The Silvered

by Tanya Huff

  By the third set, her muscles had loosened up and running came easier.

  By the tenth, fifty paces walking wasn’t enough for her to catch her breath.

  Tomas, who’d started to run on fifty, circled back beside her when she didn’t. “It’s all right. We’ll walk a while longer.”

  Mirian found enough breath to mutter, “Told you. Should’ve stolen a horse.”

  He had dimples when he grinned. She hadn’t noticed that before.

  They passed a set of cart tracks that led east to a small farm, the stubble of last year’s crops still filling the field nearest the road. They passed a trail leading west, and Tomas pointed out the tracks of the deer that had made it.

  Then they ran.

  Forty-nine. Fifty.

  And stopped.

  “Do you know where this road goes?”

  “Does it matter? I know the Mage-pack is at the end of it.”

  “It can’t be one road from Herdon to Karis. We’re the width of two conquered duchies away from the old Imperial border.” When Tomas lowered heavy brows, Mirian sighed. “Too sensible?”

  “A little.”

  And they ran again.

  Forty-nine. Fifty.

  Shrugging out of the too-small jacket, Tomas twitched inside the confines of his remaining clothes.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “The trousers are itchy.”

  Mirian managed to keep from laughing but only just. “I think they’re made to have small clothes under them.”

  “Why not make them so they don’t itch?”

  “I honestly don’t know.”

  An enormous ox patty, still damp enough to suggest war hadn’t stopped lumber from the mill heading toward buyers, blocked her path and she jumped it rather than go around. The sun was shining, birds were singing, and, while she didn’t have much breath to spare and they were heading to a fight with the emperor himself, walking along a country road with Tomas Hagen was almost pleasant. Her mother would be…

  …appalled. Mirian fought the urge to talk about the weather and ask Tomas his opinion on the new higher collars for evening jackets.

  They were running when they passed tracks leading to a farm tucked into a hollow not far from the road. One of the farm’s outbuildings had recently burned down, a pair of charred timbers rising out of the ruin like blackened bones, the smell of damp ash heavy on the air. A girl out in the garden froze, hoe half raised, and watched them pass. The distance was too great to see her expression, but from the way she stood, curled in on herself, it looked like she was afraid. A pig in a pen by the garden watched warily as well.

  Mirian slowed to a walk, then she stopped and turned up the track.

  “Where are you going?”

  “To trade apples for…not apples. Stay there, I’ll be quick.” She pulled two from the pouch as she walked. They looked so red against her hand she felt like she was in a fairy story. The girl looked at the apples, looked at Mirian, and finally limped to the edge of the garden.

  It wasn’t the fruit that had convinced her to approach, Mirian realized. It was the bruising on her face that matched the bruising on the girl’s. When the girl glanced at Tomas, Mirian shook her head. “No, it wasn’t him.”

  She took two apples with trembling fingers, then two more. “How?”

  Even Mirian knew apples didn’t look like that after having been stored all winter, not without help. “Earth-mage.”

  Still holding the apples, the girl jerked back, searching for mage marks. Mirian opened her eyes wider. After an extended search, the girl’s shoulders sagged, and Mirian was just as glad she didn’t have to tell her she had no time to help.

  A glance down at the apples. “Trade? We got sausage they didn’t find.” Pyrahn wasn’t that different a language from Aydori, although accent dragged the girl’s words sideways.

  The pig watched her as the girl ran to the cottage. Mirian wondered if there’d recently been a second. The cottage door hung crookedly from the frame, inexpertly repaired, and through the gap she heard voices but not words. Saw a pale face at the front window, features too distorted through the tiny panes of thick green glass for her to tell if it was a man or a woman. Then girl returned with a length of cooked sausage as big around as two of Mirian’s fingers. She handed it over silently.

  “Thank you.”

  Mirian had gone three steps back toward the road when she heard, “Where you going?”

  Right now? Eventually? “To get back something the Imperials took from us.”

  Arms wrapped around her torso, the girl’s mouth twisted. The war had paused here on its way to Herdon and the sawmill. “In them carriages?”

  The road had been empty all morning. Three coaches careening past this farm at full speed would be noted, day or night. “Yes.”

  “You won’t catch ’em.”

  “Not today. But we will.”

  After a long moment, the girl nodded. “All right then.”

  It sounded like a benediction. Mirian nodded in turn and joined Tomas on the road. “We can do this,” she said as she handed him half the sausage. “We can run and walk and find food and…” To her surprise, he held the piece of sausage to his nose and took a deep breath.

  “You were upwind,” he told her, eyes watering. “And these trousers are itchy enough.”

  Concentrating on putting one foot in front of the other, Mirian bounced off Tomas’ arm, grabbed it, stopped. “What?”

  “There’s a horse coming.”

  “With a rider?” She was too tired to be embarrassed by his expression. “Right. Of course.” After a moment, she realized she still held his arm and released it. The fields on both sides of the road were dead grass and small cedars and a low evergreen Mirian didn’t know the name of. Not relevant, she told herself and then aloud: “Should we hide?”

  Tomas moved around to put himself between her and the approaching rider. “No time. If you see an enemy run, you can’t stop yourself from giving chase.”

  “You’re going to chase the horse?”

  “What?” He threw a confused glance back over his shoulder. “No. If we run now, the rider will chase us. Because we’re running.”

  Not entirely certain that applied to those without the option of having four legs, Mirian was about to protest when the horse appeared around a curve, disappeared into a dip in the road, and suddenly reappeared impossibly close. Quickly buttoning her jacket, she tried to look as though she’d been displaced by war rather than like an active enemy of the empire. She watched the road in front of her feet, concentrated on the swing of her skirt against her legs, and looked up at the last minute, unable to help herself.

  The rider wore a familiar uniform, Imperial purple jacket over black trousers and boots, bicorn crammed down on his head. Tomas had said the empire would have taken over the mill. The destruction at the farm was proof soldiers had gone to Herdon, so, on this road, the mill was the only logical destination. Horse and rider had nothing to do with the two of them.

  If the soldiers who’d taken the Mage-pack were worried Tomas had survived, they’d set up an ambush. Captain Reiter and his men hadn’t had time to get far enough in front of them to send a courier back. All very logical, but Mirian’s palms were wet, and her heart pounded in time with the horse’s hooves anyway.

  As the rider passed, he looked up, saw her, slid his gaze down to Tomas, frowned, began to straighten in the saddle, pulling back on the reins…

  Tomas snarled.

  Without breaking stride, the horse moved to the far side of the road. Mirian had no idea horses could move sideways like that. The rider swore, grabbed a double handful of mane, and hung in midair for a moment, one foot in the stirrup the other hooked on the far edge of the saddle, trying desperately to keep from falling. Bit in its teeth, the horse ignored both words and reins, equally desperate to put as much distance as possible between itself and the predator. By the time the courier got himself seated again, he’d gone far enough past that
he kept going.

  Mirian released a breath she couldn’t remember holding. “I wonder what he thought he saw.”

  “Pack,” Tomas grunted as he moved back to her right.

  The horse certainly had, but the rider? Unlike some Pack, unlike Jaspyr, Tomas on two legs wasn’t obvious. He was young enough to have no facial scarring and his fur not only covered the points of his ears but was a solid black that passed for hair. Even in Aydori, it might take a second look from non Pack. Armin hadn’t realized and Tomas had been naked; usually a dead giveaway. “But the courier was Imperial.”

  “There’s Pack in the empire.”

  Surprised, she had to take three quick steps to catch up. Thirty-seven. Thirty-eight. Thirty-nine. Almost time to run again. “I didn’t know that.”

  “We don’t talk about it much. Sometimes people can’t find their place in the Pack they’re born into and they wander. Sometimes they go higher up into the mountains, to Orin or to Ural where it’s nearly all Pack.” He snorted. “Rough wood, raw meat, and hearty beer.”

  “You’ve been?”

  “Not likely, but sometimes people wander out. And sometimes the wanderers end up in the empire. Or somewhere that then becomes the empire,” he growled.

  And neither said, like Aydori although Mirian knew they were both thinking it. “Will they help us?”

  “They might, if we can find them. But interactions between small isolated Packs without direct family ties can be…” His hand cut the air in a gesture that suggested violent or bloody. “…difficult.”

  Between Packs? Mirian wondered as they started to run. Are we a Pack? But she didn’t know how to ask without seeming stupid or arrogant or both.

  By late afternoon, they began passing more farms and, without discussion, stopped running even the short distances Mirian could manage. She didn’t know Tomas’ reasons, but she found herself hobbled by the knowledge that young ladies did not run regardless of how little the rules for young ladies applied to the present situation. It was one thing to run unseen out in the country and another entirely to do it approaching civilization. It helped a little when she reminded herself it would be a very bad idea to attract too much attention.

  The road made a long sloping curve to the left, past fields with herds of black-and-white cows, and disappeared under a sprawl of red roofs that rapidly became larger buildings packed close, haze obscuring details in the distance.

  “Is it smoke from the war?”

  Tomas lifted his head, nostrils flared. “The war was over in Pyrahn the minute the duke rabbited for the border, and Imperials don’t burn down the emperor’s property.”

  “A rebellion?” They couldn’t be the only people in Pyrahn fighting back.

  “I think it’s factories.”

  “Factories?” Mirian squinted, trying to get a better look. “Then this has to be Abyek.” The road they’d been following, the road the coaches had taken the Mage-pack down must have turned almost due north and brought them out to the Aydori Road. Schoolhouse geography taught that Abyek was the largest city in Pyrahn, larger than the Duke’s Seat. The current duke’s great grandmother had built it to take advantage of new trade with Aydori. The Pack Leader at the time had insisted it be built a full day’s travel from the border so that the Pack would never have to deal with the stink of manufacturing should there ever be a shift in the prevailing winds. Most of Bercarit had been built of Abyek bricks fired with Aydori coal and other industry had soon joined the brickworks. “I’m fairly certain Mother bought my sister a set of dishes from Abyek.”

  “They must’ve changed horses here.”

  It took Mirian a moment to separate the horses from the dishes. “Are we going in?”

  Tomas nodded toward their shadows, stretching out to the right. “It’s too late to figure out how to go around. It’ll be nearly dark by the time we get there, and I bet this road will take us right…”

  “Looky, looky, looky.”

  Attention on Abyek, Mirian hadn’t noticed the five farm workers coming down a lane toward the road until the largest spoke, and by then they were nearly on top of them. She didn’t know if Tomas hadn’t seen them or merely believed they were beneath his attention as Pack. Or believed they wouldn’t be stupid enough to approach Pack.

  In Aydori, they wouldn’t have been. Before she could remind Tomas that not only were they not in Aydori but no one knew him as Pack, they were blocked by a belligerent half circle of men in dirty smocks with dirtier scarves tied round their necks.

  “Ignore them,” the memory of her mother said. “We do not acknowledge the existence of ruffians.”

  Clearly her mother’s advice worked better when applied to bricklayers in the city.

  “I’m guessin’ you two don’t know there’s a toll on this road. Bin a war, you know. We all gotta pay.” Not much of the largest man’s breadth was fat and he was easily a head taller than Tomas. Mirian had never understood the phrase fists like hams before. She did now.

  Tomas let the bedroll with his jacket slung over it slide off his shoulder as he stepped forward. Mirian caught it before it hit the ground. “Move aside.”

  “Move aside?” His beefy face flushed red when he laughed and the other four laughed as well, a beat behind the leader. “You look like the gutter all barefoot and rags, but you talk like you think your shit don’t stink. Get thrown out of your fancy house on your fancy ass when the Imperials come through, did you? Well, I don’t give a rat’s ass what you were, there’s a toll on this road for the likes of what you are now. And since I doubt you got coin to pay it, I’ll take a little time with your girl.” There were two teeth missing on the right side of his mouth when he smiled, and he looked at her the way Best had, like she was a thing not a person; only without Best’s minimal excuse of being the enemy.

  Experience had definitively proven she didn’t need mage marks to set his trousers on fire.

  The memory of cooking meat and blisters rising up under where a ginger eyebrow had been stopped her.

  “One more chance…” Tomas bit each word off in a way that should have been a warning. “…to move aside.”

  “You filthy…”

  Tomas stripped with the efficiency of long practice. Aydori fashions would have made it easier, but he was still impressively fast. As his trousers hit the road, Mirian found herself surprised by the difference between seeing him take off his clothes and seeing him without them. The latter meant he was Pack, just changed, the former that he was…well, undressing. It was a subtle distinction she really wished she could talk over with her sister.

  And one she shouldn’t be thinking of now.

  Astonishment held the farm workers in place as Tomas folded forward, enormous front paws slamming down on the road. Then his hackles rose, and he snarled. In the firelight, he’d passed as a very large dog. These men weren’t given the choice of mistaking what he was.

  Four of the five men turned and ran back up the lane. One left a tumbled pair of wooden clogs behind.

  Their leader paled but held his ground. Or froze in place, too terrified to move; Mirian wasn’t sure.

  Tomas stepped forward, stiff-legged, and snarled again.

  A dark stain spread on the front of homespun trousers. He turned, fell, scrambled to his feet, and ran after his friends, keening in fear.

  “If you see an enemy run, you can’t stop yourself from giving chase.”

  Mirian grabbed a handful of Tomas’ fur, imagined a candle on the end of his nose, imagined blowing it out with air warmed by her body and hoped that would be enough to direct her scent over Tomas’ face. A handful of fur wouldn’t stop him. “Tomas! He’s not worth the delay.”

  He jerked free of her grip, took two steps, and changed. “My clothes,” he said, reaching back without turning. His voice sounded rough. Given the snarling, Mirian wasn’t surprised.

  She scooped his shirt and trousers off the ground and pressed them into his hand. He had a scar just under his left shoulder blade, e
nough muscle that his spine was in a shallow valley of pale flesh, and dimples…She jerked her gaze back up to the scar. “Why aren’t they in the Pyrahnian army? They seem like they’d enjoy shooting people.”

  “If they were in the army, they’d have retreated to Aydori.”

  “You’re right. We don’t want them there.” She twitched her jacket into place, smoothed her skirt with both hands, checked that the bedroll was still, well, rolled, patted at her hair…

  “Mirian?”

  He’d turned without her noticing and was staring at her, one hand clutching the hem of his shirt. There was a dusting of fine black hair on the back of his knuckles. She hadn’t noticed that before. “What?”

  “Are you all right?”

  “Of course.” She let the bedroll slide off her shoulder, hitched it back up, and smoothed her skirt.

  “You’re shaking.”

  “I’m fine. If we were staying around here, I’d be worried. Big-and-ugly doesn’t strike me as the sort who takes embarrassment well.” Her laugh sounded a little stretched, even to her. “And that’s all that happened. You scared him. He ran. They all ran. Fortunately, we’re just passing through. But he had a point. Well, not really a point.” Words slipped from her mouth like beads sliding off a string; unstoppable now they’d started to fall. All she seemed to be able to do was send other words after them. She followed the bedroll to the ground. “People judge you if you’re barefoot, don’t they? Shoes seem to be the dividing line between worthwhile and wretched.” One boot already out and in her hand, she looked up. Tomas had moved closer. “Not if you’re Pack, at least not in Aydori. If you see a well-dressed person without shoes in Aydori, you know they’re Pack. And even in shoes, Pack wouldn’t wear these.” She waved the boots. “Too slow to get on and off. But we’re not in Aydori, are we? They saw your feet and didn’t know you were Pack. This will keep happening.” The leather had dried and stiffened, but she sat back, skirt billowing around her, and worked the boot open, one foot stretched out, ready to receive it.