by Terry Brooks
He rose and studied his handiwork. It would look as if she had killed both guards and set Arik Siq free. Why she would have done this and what had happened afterward would be anyone’s guess. Had he deceived her with false promises? Had she collapsed on discovering the truth? Had he chosen to leave her behind? Speculation would abound and would cause further disruption in the lives of the villagers. That, in turn, would give the rest of his plan a better chance of working out the way he intended.
Whatever the case, by the time things got straightened out—if they ever did—the staff would be in his possession and he would be far away. The whole point of this exercise was to create enough trouble for the inhabitants of the valley that they wouldn’t notice what he was about. He didn’t really care how any of this turned out for these people.
Because within a matter of weeks, they would all be dead.
“WHAT ARE WE GOING TO DO, PAN?” PRUE STARED at him with her strange, empty eyes, but the turbulence of her emotions was clearly revealed by the expression on her face. “Do you think he’s telling us the truth?”
They had moved off to one side, safely away from their prisoner’s hearing, standing close with heads bent so they were almost touching. The day around them was growing steadily brighter with the rising of the sun, and the meres were shimmering with dampness and shifting mist. Waterbirds called to one another, and in flashes of brightly colored feathers they appeared and then vanished like ghosts in the haze.
“I don’t know,” Panterra admitted. “But I can’t see what lying to us gains him. Why would he make this story up? He knows we’re not going to let him go, even if we don’t take him to Arborlon.”
“He doesn’t sound like he’s lying,” she agreed.
“Even if any part of it is true, we don’t want to risk what might happen if we deliver him to the Queen without first knowing the truth. Even if we go before the High Council and let him tell them what he’s told us, we could be in a lot of danger. The Queen could find a way to turn the story around on us. She could make it out that we’re somehow involved in what’s happened. There’s no reason the High Council should choose to believe us over her. We don’t have any proof about any of this. It’s Bonnasaint’s word against hers, and that’s not enough.”
“But we have to do something. We have to help Phryne, no matter what.”
He nodded. “Well, we can’t help her if we’re locked up with her.”
As if of the same mind, they glanced over at Bonnasaint, who sat staring off into the distance, distracted. “Too bad we can’t leave him here,” Pan muttered.
“If we did, he couldn’t tell his story. Somehow we have to find a way to let him do that, and we have to make the Elves believe it.”
Pan looked at her. “Well, that shouldn’t be too difficult, should it?”
They smiled as one. “So what are we going to do?” she repeated.
He thought about it. He was still shaken by the events of the previous night, still rattled by the idea that someone wanted them dead badly enough to send an assassin. Certainly, Skeal Eile had no love for them. But even so, this seemed a bit drastic. What could killing them gain the Seraphic?
“What if,” he suggested, “just one of us goes into Arborlon to find Tasha and Tenerife and then brings them back for a meeting? Maybe then we will have a better idea about what we should do.”
She cocked her head. “But you swore we wouldn’t let ourselves become separated again. No matter what.”
He looked at her uncomfortably. “I haven’t forgotten. But what choice do we have? We can’t leave Bonnasaint alone. We can’t even leave him unwatched.”
She glanced over at the assassin and then back at Pan. “All right. Just this once. But not again, Pan. Promise me.”
He put his hands on her shoulders and squeezed gently. “I promise.”
Getting Bonnasaint back on his feet, Pan tied his hands in front of him, then lashed them to his waist and, using a length of cord, fashioned a leash by which he could be led. Bonnasaint grumbled about being trussed up, but the boy and the girl ignored him.
“Where are you taking me?” he asked finally, watching them shoulder their packs in preparation for leaving.
“To Arborlon,” Pan advised. “We have friends we can ask for help. They might have a better idea about what to do with you. Don’t worry. We won’t take you to the Queen.”
“You would be wise not to for your own sakes.”
Pan walked over. “Don’t think for a moment we won’t give you to the Queen if we find out you’ve been lying to us. We don’t have any reason to care about what happens to you. We only care about Phryne Amarantyne. To the extent that you can be of help to her, then you are useful to us. Otherwise …”
He left the rest unsaid and turned away. Bonnasaint snorted derisively, but otherwise didn’t respond.
The boy and the girl shouldered their backpacks, and with Bonnasaint in tow they set out. Both knew the meres well enough to navigate them safely in daylight, but even so they chose a route that kept them close to the northern edges of the lakes, angling their way east toward Arborlon. The sun was fully risen now, and the mists of early morning had begun to diminish, although patches still lingered here and there, thick and smudgy against the mix of daylight and shadows, trapped within thick stands of trees and along the shores of bodies of water that glimmered like mirrors.
“I wish this were all over,” Prue whispered to Pan, keeping her voice low and the conversation between the two of them.
He noted the scowl on her face and smiled. “So things could go back to being the way they were? Just you and me and tracking?”
She nodded. “Just you and me and tracking.”
He shook his head. “Maybe things won’t ever go back to how they were, Prue. Have you thought about that? I mean, after this is over, however it gets resolved, maybe things will have changed so completely that they can’t ever be the same. The valley isn’t a safe haven like it was. The outside world has found us, and nothing can change that. Like the Drouj, other things will be coming.”
“I know.” She lowered her voice a notch further. “But that’s not what I meant. It can’t be the same between you and me. That’s the part that really hurts. We can’t be the same. You’ve got that black staff, and you’ll be just like Sider Ament—a wanderer, a protector of the people of the valley. You won’t be a Tracker anymore. Not like you were with me. And I won’t be a Tracker because of my eyes. I might not be blind, but I can’t tell colors and that’s enough of a handicap to keep me from doing my job. I have to do something else with my life.”
“It will work itself out. We’ll find a way.” He wanted to put an arm around her or ruffle her thatch of red hair, but he couldn’t do that with Bonnasaint watching. “Besides, we couldn’t go back to just being Trackers like we were in any case. The valley, the people living in it, the way we were all once safe here and protected—it will all be different.”
She nodded. “It will, and I won’t like it, either. I already don’t like what’s happened. I’m fifteen years old, and I look like I’m blind and you and I are fighting for our lives and the whole valley could be overrun with Trolls at any moment. We have to do something with a man who’s tried to kill us, but not something that would let him be killed. We don’t have a home anymore because it’s too dangerous to go back to the one we had. We have to help Phryne, and we don’t have any idea how to do that. We don’t even know how to help ourselves. We’re just running around in circles, trying to protect each other. Nothing makes sense.”
Pan didn’t say anything for a moment. “You could do something to help yourself if you left all this up to me and went home.”
She glared at him. “You make it sound like that’s something I would actually do. Are you deliberately trying to make me ashamed of myself?”
“I’m offering you a way out. Your mother and father might appreciate that. You didn’t ask for any of this. I was the one who took the staff from Sider whe
n he was dying. I was the one who made the decision to take on his responsibilities. I didn’t expect you to try to help me. I never expected that.”
“So now you insult me, too. ‘Go home, I don’t need you.’ What sort of person would I be if I did what you’re asking?” She was fuming. “And you want me to believe you didn’t expect me to try to help?”
“No. I did, actually. I just didn’t want it to happen. I thought you were still a prisoner of the Drouj. I thought I was coming to rescue you, not the other way around.”
He paused, collecting himself. “It isn’t that I don’t want you here with me. I do. I always do. I always will. There’s no one I could ever depend upon more than you. But what’s happening now is dangerous beyond anything we’ve ever run up against, Prue. What sort of person would I be if I didn’t ask you to think it over before you got yourself any more deeply involved than you already are? What if something happens to you? How would I ever forgive myself?”
“What if something happens to you? How would I ever forgive myself?” she parroted. “It works both ways, Pan.”
“But it’s not the same thing!”
“Because I’m fifteen and you’re seventeen?”
“Because you don’t have to do this and I do!”
She gave him a withering look. “If you believe that, you need to have somebody besides me explain to you what friendship is all about!” He started to protest, but she held up one hand quickly. “No, don’t say anything more. You’ll only make it worse. Keep talking, and you’ll eventually sound like a complete idiot instead of just a half-wit. This discussion is over. I am staying with you. Mark it in stone. I’m not changing my mind.”
“It could change if you wanted it to.” He gave it one last try. “You always have a choice.”
“I know that, and I’ve made it. The King of the Silver River thinks you need my help. He’s given me back the use of my instincts to see that you’re kept safe. I won’t walk away from my responsibility for you any more than you would give up yours for the people of our valley. It’s not exactly the same, but it’s close enough. You and me, Pan. That’s the way it has always been and that’s the way it’s always going to be. Now shut up and keep walking!”
She said this last so loudly that Bonnasaint, who had been paying scant attention to their whisperings until now, laughed aloud.
“You don’t want to cross the line with that one,” he observed brightly.
Panterra started to go after him, but Prue wheeled around first, blocking his way, and took five quick steps so that she was standing right in front of their prisoner. “Don’t say anything more, Bonnasaint. If you speak even a single word, I will tie you to the nearest tree and leave you for the wolves to find. Pan won’t stop me, either.”
She held his gaze for a long moment, waiting. He smiled but kept silent. Satisfied, she returned to Pan’s side, and they resumed walking.
By midday, they had come in sight of the bluffs on which Arborlon was settled. They could see Elves walking the heights and smell the smoke from the cooking fires. The day had gone warm and the wind still, and there was a sultry feel to the air.
Panterra brought them to a halt. “This is probably close enough,” he advised Prue, speaking to her out of Bonnasaint’s hearing. “Can you wait here with him while I find the Orullians?”
“I can,” she replied. “But I don’t think that’s the best plan. You should be the one who stays. I’ll have a better chance of wandering about as a blind girl. Someone might recognize Sider’s staff, and I don’t think you want that just yet.”
He saw the wisdom in her suggestion and reluctantly agreed. He didn’t like letting her out of his sight, now that he had found her again. But that was selfish thinking, so he abandoned it. “Go,” he said.
Leaving her backpack behind, she set out for the city. Pan took Bonnasaint into the trees, tethered him to one with the rope, dropped his own backpack beside Prue’s, and sat down to wait. The day eased past noontime and into the early afternoon, a slow, lazy passage that made him drowsy as he sat watching his prisoner and thinking of Prue. But he knew how not to fall asleep when on watch, and soon it was the assassin who was sleeping, his head drooping and his snores audible in the silence of the woods. Pan kept an eye out for Elves, as well, but none of them had reason to venture this far afield and none came close to where he waited.
Prue was right about things changing and never going back to the way they were. He hadn’t taken time to think about it before, but he did so now. They might not even be living in the valley when this was over. They might be somewhere else entirely. Would they even be together? Could he keep her with him when he carried the black staff and the burden of responsibility that bearing it entailed? He tried to see the future—any future—but it was hazy and out of reach. Too much blocked his vision of what might be. Too many uncertainties made it impossible to think it through clearly.
He was staring into space, seeing nothing, when Bonnasaint spoke. “This isn’t going to end well for you,” he said, suddenly awake. “You know that, don’t you?”
Maybe he had been faking sleep all along to see if Pan would drop his guard. The boy couldn’t tell. “Let me worry about that.”
“Oh, I don’t worry about it. And I do want you to be the one who does. But I think I should say it aloud, so that you understand. You won’t be able to keep me prisoner for long. Others have tried. They’re all dead. You’re just a boy. You might be a Tracker, but you aren’t like me. You can’t do what I do. You don’t know what I know about staying alive. Sooner or later, you will make a mistake.”
Pan nodded. “I already made one. I didn’t tape your mouth shut. Should I correct that mistake now?”
Bonnasaint went silent, smiling. But he kept his eyes on Pan and didn’t take them off. He was like a cat with a mouse. The boy could feel it. He was aware of the danger of keeping this man close. But he had to try to help Phryne, and this was the only way he could think to do it.
Anyway, by tonight the assassin would be someone else’s problem.
It was late afternoon by the time Prue returned, the light failing as the sun slipped west toward the mountains and the mists crept down out of the heights and up from the depths to gather in the woods. She appeared quite suddenly, coming from a different direction than he had anticipated, but walking toward him with purpose. He started to ask what she had found, but she took his arm and led him farther away from Bonnasaint, making it clear that she didn’t want their prisoner to hear what she had to say.
“Phryne’s escaped,” she told him, keeping her back to Bonnasaint. “Or she was rescued, whichever. No one seems to know. It happened sometime last night. The guard was found sleeping, the cell in which she’d been locked up left empty. The Queen is furious. Elven Hunters are searching everywhere, but so far there’s been no sign of her.”
“What about the Orullians? Maybe she went to them. Maybe they’re hiding her.”
Prue shook her head. “Not likely. The Orullians are part of a detachment holding down Aphalion Pass. They were already up there when the King was murdered and Phryne imprisoned. Word is, the Queen didn’t want them anywhere near their cousin and ordered them kept there. Unless they found a way to sneak out of the pass and away from the other Elves, they’re still on watch.”
“If they abandoned their post, it would be noticed.” Pan thought about it a moment. “But once she escaped, wouldn’t Phryne go to them?”
“How would she do that? How would she even get close?” Prue grabbed his arm. “But she might have tried getting word to them that she was free. She might have done that.”
“Or she might have gone to her grandmother.”
“I thought about that. But they say her grandmother is missing. Some say the Queen had her killed. There are all sorts of rumors floating about. No one quite believes that Phryne killed her father. They wonder if the Queen is lying. But she’s the Queen, and she has the support of the first minister and the Elven Home Guard.
So no one can do much.”
“Well, opinions won’t change much in Phryne’s favor now that she’s disappeared. It makes her look guilty. I wonder where she’s gone?”
Prue cocked an eyebrow. “I think we need to ask the Orullians.”
Pan agreed. “For the moment, we should move farther up the mountain, away from the city. We’re too close if they send out search parties.”
She started to turn away. “Wait,” he said, reaching for her arm. She looked back at him, waiting. “Did anyone recognize you? Or ask who you were?”
“Some asked if they could help me. I played at being blind. A few offered food and coins, but I told them I was one of the Children of the Hawk, come to Arborlon on a pilgrimage. They left me alone then.”
“But you’re sure about the Orullians not being there?”
She nodded impatiently. “Both up in Aphalion Pass. Come on, Pan. Let’s go.”
They strapped on their backpacks, released Bonnasaint from the tree to which he was tethered, checked his bonds, took up the leash, and set out anew. When Bonnasaint asked them what they intended to do with him, Pan told him they were going up into the mountains to find someone who would help hide him. Pan could tell from the look on his face that the assassin didn’t like the idea. But he didn’t care what Bonnasaint liked or didn’t like. Bonnasaint would do what he was told and go where he was led. He was lucky they were taking him with them at this point. He was more trouble than he was worth, and he wasn’t worth all that much now that Phryne was free. He might still be able to help them prove her innocence, but the boy was growing less and less convinced that the assassin would willingly provide any real help when it came down to it.
He was stunned by the turn of events involving Phryne. Who had freed her if not the Orullians? No one else would dare to defy the Queen and the Home Guard. Nor did he believe that Phryne possessed skills that would have allowed her to escape. The most likely scenario involved a careless guard and a door unwittingly left open—something of that sort.
