Did Wil know? Could he see into Dallin as easily as he could apparently see into those clever little gifts the Old Ones had given him? Wil had hit the core, and extraordinarily hard, when they’d stood at the falls—Do you put everything away like that? Do you bury everything that hurts?—and Dallin didn’t even think Wil had really been trying. Was there even any point in trying to keep things from him?
Except then Wil had let it go, let Dallin push it all away with assurances neither one of them really believed, so… it was still possible Wil didn’t really want to know.
Right. Possible. Possible in some other world, where purple dragons vomited rainbows and trolls pissed perfume. This was Wil, after all. And the acceptance hadn’t lasted very long at all, had it, not when it came to withholding something Wil thought important.
Still… there had been that night in Chester, exposing deductions and theorizing their implications, and Wil hadn’t wanted to hear it, not even a little. Dallin had forced the knowledge on him, and this time… this time Dallin couldn’t convince himself it was the right thing to do. For pity’s sake, the man didn’t even want to know his own name.
Dallin looked away and rubbed at his brow. The headache was growing steadily again, and he didn’t know if it was the stress of constantly keeping this place from pounding Wil, or if Dallin’s brain was trying to bash itself against the inside of his skull to make him stop bloody thinking.
Is there something I should know?
Ha!
Well, let’s see—I know how the power here works, I can see it all as clearly as you see your threads, and I know what they all want you for. I know the Brethren are here, waiting, and I know, whoever their Cleric is, he’s coming, because I can feel him too. I know it’s all coming together, converging down to one moment in time when it’ll all narrow down to what you’ll choose, and if I have to betray you to make you choose right, I’m pretty sure I will. I don’t know who or how or when, but I know how this has to go, and you would too, but you’re so busy pushing everything about this place away that you’ve not let yourself know it yet. I know that if you let yourself know before the time comes, it’s over, you won’t choose yourself, and once you go to Fæðme, you won’t be able to help yourself knowing. And then what?
You forced me into a promise I didn’t want to make, and They forced me into a calling I don’t want, and one contradicts the other—I can’t do both. And now I see I may have to force something on you I know you wouldn’t want, but there’s no alternative that I can see, and I can’t trust any one of these people enough to help me see another way.
Fucking hell, I’ve been trying so hard not to take your choices away, but this one’s mine, and I don’t know how to make it without betraying everything.
Angry, furious, Dallin abruptly pulled rein, then waited for Wil and the others to do the same. Dallin couldn’t explain it all, not even half of it, but they all deserved to know at least some. He was going to need every single person who was capable of fighting, after all, and he did truly believe that people fought harder when they knew what it was they were fighting for.
“The Brethren are here in Lind,” he told them bluntly, watching all their reactions closely. Shaw looked surprised and wary but not disbelieving. Both Calders seemed more enraged and offended than anything else. Wil looked… angry. Fear and trepidation, but with an implicit accusation of perfidy beneath the bristling, and pointed directly at Dallin.
“How long?” Wil’s tone even but peculiarly soft.
It was new, this cold, quiet anger. Wil usually got loud and heated when he was pissed off, and this calm fury was novel and unnerving.
The question would have seemed ambiguous, perhaps even nonsensical, if Dallin hadn’t spent the last thirty minutes steeped in conjecture and self-rebuke. He knew exactly what Wil meant, but he looked at Wil straight and answered the question only obliquely.
“I didn’t know when I chose this path. I can’t do anything until we get down to the Bounds, and we can’t go any faster over this terrain than we’re going. The Weardas can sound the horns and send runners when we get there.”
“Hunter should ride ahead,” Shaw volunteered. “They could be—”
“No, I need him here—I need all of you right here—and they won’t dare move until they know where Wil is.”
Wil’s jaw tightened. “How long?”
Dallin made his expression as blank as he could. “About an hour ago.” So at least I haven’t been lying to you for very long.
“Where?”
“I don’t know. I felt the land… I suppose you might say it protested when they crossed in, but I don’t know where.”
“It is impossible!” Hunter said sharply. “Every entrance into Lind is guarded—every Weardas, even the eldest and those who have not yet earned their Marks, are recalled to stand their watches. The border is too thick with Linders. No one could have got through.”
“And you are welcome to go on believing that until one of them skulks up behind you.”
Calder was shaking his head. “The lad is right. Lind is nearly barren but for the infirm and the too young. Every able body is patrolling. They can’t have got through.”
“Then we’d best get some of them back from their patrols to protect the rest, because it’s too late to worry about the borders now—they’re here.”
Calder looked first at Hunter, then Shaw, finding no help on either front. He looked strangely helpless in a way that surprisingly didn’t please Dallin. “But how?”
Wil was staring over Dallin’s left shoulder, gaze gone slightly hazy. “There are passageways honeycombed beneath the Temple. Two of them join a network of tunnels that lead directly into Ríocht. Another three are dead-ended with cave-ins. One crosses beneath the Flównysse and ends where Éaspring won the border from Áthlone.” He pinked, shifting a slight shrug when they all stared at him openmouthed. He shot an uneasy glance at Dallin, then pointed it to the ground. “People aren’t the only ones who dream.”
You didn’t even know you knew that. Wait ’til you figure out what else you know.
Dallin scrubbed a hand through his hair. “Right.” He looked at the others. “They’re waiting, but they won’t for long. Their Cleric is on the way, but if they can get their hands on Wil before he gets here, if they think they can secure him and get him out of Lind, they’ll give it a go. There’s a lot of them this time—one of them once told me there were hundreds, and I don’t think he was lying—and they’re all here. I can feel them.”
He took a deep breath and turned to Wil.
“This is it, this is where it all happens, whatever it turns out to be. We’ll be down at the Bounds within the hour, and if I play all this right, we’ll have the protection of the soldiers, at least until Wheeler gets here and court-martials the captain. But they are coming, and they are going to try an attack.” He leaned in his saddle and pierced Wil with a hard stare. “I won’t argue with you about this. If I tell you to run, you’ll run. If I tell you to shoot, you’ll shoot. If I tell you to dig a hole and climb into it until all the shooting stops, that’s what you’ll do. Are we clear?”
He’d expected Wil to argue, at least bridle. Wil did neither, merely stared for a moment, mouth thin, then tore his gaze away and stared at the ground. He nodded.
Dallin watched Wil distractedly slipping his fingers through Miri’s rough mane, watched his mouth twitch, holding back the things he wanted to say, but he remained tense and silent. The badger was nosing about but not yet ready to bite. In this one thing, at least, Dallin wasn’t sure how to feel about that. Either he’d been worrying needlessly about Wil’s survival instinct dulling, or Wil was working up to an explosion that would throw a spanner into everything anyway.
Dallin shook it away and turned to Hunter. “You want to be his bodyguard. Now’s your chance.” Hunter blinked, peered closely at Wil for a moment, then sat straighter in his saddle and lifted his chin.
“Don’t I get a say in this?” Wi
l wanted to know.
“No.” Dallin kept a solid gaze on Hunter. “He will not leave your sight except for when he’s with me. You will remain armed at all times, and you will shoot anyone who tries to take him from your side.” He jerked his chin at Calder. “Even him.” He waited, watching closely as Hunter turned a startled gaze on his uncle.
“Dallin,” Wil said, quietly and through his teeth, “I don’t think—”
“I wasn’t asking you to.”
Testing the boundaries, seeing how far Wil would let Dallin push them. As far as he liked, it seemed, or at least giving him enough rope to hang himself. Wil went silent again, and again refrained from arguing. Seething—Dallin could see it beneath the ice. When Wil blew, it was likely going to be an almighty big one.
Dallin waited again, keeping his stare fixed to Hunter, watching as Hunter weighed family against faith and chose the latter. He sucked in a long breath and turned back to Dallin.
“As you will, Guardian.”
Wil let out a small growl. “Hunter, I’m sorry. This isn’t what—”
“To do else would be an insult to my uncle and all he has ever believed.” Hunter’s gaze was going defiant as he held Dallin’s, more steel in those bright blue eyes than Dallin had seen before. Hunter dipped his head. “At your command.”
“I’ll remember that.” Dallin shifted his glance to Shaw. One last chance to do this yourself, shaman. “When was the last time you held a gun?”
Shaw didn’t take the opportunity. “A shaman doesn’t generally—”
“Unless he’s former military. Please don’t fuck with me. We haven’t the time and I haven’t the tolerance.”
Wil glanced sharply at Shaw, who in turn shot a speaking look at Calder. Calder merely shook his head and sighed. Shaw echoed it, dipping his head on a small half bow, acknowledging a point scored.
“I had not realized your skills had grown so quickly, Shaman.”
Dallin snorted without humor. “It’s nothing to do with anything but the fact that you ride like cavalry and bear yourself like someone who keeps forgetting to try not to look like a general.” Dallin’s mouth quirked at the corner. “I admit the connection took me a little while, but I fought in the Shaw Campaign, you understand. It was pure chance my regiment didn’t fall under your command at the northern border.”
“Chance, was it?” Shaw slanted a rather chilly little half smile. “If memory serves, it was the Fifth Regiment that cleared our way into Ríocht, led by a young lieutenant who earned his captain’s rank by blowing past my men and almost to the Guild’s doors.” He tilted his head. “I might not have remembered the young lieutenant at all, seeing as how I never actually met the lad, but for the rumors going about the troops at the time.” He turned a dry glance toward Wil. “Something about a legend come to life, a giant sent by the Mother Herself to lead Cynewísan to victory over the Dominion, and who coerced his men to follow him down into the Beast’s very throat by using only the magic of his voice.” Shaw turned back to Dallin, gaze measuring. “Do you know what they call you in Ríocht?”
Whatever reaction Shaw was looking for, Dallin refused to give it to him. “I’m aware of one or two epithets.”
“Diabhal Mháthair. Aithnidiúil Bás.”
Wil obviously didn’t need a translation, staring at Shaw now with a strange intense curiosity.
Shaw translated for the others as much as for effect. “Mother’s Devil. Death’s Familiar.” He waved a hand. “My own troops would have marched under that banner, if they hadn’t half believed you were a myth altogether.”
Dallin ignored Wil’s critical gaze and forced a smirk. “Military men are ever a puzzling mix of superstition and practicality—both of which I found useful and so useable.”
“I’ve no doubt.” Shaw’s expression was thoughtful and not entirely approving. “I believe I now see your strategy for Lind more clearly.”
“Then we understand each other.”
“Perhaps you do.” Wil’s tone was challenging. “But I would prefer it if you didn’t keep it a secret from the rest of us.”
He stared Dallin down—How long have you known? And why didn’t you tell me?—until Dallin shrugged, perhaps somewhat repentant but not even a little apologetic. Just one more secret Dallin didn’t necessarily want to keep, and he was beginning to resent having been put into the position in the first place.
It’s for the best. I swear it’s for the best.
So why did Síofra’s voice keep encroaching?—I kept you safe. It was too big for you, too much… I took it all away for you. For you, Chosen, always for you….
The guilt, born from the accusation in Wil’s eyes, sideswiped Dallin—which was stupid, because he’d known it was coming, and he knew what he was doing. He hoped he knew what he was doing.
With massive effort, Dallin kept himself from answering the silent indictment and turned his gaze to Shaw. He kept his face blank and waited. Shaw’s return stare was a mix of hard reprimand and grudging approval until he turned it toward Wil, softened it.
“Rank speaks to rank.” Shaw’s voice and gaze were both kinder than they’d been since Dallin had spilled his little secret. “Your Guardian does not wish my presence as a healer, but as a general in the Commonwealth’s service.” He shot a sharp glance back to Dallin. “A former general. I am a shaman now, and have been since my calling rang louder than the war horns.”
“Which is why you left your Temple with all its initiates and apprentices when you understood that the Commonwealth was being misled. Old loyalties never die. This one perhaps betrayed you, but it was a happy betrayal—for me, at least. I need you.” Dallin waved his hand. “I appreciate that you were weary of war—so was I—but one is on its way, if we don’t use every tool we can lay our hands on to stop it. A person can have more than one calling.”
And Dallin should know.
Shaw’s mouth twisted. “My religion—”
“It was not your religious sentiments you followed when you decided to join us in Chester. You left your Temple because you saw what Síofra’s presence among those Commonwealth troops meant to Cynewísan, and your loyalties bit you on the arse. You knew you might prove useful.”
“Useful.” Shaw sighed. “So I am a tool.” He didn’t look insulted, but he also didn’t look entirely pleased. “I am a healer now. I left the Temple when I saw Wil collapse in the street, when I saw the power that he—”
“Bollocks, did you. You did it because a strategist never stops strategizing.” Dallin paused and deliberately softened his voice. “And that power may well find its way into the hands of men who really shouldn’t have it, unless you do what’s necessary.”
Shaw was clearly unsettled, struck to a standstill between whatever he saw as his current duty and his former loyalty—neither of which had come so close to clashing before, Dallin guessed. And why should they?
Dallin held up his hand. “I’m not asking you to lead a charge against Commonwealth troops—quite the contrary. I’m not even asking you to carry a weapon, though I’d much prefer it if you did. I’m merely asking you to lend your influence when Wheeler gets here. He’s a general—a career general at that—and if his ego has grown any more since my last experience with him, though granted it was a peripheral one, my paltry former captain’s rank will be seen as an insult. He may not deign to talk to me at all. In fact, it’s debatable whether he should even know that I was in the military. He might see all this as more treasonous than walking away from the constabulary.”
Shaw was shaking his head, but it didn’t look like refusal; more like skepticism and disquiet. “If I didn’t know Wheeler, I would say it wasn’t possible for his ego to have grown, but I’m afraid it’s not only possible but likely.”
“You fear him,” Wil put in quietly.
Dallin had been getting the same impression, but he kept silent and let it come from Wil.
“You don’t have to do it, you know,” Wil went on. “You’ve already done a lot
for us. We’ve no right to ask more.” He shot a reproachful glance at Dallin.
Dallin refused to even twitch beneath it.
Funny, Dallin had worried that Wil might see Shaw’s secrecy as a betrayal and avoid Shaw after it was exposed. Ha. Instead it seemed Wil was sympathizing with Shaw and blaming Dallin.
Dallin made a mental note. Lesson Six: Nothing draws empathy out of Wil like witnessing someone else with his back to the wall. Maybe it was Lesson Seven. Or Lesson Six Hundred and Forty-Two. Who could keep track?
“I realize it’s a difficult position.” Dallin was speaking to Shaw, but he kept his eyes locked to Wil’s. “I’m not trying to be callous about it, and if it weren’t as important as it is, we’d drop it right here. In fact, I never would have brought it up.”
Wil stared at him, scowling a bit, before he shrugged minute concession and looked away. Dallin turned back to Shaw.
“Is he right? Do you fear him?”
And if so, why?
“Brother Shaw.” Calder’s voice dipped down to tones vaguely threatening, but somehow Dallin didn’t think the threat was directed at Shaw. “You do not have to answer. You are my guest in Lind, and if—”
“No.” Shaw slanted a weary smile at Calder. “No reason for secrets, and Brayden is right.” Frowning, Shaw turned back to Dallin. “I wouldn’t say ‘fear.’ I am… wary of him. He has always had his own agenda, one that I long suspected did not quite coincide with Cynewísan’s welfare, but he was always terribly clever and….” He shrugged, discomfited. “If I could explain it, I would have done so to the elders in Penley and had him dismissed years ago. But he had this… charm about him, this….” He turned to Wil, frown deepening. “I was minded of him when I saw Síofra.”
Dallin stared down at his fist on the reins. The beat of Lind’s heart was abruptly hammering in his ears, a rising crescendo. Síofra; soldiers at the Bounds; Wheeler on his way; the Brethren prowling even now; the faceless Cleric catching up, with every intention of inviting a nightmare to… to—
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