‘No, wait,’ Florentyna said. ‘The forest is where we need to be, isn’t it?’ Cassien gave a slight nod that was almost a shrug. ‘Can we make it by nightfall?’
‘We can make it there during the night,’ he confirmed. ‘Three hours.’
‘Then I’d rather keep moving. I agree, a rest and something to eat would be helpful, but we are not to stop pushing onward on my account. Stable ours and buy new horses if you must.’
Cassien stepped closer. ‘Florentyna, this is all on your account. There is no point if you are not safe.’
She smiled sadly. ‘I know. All the more reason for me to make this easier for you. You can offer better protection in the forest, you said.’
‘I can.’
‘Then let’s eat and move on.’
He studied her for a moment longer before he nodded at Tilda. ‘Where do you know that’s quiet for food?’
‘Mistress Falc offers soup and bread for a few coppers at her dinch-house. There’s nothing elegant about it, I’m not sure we could take her maj—’ she looked at Florentyna and corrected herself ‘— take our guest. Well, it’s not what you’d be used to,’ she said, looking uncomfortable.
‘Tilda, this is going to be a struggle, I know. Why don’t you call me Florrie, as my father did? You too, Cassien,’ she said, ‘or neither of you will ever finish a sentence.’
The both smiled back at her awkwardly.
‘It’s fine, really … I insist. And I always rather liked it,’ Florentyna said, as though bringing them both into her secret. ‘Now, a bowl of soup sounds good, Tilda. Then you can both tell me more about how you know each other.’
Tilda glanced at Cassien. ‘Ask anyone the way to the stable and back to Mistress Falc’s. They will know it. I’ll take … Florrie,’ she said, looking at Florentyna with an enquiry of permission in her expression to which the queen smiled. ‘And I’ll order the food.’
Cassien glanced at the queen and nodded encouragement. He left her with Tilda, leading the horses away.
Florentyna could hear the dinchers’ conversations well before they’d reached the dinch-house itself. It was as simple a dwelling as Florentyna had ever stepped into. Yet the atmosphere was warm and cheery. Mistress Falc had whitewashed the timbers and, as evening was drawing in, her girls began to light the lamps hanging from the house’s eaves and from the tall spokes driven into the earth to form a bright pathway. The dinch-house was at the end of a lane and while it had no formal gardens, the land around it had been left to grow wild. Sprawling cleaver plants, which appeared to glow as darkness fell, created pretty, luminous drifts of flowers that trailed away from Mistress Falc’s into the meadows beyond.
‘I’ve never understood cleaver flowers and their glowing petals,’ Florentyna remarked as they waited for the girls to clear one of the small outside tables for them. ‘But they’re very beautiful. My father used to say it was the magic of the moon that lit their internal lights.’
Tilda seated herself, giving a soft groan. ‘I must stop doing that. Makes me feel older than I am,’ she said with a grin. ‘It’s not the flowers that glow. I like your father’s notion though. It’s romantic.’
Florentyna fiddled with the largest drip of beeswax oozing from a small channel at the lip of the fat candle in front of her. She snapped it off, feeling the stinging but not unpleasant burn of the clump of hot wax, still molten in the middle. She thought of her father and how, if he could see her, he would be frightened on her behalf, yet he would expect her to set aside her fears to be decisive and courageous, come what may. ‘So what makes them glow?’ she asked, massaging the wax like putty until it hardened. She wanted to talk about anything else but demons, death, destruction.
‘There’s a worm inside each flower.’
‘A worm?’ she repeated, astonished. ‘You jest.’
Tilda grinned. ‘My old pappy used to say we learn something new each day. The worms are female; they use their glow to attract their mates and they use the flowers as warm, safe cups in which to lay their eggs.’
‘Do the eggs glow as well?’ Florentyna asked, pushing the solid ball of wax back into the heat of the candle near the wick.
‘No, only adult females and only at mating time.’ She grinned. ‘Just like us, really,’ she said in a wry tone. Florentyna smiled shyly. ‘I use the eggs for my potions.’
‘Really?’
‘I only take one or two from each flower. As you can see, there are thousands in each drift.’
‘Plenty to go around,’ Florentyna smiled, as one of the serving girls arrived. ‘Anyway, Til—’
‘Soup for three,’ Tilda said, cutting across the queen’s words. ‘What is it for tonight?’
‘Mistress Falc is doing a sweet farl and creamed chivarac this evening. It’s delicious.’
Tilda nodded her approval. ‘And some of her sunflower bread?’
‘I shall organise that for you. Dinch for you both … and your other guest?’
Florentyna nodded, feeling a thrill of excitement — despite the danger — to be doing something so common and so very normal as being out at nightfall in a dinch-house. Even better, she was doing it without a host of guards and the usual pomp and ceremony. Darcelle would turn in her grave — if her body hadn’t been stolen by a demon, Florentyna thought bitterly. She abruptly pushed Cyricus away from her thoughts, determined to appear composed and strong, as her father had always counselled her so that everyone around him — or her — would have a model to follow.
‘The best thing,’ Florentyna said, taking Tilda into her confidence, ‘is that this is so very normal for everyone. Look around. People are chatting, having a good time, solving the problems of the land over a hot cup of dinch.’ She sighed. ‘I don’t get to do anything remotely like this. Whatever I do, I have people minding my every move.’ She looked out across the tables of dinchers. ‘I envy you.’
‘Don’t. Most of them here would pull out their own teeth with pliers to have your life, your lands, your money, your power.’
Florentyna frowned. Tilda spoke evenly, but there was an edge to her words. They sounded like wise counsel but there was also an underlying note of scorn. She tried a different tack. ‘That’s how it is, isn’t it? We always want what the other person has,’ Florentyna admitted with a sigh. They both looked out across the fields. ‘So is this a regular watering hole for you, Tilda?’
‘Yes. I always take a bowl of dinch and soup here when I leave Pearlis. It’s my routine to head north after seeing everyone in the city.’
‘How do you come to know Cassien?’ Florentyna asked, determined to be direct.
Tilda hesitated and the queen noticed. ‘Is it a secret?’
‘No, although it is a sensitive topic.’
‘I see,’ Florentyna said, but she didn’t.
Their bowls of soup arrived then, the steam rising enticingly enough to make the queen’s belly grind with anticipation.
Cassien chose this moment to enter the garden. He threaded his way to their small table and she was amazed that no-one felt threatened by the weapons she knew he wore, but then as she watched him approach, she was aware there was no giveaway clank of metal; in fact he never ‘clanked’ like other men who carried weapons. Cassien seemed to move in silence and yet she knew he wore a fine sword, carried blades. ‘Something smells good,’ he admitted.
‘I’ll bring the dinch out shortly,’ said the serving girl, staring at him. ‘I’ll be back in a moment with the bread,’ she said to Tilda, stealing another glance at Cassien, in which Florentyna saw only invitation.
The queen joined Tilda in a shared dry look that they then directed his way.
‘What? Did I miss something?’ he said, his eyes darting between them, his brow creased in enquiry.
‘You’re not even aware of it, are you?’ Florentyna said with a grin.
‘It?’
Tilda laughed aloud. ‘That’s what makes him bearable.’
He frowned deeper, but they shook thei
r heads. Florentyna was hit suddenly by a novel notion … why wasn’t she as heartstruck as the serving girl? Or the palace servants, for that matter, whom she had overheard talking about Cassien? He really was extremely easy on the eye, and his strapping frame meant he would have won attention even without his handsome features. She blinked as he seemed to note her attention and then looked away. It was obvious, even to her slightly detached approach to the world around her, that Cassien liked her. And he was clearly fighting liking her in a way he was undoubtedly not permitted to by the Brotherhood. She too had restrictions on her friendships, but even so … why didn’t she respond?
‘Shall we?’ Cassien said, breaking into her thoughts.
She smiled and began to eat. Florentyna noticed she was the only person in sight who was tipping their bowl away to scoop up the soup. Some patrons, she observed, dispensed with the spoon altogether and picked up the bowl to tip the contents directly into their mouths. She could imagine what Burrage might have to say about that. Might have said, she corrected, feeling a fresh wave of sorrow wash over her.
‘Feeling better?’ Cassien enquired.
‘I felt overcome with grief and became dizzy. My sister, Burrage, the deaths at the monastery, the deaths within the palace,’ she murmured, becoming quieter with each word.
‘Perfectly understandable. Eating will make you feel stronger — capable of facing anything.’
She gave him a wan smile. ‘Food does not solve a single problem,’ she counselled more dryly than she’d meant to sound.
‘It would if you’d ever had to spend a day hungry … or a day and night. Or a few,’ he countered and then looked away, appearing self-conscious. ‘Forgive me …’
‘No, you’re right, of course. I haven’t got a clue really about everyday life and yet I yearn for it,’ she whispered, her apology written in her expression. ‘I have no idea about how to live through hardship,’ she added, ‘other than the emotional kind.’
The bread arrived and it was warm, oozing with chunks of golden butter.
‘Don’t let your soup go cold,’ the girl said and was quickly gone, but not before casting Cassien another silent invitation.
This time the two women sighed.
‘I didn’t say a word,’ he muttered, biting off a chunk of his bread.
‘You don’t have to,’ Tilda said. ‘That pretty young thing has already said yes to your question.’
‘Be assured I’m not asking,’ he replied.
Florentyna stifled a grin. She picked up her wooden spoon again and began ladling the broth into her mouth without observing the courtly customs she’d been raised in. It felt wicked to do so, but Burrage — if he were watching — would forgive her, she was sure.
‘So, Tilda, you obviously know about the problems in the palace with the deaths …?’ She took her cue from Cassien as he was clearly at ease with the herbwoman.
‘I do. It’s good to see you have an appetite,’ Tilda said, not giving a specific response to the queen’s query. ‘People think you’ve been looking very thin and frail.’
The queen didn’t like being sidetracked but went along with it for now. ‘Poppycock,’ Florentyna admonished. ‘I’ve always been this size. It’s just recently I’ve had to wear gowns that annoyingly accentuate waists and busts and those bits usually covered by my everyday clothes. Now, Cassien,’ she said. ‘Tilda preferred you to tell me how you two know one another.’
Cassien stopped eating and put his spoon down. Florentyna sensed his discomfort.
‘I see,’ she said. ‘So there is a secret?’
He shook his head. ‘No, more to the point a difficult epiphany, that’s all.’
‘An epiphany, I recall from my long and intense education, suggests something divine, certainly something supernatural, which has come to you from the outside and opened your mind to encompass a far bigger comprehension of your world,’ Florentyna said, matter of factly, chewing on a thick slice of the bread.
‘Then I chose the right word. It was exactly that,’ he said.
She looked between her companions. ‘And still you don’t explain anything to me. You both look tense. Scared even.’
‘That’s because it is unnerving,’ Tilda admitted.
‘Try me,’ Florentyna urged.
Cassien glanced at Tilda and nodded to indicate he would tackle this. ‘Your majesty,’ he whispered, only for her hearing, ‘the reason I have been sent to protect you is, I believe, not just because of my skills with weapons.’
Florentyna stopped chewing. She watched him intently, waiting. ‘Go on.’
He took a breath and placed his spoon down. She noticed his soup was finished; not a drop wasted. ‘Fynch sent me to you because of my ability to roam.’
‘Roam? You mean cover great distances?’
He shrugged. ‘You could say it like that but the meaning is, perhaps, shrouded.’
‘Why don’t you explain? Say it simply to me. Why do I get the feeling this is a struggle for you?’
‘Because it is painful,’ he said. ‘My roaming is not of the earth.’
She blinked. ‘I don’t understand.’
‘You’re not meant to,’ Tilda chimed in.
‘I roam on an ethereal plane,’ Cassien continued. Florentyna knew she was looking at him as though he was speaking gibberish while he tried to enlighten her. ‘It’s a skill like wielding a sword, or running faster than others.’
‘A magical skill,’ Tilda qualified. At Cassien’s glare, she returned it with one of supplication. ‘Say it how it is, Cassien.’
‘Yes, why don’t you?’ Florentyna added.
He did. His roaming episode at the palace was explained baldly and clearly. She stared at him in shocked silence before she licked her lips, buying another few heartbeats to gather her thoughts.
‘So if I understand you right, you killed Burrage?’
‘Not directly or intentionally, but yes I did. And I have not yet come to terms with the deaths I caused, including his. I had no idea of the effect of my roaming. All I had in my mind was protecting you.’
She shook her head in silent despair. ‘But surely you’ve roamed previously?’
He nodded. ‘In the forest.’
‘And?’
She noted he struggled with how to phrase his reply. ‘Well … the first time animals died. After that, I went to a place where animals were … um, where they were scarce and I could roam without hurting any.’ He was speaking carefully, seemingly choosing his words as though couching the truth neatly behind them.
‘So you knew if you roamed at the palace it could cause death?’
‘I thought only that it might kill a few dogs, cats, rats.’ He shrugged. ‘I am honest with you when I say I had not even the slightest idea that it could hurt a person.’
‘How does it choose?’ she said, aware vaguely of Tilda’s awkward silence but too determined to understand Cassien’s magic to worry about their companion.
‘I don’t know,’ he said, running a hand over his face. ‘I wish I did. It’s one of the reasons I had to get you away from Stoneheart,’ he murmured. ‘In the forest I can protect you properly with my skills. I have worked out, however, that it only killed anyone who was outside of Stoneheart’s palace walls. Everyone within the palace was kept safe.’
She frowned. ‘Burrage was —’
‘On his balcony,’ Cassien interrupted softly.
Florentyna blinked in consternation; Cassien was right. The animals, the people who’d died had all for some reason been moving or sleeping outside of the palace proper.
‘This is clearly a heavy burden for Cassien,’ Tilda finally said, eyeing him. Florentyna wondered what her intense look meant. Cassien hadn’t noticed and the queen couldn’t read the nuances dancing around her. ‘He has been charged to hold your life as the most precious in the realm … and at the expense of others. He should not be blamed.’
‘So any of us could have died?’ Florentyna pressed.
They
nodded together.
‘How did you think your roaming might protect me?’ she demanded. ‘I mean, explain to me how the risk of killing was worth it.’
He nodded, understanding entirely her sense of despair. ‘In that magical plane, I would have seen the one who hunts you.’
Tilda sat back and stared at Cassien in wonder. Florentyna privately wondered at so much being revealed in front of a stranger. It was obvious Tilda knew about Cassien’s skill before Florentyna was told, but even so, surely Cyricus and his threat were to be kept secret.
Cassien shook his head, easily reading her thoughts. ‘Tilda knows that we are moving you away from the palace and that there is someone who wishes death to the royals.’ There was a hidden message in his words. So, he hadn’t told Tilda about the demon, but was letting the herbwoman think the threat was a person.
Florentyna glanced at Tilda and could see her eyes narrowing as she considered Cassien. ‘I didn’t know you could use your roaming magic to find this killer. If you know who it is, why do you need an ethereal plane to see him?’
Florentyna didn’t know why her instincts were screaming at her to assist Cassien in keeping their real purpose secret, but she interjected to help obscure and distract. ‘Shar, but this is beyond my ability to reason. My sister always said magic was dangerous.’
‘And she’s right,’ Tilda said. Again Florentyna saw her regard Cassien speculatively.
He looked up. ‘Are you coming with us, Tilda?’
The older woman shook her head. ‘You can move quicker and with less notice as a couple. I must go now. Please,’ she said, standing and holding a hand up, ‘don’t disturb yourselves. I promise our paths will cross again. You trust me, don’t you, Cassien?’
He looked surprised to be asked. ‘I’ll look for you.’
She nodded, turned to Florentyna. ‘I’d like to kiss your hand, but dare not. Be safe.’
‘How can I be otherwise with Cassien at my side,’ she replied, and threw him an affectionate glance.
Tilda left and the dinch was served. Florentyna suggested they drink the spare cup that Tilda would not be taking. She was surprised the woman hadn’t at least remained for that. She noticed Cassien didn’t meet the serving girl’s gaze on this occasion.
The Scrivener's Tale Page 45
