I stood there, it occurred to me how foolish the hope was. What had I hoped to find? A footprint? A scrap of cloth from someone’s cloak? Some crumpled note with a vital piece of information conveniently written out for me to find? That sort of thing only happened in stories.
I pulled out my water bottle and drank off the last of it. “Well, I’m done here,” I said as I walked over to the water trough. “What are you planning to do next?”
“I need to look around a bit,” she said. “There’s a chance my gentleman friend is out there, hurt.”
I looked out over the rolling hills, gold with autumn leaves and wheat fields, green with pasture and stands of pine and fir. Scattered throughout were the dark scars of bluffs and stone outcroppings. “There’s a lot of ground to cover… .” I said.
She nodded, her expression resigned. “I’ve got to at least make an effort.”
“Would you like some help?” I asked. “I know a little woodcraft… .”
“I certainly wouldn’t mind the company,” she said. “Especially considering the fact that there may be a troupe of marauding demons in these parts. Besides, you already offered to make me dinner tonight.”
“That I did.” I made my way past the charred windmill to the iron hand pump. I grabbed the handle, leaned my weight against it, and staggered as it snapped off at the base.
I stared at the broken pump handle. It was rusted through to the center, crumbling away in gritty sheets of red rust.
In a sudden flash I remembered coming back to find my troupe killed that evening so many years ago. I remembered reaching out a hand to steady myself and finding the strong iron bands on a wagon’s wheel rusted away. I remembered the thick, solid wood falling to pieces when I touched it.
“Kvothe?” Denna’s face was close to mine, her expression concerned. “Are you alright? Tehlu blacken, sit down before you fall down. Are you hurt?”
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