by Jenna Rhodes
“Rivergrace calls them Stinkers.”
Tolby nodded. “She has a fear of them. That and closed-in places. The first she can handle, the second, it’s tough on her.”
“This cellar we’re headed to . . .”
“Cracked open like an egg. No worry there. We may have a bit of digging to do, to find my wife’s cubbyhole, but that’s about it. She told me where it is; it’s the debris that’ll slow us down getting to it.”
“Good.” Sevryn got to his feet and stretched his legs, handing the cup of brew back to Tolby. “I’m going downstream for a look-see. If I find any trouble, I’ll whistle, sharply.”
Tolby peered up at him, one thick eyebrow crooked. “Expect any?”
“Don’t know. Seems wise to check around a bit.”
“I’ll be listening, then.”
Sevryn moved as quietly off the hillock as he could, pausing by the banked campfire, letting the horses and goat smell him and know he was moving about, before making his way into the brush and following the stream. Each step came slowly and deliberately, moving with or around the underbrush rather than against it, to lessen the noise. He came upon a small clearing and found flattened stones on the ground, with the bone and skin remains of fish on them. He touched the stone and found them with a little warmth still to them, heated by the sun and then used if not to cook the fish thoroughly, at least somewhat. The diner, however, had since moved on. Sevryn cast about the clearing and found fresh horse sign as well although darkness muddled the hoofprints. He had missed horse and rider go by as he talked with Tolby, he guessed.
Either he’d been heard coming downstream or the diner believed in not staying in one place any longer than necessary.
Sevryn stared downstream, listening, and heard nothing other than the occasional skitter of a rodent through the tangled grasses by the brook.
Horses needed to rest and graze a considerable part of each day. If the diner did indeed follow them, moving from spot to spot to keep from discovery, his mount would not recover easily.
Sevryn quietly returned to camp, determined to push a little harder, hoping to gain a day or so advantage. He rolled into his blanket and dropped into a dreamless sleep. Gray dawn woke him, that and the nudge of a boot toe from Tolby as he returned to get another candlemark of sleep or so before breaking camp. On one knee, he could see the amber tousled head of Nutmeg still burrowed in sleep, but the blanket Rivergrace used was neatly folded, tied, and ready to be stowed. He went to the edge of the brook and found her there, lying on her side on the bank, one hand trailing idly through summer-slowed water, her eyes narrowed in thought and half sleep. He watched her for long moments. A frog croaked as the sun began to warm and he hopped away from the grasses and marshes near her. Her booted foot twitched slightly, enchantment broken.
“M’lady Rivergrace,” he said, so as not to startle her further.
She sat up and dried her fingers on her farmers’ pants. “Sleep well?”
He offered his hand to help her up. “It’s fortunate,” he said, “to be on watch when Tolby snores, and to sleep when he is awake.”
She giggled at that, a sound of unforced and unexpected pleasure. “He can be loud, but I miss it when he doesn’t. It’s rather like knowing something fiercely protective is in the room next to you.” She rose easily to her feet, barely tugging on his hand. “I’ll start a breakfast.”
“Not much of one today. Just rolls and fruit, no fire. I want to be away.”
“I’ll get Nutmeg up, then. She can sleep till the sun is high, if you let her.”
“Not the lazy type?”
“Oh, no! Not at all. But sometimes she spins about so much, she winds down for a while.”
“All that chattering.”
She showed a dimple when she grinned, and he hadn’t seen that before; it enchanted him. He would like to see her flash a true and genuine smile often. She slipped past him, a whisper of wind through the reeds and grasses, toward the camp.
Nutmeg stood yawning when they arrived, running a brush over Bumblebee’s thick coat and shaking horsehair into the wind. “I swear I could build another pony out of all this.”
“I take it he hasn’t lost his winter coat yet.”
Nutmeg crooked an eyebrow at Sevryn. “His winter coat would hang to the ground if we let it. He looks like a furry boulder rolling over the snow and frost.”
He said to Rivergrace, “I think she’s pulling my leg.”
She slapped the pony on his rump, a cloud of dust and hair flying up. “No. Da says he’s not all pony, he’s a cross with one of those great cows of the north whose hair you can weave.”
Bumblebee snorted as if knowing an insult when he heard one and flicked his tail at Grace as she dodged away.
Sevryn got his horse ready, rubbing the gelding’s soft nose, calling it by its tashya name, Aymaran. The dark-gray horse, so dark that he would be called black save for his powdery-gray nose, snuffled back at him. As the horse aged, his coat would lighten to a charcoal or even snowy gray, but he was young yet. Part of Lariel’s herd, he could not lay a claim to the beast, but he held a clear affection for him. He saddled up Black Ribbon and Aymaran, and Tolby rose with a creak of his knees, and took to readying Neatfoot.
They ate their rolls and fruit quickly, clearing the grounds as they did, munching with one hand and kicking apart the last of the fire to cool it. Then, before the sun began to truly rise in the sky and the dawn burned away, they were off. Tolby took the head of the trail, and Sevryn the rear. He let Aymaran drop his head and graze a bit, watching behind them and seeing nothing. If they were still being followed, he could not detect it.
Over the days that followed, they wound into rougher country, sometimes dismounting and walking the horses to take the weight off them and stretch their own legs. Bumblebee lost some of his coat and weight, and chuffed when they pulled up his tie-line in the mornings, grass hanging from his lips as he was interrupted in his morning graze. The others kept their flesh and looked fit, Black Ribbon gleaming like a ripened cherry under Rivergrace’s grooming.
He found himself watching Rivergrace whenever he could. Despite her broadbrim hat, her freckles blossomed, and her dimple deepened. The sun lit a gold fire in her deep chestnut hair, and brought out light yellow streaks in Nutmeg’s thick curls. Tolby’s tales never repeated themselves about the fire at night, his repertoire a bottomless well, and Nutmeg never ran out of things to say about everything else. He grew used to the smell of the horse ointment and even Tolby’s stinky toback, although the snoring still rattled his teeth at night. Sevryn found himself growing fond of all of them, and could not imagine a day when he could not look upon Rivergrace.
They crossed the Nylara without incident, although Rivergrace seemed leery of the huge Ferryman as if expecting something more than merely a hand stuck out for the few bits of coin he demanded of them.
He was leaning back in his saddle, half drowsing in the hot sun, watching the graceful sway of Rivergrace on Ribbon walking ahead of him, when he heard the loud crack of a limb snapping behind them. He bolted upright, and pivoted Aymaran, the horse throwing his ears up alertly. Tolby reined his horse about immediately, waving the girls on ahead of him. Sevryn gestured at him to stay and dismounted, running back through the trees and high grass, as light afoot as he could manage, bringing his dagger to his hand as he did. He found a trail breast-high pushed through the undergrowth, angling along theirs, but the horse that had made it, and the rider, were unseen. He bent by the tracks. Crudely shod. Mountain pony perhaps.
Sevryn straightened up and circled the sign, finding nothing clear. The rider had taken his mount back the way he had come, leaving no new trail. He would have to run a good long way to catch up, and he had no wish to leave the others alone that long, in case the rider circled around.
It convinced him of two things. They were being followed, and the follower seemed to have no wish to catch them, merely to trail them. It meant the danger lay at journey’s end.
He went back to Tolby, saying, “He follows only. For now.”
Tolby considered that. “When we near, we can pick up a lad or two, if we need numbers.”
“Good.” He caught Aymaran’s reins and swung up into the saddle.
For a handful of days and more, he’d forgotten himself and the task at hand, but whatever trailed them obviously had not.
Chapter Fifty-Eight
LARIEL ENTERED THE ROOM where Azel lay, his body taut from convulsions from the venom still being flushed from his body, a healer on either side, one working with his face etched in painful concentration while the woman on the other side bathed sweat away from one face, then another. She’d seen this scene at least once a day for weeks now, but the purging took less and less time, and Azel’s agony lessened. She could not begin to guess if he were getting better or if his big frame was simply giving up, bit by bit. Sevryn’s recovery had never been this grueling. She wondered if it was because Azel was full-blooded and Sevryn not, although they were usually much quicker to heal and harder to kill. Perhaps the venom the Kobrir used was now being brewed exclusively for use against Vaelinars. All these questions and more she would ask, later, after the crisis passed.
She sat carefully on the corner of the bed, trying not to disturb anyone, and put her hand on Azel’s ankle, covered by a lightweight spread. “Avana, old friend. You look better to me. I pray that I’m right. I would never ask you to stay, in such pain, just for me. Yet, there is work here for you to finish, and if your soul wills it, you should stay. Don’t Return, Azel. Stay if you can, and grow strong.” Then she lapsed into silence. After long moments, the contracted muscles under her touch relaxed a bit, and both healers breathed a little easier. Neither of them said anything to her, even when she stood to leave. They had nothing they could say.
She wove through the small hallways and courtyards hiding the place where they’d taken Azel. Veils and a light, hooded cloak disguised her steps a lane or two away from the inn, where she dropped the hood back, tearing the veils off to breathe. Heat stifled the day and streets, the sun at its zenith, and Calcort shimmered in mirage waves under it, baking. Even here, behind thick walls and where windows were mere slits for light, the oppression crept in.
After changing in her rooms, she took a light meal and then went to the Conference halls. Bistane stepped out of a doorway and took her by the elbow.
“Talk to me. You must, sooner or later.”
“Formal or here and now?”
“Here and now.”
“You press our friendship.”
“From where I stand, there is no longer one.”
“Then perhaps you should become more illuminated.”
“Lariel!” His grip tightened as if he thought to shake her. She did not look down at his hand, for if she did, he would be forced to let go of her, and she wanted to read the emotions in his hold that his face and words would not give her.
“I listen.”
“Whatever is being said of my father, I know he rode out in defense of the kingdoms.”
“Word from this battlefield is strangely muddled. I’d like to believe you, Bistane, but he rode with ild Fallyn. Old enemies, in a common cause? Unlikely, and you know that. Did they battle one another? Tressandre is keeping her own counsel, and your father hasn’t returned yet for his accounting.”
The hand on her arm quavered a bit. “He lives, that I know. As for the ild Fallyn, yes, odd allies, but we’ve both been watching Abayan Diort and not liking what we see.”
“Diort’s troops were not involved in this.”
“No. Someone else hit them and hit them hard when they rode in to keep two armies from merging. My father sent to me. He stays behind to find out, and he will appear at the Conference when he has evidence.”
“No coincidence you told me you wanted the Accords abolished.”
Bistane stood closer to her. “You yourself put them in abeyance with the others.”
“Because now I arm for war.”
“And because you do, we should stand together! Lariel, you were loved because no one feared that you would carry out your title.”
“Then they were fools to think of me and love in the same breath.” She watched his face.
“Not foolish at all. Now they fear you.”
“And I don’t know this?”
“I have never overlooked you, Lariel Anderieon.” His hand stayed steady on her arm, closing a bit in warmth.
“We are not allies, Bistane. Not yet.”
“Nor are we enemies.” He let go of her then, withdrawing from her space. “And I would have so much more with you, you know that.” With his hair now cropped short and his eyes of blazing color, he looked more than ever like his father’s son. Bistel had alliances but few closely held friends, known for his difficulty since their first appearance on Kerith. A mere youth then, Bistel still held the edge of a Vaelinar in his prime, though surely that prime was finished, and he was looking death in the face. Did that make him more or less reckless now? And did Bistane follow inevitably in his father’s footsteps?
“I have a committee waiting,” she told him, and pushed by. He let her go, though she thought she heard a sigh follow after.
Jeredon cornered her after the committee broke up, a luncheon tray in his hand, and a stormy look on his face. He let the tray crash upon a table, food bouncing up and over as he did, goblets rattling and their contents frothing up.
“I take it you found my reports on the armory order.” She took a salad that looked fresh enough and picked a nut from the leaves to crunch.
“We can’t quarter an army the size you want equipped.”
“Of course not. We place our orders with an armorer, he will not be able to fulfill it, we shall settle for a lesser amount which we both can afford, and yet word goes out about our projected strength.” She found another nut to chew in relish.
He stopped in mid-pace and gesture. “A foil?”
“A wise one, don’t you think?” She seated herself to devour the salad in earnest. “Because more armorers have been operating more-or-less quietly out of watch of the Accords, we’re not likely to find a single weaponsmith who can equip us as it is. It will not hurt, I think, to exaggerate our strength.”
“What if we find one who can meet our order?”
“Then, my brother, we make allies who can foot the bill and fill the barracks.”
“I’m against this.”
She stopped eating. “That, Jeredon, is why I am Warrior Queen and you are not Warrior King. Not our circumstance of birth, but our resolve.”
“It’s not resolve. You’re cursedly headstrong.”
“How can you say that to me?”
He leaned both hands on the table’s edge, his body shadowing her. “Because I have to. Because you have the title does not mean that it is right and meet in your lifetime to execute it!”
“Jeredon, sit down.”
His jaw tightened.
“Please. Sit down.”
He threw himself into a chair, legs sprawling, arms over his chest.
“Tranta did not fall from the cliff of Tomarq, he was thrown. The Shield weakens, and he can’t find the Way to recharge it. We know that the Ravers have gotten stronger and bolder. Are they preparing for the Raymy to come back? If all our eyes and blades are turned to the east, what happens to our back from the west? Our coast has always been vulnerable and even more so now.” She paused. “I know more than I’m prepared to say in this place, but you’re more than my brother. You’re my heir and my closest friend, and the voice of my father in my ear.”
“And yet you haven’t been talking to me.”
“I needed truth instead of rumor.” She turned her head away, looking across the room, away from its tapestried walls and bannered ceiling. “It comes in shreds, and I weave it together fitfully. Gods are stirring. We’ve been tolerated on Kerith, but now we may have come to our moment of judgment by Them. We’re still Strangers, invaders.” She looked back t
o him. “We’ve no Way home and no Way to the future.”
“This used to be the Panner stead,” Tolby mourned, looking down at char and broken stone.
Sevryn had squatted, digging through the ruin with a stick, looking at the green shoots coming up from the burned ground. “It’s been a month or so, I’d say.” He poked at the grasses and weeds.
“I’d no news on this. I’ve hopes they live and are hopping mad about it, and building elsewhere.”
“Mistress Greathouse would have written, or Honeyfoot,” Nutmeg told her father.
“Aye, so I’m thinking. Likely, anyway. Then again, the Panners kept to themselves. Like their family name, they oft took to the mountains, sifting the streams for metals and gems.”
Sevryn stood, tossing his stick away. “Did they have any luck?”
“Some. Enough that they did not farm or ranch like most others roundabout here. Not rich, no. Just getting by, but th’ Panners had a nose for stream mining.” Tolby fetched out his pipe, and pointed the stem across the landscape. “Barrels are thataway. I imagine they’ve a lad or two who will ride with us to th’ old place.”
“Can we make it by nightfall?”
“It’ll be close, but I think so. If the weather holds.”
Rivergrace looked up. Clouds mounted on the horizon, and she could feel water growing heavy in the air. The hot, unbearable summer of Calcort had been left behind and now they were in the high country, where the edge of the fall months could be felt approaching. The mare shifted under her, ears moving forward and back, and she pawed at the ground.
“All right, then.” Sevryn swung up as did Tolby, and he led the way out of the burned-out yard.
The weather did not hold. The skies opened up and poured, and they hung tarps from tree branches and huddled under them, trying to keep their stores as dry as possible. Daisy stood out in the open, his short tail bobbing in irritation, but refusing to come in out of the rain once his pack had been unloaded from him. Soon the camp stank of wet goat. When night came, it came without a moon, and Sevryn sat alone in darkness that had only the sprinkling of stars to guide him. He listened for that which trailed them and did not hear it, but instead Rivergrace’s soft steps to the rocks he sat upon.
