But all she did was nod.
Halliwell turned his back on her, studying the sky. “Give me a minute? I’ve just got to-”
Gruff as he was, he didn’t want to talk about the need to relieve his bladder in front of her. The guy was an enigma. Julianna smiled and let out a breath.
“Sure. I’ll start walking. You can catch up. Due west, right?”
“No. We’ve lost too much time. I think we need to go northwest, try to gauge where we might intersect with the river, and then turn north until we come to the other side of the plateau. If we haven’t hit another valley first.”
Julianna pushed her fingers through her hair again. “All right.”
She started walking. Her feet ached from all the walking that they had done the previous day, but that was just the beginning. Somehow she doubted there would be a bus to carry them to their destination. Her shoes were comfortable, hiking boots that doubled for her as winter footwear. But this was no ordinary hike.
The sun had spread across the plateau, and as she set out, it began to warm her at last.
After several minutes, Halliwell caught up, not even winded. For his age, he was in pretty good shape. That was good. If he had been out of shape, they’d likely be dead by now.
In silence-the space of words unspoken between them-they walked across the plateau. Halliwell had been a Boy Scout as a child, which came as no surprise to Julianna. She herself had been forced into the Brownies, the junior Girl Scouts, but by the time she could have joined the older girls, she refused to have anything further to do with it. Hallie Terheune had by then become queen bitch of all Brownies, and she’d be going into Girl Scouts as well. But even now, Julianna remembered well enough how to navigate by the sun, and Halliwell had not forgotten much of his childhood love of the woods either. Growing up in midcoastal Maine, it was just the sort of thing children learned.
Time had passed, of course, and scouting wasn’t exactly like riding a bike. Some things did fade. Yet Julianna felt sure they were on the right track.
The landscape reminded her of Arizona: dry and rocky with stretches of scrub grass. Not desert, certainly, but not exactly lush. Small ridges of rock jutted up from the earth as though carved out by ancient glaciers, and there were small, thin trees here and there-wiry things that resembled nothing at all familiar.
Within a quarter of an hour after setting out, Julianna was wetting her lips with her tongue, mouth parched. It was warm, but not uncomfortably so, and there was a breeze that brought a dry, sweet smell, like pressed flowers. But she was thirsty. Hunger had not begun to rumble her belly yet, but she was certain it would begin soon enough. She could do without the food for a while, but the water was going to be a problem. The river was important to them for more reasons than one.
The stale smell of her own body and the unpleasant way her dirty clothes clung to her reminded Julianna of mornings in college when she had woken after long, regrettable nights. But despite it all, she had none of the dullness of a hangover. The scent on the breeze, the feel of the sun, the colors of this world were all too vibrant to allow it.
Halliwell limped a bit as he walked. She was not even sure he noticed it, but he favored his left leg. A selfish twinge went through her when she noticed, and she hoped it was just sleeping out on the ground that had given him a kink, not something permanent. Something that was going to be a problem down the line.
Her shoelace came loose.
“Hang on,” she said, as she knelt to retie it.
Halliwell paused and stood above her. As she finished, he spoke in a voice that was barely a rasp.
“We’re not alone.”
Outside Oliver’s window, dawn’s light was reaching down into Twillig’s Gorge. Morning came later in the Gorge, the sunlight creeping down along the western wall as it rose. The Nagas had given them specific instructions to be gone by dawn, but Oliver could not move. He sat on the edge of the bed in his room at the inn and stared at Kitsune.
“That’s insane.”
Kitsune’s eyes were always so wild, but not now. In this moment, they were rock steady. She leaned forward, silken hair hanging in black curtains on either side of her face.
“You think I don’t know how it sounds?” she asked, an edge in her voice. Kitsune glanced around the room, hands fluttering, as though trying to search for some explanation for the inexplicable. “I am used to being on my own, Oliver. Solitary. Tricksters nearly always are. But when I learned that the Borderkind were being killed, I thought perhaps it would be best not to be alone for a while.”
“And then you met Frost and me in the Oldwood,” Oliver said.
The fox-woman nodded. Her hood was thrown back, the fur soft. Vulnerable. Oliver had never thought of her that way before.
“I thought I had found trustworthy companions whose goals were my own. To survive. To uncover terrible secrets. But there were more secrets than I ever imagined-”
Oliver held up a hand. “Wait. Just…just stop, okay? I get that you were just as much in the dark as I was, so can we focus for a minute? Does any of what Frost and Smith were saying sound familiar to you? Do you have any idea what he was talking about?”
Kitsune took a breath. “Not at all. It was clear he believes that you and your sister are somehow important to this world, that if the truth about you were to come out, it would be even more dangerous to you than the death warrant.”
“How can that be?” Oliver shot to his feet. “What is more dangerous than someone ordering your execution?”
He searched her eyes for answers but found only confusion that mirrored his own, and sympathy. Oliver put a hand over his eyes and sighed. Could it be that Frost was not his friend, that the winter man had been lying to him all along?
“Jesus,” he whispered, dropping his hand. “All right. So the Falconer…wasn’t hunting Frost. He was sent after me and Collette, and Frost was wounded trying to stop him. That’s what you’re saying?”
Kitsune opened her hands. “I have told you what I heard.”
“Why us? What is it about us?”
“This is not the first time we’ve asked that question, Oliver. The Sandman wants your life so badly that he is holding your sister as bait. It is you he wants, not Frost. Not any Borderkind. You. And now we know that Collette is only still alive because the Sandman has not caught you yet.”
Oliver narrowed his eyes. “The Sandman? Or whoever woke him up? Whoever sent the Falconer?”
Kitsune turned her back on the window. Slowly, she raised her hood, jade-green eyes staring out from the shadows beneath. When she spoke, he could see the points of her tiny, sharp teeth.
“Your questions might be better put to another.”
Anger and confusion roiled in him. He nodded, staring at Kitsune. “I want to trust you. But I’m beginning to wonder if there’s anyone I can trust.”
“I wonder the same,” she said, voice a low growl. “You are not the only one who has been kept in the dark.”
“All right,” Oliver said. “Let’s go ask those questions, then.”
He dressed quickly, grateful once again for the new clothes Coyote had supplied. Hunyadi’s sword hung at his hip and he was surprised how quickly he had become used to its weight and sway.
Oliver opened the door and led Kitsune into the hall. He went to the next room and rapped on the door.
“Blue Jay won’t be there,” Kitsune said. “We were supposed to meet at the front desk.”
“Right.”
Together they went down the stairs. Oliver quickened his pace, anger rising. With all that they had been through together, the idea that Frost had been keeping secrets was infuriating. His father had been horribly murdered. His relationship with Julianna was in shambles, the wedding plans ruined. His life was in constant peril. Collette was in the hands of a monster. Maybe Frost had only come to Kitteridge to try to save them, but he’d been less than completely successful. If there were reasons behind all of this, Oliver deserved to know what they were. Hell, Kit
sune deserved to know.
His boots pounded the wooden steps. Out the window in the stairwell he saw the gorge spreading out below, coming alive with the industry of morning. People and legends traveled bridges and ladders; store awnings were unfurling; small boats were bobbing at the dock on the river as goods were unloaded. All of that, he caught in a glance. What was going on in Twillig’s Gorge mattered not at all. Not now.
“Frost!” he shouted as he reached the bottom of the stairs.
“Oliver, you may want to-” Kitsune began.
His hands curled into fists. He wasn’t listening. Two governments wanted him dead, and now it seemed that those trying to kill the Borderkind had set their sights on him as well. And Frost was keeping fucking secrets? The time to be quiet was over.
“Frost, where the hell are you?” he shouted.
Behind the front counter, the innkeeper shot him a dark look and crossed his arms. “Sir, if you please, some of the guests may still be sleeping.”
Oliver ignored him. Kitsune prowled around the foyer for a moment, sniffing the air, then went toward the tavern. Oliver followed, but she stopped at the door, peering inside.
“They’re gone,” she growled. When she turned, he saw the wildness had returned to her eyes. The fox-woman bit off the words. “Chorti, Cheval Bayard, Blue Jay, and Frost. Just this morning; they’ve been and gone.”
Kitsune slipped past him, fur brushing his hand, electric to the touch. She darted toward the front of the inn again and leaped up onto the counter. The innkeeper snapped an angry curse and raised a finger to admonish her. Kitsune slapped the hand away and grabbed him by the hair, pulling his face close to hers.
“How long ago?”
“Let me go, you myth bitch!”
Oliver drew the sword, staring at the man. “When did Frost and the others leave?”
The innkeeper whimpered, but he opened his mouth to answer. Before he could, however, another voice spoke up from the front door.
“You’ve missed them by half an hour, I’m afraid.”
Oliver and Kitsune both twisted round. Wayland Smith stood just inside the door, fox-head walking stick in his hand. If he had just entered, the door had made not a creak.
Smith nodded toward Kitsune, hat brim hiding his eyes. “You chose your path, fox.”
All of the anger and tension went out of Kitsune. Oliver watched in amazement as she stood straighter, letting her cloak fall around her, and bowed her head in deference.
“As you say, uncle.”
Wayland Smith raised his gaze and stared at Oliver. “You saw last night that there are spies in the gorge. There’s no telling how many of those frogs escaped. Even if the Nagas did not order you to leave, you risk danger from myriad sources every moment you remain. Even if there were no conspiracy, no Hunters, have you forgotten the price on your head? Word is spreading. You ought to-”
Oliver snorted. “You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.” He glared at Smith, then at Kitsune. “Kit, this is the guy Frost was talking to, right?”
The fox-woman did not raise her head.
“Bascombe,” Smith began, as though to admonish him.
The Sword of Hunyadi felt warm and light in his grip. Oliver raised it, pointing the tip at the old Borderkind in punctuation.
“Kitsune heard your little chat with Frost this morning, old man. I’m through with secrets. The Falconer was after me and my sister, that’s what you said. The legendary want us dead. You’re going to tell me what it’s all about, or I swear to God, I’ll take your fucking head off!”
“Oliver,” Kitsune whispered. “Don’t.”
He stared at her. “Don’t? My father had his eyes ripped out by the fucking Sandman. The thing has my sister. Come on, Kit, don’t you think I deserve to know why?”
Wayland Smith shook his head slowly. “You fool.” He gripped the fox-head of his stick and glanced at the innkeeper. Something about the look drew Oliver’s attention, and he saw that the innkeeper was looking back and forth between them as though trying to work out a puzzle.
“Now, wait a moment,” the man behind the counter whispered. He pointed to Smith. “He’s the one, isn’t he? Oh, you bastard, trying to keep it so quiet. You clever prick.”
Smith clucked his tongue and shot a meaningful glance at Oliver. “See what you’ve done?”
Then Wayland Smith leaped across the room, twisting in the air. He swung the stick with its heavy, carved head, and brought it down with a sickening crack on the innkeeper’s skull.
The man staggered back, crashed into the wall, and slid to the floor, unmoving.
Oliver stared, sword wavering in his grasp. “Oh, Christ. What the hell did you do?”
Kitsune stepped up, fur brushing him, and grasped his free hand. “We must go, Oliver.”
He gritted his teeth. “Not without the truth.”
“You’ll die here, then,” Smith said, eyes cold and gray. “You’ve said too much. I killed the man for your own safety, but there’s a chance others overhear us even now. And you cannot know how much Coyote may have guessed, or who else he will tell to save his own skin. Word will spread, the truth will out, and it will come to you eventually. It’s safest for you if you do not know.”
“Bullshit! If it concerns me, then it’s my truth! And you’re going to tell me, damn you.”
He started toward Smith, sword up, watching the walking stick warily. How many fencing matches had he won? Dozens, at least. But he had never fought someone with such uncanny speed, not at close quarters.
Wayland Smith removed his hat and set it on the counter. Even as the brim touched wood, he sprang. Oliver raised the sword, parried his attack, then darted the blade forward. Kitsune cried out, but Oliver could not hear her over his own howl of rage. All of his betrayal and fear went into his attack and he twisted inside Smith’s defenses, then drove the point of the sword through his shoulder, puncturing flesh and grinding against bone.
The old man grunted in pain, but grinned.
“Well, there’s proof, eh?”
Gripping the stick with one hand, he shot the other out and cuffed Oliver in the side of the head like he was an errant child. Staggered, Oliver lost his balance. Smith kicked him away, the blade slipped out of the wound, and then the old man stood there, glaring at him, one hand clasped over the piercing in his shoulder. Blood seeped through his fingers.
“Uncle,” Kitsune began.
“I heal,” Smith replied.
Oliver was disoriented from the blow, but determined. Blood dripped from the tip of Hunyadi’s sword as he raised it, ready to attack again.
Wayland Smith rushed at him with the speed of the wind. One hand gripped his wrist, keeping the sword at bay, the other grabbed his throat and he felt himself driven backward. In the span of three heartbeats he was nearly carried across the foyer of the inn. When he slammed into the door, it crashed open, and then they were at the top of the bridge that led to the inn, hanging above the Sorrowful River.
The sun splashed down upon them. Oliver twisted to escape its glare, trying to wrest himself from Smith’s grasp. The old man slammed him against the thick wooden balustrade of the bridge and Oliver was bent backward, a hundred feet above the river, nothing below him but a fall that might kill him.
“You will go,” Smith said, “because you have no choice. To stay is to die, but to go is to have a chance for yourself and your sister. You will see me again, Bascombe. Be assured of it.”
The old man glared at him with stormy gray eyes, then abruptly released him. Wayland Smith backed away, turned, and strode along the bridge, leaving Oliver to gasp to catch his breath. He pulled himself away from the balustrade and stared for a moment at the drop below, at the community of Twillig’s Gorge going about its business, none the wiser.
Kitsune stepped out of the front door of the inn. She raised her hood and looked at him from its depths, jade eyes gleaming.
“You’re fortunate to be alive,” she said. “Shall we be going n
ow, and try to stay that way?”
The fox-woman turned and started along the bridge. Oliver took a deep, shuddering breath of frustration, slid the sword into his belt, and followed.
We’re not alone.
Julianna stood after tying her shoe, Halliwell’s words echoing in her mind. She looked at the detective, but his expression revealed nothing. Halliwell scratched at the back of his neck like a man dying of boredom and regarded her impatiently.
“You all set?” he asked.
“Yeah. Shoelaces. They come untied. It happens.”
A smile flickered across his face and was gone. By silent consent they started walking again. Julianna watched Halliwell, wondering when he would comment further. Obviously there was a purpose to his behavior. He’d said those words and now he was acting as though nothing had happened at all.
But his gaze was restless. Whenever she glanced at him, Halliwell’s eyes were moving, taking in the landscape around them, this copse of skeletal trees, that jutting rock obelisk.
Julianna saw the figure then, perched upon a rock fifty yards ahead. She had looked that way a dozen times and not seen the little man. Now, suddenly, he was simply there. Halliwell had noticed him, obviously. Or had felt that they were observed.
“Keep walking,” Halliwell said softly.
She had slowed nearly to a stop without realizing it. Now she picked up her pace, keeping stride with Halliwell. At the same time, she did not take her eyes off of the figure who sat on the rock slab like a child, knees jutting up, elbows resting atop them. In his hands, the little man held a flute and as she watched, he set it to his lips and began to play a lilting, pleasant tune, as though to greet the morning. The melody swirled and dipped, and in spite of her trepidation, she smiled.
As they came abreast of the rock, Julianna slowed again. Halliwell stopped entirely, so she did the same. The detective stood with his hands at his sides, fingers splayed, as though he expected an attack.
They stood together and listened to the jaunty, winding music, watched the little man play his flute. He was dressed in a gray cloth tunic with a thin black rope around his waist, almost like some kind of monk. His bald pate gleamed in the sun and against the early morning blue of the sky, his nut-brown skin seemed a shadow unto itself. Her first impression, that he was old, was borne out by the many wrinkles upon his face, though his skin was taut against his skull.
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