The Charnel Prince

1 A Joust

“I think this man wants to kill us, Hurricane,” Neil told his mount, patting the stallion’s neck. Then he shrugged, took a deep breath, and studied the sky.

He’d always reckoned the sky was the sky—changeable with weather, yes, but essentially the same wherever you went. But here in the south, the blue of it was somehow different, bolder. It went with the rest of the strangeness—the rambling sun-drenched fields and vineyards, the white-stuccoed houses with their red tiled roofs, the low, gnarly oaks and slender cedars that spotted the landscape. It was hard to believe that such a region existed in the same world as his cold, misty homeland—especially now, with the month of Novmen half-done. Skern was probably under a king’s yard of snow right now. Here, he was sweating lightly beneath his gambeson and armor.

The wonder of it did not escape Neil. He remembered his awe at first seeing Eslen, how big the world had seemed to a boy from a small island in the Lier Sea. And yet these last months the world had seemed to shrink around him, and Eslen Castle had become little more than a box.

Now the world seemed larger than ever, and that brought for him a sort of melancholy happiness. In a world this spacious, the sadness and fears of Neil MeqVren were not so large a thing.

Even that mixed pleasure brought with it a certain amount of guilt, however. The queen lived in constant danger, and leaving her for any reason felt wrong. But she had chosen this road for him, she and the shades of Erren and Fastia. Surely they knew better than he what was the right thing to do.

Still, he ought not to enjoy himself.

He heard shouting, and realized that the man in the road didn’t care to be ignored in favor of the sky.

“I’m sorry,” Neil called back, in the king’s tongue, “but I can’t understand you. I am not educated in the speech of Vitellio.”

The man replied with something equally unintelligible, this time addressing one of his squires. At least Neil guessed they were squires, because he reckoned the shouting man to be a knight. He sat upon a powerful-looking horse, black with a white blaze on the forehead, and it was caparisoned in light barding.

The man also wore armor—of odd design, and awfully pretty, with oak leaves worked at the joints, but lord’s plate nevertheless. He carried the helmet under his arm, but Neil could see that it was conical in shape, with a plume of bright feathers arranged almost like a rooster’s tail. He wore a red-and-yellow robe instead of a tabard or surcoat, and that and his shield bore what might be a standard—a closed fist, a sunspray, a bag of some sort—the symbols meant nothing in the heraldry familiar to Neil, but he was, as he had been reflecting, very far from home.

The knight had four men with him, none in armor, but all wearing red tabards with the same design sewn on them as the shield. A large tent had been erected by the side of the road, flying a pennant with the sunspray alone. Three horses and two mules grazed in the pastures along the side of the rutted red road.

One of the men shouted, “My master asks you to declare yourself!” He had a long, bony face and a tuft of hair on his chin trying to pass for a beard. “If you can do so in no civilized language, then speak what babble you will, and I shall translate.”

“I’m a wanderer,” Neil replied. “I may tell you no more than that, I fear.”

A brief conversation followed between the knight and his man; then the servant turned back to Neil.

“You wear the armor and bear the weapons of a knight. In whose service do you ride?”

“I cannot answer that question,” Neil said.

“Think carefully, sir,” the man said. “It is unlawful to wear the armor of a knight in this country if you do not have the credentials to do so.”

“I see,” Neil answered. “And if I am a knight, and can prove it, then what will your master say to that?”

“He will challenge you to honorable combat. After he kills you, he will take possession of your armor and horse.”

“Ah. And if I am merely masquerading as a knight?”

“Then my lord will be forced to fine you and confiscate your property.”

“Well,” Neil said, “there is not a large difference in what I call myself then, is there? Fortunately I have a spear.”

The man’s eyes went round. “Do you not know whom you face?”

“I would ask, but since I cannot give my name, it would be impolite to require his.”

“Don’t you know his emblem?”

“I’m afraid I do not. Can we get this over with?”

The man spoke to his master again. For answer, the knight lifted his helmet onto his head, couched his lance beneath his arm and lifted his shield into position. Neil did the same, noticing that his own weapon was nearly a king’s yard shorter than his foe’s.

The Vitellian knight started first, his charger kicking up a cloud of red dust in the evening sun. Neil spurred Hurricane into motion and dropped the point of his spear into position. Beyond the rolling fields, a cloud of blackbirds fumed up from a distant tree line. For a moment, all seemed very quiet.

At the last moment Neil shifted in the saddle and moved his shield suddenly, so the enemy iron hit it slantwise rather than straight on. The blow rattled his teeth and scored his shield, but he swung his own point to the right, for his enemy was turning in a similar maneuver. He hit the Vitellian shield just at the edge, and the whole force of his blow shocked into the knight. Neil’s spear snapped, its head buried in the shield. As he went by, he saw the Vitellian knight reel back in the saddle, but as he turned, he discovered that the fellow had somehow managed not to fall.

Neil grinned fiercely and drew Crow. The other knight regarded him for a moment, then handed his lance to one of his men and drew his blade, as well.

They came together like thunder, shield against shield. Crow beat over and rang against the Vitellian’s helm, and the strange knight landed a blow on Neil’s shoulder that would certainly have taken the arm off if not for the steel it was sheathed in. They tangled like that for a moment, horses crushing their legs between heaving flanks, but they were too close for hard blows.

Hurricane broke free, and Neil wheeled him around, cutting almost instinctively. He caught his foe right at the neck and sent him crashing to earth. The black horse stamped fiercely and stood to protect his master.

Amazingly, the knight came shakily to his feet. His gorget and the thick cloth wrapped beneath it had stopped the edge, but it was a miracle that his neck wasn’t broken.

Neil dismounted and strode toward his opponent. The Vitellian cocked his sword back for a swing, but Neil shield-rushed him, sending him staggering back a step. Neil used the opening in distance to make a cut of his own, hitting the shoulder of the man’s weapon arm. The armor rang like a bell, and the foe’s blade clattered to the ground. Neil waited for him to pick it up. Instead, the knight dropped his shield and pulled off his helmet, revealing a face rounded by middle age, tousled black hair streaked silver, a well-tended mustache and goatee. His nose was a bit shapeless, as if it had been broken too many times.

“You are a knight,” the man admitted, in accented but comprehensible king’s tongue. “Even though you will not name yourself, I must yield to you, for I believe you have broken my arm. I am Sir Quinte dac’Ucara, and I am honored to have faced you in combat. Will you guest with me?”

But before Neil could answer, Sir Quinte fainted, and his men rushed to his side.

Neil waited as Sir Quinte’s men peeled him out of his armor and washed him with a perfumed rag. The shoulder bone was indeed broken, so they made a sling for the arm. Sir Quinte revived during the process, but if the shattered bone caused him pain, he showed it only a little, and only in his eyes.

“I did not speak your tongue before,” he said, “because I did not know you, and it would not be meet to speak a strange language in my native land. But you have bested me, so Virgenyan shall be the language of this camp.” He nodded at his dented armor. “That belongs to you,” he managed. “As does zo Cabadro, my mount. Treat him well, I beg you—he is a fine horse.”

Neil shook his head. “You are generous, Sir Quinte, but I have no need for either. I must travel light, and both would slow me.”

Quinte smiled. “You are the generous one, sir. Will you not extend that generosity to telling me your name?”

“I may not, sir.”

Sir Quinte nodded sagely. “You have taken a vow. You are on secret business.”

“You may guess as you like.”

“I respect your wishes,” Sir Quinte said, “but I must call you something. Sir zo Viotor you shall be.”

“I don’t understand the name.”

“It is no more than you named yourself, ‘the wanderer.’ I put it in Vitellian so you can explain who you are to less educated folk.”

“Thank you then,” Neil said sincerely.

Sir Quinte turned to one of his men. “Arvo, bring us food and wine.”

“Please, I must be going,” Neil told him. “Though I thank you for the offer.”

“The hour is late. Lord Abullo dips his chariot to the world’s end, and even you—great warrior though you may be—must sleep. Honoring my hospitality could not hinder your quest by much, and it would give me great pleasure.”

Despite Neil’s protests, Arvo was already spreading a cloth on the ground.

“Very well,” Neil relented. “I accept your kindness.” Soon the cloth was covered in viands, most of which Neil did not recognize. There was bread, of course, and a hard sort of cheese, and pears. A red fruit revealed countless tiny pearl-like seeds when husked. They were good, if a bit of a bother to eat. A yellowish oil turned out to be something like butter, to be eaten with the bread. Small black fruits were salty rather than sweet. The wine was red and tasted strongly of cherry.

It occurred to Neil only after they began eating that the food might be drugged or poisoned. A year earlier, he would never have even imagined such a dishonorable thing. But at court, honor and the assumptions it carried were more a liability than anything else.

But Sir Quinte and his squires ate and drank everything Neil did, and the thought left him. However strange his appearance and standard, Sir Quinte was a knight, and he behaved like one—he would no more poison Neil than would Sir Fail de Liery, the old chever who had raised him after his father had died.

Vitellio suddenly did not seem so strange, after all.

The Vitellians ate slowly, often pausing to comment or argue in their own language, which to Neil’s ears sounded more like singing than speaking. Dusk gave way to a pleasant, cool night. Stars made the heavens precious, and they, at least, were the same stars Neil remembered from home.

Except that in Eslen one rarely saw them. Here, they dazzled.

Sir Quinte switched back to the king’s tongue somewhat apologetically. “I am sorry, Sir Viotor,” he said, “to leave you outside of the conversation. Not all of my squires speak the Virgenyan tongue, nor does my historian, Volio.” He gestured at the oldest of his men, a square-headed fellow with only a fringe of gray hair on his scalp.

“Historian?”

“Yes, of course. He records my deeds—my victories and losses. We were arguing, you see, about how my defeat today shall be written—and what it portends.”

“Is it so important that it be written at all?” Neil asked.

“Honor demands it,” Quinte said, sounding surprised. “Perhaps you have never lost a duel, Sir Viotor, but if you did, could you pretend that it never happened?”

“No, but that is not the same as writing it down.”

The knight shrugged. “The ways of the north are different—there is no arguing that. Not every knight in Vitellio is answerable to history, either, but I am a Knight of the Mount, and my order demands records be kept.”

“You serve a mountain?”

The knight smiled. “The mount is a holy place, touched by the lords—what you call the saints, I believe.”

“Then you serve the saints? You have no human lord?”

“I serve the merchant guilds,” Sir Quinte replied. “They are pledged to the mount.”

“You serve merchants?”

The knight nodded. “You are a stranger, aren’t you? There are four sorts of knight in Vitellio, all in all. Each overguild has its knights—the merchants, the artisans, the seafarers, and so on. Each prince—we would say meddissio—each meddissio also commands knights. There are the knights of the Church, of course. Finally, the judges are served by their own knights, so they cannot be intimidated by any of the others to render corrupt decisions.”

“What about the king?” Neil asked. “Has he no knights?”

Sir Quinte chuckled and turned to his squires. “Fatit, pispe dazo rediatur,” he said. They took up his laughter.

Neil held his puzzlement.

“Vitellio has no king,” Quinte explained. “The cities are ruled by meddissios. Some meddissios rule more than one city, but no one rules them all. No one has ruled them all since the collapse of the Hegemony, a thousand years ago.”

“Oh.” Neil could imagine a country with a regent, but he had never heard of a country without a king.

“And,” Sir Quinte went on, “since I serve the merchant overguild, they want records to be kept. Thus I have my historian.”

“But you also said something about portents?”

“Ah, indeed,” Sir Quinte said, raising a finger. “A battle is like the casting of bones or the reading of cards. There is meaning in it. After all, it is the saints who choose which of us defeats the other, yes? And if you have defeated me, there is meaning in it.”

“And what does your historian see in this?”

“A quest. You are on a most important quest, and much hangs upon it. The fate of nations.”

“Interesting,” Neil said, trying to keep his face neutral, though inwardly, his curiosity was aroused.

“Therefore, of course, I must join you. The saints have declared it.”

“Sir Quinte, there is no need to—”

“Come,” the knight said. “We have banqueted. I am injured and weary. You must at least be tired. I beg you, share the hospitality of my camp for the night. Tomorrow we shall make an early start.”

“I must travel alone,” Neil said, though more reluctantly than he might have expected.

Sir Quinte’s face flattened. “Do you mistrust me? You have defeated me, sir. I could never betray you.”

“Sir Quinte, I have learned to my great chagrin that not all men—and I mean no disrespect—but not all men who lay claim to honorable behavior do follow it. My destination is secret, and must remain so.”

“Unless your destination is the hamlet of Buscaro, I cannot imagine what it might be, whether secret or no.”

“Buscaro?” Neil had a map, but he wasn’t very good at reading it. He had been a little uncertain of his route since leaving the Great Vitellian Way.

“That’s the only place this road goes. Are you certain you don’t need a native guide?”

Neil considered that a moment. If he was lost, he’d lost more than just his way—he’d also lost time. If he had gone astray, he would eventually have to ask directions of someone.

But not necessarily a group of armed men.

Still . . .

He returned his gaze to Sir Quinte’s earnest-looking face and sighed. “You do not deceive me, sir?”

“Echi’dacrumi da ma matir. By my mother’s tears.”

Neil nodded. “I’m searching for the coven Saint Cer,” he said reluctantly, “also known as the Abode of Graces.”

Sir Quinte whistled. “Then you see, it is the will of the saints that you should meet me. You chose the wrong path several leagues ago.” He waggled his finger at Neil. “It is no shame to admit you need a guide.”

Neil considered that. If Sir Quinte was an enemy, he could easily follow him, and with his men take Neil whenever it was his pleasure—at night, with no warning. At least if he was among them, he knew where they were. And he would know if they sent a messenger with the news.

“I accept your offer, sir,” Neil replied. “I would be happy of your help.”

Still, he slept very lightly that night, with his hand on the pommel of Crow.

The next morning dawned cool and clear, with a slight frost on the grass. Sir Quinte’s squires had his camp broken down and packed before the sun even cleared the horizon. They followed back down the road Neil had come up, and within two bells had turned onto a track that might have been left by a few goats.

“This is the road to the coven Saint Cer?” Neil asked, trying to hide his skepticism. He was still more than uneasy with his decision to confide in the Vitellian, and was careful not to let any of the knight’s men entirely out of his sight.

“A shortcut,” the knight explained. “You went wrong back at the crossroads after Turoci, on the river. This will take us to the proper road in half the time. And my guess is that time is not your ally.”

“You are right there,” Neil replied earnestly. The sooner he found Anne and returned to Eslen, the sooner he could resume his protection of the queen.

“Never fear, then. I’ll have you at the coven before the stars come out tonight.”

The cultivated landscape grew wilder as they went on. One of Sir Quinte’s squires produced a stringed instrument that resembled a small lute with too few strings and began to sing a jaunty melody Neil understood not a word of. Still, the tune was pleasing, and when the lutist finished, he struck up another.

“It’s a tragedy, this song,” Sir Quinte explained, “about the doomed affair between a knight and a lady in a coven. Very sad.”

Neil felt a melancholy smile flit across his face.

“Ah!” Sir Quinte exclaimed. “There is a lady involved then! In the coven?”

“No,” Neil said. “A lady, yes, but she is very far from the coven.”

“Ah.” Sir Quinte chewed on that a bit. “I am sorry, Sir Viotor, for my questions. I did not see the pain in you before. Now it marks you like a coat-of-arms.”

“It’s nothing,” Neil replied.

“It is far from nothing. I fear no sword or lance, Sir Viotor, not even yours. But love—that can lay the tallest giant low.” He frowned and started to say something, then began again, much more softly. “Take care, Sir Viotor. I know nothing of your love, and would ask no further questions, but it seems to me that your lady must be forever lost, perhaps passed beyond these fields we know. If that is the case, you must be certain you know your heart, for your heart will hear her voice and try to answer. It may betray you to Lord Ontro and Lady Mefita and their dreary kingdom when you still have many deeds to accomplish here among us.”

Neil felt a sudden catch in his throat, and for a terrible moment thought he might weep. He swallowed it down. “You seem to think you know a lot about me, Sir Quinte.”

“I know that I presume. Let me presume one thing more, and then I shall remain silent. If you seek audience with the departed through the sisters of the coven, I would advise against it. The price is terrible.”

“You’ve lost me entirely now,” Neil admitted.

“Do you know nothing of where you go? Lady Cer and Lady Mefita are aspects of the same sahto, what you call a ‘saint’ in the king’s tongue. The ladies who dedicate to her—while holy, and of the Church—learn the arts of murder and the language of the dead. You will never in your life want to cross even an initiate of that order, Sir Viotor.”

Neil had a sudden vision of the lady Erren, in the fortress of Cal Azroth, surrounded by the slain bodies of her enemies, most with no visible mark upon them. He remembered that she had trained at Saint Cer.

“That I believe most sincerely, Sir Quinte,” he replied.

They entered a region of vineyards, rows of vines that stretched to the tops of the hills surrounding them, and Sir Quinte changed the topic to wine, about which he seemed quite knowledgeable. Dusk approached, and Neil’s doubts about his companions crept and faded, then crept back again. But, if they meant him harm, why had they not seized the opportunity? He was outnumbered.

Perhaps they still needed something from him. Anne, for instance. If the women of Saint Cer were all as fearsome as Erren, they could not walk or fight their way in. They would need Neil to bring her out with the queen’s word.

That would be the time to be wary.

Sir Quinte was as good as his word on one issue, at least—before the sunset, they followed a curve around the base of a hill and came upon the coven Saint Cer.

Or, rather, the ruins of it, for the coven had been put to the torch. At first sight, Neil kicked Hurricane into a gallop, but he had ridden only a hundred paces when he slowed the horse to a walk.

There was no smoke. This place had burned long ago.

But was this even the coven Saint Cer? He had only Sir Quinte’s word.

Behind him he heard the faint snick of steel coming from scabbard, and he realized that he had finally put Sir Quinte and the others at his back.

2 Return to the Forest

When the plain of Mey Ghorn gave way to the King’s Forest, Aspar White stopped and stared, and wished he were [missing].

“We came this way just two months ago,” Stephen whispered.

“I don’t remember much of what happened then,” Winna said. “But I would have remembered this.”

“Quiet, the both of you,” Aspar snapped.

Winna’s eyes rounded with surprise and hurt, and he couldn’t look at them.

Ehawk, the Wattau boy, just stared at the ground.

“I’ve got to . . .” Aspar tried to explain, but he couldn’t think of anything to say. “Just wait here,” he muttered instead. “I’ll be back.”

He gave Ogre a switch with the reins, and the massive horse started forward—reluctantly, it seemed. Aspar didn’t blame him—Ogre was a killer, a beast with very little fear, but he and Aspar were alike in this. What they rode toward now ought not to be.

As Stephen had said, they had been here scarcely two months before. Then, it had been forest fringe, meadows and small trees, a few giant oaks and chestnuts, their leaves touched with fall color.

Now all was black. From a distance it looked almost like smoke, billowing yet strangely anchored to the ground. Close up, you could see what it really was. Vines as thick as ferry cables wound about the trees and writhed across the ground, sending thousands of smaller shoots to grapple with every limb and twig they could reach—which was all of them. The tops of the tallest trees had bent or snapped beneath their clinging weight. And everywhere, thorns—from stickers no longer than his fingernail to woody daggers more than a hand span long.

“Grim,” Aspar muttered. “Haergrim Raver, what is happening to my forest?”

Stephen cast a glance at Winna. “He didn’t mean—”

“I know,” she said. “His hardness comes from habit, not from his heart. It’s like those metal shells the knights in Eslen wear.” She kept her eyes on the holter as his figure grew smaller against the loom of black. “He loves this forest,” she said softer. “More than anything. More than he loves me.”

“I doubt that,” Stephen said.

“Don’t,” she replied. “It doesn’t bother me. It doesn’t make me jealous. It’s good to know a man can feel so much, even one who has been through what Aspar has. It’s good to know a man has a passion, and not just hollow bones in him.” She glanced at Stephen, and her green eyes looked almost gray in the overcast morning. “I love these woods, too—I grew up at the other edge of them. But you and I can never know what he feels for this place. That’s the only thing that I’m jealous of—not that he feels it, but that I don’t.”

Stephen nodded. “What about your family? Are you worried about them?”

“Yah,” she said. “Oh, yah. I try not to think of it. But my father, he’d be the first to leave, if things went too wrong. If he had notice. If he had time.”

Aspar had dismounted now, some distance away. Stephen heard the squeak of him coming off the leather saddle. As a novice priest, Stephen had walked the faneway of Saint Decmanis. The saint had improved his senses, his memory—and other things. He heard Aspar curse, too, invoking the Raver.

“Do you have an explanation for this?” Winna asked. “Why this is happening? What those thorns are, exactly? Did you find anything in the royal scriftorium?”

“I know little more than you do,” Stephen admitted. “They are connected in folklore and legend to the Briar King, but that much we already know from experience.”

The fortress of Cal Azroth was still visible behind them, across the Warlock River, a mass of twining thorns and little more. That was where they had last encountered the Briar King. A path of the vines led here, to the forest, where they seemed to have taken hold.

“Why would he destroy his own forest?”

“I don’t know,” Stephen said. “Some stories say he will destroy everything, make the world new from the ashes of the old.” He sighed. “Half a year ago I considered myself learned, and the Briar King was no more than a name in a children’s song. Now nothing I know seems true.”

“I know how you feel,” Winna replied.

“He’s motioning us forward,” Stephen said.

“Are you sure?”

“Yes.”

Aspar watched his companions approach. He calmed his breathing.

Sceat on it, he thought to himself. What is, is. No use getting all mawkin’ about it. That won’t help a thing. I’ll find the Briar King, kill him, and put an end to this. That’s that.

By the time they’d arrived, he even managed to force a smile.

“Fast-growin’ weed,” he said, tilting his head at the dying forest.

“That it is,” Stephen allowed.

“I reckon all of this sprang from his trail,” Aspar said. “That makes him easy to track, at least. Unless this stuff has already spread everywhere.”

It hadn’t. Only a bell later, they found trees that were only half covered with the stuff, and finally not at all. Aspar felt relief sink down his body and toward his toes. There was still time to do something. It wasn’t all lost yet.

“Let’s see,” Aspar said. “We’ve another two hours of daylight yet, but I expect rain at dusk. Stephen, since we’re working for the praifec now, I reckon you ought to mark all this on your maps—how far this stuff has spread. Winna and I will set up camp, meantime.”

“Where do you think we are?” Stephen asked.

Aspar took a slow look around. His bearings had been thrown off a bit by the unfamiliarity of what they had seen earlier.

The forest was more or less west of them, running north-south. East were the rolling fields of the Midenlands. He could make out five or six small farmsteads, a scattering of sheep, goats, and cows on the gentle hills. The tower of a small country church stood perhaps a league away.

“Do you know what town that is?” Stephen asked.

“I make it to be Thrigaetstath,” Aspar said.

Stephen had his map out and was scrutinizing it. “Are you sure?” he asked. “I think its more likely Tulhaem.”

“Yah? Then why ask me? I’ve only traveled these woods my whole life. You, you’ve got a map.”

“I’m just saying,” Stephen said, “that this is only the third town I’ve seen since passing Cal Azroth, which ought to make it Tulhaem.”

“Tulhaem’s bigger than that,” Aspar replied.

“It’s hard to tell how big a town is,” Stephen said, “when you can only see the top part of a bell tower. If you say it’s Thrigaetstath, I’m happy to mark it that way.”

“Werlic. Do it then.”

“Still, Thrigaetstath ought to be nearer—”

“Winna,” Aspar asked, “where are you going?” She had quietly started her mount walking down the hill, away from the forest.

“To ask,” she said. “There’s a farmstead just down there.”

“Bogelih,” Aspar grunted. “Are you sure?”

The boy—a straw-headed lad of fourteen or so named Algaf—scratched his head and seemed to think hard about the question.

“Well, sir,” he said at last, “I’ve spent my whole life here and never heard it called nothin’ else.”

“It’s not on my map,” Stephen complained.

“How far are we from Thrigaetstath?” Aspar asked.

“Ogh, near a league, I reckon,” the boy said. “But ain’t nobody living there now. Them black brammels grew over it.”

“The whole town?” Winna said.

“I always said it was too near the forest,” a female voice added. Aspar’s gaze tracked the sound to a woman of perhaps thirty who was clad in a brown homespun dress and standing near the stonewalled pigpen. Her hair was the same color as the boy’s, and Aspar reckoned her for his mother.

“Pride, that’s what it was,” she went on. “They went over the boundary. Everyone knew it.”

“How long ago was this?” Stephen asked.

“I don’t know,” she said. “Before my grandmother’s grandmother. But the forest thinks slow, my grandmother said. It doesn’t forget. And now the lord Brammel has waked, and he’s taking back what was his.”

“What happened to the folk of Thrigaetstath?” Aspar asked.

“Scattered. Went to their relatives, if they had any. Some went to the city, I reckon. But they’re all gone.” Her eyes narrowed. “You’re him, aren’t you? The king’s holter?”

“I’m the holter,” Aspar acknowledged.

The woman nodded her head at the small buildings of her farm. “We built outside the boundary. We respected his law. Are we safe?”

Aspar sighed and shook his head. “That I don’t know. But I intend to find out.”

“I’ve ney husband ner family that will take me,” the woman said. “I’ve only the boy there. I can’t leave this place.”

Stephen cleared his throat. “Have you heard anything about other villages being abandoned? About people who run—pardon me—naked, like beasts?”

“A traveler from the east brought tales like that,” the woman said. “But travelers often bring tales.” She shifted uncomfortably. “Still, there is something.”

“What?” Aspar asked.

“Things come out of the brammels. The animals smell them. The dogs bark all night. And yesterday I lost a goat.”

“I saw it,” the boy said eagerly. “I saw it at the edge of the woods.”

“Algaf,” the woman snapped. “I’ve told you not to go there. Ever.”

“Yes, Mum. But Riqqi ran up there, and I had to go after him.”

“We can get another dog, if it comes to that,” the woman said. “Never, you hear me?”

“Yes, Mum.”

“But what did you see, boy?” Aspar asked.

“I think it was an utin,” the boy said cheerfully. “He stood taller than you, but he was all wrong, if y’kann me. I only saw him for a minute.”

“An utin,” Aspar grunted. Once he would have gruffly dismissed the boy’s words. His whole life he had heard tales of utins and alvs and boygshinns and all manner of strange beasts in the King’s Forest, and in almost four decades he had never seen any sign of them.

But he’d never seen a greffyn before this year, either, or a Briar King.

“I can take you there, master holter,” Algaf said.

“Your mother just told you to stay away from the forest,” Aspar said. “It’s fine advice. You just tell me where, and I’ll have a look before sundown.”

“You’ll stay with us, will you?” the woman asked.

“I wouldn’t impose,” Aspar said. “We’ll pitch a camp in your field, if we may.”

“Stay in the barn,” the woman said. “It won’t be an imposition—it’ll be a comfort.” She couldn’t quite meet his eyes.

“Well enough,” Aspar said. “Thank you for your kindness.” He motioned to the Wattau. “Ehawk, you come with me. We’ll go see if this thing left any sign.”

Aspar wrinkled his nose at the smell.

“Don’t touch it,” Aspar warned Ehawk, who had bent to trace the track with his finger.

“Why, Master White?”

“I touched a greffyn track once, and it made me ill. Killed smaller creatures outright. I’ve no idea what left that, but it’s nothing I know, and when I see things I don’t know in the King’s Forest, I’ve learned to be careful about ‘em.”

“It’s big,” Ehawk observed.

“Yah. And six toes, yet. Do they have anything leaves tracks like this up your way?”

“No.”

“Mine either,” Aspar said. “And that smell?”

“I’ve never smelled the like,” the boy admitted. “But it is foul.”

“I’ve known that scent before,” Aspar said. “In the mountains, where I found the Briar King’s barrow.” He sighed. “Well, let’s go back down. Tomorrow we’ll track this thing.”

“Something’s tracking it already,” Ehawk said.

“Eh? What do you see?”

The boy knelt and pointed, and Aspar saw he was right. There was another set of tracks, small, almost child-size, these in soft-soled shoes. The prints were so faint, even his trained eye had skipped over them.

“Those are good eyes you have there, Wattau,” Aspar said.

“They might be traveling together,” the boy allowed.

“Yah. Might be. Come along.”

Brean was the woman’s name, and she served them chicken stew, probably better than she and the boy had eaten in months. Aspar ate sparingly, hoping to leave them some when they’d gone.

That night they slept in the barn. The dogs, as Brean had claimed, did bark all night, for leagues in all directions and probably out of earshot, too. There was fear in their voices, and Aspar did not sleep well.

The next day they rose early and went utin-hunting.

Unfortunately, the tracks didn’t go far—they vanished about twenty yards into the woods.

“The ground is still soft,” Aspar said. “And this beast is heavy. There ought to be tracks.”

“In the stories I heard growing up, utins could shrink to the size of a gnat or turn into moss,” Winna said. “It could be hiding right beneath our feet.”

“That’s just stories,” Aspar said.

“Greffyns used to be just stories, too,” she replied.

“But the stories didn’t have it all right,” Stephen pointed out. “Each tale and account I read of the Briar King had only a few words of truth about him. And the real greffyn was very different from phay-story greffyns.”

“But real, yah?”

“Werlic,” Aspar agreed. “I never trusted those stories.”

“You never trust anything except what you see with your own two eyes,” Winna shot back.

“And why should I? All it ever took to convince me there was such a thing as a greffyn was to see one. All it will ever take to convince me a beast that weighs half a ton can turn into moss is to see it. I’m a simple man.”

“No,” Stephen said. “You’re a skeptical man. That’s kept you alive when others would have died.”

“Are we agreeing about this?” Aspar asked, one eyebrow raised.

“More or less. It’s clear that many things we once considered legend have a basis in fact. But no one has actually seen a greffyn or an utin since ancient times. Stories grow and change in the telling, so no, we can’t trust them to be reliable. The only way to sort out truth from invention is with our own senses.”

“Well, use your senses,” Winna said. “Where did it go?”

It was Ehawk who answered, solemnly pointing up.

“Good lad,” Aspar said. He motioned to where Ehawk had indicated. “The bark is scraped there, see? It’s traveling in the trees.”

Stephen paled and stared up at the distant canopy. “That’s almost as bad as being able to turn into moss,” he said. “How will we ever see it?”

“Is that a riddle?” Aspar asked. “With our eyes.”

“But how to track it?”

“Yah, that’s a problem. But it seems to be going along the forest edge where the briars are, which is where we’re going, as well. The praifec didn’t send us out here to hunt utins. I reckon we’ll keep on with what we were hired for, and if we run across it again, all well and good.”

“That’s not at all well and good by my sight,” Stephen said, “but I take your point.”

They traveled in silence for a time. Aspar kept his eyes searching the treetops, and his back itched constantly. The smell of autumn leaves was almost overpowering. Long experience had taught him that the smell was a sign that murder was coming. The Sefry woman who had raised him had told him the strange sense came from Grim, the Raver, for Aspar had been born at a place of sacrifice to Grim. Aspar didn’t necessarily believe that, nor did he care—he cared only that it was usually true.

Except in autumn, when the smell was already there . . .

But once again, his nose was right. Approaching a clearing, the scent intensified.

“I smell blood,” Stephen said. “And something very foul.”

“Do you hear anything with those saint-blessed ears of yours?”

“I’m not sure. Breathing, maybe, but I can’t tell where.” They advanced a little farther, until they saw the crumbled, torn body in the clearing.

“Saints!” Winna gasped.

“Saints bless,” Stephen said. “The poor lad.” Blood soaked the leaves and ground, but the face was clean, easily recognizable as Algaf, the boy from the homestead.

“I guess he didn’t listen to his mother.” Aspar sighed. Stephen started forward, but Aspar stopped him with an outstretched arm.

“No. Don’t you see? The boy is bait. It wants us to walk in there.”

“He’s still alive,” Stephen said. “That’s him I hear breathing.”

“Asp—” Winna began, but he hushed her. He walked his gaze through the treetops, but there was nothing but bare branches and a sigh of wind.

He sighed. “Watch the trees,” he said. “I’ll get him.”

“No,” Stephen said. “I will. I can’t use a bow the way you can. If it’s really hiding in the trees, you’ve got the best chance of stopping it.”

Aspar considered that, then nodded. “Go, then. But be ready.” As Stephen advanced cautiously into the field, Aspar nocked an arrow to his bow and waited.

A flight of sparrows whirred through the trees. Then the forest was eerily silent.

Stephen reached the boy and knelt by him. “It’s bad,” he called to them. “He’s still bleeding. If we bandage him now, we might have a chance.”

“I don’t see anything,” Ehawk said.

“I know,” Aspar said. “I don’t like it.”

“Maybe you were wrong,” Winna suggested. “We don’t know that an utin—or whatever it is—is smart enough to set a trap.”

“The greffyn had men and Sefry traveling with it,” Aspar reminded her. He remembered the footprints. “This thing might, too. It doesn’t have to be smart enough itself.”

“Yah.”

He was missing something—he knew it. It had to have come into the clearing on foot. He had found only the one set of tracks in. He’d assumed it had left on the other side, then taken to the trees.

“Utins could shrink to the size of a gnat or turn into moss,” Winna had said.

“Stephen, come here, now,” Aspar shouted.

“But I—” His eyes widened, and his head nearly spun from his shoulders; then he lurched to his feet.

He hadn’t gone a yard when the ground seemed to explode, and in a cloud of rising leaves, something much larger than a man leapt toward Stephen.

3 Mery

Leoff’s fingers danced across the red-and-black keys of the hammarharp, but his mind drifted into daymarys of corpses with eyes of ash and a town gone forever still beneath the wings of night. Darkness crept through his fingers and into the keyboard, and the cheerful melody he had been playing suddenly brooded like a requiem. Frustrated, he reached for his crutches and used them to stand, wincing at the pain from his leg.

He considered returning to his room to lie down, but the thought of that small dark chamber depressed him. The music room was sunny, at least, with two tall windows looking out across the city of Eslen and Newland beyond. It was well furnished with instruments, as well—besides the hammarharp, the were croths of all sizes, lutes and theorbos, hautboys, recorders, flageolettes and bagpipes. There was an ample supply of paper and ink, too.

Most of these things lay under a fine layer of dust, however, and none of the stringed instruments had been tuned in years. Leoff wondered exactly how long it had been since the court had employed a resident composer.

More pointedly, he wondered if the court employed one now.

When would he hear from the queen?

Artwair had as been as good as his word, finding Leoff quarters in the castle and getting him permission to use the music room. He’d had a very brief audience with the king, who had hardly seemed to know he was there. The queen had been there, beautiful and regal, and at her prompting, the king had commended him for his actions at Broogh. Neither had said anything about his appointment. And though a few suits of clothes had been made for him and meals came regularly to his chambers, in twice ninedays he had been given no commission.

So he had dabbled. He’d written down the song of the malend, arranging it for a twelve-piece consort and then—dissatisfied with the result—for thirty instruments. No consort so large had ever played, to his knowledge, but in his mind that was what he heard.

He’d made another stab at the elusive melody from the hills, but something kept stopping him, and he had laid that aside, instead beginning a suite of courtly dance music, anticipating the hoped-for commission—for a wedding, perhaps.

Through it all, the dead of Broogh haunted him, crying out for a voice. He knew what he needed to do, but he hesitated. He was afraid that the composition of so powerful a work as was forming in his mind might somehow drain him of his own life.

So he fretted, and poked about the music room, exploring the manuscrifts in its cabinets, tuning the stringed instruments, then tuning them again.

He was staring out the window at distant barges on the Dew when he heard a muffled sneeze. He turned to see who was there, but there was no one in the room. The door was ajar, and he could see ten yards of the hall beyond.

The hair on his neck pricking up, he walked slowly around the room, wondering if he had imagined the sound.

But then it came again, louder, from one of the wooden cabinets.

He stared at the source of the noise, fear waxing. Had they found him, the murderers from Broogh? Had they come for revenge, sent an assassin, fearing he might reveal them?

Carefully, he picked up the nearest thing at hand, an hautboy. It was heavy—and pointed.

He glanced back out into the hall. No guard was to be seen. He considered going to find one, and almost did, but instead, he steeled himself, advanced on the cabinet, and brandishing the hautboy, quickly grabbed the handle and yanked it open.

Wide eyes blinked up at him, and a small mouth gave a little gasp. The child within stared at him a moment, as Leoff relaxed.

The cabinet held a little girl, probably no more than six or seven years of age. She wore a blue satin gown, and her long brown hair was rather disarrayed. Her blue eyes seemed guileless.

“Hello,” he said after a moment. “You gave me rather a fright. What’s your name?”

“It’s Mery, please,” she replied.

“Why don’t you come on out, Mery, and tell me why you’re hiding in here.”

“Yes, please,” she said, and scooted out of the cramped space. She stood and then backed away from him.

“I’ll go now,” she said.

“No, wait. What were you doing in there?”

“Nobody used to be in here,” she said. “I would come in and play with the hammarharp. I like the way it sounds. Now you’re here, and I can’t play it, but I like to listen to you.”

“Well, Mery, you might have asked. I wouldn’t mind you listening sometimes.”

She hung her head a little. “I just try to stay quiet and not be seen. It’s best that way.”

“Nonsense. You’re a beautiful little girl. There’s no reason to be shy.”

She didn’t answer, but stared at him as if he were speaking Vitellian.

He pulled another stool up to the hammarharp. “Sit here. I’ll play you something.”

Her eyes widened further, and then she frowned, as if doubting him. “Truly?”

“Truly.”

She did as he said, settling on the stool.

“Now, what’s your favorite song?”

She thought for a moment. “I like ‘Round the Hill and Back Again.’”

“I know that one,” he said. “It was a favorite of mine when I was your age. Let’s see—does it go like this?” He picked out the melody line.

She smiled.

“I thought so. Now let me play it with two hands.” He started a simple bass line and played through again, and on the third pass added a counterpoint.

“It’s like a dance now,” she observed.

“Yes,” he said. “But listen, I can change it into a hymn.” He dropped the moving bass line and went into four-part harmony. “Or I can make it sad.” He shifted into a more plaintive mode.

She smiled again. “I like it like that. How can you make one song into so many songs?”

“That’s what I do,” he said.

“But how?”

“Well—imagine you want to say something. ‘I want some water to drink.’ How many ways could you say that?”

Mery considered. “Some water I want to drink?”

“Right. How else?”

“I’d like some water to drink, please.”

“Just so. Politely.”

“I want some water, now.”

“Commanding, yes. Angrily?”

“Give me some water!” She suppressed a giggle at her feigned rage.

“And so on,” Leoff said. “It’s the same with music. There are many ways of expressing the same idea. It’s a matter of choosing the right ones.”

“Can you do it with another song?”

“Of course. What song would you like?”

“I don’t know the name of it.”

“Can you hum it?”

“I think so.” She concentrated, and began humming.

Two things struck Leoff immediately. The first was that she was humming the main theme from the “Song of the Malend,” which he’d just written down only a few days before.

The second was that she was humming it exactly in key, with perfect pitch.

“You heard that in here, didn’t you?”

She looked abashed. “Yes, please.”

“How many times?”

“Just once.”

“Once.” Interest went quicker in his chest. “Mery, would you play something on the hammarharp for me? Something you used to play when you came in here alone?”

“But you’re so much better.”

“But I’ve been playing longer, and I was trained. Have you ever had a lesson in music?” She shook her head.

“Play something, then. I’d like to hear it.”

“Very well,” she said. “But it won’t be good.” She settled onto the little stool and spread her tiny fingers on the keyboard and began to play. It was just a melody, a single line, but he knew it immediately as “The Fine Maid of Dalwis.”

“That’s really very good, Mery,” he said. He pulled up another stool next to her. “Play it again, and I’ll play with you.”

She started again, and he added only chords at first, then a walking bass line. Mery’s smile grew more and more delighted.

After they were done, she looked at him, her blue eyes glittering. “I wish I could play with both hands,” she said, “the way you do.”

“You could, Mery. I could teach you, if you would like.”

She opened her mouth, then hesitated. “Are you sure?” she asked.

“It would be my honor.”

“I’d like to learn.”

“Very well. But you must be serious. You must do what I say. You have an excellent ear, but the way you’re using your hands is wrong. You must place them thusly—”

Two bells passed almost without Leoff’s realizing it. Mery picked up the exercises quickly. Her mind and ear were quite amazing, and it delighted him to see her progress.

He certainly didn’t hear anyone approaching, not until they were rapping on the open door.

He swiveled in his chair. The queen, Muriele Dare, stood there. She wasn’t looking at him, but at Mery. The girl, for her part, hopped down quickly and bent her knee. Belatedly, Leoff overcame his surprise and tried to do the same, though his splint spoiled the effect.

“Mery,” the queen said in a soft, cold voice, “why don’t you run along?”

“Yes, Majesty,” she said, and started to scuttle off. But she turned and looked shyly at Leoff. “Thank you,” she said.

“Mery,” the queen said, a little more forcefully.

And the little girl was gone.

The queen turned an icy eye on Leoff then. “When did Lady Gramme commission you to teach her child music?” she asked.

“Majesty, I know no Lady Gramme,” Leoff said. “The child has been hiding here because she likes music. I discovered her today.”

The queen’s face seemed to relax a bit. Her voice softened incrementally. “I shall make certain she bothers you no more.”

“Majesty, I find the child delightful. She has an excellent ear, and is quick to learn. I would teach her without compensation.”

“Would you?” The chill was back, and Leoff suddenly began wondering who exactly Lady Gramme was.

“If it is permitted. Majesty, I know so little of this place. I do not even know, frankly, if I am employed here.”

“That is what I have come here to discuss.” She took a seat, and he stood watching her nervously, the crutches tight under his arms. In the hall, a guard stood at either side of the door.

“My husband did not mention hiring you, and the letter you had from him seems to have left your possession.”

“Majesty, if I may, the fire in the malend—”

“Yes, I know, and Duke Artwair saw the letter, and that is good enough for me. Still, in these days, I must take great care. I made inquires about you in various places, and that took some time.”

“Yes, Majesty. Of course I understand.”

“I do not know much about music,” the queen said, “but I am given to understand you have an unusual reputation, for a composer. The Church, for example, has censured your work on several occasions. There were even allegations of shinecraft.”

“I assure you, Majesty,” Leoff began quickly, “I have done nothing heretical, and am certainly no shinecrafter.”

“Yet that opinion comes from the clergy in Glastir. They said that your works were often indecently orchestrated.” She shrugged. “I do not know what that means. They also report that one of your concerts provoked violence.”

“That is true in only the most abstract way, Majesty. Two gentlemen began arguing about the worth of one of my compositions. They did come to blows over it, and they had—friends—who joined them.”

“So there was a brawl.”

Leoff sighed. “Yes, Majesty.”

“The attish of Glastir said your music had a corrupting influence on the crowd.”

“I do not believe that to be true, Majesty.”

She smiled faintly. “I think I understand why my husband offered you this position, though it went long unfilled. He was somewhat at odds with the Church, and especially with Praifec Hespero. I suppose he did this to devil him a bit.” The smile vanished. “Unfortunately, my son is not in the position my husband was. We cannot afford to provoke the Church—at least not much. On the other hand, you did prove yourself a friend to this kingdom, and Duke Artwair’s good word in your behalf is worth its measure in gold.” Her brow creased slightly. “Tell me what the Church dislikes about your music. Precisely.”

Leoff considered his words carefully. “Majesty, your last court composer—what was your favorite of his works?”

She blinked, and he suddenly felt cold, for presuming to answer her question with a question.

“I really cannot say,” she said. “I suppose it may have been one of his pavanes.”

“Can you hear it in your head? Can you hum it?”

Now she looked annoyed. “Is there a point to this?”

He balanced on the crutches so he could clasp his hands in front of him. “Majesty, music is a gift of the saints. It has the power to move the human soul. And yet for the most part it does not. For almost a hundred years, music has been written not with the heart, but with the mind, almost arithmetically. It has become sterile, an academic exercise.”

“A pavane should sound like a pavane, should it not?” the queen asked. “And a requiem like a requiem?”

“Those are forms, Majesty. Within those forms, such sublime things could be done—”

“I don’t understand. Why does the Church object to your philosophy?”

And now Leoff knew he must choose his words very carefully.

“Because some members of the clergy confuse habit with doctrine. There was a time before the invention of the hammarharp—it was hardly a hundred years old. Two hundred years ago, it was unheard-of for two voices to sing different parts, much less four, yet hymns in the Church are now routinely written in four parts. And yet, for whatever reason, for the last hundred years, music has changed not at all. It has inertia, and familiarity. Some people fear change—”

“I asked you to be specific.”

“Yes, Majesty. Forgive me. Take, for instance, the separation of instrumental and vocal music. The music of the Church is of the voice only. Instruments never accompany a requiem. A concerto, on the other hand, never has a human voice added to it.”

“Minstrels play and sing,” the queen said.

“Yes. And the Church mislikes it. Why? I have never been shown a written doctrine to explain it.”

“Then you want to compose for both the voice and instruments?”

“Yes! It was done in ancient times, before the reign of the Black Jester.”

“He banned it?”

“Well—no. He encouraged it, actually, but like everything else he touched, he corrupted the form. He made music a thing of terror—torturing singers to scream in unison, that sort of thing.”

“Ah,” the queen said. “And when the Hegemony defeated him and imposed the peace, they banned such music because of its association, just as they banned everything else associated with the Black Jester.”

“Including artifice,” Leoff said. “If all such bans were still in effect, the malends that drain your Newland would never have been invented.”

The queen smiled again. “Don’t think the Church didn’t try to stop that,” she said. “But to return to your own assertion—you say music has the power to move the human soul, and now you mention the Black Jester. It is said that in his reign, music was written which drove whole nations to despair, which could provoke madness and bestial behavior. If so—if music can move the human soul toward darkness—is it not better that it remain, as you say, sterile and harmless?”

Leoff unclasped his hands and sighed. “Majesty,” he said, “the world is already full of the music of despair. Songs of woe are always in our ears. I would counter that with joy, pride, tenderness, peace—and above all, hope. I would add something to our lives.”

The queen looked at him for a long moment without showing a readable expression. “Move my soul,” she said finally. “Show me what you mean. I will judge how dangerous it is.”

He hesitated a moment, knowing this was the moment, wondering what to play. One of the stirring airs he had written for the court at Glastir? The victory march of Lord Fell?

He had chosen that last, and set his fingers to the keyboard, but something else happened. He began playing the thing he had been avoiding, the part that had already formed in his head. Softly at first, a song of love and desire, a path to a bright future. Then the enemy, discord, terror, dark clouds blotting the sun. Duty, grim duty but through it all, the melody of hope returned again and again, unconquerable, until in the end, after death and grief, only it remained, triumphant despite everything.

When he finished, he felt his own eyes were damp, and he gave silent prayer to the saints for what they had given him.

He turned slowly from the keyboard, and found the queen staring at him. A single tear was working down her cheek.

“What is it called?” she asked softly.

“I have never played it before,” he said. “It is a part of something larger, a distillation of it. But I might call it the ‘Tale of Lihta.’”

She nodded thoughtfully. “I see why the Church does not like your music,” she said. “It does indeed move the soul, and they would claim our souls as their own. But the saints speak through you, don’t they, Leovigild Ackenzal?”

“I believe so, Majesty. I hope so.”

“So do I.” She lifted her chin and stood. “You are in my employ,” she said. “And I would like to commission something from you.”

“Anything, Majesty.”

“These are dark times. War threatens, and creatures of terror that should not exist walk the land. Much has been lost, and as you say, despair is all around us. I had thought to commission from you a requiem for the dead—for my husband and daughters. Now I think we need something greater. I want you to write something—something like I just heard—not for me, or the nobles of the court. I want you to write something for this country, something that will unite the most humble servant with the highest lord. I want something for all of my people, do you understand? A music that can fill this whole city, that can float into the countryside beyond and will be whispered of over the gray seas.”

“That would be—” Leoff couldn’t find words for a moment. “Majesty,” he began again, “you have named my heart’s desire.”

“I’d like it performed on Wihnaht, in the Yule season. Could you have it ready by then?”

“Absolutely, Majesty.”

She nodded, turned, and began to leave, but she stopped.

“You are dangerous, Mestro Ackenzal. I take a great risk with you, much greater than you can ever know, but since I take it, I take it fully and with conviction. If you do this, you cannot hold back from fear of the Church. You must do as I have asked to the best of your abilities and with all of your invention. Do it understanding that I may not be able to protect you, though I will do my best. If you are not willing to burn for this, tell me now.”

A chill of fear went through Leoff, but he nodded. “I was as you know, Majesty, in Broogh,” he said. “I saw the price they paid there for your kingdom. I am no warrior. In my heart I am not brave. But for what you ask—for the chance to do what you ask—I will risk burning. I only hope I am worthy.”

“Very well,” she said. And then she was gone.

4 Guest of the Countess

Neil spun in his saddle, fearing treachery in the sound of steel behind him, but the Vitellian knight and his retainers weren’t threatening him. Instead, he realized, they had noticed what he had not—a group of armed horsemen off to the right, riding their way.

They were dressed all alike, in sable surcoats and crimson robes over armor. None had donned their helms.

Sir Quinte resheathed his sword, and his men did likewise. “Knights of the Church,” he said. “The order of Lord Tormo.”

Neil nodded and said nothing, but he kept his hand near his sword. While he trusted the saints, he’d learned the hard way that their human servants were as corruptible as anyone.

They sat their horses and waited for the knights to arrive.

The leader was a giant of a man, with bushy black beard and swell-green eyes. He held up his hand in greeting and spoke in clear Vitellian. Sir Quinte answered, and they seemed to have a brief argument. Then the knight of Tormo turned to regard Neil.

“I am Sir Chenzo,” he said, in the king’s tongue now, “a knight in service of our holy Fratrex Prismo in z’Irbina. Sir Quinte tells me you came in search of this coven?”

“I did,” Neil replied.

“Did you know of its condition?”

“No, sir, I did not.”

“Then for what purpose did you travel here?”

“I am sorry, Sir Chenzo, but I’m afraid I cannot tell you that. But please, I must know—what happened here? Where have the sisters of the coven gone?”

“They have gone to their lady Cer,” the knight replied. “All were slaughtered.”

Neil felt light, as if he were falling. “All, Sir Chenzo? None survived?”

Sir Chenzo narrowed his eyes. “A terrible crime has been committed here. I must ask you again, why did you come to this place?”

“Sir Viotor is sworn to secrecy,” Sir Quinte explained, “but I will vouch that he is a most gentle and honorable knight.”

“Come, come,” Sir Chenzo said to Neil. “Tell me generally. Did you come to deliver a message? Did you come for one of the sisters? A rendezvous, perhaps?”

Neil felt his chest tighten. “I am sorry, sir. Sir Quinte is right. I have taken a vow.”

“As have I,” the knight replied. “I have vowed to find the perpetrator of this obscenity. Anything you know may be of use to me.”

“Have you no clues?” Sir Quinte asked.

“A few. It was done by foreign knights bearing no standard or markings, like your friend here. They slaughtered the sisters and then rode off in different directions.”

“As if they were searching,” Neil muttered.

“Yes, as if searching for someone,” Sir Chenzo affirmed. “But searching for whom, Sir Viotor? That is the question, and I suspect you have some inkling of the answer.”

Neil averted his eyes, trying to think. He could not imagine that the slaughter at the coven and the murder of the royal family in Eslen were coincidence. Whoever had sent the assassins to slay his beloved Fastia had also sent killers here, to murder her sister.

If Anne were dead, then he could justifiably consider himself released from his vow. He could return to the queen and protect her.

But the queen’s conversation with the shade of Erren indicated that Anne was still alive only two weeks ago. Judging from the ruins, the coven looked to have been burned longer ago than that. So she must have escaped the general slaughter, and was being pursued by the perpetrators.

That meant that her pursuers already knew who she was. The secret he was sworn to protect was no longer a secret at all.

If that was so, the only things that remained secret were his identity and what his mission was. He had to preserve his anonymity; if Anne was still alive, he might be her only hope. He could not allow himself to be waylaid.

And so, saying a silent prayer to Saint Freinte, Neil lied.

“I see that I must trust you with my secret,” he sighed. “My name is Etein MeqMerlem, from the isle of Andevoi. There is a young lady whom I love, but her parents disapproved of our affections. They sent her to a coven to keep us apart. I know not which coven, but for three years now I have searched for her, from Hansa to Safnia, thus far without success.”

“Now I have come here, and you tell me of this terrible thing.” He sat straighter in his saddle. “I know nothing of these murders, but I must know if she was here. If she lives, I will find her. If she is dead, then I will avenge her. I pray that you will help me in my quest.”

“I knew it!” Sir Quinte said. “I knew your quest was for the sake of love.”

Sir Chenzo studied Neil with one eyebrow upraised. “What was the lady’s name?” he asked.

“Muerven de Selrete,” he replied. Then, anxiously, “Please, was she here?”

The knight shrugged. “The records of the coven were burned along with everything else. I’m sorry, but there is no way of knowing.”

“Yet the bodies—”

“Long buried, and—you’ll forgive me—mostly unrecognizable, in any case.”

“I know that she lives,” Neil said. “I feel it in my heart. Can you at least tell me the direction the largest group of searchers went in?”

Sir Chenzo shook his head. “I am sorry, Sir Etein, I have my own vows and duties. But please, accompany us to the place where we are guested. Take ease for the night. Perhaps you will remember something there that will be of use to us.”

“I’m afraid I must decline,” Neil replied. “I must renew my search immediately, especially now.”

“Please,” Sir Chenzo said. “I insist.”

The look in his eye made it clear to Neil that he was not merely being polite.

They rode from fields of yellowing grass and purple thistle into vast vineyards and finally up to a rambling white-walled estate roofed in red tile. By the time they reached the mansion, the sun had set, and only a faint glow remained in the west.

Servants in plum doublets and yellow hose took their horses, and they passed through a gate and into a large inner courtyard. A few servants in the same livery were sweeping it as they entered, and a page led them through another door and into a hall lit brightly by candles and hearth. A few people were gathered around a long table. The most notable of these was a woman of middle years and large girth, who rose from the head of the table as they entered.

“Portate az me ech’ospi, casnar Chenzo?” she said in a pleasant, jovial voice.

“Oex,” he answered, and then he proceeded to make some explanation in Vitellian.

The woman nodded, made various hand gestures, and then looked pointedly at Neil.

“Pan tio nomes, me dello?” she asked.

“I am sorry, my lady,” Neil said, “I do not understand you.”

The woman shot a mock-angry look at Sir Chenzo. “You’ve allowed me to be rude to a guest,” she told him in the king’s tongue. “You should have told me right away that he doesn’t understand our tongue.”

She turned back to Neil. “I only asked your name, my dello,” she said.

“Lady, my name is Etein MeqMerlem, and I am at your service.”

“I am the countess Orchaevia, and this is my house you’ve been brought to.” She smiled again. “My. So many guests.”

“I regret the lack of notice,” Sir Chenzo rushed to say, “but we met them just now, near the ruins of the coven. My order will of course reimburse—”

“Nonsense,” the woman said. “Do not become vulgar, Sir Chenzo. The countess Orchaevia does not need to be plied with Church silver to persuade her to host travelers.” Her gaze settled on Neil. “Especially such a handsome young dello as this.” Then she smiled at Sir Quinte. “Or one with the reputation of Sir Quinte.”

Sir Quinte bowed. “Countess Orchaevia, the pleasure is mine. I had a mind to pay you a call, being in the region, even before these gentlemen escorted us here.”

Neil bowed, too. He was reminded of the Duchess Elyoner of Loiyes, though physically there was no resemblance. The duchess was dainty, almost a child in size. Yet the countess Orchaevia had something of her flirting manner.

She set as lavish a table, as well. Fruit came out first, and a dark sweet wine, followed by an earthy yellow soup Neil did not recognize, roasted hare, tender flanks of kid stuffed with parsley, roasted pork with sour green sauce, and pasties filled with wild mushrooms. Next came partridge and capon served with dumplings of ground meat shaped and gilded so as to resemble eggs, then a pie of unlaid eggs and cheese and quail glazed with red honey and garlic.

By the time the fish course arrived, Neil was nearly too full to eat any more, but he persevered, not wishing to insult his host.

“Sir Etein is in search of his true love, Countess,” Sir Quinte said as he plucked out the eyeball of a trout and popped it into his mouth.

“How delicious,” the countess said. “I am an authority on true love. Do you have someone specific in mind, Sir Etein, or is the girl still unknown to you?”

“She—” Neil began, but Sir Quinte interrupted him.

“We believe she was in the coven,” Sir Quinte explained.

“Oh,” the countess said, her face falling. “So many girls, so young. What a horrible thing. And just after the Fiussanal, too. They had just been here, you know.”

“Here?” Neil asked.

“Oh, indeed. The sisters of the coven are—were—my neighbors. I held a feast for the girls each Fiussanal. It was that very night—”

“The night of the purple moon?” Neil blurted before he could think better. Again he saw poor Elseny, her throat cut ear to ear. He felt Fastia in his arms, her heartbeat no stronger than a bird’s. He saw again the greffyn and the Briar King.

He realized that everyone at the table was watching him.

“Yes,” the countess said, “the night of the purple moon.” Her eyebrows descended, and she shook her head. “I hope you are mistaken, Sir Etein. I hope your love was not one of the girls in the coven.”

“Is it possible—if they were here—that they did not all return?”

“I do not think so,” Orchaevia said softly. “The sisters were quite strict about such things, and the attack came hours after the party had ended.”

“Bless the saints that their attackers did not come here,” Sir Quinte said, quaffing from a cup of dry red wine.

“Yes,” Orchaevia said. “Thank the saints, indeed. What was your lady’s name, Sir Etein? If she was here, I might have met her.”

“Muerven de Selrete,” he replied.

“Of course they did not go by their given names in the coven,” Orchaevia said. “Can you describe her?”

Neil closed his eyes, still remembering Fastia. “Her arms are whiter than thistledown,” he said. “Her hair as black as a raven’s wing. Her eyes were darker yet, like orbs cut from the night sky.” His voice shook as he said it.

“That does not help me much,” the countess said. “You describe your love better than her appearance.”

“I must find her,” Neil said earnestly.

Sir Chenzo shook his head. “We’ve had a few reports of two girls who were seen fleeing with two men. One had hair like copper, the other like gold. Neither sounds like your lady, Sir Etein.”

As he said this, he glanced rather casually at Neil, but something in that glance was searching, watching for him to react.

“I must hope,” he said softly.

But inwardly, he felt a sudden fire. Sir Chenzo had just described Princess Anne and her maid, Austra.

He tried to look disappointed, and thought he succeeded.

After the meal, one of the countess’ servants led him to what he reckoned would be a bedchamber, but he was wrong. The room he was shown to was decorated all in tile, with frescoes of leaping dolphins, eels, and octopi. Set into the floor was a huge tub, already full of steaming water.

The servant stood by, expectantly, as Neil stared at it, knowing how good it would feel.

Knowing also how vulnerable he would be. The room had only one entrance. “I am not in need of a bath,” he said finally.

Clearly puzzled, the servant nodded and led him to a bedchamber. It was as lavish as the rest of the house, but it had a window, and the door could be barred.

The drop from the window was not a long one. He was considering this when a faint sound caused him to whirl about.

The countess was standing there in his chambers. He could not see how she had entered.

“First you refuse the hospitality of a warm bath, and now it looks as if you will refuse my bed, as well,” she said.

“Countess—”

“Hush. Your suspicions are well advised. Sir Chenzo plans to take you into his custody this very night.”

He set his mouth grimly. “Then I must leave at once.”

“Rest a moment. Sir Chenzo is of no danger to you at this instant. This is my house.”

When she said it, all frivolity dropped from her, and for a moment Neil felt a tingle of fear—not of something substantial, but of her very presence. It was as if he stood alone in the dark of the moon.

“Who are you?” he whispered.

“I am the countess Orchaevia,” she said.

“You are something else.”

A wan smile flitted across her face. “Not all of the sisters of Cer died in the razing of the coven. One lives yet.”

He nodded in understanding. “Do you know what happened?” he asked.

“Knights came by dark, mostly Hanzish. They sought a girl, just as you do. The same girl, yes?”

“I believe so,” Neil replied.

“Yes. She is important. More important than you could possibly know.”

“I know only that my duty is to find her and keep her safe. It is all I need to know.”

“I can see that. I watched you lie, and saw how it hurt you. You are not skilled at falsehood.”

“I have not practiced it,” he said.

“She lives, she and her maid. I believe two friends of mine, swordsmen who know the country, yet accompany them. My servants tell me they went north, probably to the port of z’Espino. I advise you to seek them there. I also advise you to leave tonight, and alone.”

“Sir Chenzo. Is he a villain?”

“Not as such, though he may serve them. He was not involved in the murders at the coven. But mark this well, Sir Neil—someone in the Church was. Someone of importance. The knights that were here were saint-marked, and some were of a very special sort, a sort that the world has not seen in ages.”

“What sort is that?”

“In one of my wine cellars there is a man whose head has been smitten off. He is still alive. He is not conscious, he cannot speak or see or feel, but his body continues to twitch.” She shrugged. “I think Sir Chenzo knows nothing of this, but his superiors might. He was told to watch for someone like you. Your lies, as I said, are quite unconvincing.”

“And Sir Quinte?”

“I don’t know if he has any part in this, but it would be foolish to chance it.”

“He has been a help to me. I do not know the language here. I was lost when he found me.”

“Perhaps you were. Perhaps he merely convinced you that you were. I have a servant I will send with you. He is utterly trustworthy, and will act as your guide and interpreter. He will provision you, as well.”

Then she smiled. “Go. You may leave by the front door. You will be neither seen nor hindered.”

“What of you?”

“Do not fear for me. I can settle any trouble that may arise from your leaving.”

Neil regarded her for a moment longer, then nodded.

As the countess had promised, he encountered no one in the halls or manse other than her own servants, who only bowed or nodded politely, always in silence.

Outside, in the courtyard, Hurricane was waiting, along with a smallish black mare and a brown gelding strapped with provisions. Near them stood a boy in brown breeches and white chemise with long black waistcoat and a broad-brimmed hat.

“If you please, sir,” the boy said. His language was slightly accented king’s tongue. His tone seemed ironic.

“Thank you—”

“You may call me Vaseto.” He nodded at the horses. “All is ready. Shall we leave?”

“I suppose so.”

“Good.” He swung onto his mount. “If you will follow me.”

The land was pale gold where the moon kissed it, but where she did not, the shadows were strange. Some were spread like dark rust, others like bronze blackened in flame or the green of rotted copper. It was as if a giant had wrought the world of metal and then left it too long to the weather. Even the stars looked like steel, and Vaseto—when his face came into view from beneath his brim—was red gold etched in deep relief.

Neil had never known such a night. He wished he could appreciate it, but the many-colored shadows seemed to bristle with deadly quills, and nocturnal sounds parted around them, leaving space to hear something else—something following them. “Do you hear that?” he asked Vaseto.

“It is nothing,” the boy replied. “It’s not your friends the knights, that’s for sure. They would each be as noisy as you.” He smiled thinly. “But you have good ears.”

A few hours later they stopped at an abandoned house hidden by a copse of willows and took turns sleeping. Neil glumly stood guard, watching the shadows shift as the moon went down, now and then seeing one move in a way it shouldn’t.

Dogs bayed in the distance, as if mourning the moonset. A little after daybreak, they resumed their journey northward, Neil with weary eyes, his companion seeming cheerful and rested. Vaseto was a small, dark lad with large brown eyes and hair cropped in a bowl just above his ears. He rode as if born to the saddle, and his mount—though small—was spirited.

Midday they crossed a small river and passed a town on a hilltop. Three large towers stood up from the jumble of roofs, and fields spread to the road and beyond. Houses and inns became more frequent, until the road was nearly bounded by them; then they thinned again. Woodlands crept around the trail, sometimes forming dark, fragrant tunnels of cedar and bay.

“How far is z’Espino?” Neil asked restlessly.

“Ten chenperichi. We should reach it tomorrow.”

“What did the countess tell you?”

“You’re looking for two girls, one with red hair and another with golden. They might be with Cazio and z’Acatto.”

“Who are Cazio and z’Acatto?” Neil asked.

“Former guests of the countess,” Vaseto answered.

“Why would they be with these girls?”

“Cazio was courting one of them. The night the coven burned, Cazio and z’Acatto vanished, as well. I found some sign of their trail.”

“You did?”

“Yes,” Vaseto answered. “I did.”

“And you think they were together?”

Vaseto rolled his eyes. “Three sets of tracks, two small, one large, all pursued by mounted men. They met at some ruins where a third man joined them—z’Acatto, by the torn sole of his boot. They fought the horsemen, and won after a fashion. All four left together.”

Neil regarded Vaseto for a few moments, considered the authoritative ring of his voice.

“You’re older than I thought,” he said.

“Probably,” Vaseto replied.

“And you’re not a boy.”

Vaseto gave him a small smirk. “I wondered if you would ever work that out,” she said. “They must make you thick, up north. Not that men down here are generally any smarter.”

“You’re dressed like a boy. Your hair is cut like a boy’s. And the countess called you male.”

“So I am, and so it is, and so she did,” Vaseto said. “And that’s plenty of talk on that subject. Anyway, we’ve other things to worry about at the moment.”

“Such as?”

For answer, an arrow thumped into the trunk of an olive tree, just a yard from Neil’s head.

5 The Utin

Aspar loosed an arrow at the thing before he could even see what it was. It hit, he was certain, but the arrow didn’t seem to have much effect. A long, clawed limb whipped out and struck Stephen to the ground.

As Aspar loosed his second arrow, a film of light seemed to settle on everything. The leaves that had concealed the pit where the creature had been hiding turned slowly as they fell, each distinct—ironoak, ash, haurnbagm, poplar.

As the leaves settled, the utin was revealed. The first impression was of a huge spider—though it had only four limbs, they were long and spindly, attached to a torso so compact as to be boxlike, a mass of muscle covered in what looked like brown scales and sparse greenish hair that grew thicker on its upper spine and ruffed a short, thick neck. Yellow eyes glared from an enormous oblong of dark-green horn with only slits for nostrils and holes for ears. Its mouth was the laugh of a Black Mary, a slit that cut the head in two and champed around wicked, black, uneven teeth.

The second arrow took it high in the chest, where its heart ought to have been. The creature turned away from Stephen and dropped to all fours, then sprang toward Aspar with terrible speed.

Aspar got off another shot, and so did Ehawk, and then the monster was on them. Its stench hit Aspar in the gut, and his gorge rose as he discarded the bow and yanked out his fighting dirk and throwing ax. He struck hard with the latter and dodged as the thing swept by. A six-clawed hand swiped at him and narrowly missed.

He whirled and fell into a fighting crouch.

The utin paused, bouncing slowly up and down on its two weird long legs, its body upright, fingers tapping at the ground. It towered a kingsyard above Aspar.

Aspar shifted back, hoping he was a little out of reach.

“Winna,” he said. “Get away from here, now.”

Ehawk, he noticed, was slowly creeping to get behind the beast.

“Wüüünaaah,” the thing croaked, and Aspar’s flesh went as crawly as if he’d stumbled into a nest of worms.

“Wünaah gooh, yah. I find you later. Make fun.”

The language was the local dialect of Almannish.

“Grim’s eye,” Aspar swore. “What the sceat are you?”

For answer, the utin swayed forward a bit, then plucked one of the arrows from its chest. Aspar saw the scales were more like bony plates, natural armor—the shaft hadn’t penetrated deep. More and more he was reminded of the greffyn, which had also had much of the reptile about it.

If this thing was poisonous like the greffyn, Stephen was already as good as dead. So was he, if it touched him.

He waited for its next move, looking for soft spots. The head was plated, too, and was probably mostly bone. He might hit one of the eyes with a good throw. The throat, maybe?

No. All too far in. Its limbs were everywhere. He shifted his knife hand slightly.

The utin suddenly blurred toward him. Ehawk gave a cry and fired an arrow; Aspar ducked, leapt inside the reaching claws, and slashed at the inner thigh, then stabbed toward the groin. He felt flesh part at the first cut, and the thing howled. His thrust missed as the monster leapfrogged over him and then dealt him a terrific kick that sent him sprawling. It turned before he could even think about getting up, tore a branch from a tree, and hurled it. Aspar heard Ehawk cry out, and the thump of a body hitting the ground. Then the utin bounded toward him. From the corner of his eye, he saw Winna armed only with a dagger, rushing in to help.

“No!” Aspar shouted, levering himself up, lifting his ax.

But the utin struck Winna with the back of its hand, and as she staggered, it grabbed her with the other. Aspar hurled the ax, but it bounced harmlessly from the monster’s head. In the next instant it leapt straight up, taking Winna with it. It caught a low-hanging branch, swung, clenched another branch with its hand-like feet. It moved off through the trees faster than a man could run.

“No!” Aspar repeated. He pushed to his feet, retrieved his bow, and chased after the rapidly receding monster. A sort of shivering was in him, a feeling he had never known before.

He pushed the emotion down and ran, reached to his belt for the arrow case the praifec had given him, and extracted the black arrow.

The utin was quickly vanishing from sight, here-again-gone-again behind trunk and branch. Breath tore harshly through Aspar’s lips as he set the relic to his string. He stopped, got his stance, and for an instant the world was quiet again. He felt the immensity of the earth beneath him, the faint breeze pushing itself over the land, the deep slow breath of the trees. He drew.

The utin vanished behind a bole, reappeared, and vanished again. Aspar aimed at the narrow gap where he thought it would appear again, felt the time come right, and released.

The ebony shaft spiraled out and away from him, hissing past leaf and branch, to where the utin’s broad back was a brief occlusion between two trees.

The quiet stretched, but stillness did not. Aspar ran again, already taking out another shaft, cursing under his breath, his heart tightening like an angry fist.

He found Winna first. She lay like an abandoned doll in a patch of autumn-reddened bracken, her dress smeared with blood. The utin sprawled a few feet away, its back to a tree, watching him come. Aspar could see the head of the black arrow protruding from its chest.

Aspar knelt by Winna, feeling for her pulse, but he kept his gaze fixed on the utin. It gurgled and spat out blood, and blinked, as if tired. It raised a six-fingered hand to touch the arrowhead.

“Not fair, mannish,” it husked. “Not weal. An unholy thing, yes? And yet it will slay you, too. Your doom is the same as mine.”

Then it vomited blood, wheezed two more times, and looked beyond the lands of fate.

“Winna?” Aspar said. “Winna?” His heart tripped, but she still had a pulse, and a strong one. He touched her cheek, and she stirred.

“Eh?” she said.

“Stay still,” Aspar said. “You fell, I don’t know how far. Do you have any pain?”

“Yes,” she said. “Every part of me hurts. I feel like I’ve been put in a bag and kicked by six mules.” She suddenly gasped and jerked up to a sitting position. “The utin—!”

“It’s dead. Still, now, until we’re sure nothing’s broken. How far did you fall?”

“I don’t know. After it hit me, everything is cloudy.”

He began inspecting her legs, feeling for breaks.

“Aspar White. Do you always get so romantic after killing an utin?” she asked.

“Always,” he said. “Every single time.” He kissed her then, from sheer relief. As he did it, he realized that in the past few moments he had known the greatest terror of his life. It was elevated so far above any fear he had ever known before, he hadn’t recognized it.

“Winna—” he began, but a faint noise made him look up, and in the thicket behind the dead utin, he had a brief glimpse of a cowled figure, half hidden by a tree, face as white as bone, and one green eye—

“Fend!” he snarled, and reached for the bow.

When he turned, the figure was gone. He set the arrow and waited.

“Can you walk?” he asked softly.

“Yah.” She stood. “Was it really him?”

“It was a Sefry, for certain. I didn’t get a better look.”

“There’s someone coming behind us,” she said.

“Yah. That’s Stephen and Ehawk. I recognize their gaits.”

The two younger men arrived a moment later.

Stephen gasped when he saw the dead creature. “Saints!”

Aspar didn’t take his gaze from the woods. “There’s a Sefry out there,” he said.

“The tracks we saw earlier?” Ehawk asked.

“Most likely. Are you okay?” Aspar asked.

“Yes, I’m fine, thanks,” Stephen said. “A little bruised, that’s all.”

“The boy?” Winna asked.

Stephen’s voice sobered. “He died.”

No one said anything at that. There wasn’t much to say.

The forest was still, its normal sounds returning.

“You two stay with her,” Aspar said. “I’m going to see what became of our friend’s companion.”

“Aspar, wait,” Winna said. “What if it is Fend? What if he’s leading you into another trap?”

He touched her hand. “I think the one trap was all he had planned. If we hadn’t had the praifec’s arrow, it would have worked well enough.”

“You used the arrow?” Stephen said.

“It had Winna,” Aspar said. “It was in the trees. There was nothing else I could do.”

Stephen frowned, but then nodded. He walked over to the utin, knelt near the corpse, and gingerly removed the dart.

“I see what you mean,” he said. “The other arrows didn’t even penetrate a fingerbreadth.” He shot them a wry grin. “At least we know it works.”

“Yah. On utins,” Aspar allowed. “I’ll be back.” He squeezed Winna’s hand. “And I’ll be careful.”

He followed the tracks for a few hundred yards, which was as far as he dared alone. He’d told Winna the truth—he didn’t fear a trap—but he did fear that the Sefry was working his way back to Stephen and Winna, to catch them while he was away. Fend would like nothing more than to kill someone else Aspar loved, and he’d just come as close to losing Winna as he ever wanted to.

“It still looks like he’s alone,” Aspar said.

They had been following the Sefry trail for the better part of a day. “Traveling fast,” Ehawk said. “But he wants to be followed.”

“Yah, I reckon that, too,” Aspar said.

“What do you mean?” Stephen asked.

“The trail is obvious—sloppy even. He’s making no effort to lose us.”

“Ehawk just said he seems to be in a hurry.”

“That’s not enough to account for it. He hasn’t even tried the simplest tricks to throw us off. He crossed three brooks, and never even waded up or down the stream. Werlic, Ehawk is right—he wants us to follow him for some reason.”

“If it’s Fend, he’s likely leading us somewhere unpleasant,” Winna said.

Aspar scratched the stubble on his chin. “I’m not sure it is Fend. I didn’t get a very clear look, but I didn’t see an eye patch. And the prints look too small.”

“But whoever it was, he was traveling with the utin, just as Fend and Brother Desmond traveled with the greffyn. So it’s probably one of Fend’s bunch, right?”

“Well, so far as I know, Fend’s outlaws are the only Sefry left in the forest,” Aspar agreed. “The rest left months ago.”

The trail had pulled them deep into the forest. Here there was no sign of the black thorns. Huge chestnut trees rose around them, and the ground was littered with their stickery issue. Somewhere near, a woodpecker drummed away, and now and then they heard the honking of geese, far overhead.

“What could they be up to?” Winna wondered aloud.

“I reckon we’ll find out,” Aspar said.

Evening came, and they made camp. Winna and Stephen rubbed down the horses while Ehawk started a fire. Aspar scouted, memorizing the land so he might know it in the dark.

They decamped at the first light of dawn and continued on. The tracks were fresher now—their quarry wasn’t mounted, while they were. Despite his speed, they were catching up.

Midday, Aspar noticed something through the trees ahead and waved the others to a halt. He glanced at Stephen.

“I don’t hear anything unusual,” Stephen said. “But the smell—it reeks of death.”

“Keep ready,” Aspar said.

“Holy saints,” Stephen breathed as they got near enough to see.

A small stone building sat on a rounded tumulus of earth. Around the base of the mound lay a perimeter of human corpses, reduced mostly to bone. Stephen was right, though—the stink was still there. To his saint-blessed senses it had to be overwhelming, Aspar supposed.

Stephen confirmed that by doubling over and retching. Aspar waited until he was done, then moved closer.

“It’s like before,” Aspar said. “Like the sacrifices your renegade monks were making. This is a sedos, yah?”

“It’s a sedos,” Stephen confirmed. “But this isn’t like before. They’re doing it correctly, this time.”

“What do you mean?” Winna asked.

Stephen sagged against a tree, looking pale and weak. “Do you understand about the sedoi?” he asked her.

“You mentioned something about them to the queen’s interrogators, but at the time I wasn’t paying much attention. Aspar was hurt, and since then—”

“Yes, we haven’t discussed it much since then.” He sighed. “You know how priests receive the blessing of the saints?”

“A little. They visit fanes and pray.”

“Yes. But not just any fanes.” He waved at the mound. “That’s a sedos. It’s a place where a saint once stood and left some bit of his presence. Visiting one sedos doesn’t confer a blessing, though, or at least not usually. You have to find a trail of them, a series of places visited by the same saint, or by aspects of that saint. The fanes—like that building there—have no power themselves. The power comes from the sedos—the fane is just a reminder, a place to help us focus our attention in the saint’s presence.”

“I walked the faneway of Saint Decmanis, and he gifted me with the heightened senses I have now. I can remember things a month after as clearly as if they just happened. Decmanis is a saint of knowledge; monks who walk other faneways receive other blessings. The faneway of Mamres, for instance, conveys martial gifts on those who travel it. Great strength, alacrity, an instinct for killing, those sorts of things.”

“Like Desmond Spendlove.”

“Yes. He followed the faneway of Mamres.”

“So this is part of a faneway?” Winna asked. “But the bodies . . .”

“It’s new,” Stephen said. “Look at the stone. There’s no moss or lichen, no weather stains. This might have been built yesterday. The renegade monks and Sefry who were following the greffyn were using the creature to find old sedoi in the forest. I think it had the power to scent them out, and made a circuit of those which still had some latent power. Then Desmond and his bunch performed sacrifices, I think to try to find out what saint the sedoi belonged to. I don’t think they were doing it right, though—they lacked certain information. Whoever did this did it correctly.”

He passed his palm over his eyes. “And it’s my fault. When I was at d’Ef, I translated ancient, forbidden scrifts concerning these things. I gave them the information they needed to do what you see here.” He shook, looking paler than ever. “They’re building a faneway, you see?”

“Who?” Aspar said. “Spendlove and his renegades are dead.”

“Not all of them, it would seem,” Stephen said. “This was built after we killed Spendlove.”

“But what saint left his mark here?” Winna whispered.

Stephen retched again, rubbed his forehead, and stood straight. “It’s my place to find that out,” he said. “All of you, wait here—please.”

Stephen nearly vomited again when he reached the circle of corpses. Not from the smell this time, but from the horror of details. Bits of clothing, the ribbon in the hair of one of the smaller ones, juxtaposed with her lopsided, not-quite-fleshless grin. A stained green cloak with a brass brooch worked in the shape of a swan. Little signs that these had once been human beings. Where had the little girl got the ribbon? She was probably the daughter of a woodcutter—it might have been the grandest present she’d ever received in her life. Her father had brought it when he drove the hogs to market in Tulhaem, and she’d kissed him on the cheek. He’d called her “my little duckling,” and he’d had to watch her be eviscerated, before he himself felt the knife, just below where a swan brooch pinned his cloak . . .

Stephen shuddered, closed his eyes to step over her, and felt—

—a hum, a soft tickling in his belly, a sort of crackling in his head. He turned to look back at Aspar and the rest, and they seemed far away, tiny. Their mouths were moving, but he could not hear them speak. For a moment, he forgot what he was about, just stood there, wondering who they were.

At the same time, he felt wonderful. His aches and pains were all gone, and he felt as if he could run ten leagues without stopping. He frowned at the bones and rotting flesh around the mound, vaguely remembering that the sight of them had bothered him for some reason, though he wondered why they should upset him any more than the branches and leaves that also littered the ground.

Musing at that, he turned slowly to regard the building behind him. It was built as many Church fanes were—a simple stone cube with a roof of slate and a perpetually open doorway. The lintel was carved with a single word, and with interest he noticed it wasn’t Vitellian, the usual language of the Church—but rather old Vadhüan, the language of the Warlock Kingdoms. MARHIRHEBEN, it said.

Inside, a small, slender statue carved of bone overlooked a stone altar. It depicted a beautiful woman with an unsettling smile. On either side of her stood a greffyn, and her hands dropped down as if to stroke their manes.

He looked around, but saw nothing else of note. Shrugging, he left the fane.

As he stepped across the line of corpses again, something terrible tore loose and leapt from his throat. The world shattered like glass, and he fell into the night before the world was born.

6 The Hounds of Artumo

While the arrow was still quivering, two men stepped into the road, and Neil guessed there were at least four in the bushes by the side. A faint scuff told him there was one behind him.

The two in front were dressed in faded leathers, and each bore a long-hafted spear. They also had kerchiefs pulled up to conceal their faces.

“Bandits?” Neil asked.

“No, clergymen,” Vaseto responded sarcastically.

One of the men called something out.

“Of what saint?” Neil asked.

“Lord Turmo, I would think, patron of thieves. They’ve just asked you to dismount and strip off your armor.”

“Did they?” Neil asked. “What do you advise?”

“Depends on whether you want to keep your things or not.”

“I’d like to, thanks.”

“Well, then,” Vaseto said, and gave a clear, high whistle.

The man shouted something again. This time Vaseto shouted back.

“What was that all about?”

“I’ve offered them a chance to surrender.”

“Good thing,” Neil replied. “Try to keep low.” He reached for his spear.

At that moment, furious motion erupted on the side of the road. Neil wheeled Hurricane and caught a glimpse of something very large and brown in the undergrowth. Leaves were flying, and someone shouted in anguish.

Confused, he turned back to the men on the road, just in time to see them go down beneath the paws of two huge mastiffs.

“Oro!” one of them screamed. “Oro, pertument! Pacha Satos, Pacha sachero satos! Pacha misercarda!”

Neil looked around. There were at least eight of the huge beasts. Vaseto whistled again. The dogs backed up a pace or so from their victims, but kept their teeth bare.

Neil glanced at Vaseto, who was dismounting. “Why don’t you keep that big sword out,” she said, “while I take the weapons from these fellows?”

“Have pity!” one of the men in the road said, in the king’s tongue. “See how I speak your language? Perhaps a kinsman am I!”

“What sort of pity would you have from me?” Neil asked, keeping one eye on the dog that was guarding the fellow as he took his spear and two knives. “You meant to steal from me, yes? Perhaps even kill me?”

“No, no, of course not,” the man said. “But it is so hard to live, these days. Work is scarce, food scarcer. I have a wife, ten little ones—please, spare me, master!”

“Hush,” Vaseto said. “You said it yourself. Food is scarce. If my dogs eat a sheep or goat, I’ll get in trouble. If they eat you, I’ll only get thanks. So be quiet now, thank the lords and ladies you’ll feed such noble creatures.”

The man looked up. Tears were rolling from his eyes. “Lady Artuma! Spare me from your children!”

Vaseto squatted by him and tousled his hair. “That’s disingenuous,” she said. “First you molest a servant of Artuma, then you ask forgiveness of her?”

“Priestess, I did not know.”

She kissed his forehead. “And how is that an excuse?” she asked.

“It’s not, it’s not, I understand that.”

She searched at his belt, came up with a pouch. “Well,” she said. “Perhaps a donation at the next shrine will help your cause.”

“Yes,” the man sniffled. “It might. I pray it might. Great lord, great lady—”

“I’m tired of your talking now,” Vaseto said. “Another word, and your throat will be cut.”

They disarmed the rest of the bandits and remounted.

“Shouldn’t we take them somewhere?” Neil asked.

She shrugged. “Not unless you’ve got time to waste. You’d have to stay and wait for a judge. Without weapons, they’ll be harmless for a while.”

“Harmless as a lamb!” the man on the ground seconded; then he screamed when the dog lunged at him.

“No more talk, I told you,” Vaseto said. “Lie there quietly. I leave my brothers and sisters to dispose of you as they see fit.”

She trotted her mare down the road. After a moment, Neil followed.

“You might have told me about the dogs,” Neil said after a few moments.

“I might have,” she agreed. “It amused me not to. Are you angry?”

“No. But I’m learning not to be surprised.”

“Oh? That would be a shame. It fits you so well.”

“Will they kill them?”

“Hmm? No. They’ll stay long enough to give them a good scare, then follow us.”

“Who are you, Vaseto?” Neil asked.

“That’s hardly a fair question,” Vaseto said. “I don’t know your name.”

“My name is Neil MeqVren,” he said.

“That’s not the name you gave the countess,” she observed.

“No, it isn’t. But it is my real name.”

She smiled. “And Vaseto is mine. I’m a friend of the countess Orchaevia. That’s all you need to know.”

“Those men seemed to think you are some sort of priestess.”

“What’s the harm in that?”

“Are you?”

“Not by vocation.”

Which was all she would say in the matter.

Midday the next day, Neil smelled the sea, and soon after heard the tolling of bells in z’Espino.

As they rode over the top of a hill, towers came into view, slender spires of red or dark yellow stone rising above domes and rooftops that seemed to crowd together for leagues. Nearer, fields of darker olive green contrasted sharply with golden wheatland and delicate copses of knife-shaped cedars. Beyond, the blue sliver of the sea gleamed beneath a pile of white clouds.

To the west of the city stood another jumble of buildings, this one more somber, with no towers and no wall. That would be z’Espino-of-Shadows, he reckoned.

“It’s big,” Neil said.

“Big enough,” Vaseto replied. “And too big for my taste.”

“How can we ever find two women in all that?”

“Well, I supposed we’d have to think,” Vaseto replied. “If you were them, what would you do?”

Hard to say, with Anne, Neil reflected. She might do almost anything. Would she even know what had happened to her family?

But even if she didn’t, she was lost in a foreign country, pursued by enemies. If she had any sense, she’d be trying to get home.

“She would try to reach Crotheny,” he said.

Vaseto nodded. “Two ways to do that. By sea or by land. Does she have money, this girl?”

“Probably not.”

“Then I should think it would be easier to go by land. You ought to know—you just came that way.”

“Yes, but the roads are dangerous, especially if those men are still hunting her.” He shifted in his saddle. “The countess said something about a man who had his head cut off, and was yet still alive.”

“She told you about that, did she? And you’ve waited this long to ask me about it?”

“I want to know what I’m up against.”

“I would tell you if I knew,” Vaseto said. “Not the usual sort of knight, but that’s obvious. As the countess said, the fellow was still alive, after a fashion, but not exactly in a condition to speak.” She wrinkled her brow. “Don’t you object to this at all? You seem all too eager to accept a most absurd notion.”

“I have seen shinecraft and encrotacnia enough this past year,” Neil said. “I’ve no reason to doubt the countess and every reason to believe her. If she told me they were the eschasl themselves come back from the grave, I would credit it.”

“Eschasl?” Vaseto said. “You mean the Skasloi? You Lierish can certainly mangle up words, I’ll give you that. In any event, the men we’re talking about are human, or started that way. We did find the more ordinary sort of corpse, as well. If I had to guess, they’re from your country, or some other northern place, for several had yellow hair like yours, and light-colored eyes. They were not Vitellian.”

“Which leads me to wonder how they came so deep into your country on a mission of murder.”

Vaseto grinned. “But you already know the answer to that, or at least you have some suspicion. Someone here is helping them.”

“The Church?”

“Not the Church, but maybe someone in the Church. Or it might be the merchant guilds, given your Sir Quinte’s attentions. Or it could be any random prince, who knows? But they have aid here, of that you can be sure.”

“And have they aid in z’Espino?”

“That’s likely enough. A copper minser could corrupt most any official in this wicked town.”

Neil nodded, looking with fresh eyes at the landscape that lay between him and city.

“What’s that down there?” he asked, pointing to where the road they were on joined a larger way. Along it, numerous tents and stalls had been set up. Just past the joining, the road crossed a stone bridge over a canal, and there was a gate on the city side.

“That’s where the merchant guilds take their taxes,” Vaseto replied. “Why do you ask?”

“Because if I were looking for someone entering or leaving z’Espino, that’s where I might place myself.”

Vaseto nodded. “Good. I’ll make you a suspicious man yet.”

“They might be looking for me, too,” Neil said.

“Good boy.”

He felt she might have been talking to one of her dogs. He glanced at her, but she was staring intently at the travelers who were cueing up to cross the bridge.

“I have an idea,” she said.

Neil pressed his eye to the crack in the wagon wall. Through the narrow slit, he saw mostly color—silks and satin and brightly dyed cotton swirling like a thousand flower petals in the wind. Faces were nearly lost in it, but he caught them now and then.

The wain jounced to a stop. He tried to find the view he was after, by half crouching and gazing through a knothole.

A group of men in orange surcoats was talking to the drivers of wagons and those on foot or with pack animals. They examined cargo sometimes, sometimes let the travelers pass with little comment. A few arguments erupted, ending when coins changed hands. Beyond all that, at the gate, were more men, these armed, and he could see the archers in the towers above the gate.

He kept looking, cursing the knothole for affording such a small field of vision. The guildsmen were moving toward the wagon he sheltered in. Soon, he would have to—

It wasn’t his eyes that gave him the clue, but his ears. The cloud of unintelligible Vitellian surrounding him had become transparent. Now, through that clearness, he heard a language he recognized. A language he loathed. Hanzish.

He couldn’t make out what they were saying, but he knew the cadence of it, the long vowel glides and throat-catching gutturals. His hands clenched involuntarily into fists.

He moved to another crack, bumping his head in the process. “Hiss, back there,” a voice whispered furiously. “There’s no bargain if you don’t lie still, as you were told.”

“A moment,” Neil replied.

“No moment. Get in your place, now.”

A face pushed through the curtain, and light flooded in. Neil saw only the silhouette of a broad-brimmed hat and the faint glint of leaf-green eyes.

“Do you see anyone with light hair out there?”

“The two Hanzish with the guildsmen? Yes. Now lie down!”

“You see them?”

“Of course I see them. They’re watching people, watching the guildsmen do their work. Looking for you, I’d guess, and they’ll find you if you don’t lie still!”

Another face pushed through, this one Vaseto’s. “Do it, you great idiot. I’m your eyes here! I’ve marked them. Now play your part.”

Neil hesitated for a moment, but realized he had no choice now. He couldn’t fight all of the guildsmen and the Hanzish, too . . .

He lay back, pulled the cloth up over his mouth, just as someone thumped on the back of the wagon. He tried to slow his breathing, but with a start realized he’d forgotten something. The coins! He found them and placed them on his eyes, just as the back wagon flap rustled.

He held his breath.

“Pis’es ecic egmo?” someone asked sharply.

“Uno viro morto,” A heavily ironic voice said. Neil recognized it as that of the Sefry man who spoke for the rest of them.

“Ol Viedo! Pis?”

Neil felt fingers grab his arm. He fought the instinct to leap up.

Then he felt fingers brush his forehead. His breath was going stale, and his lungs began to hurt.

“Chiano Vechioda daz’Ofina,” the Sefry replied. “Mortat daca crussa.”

The fingers jerked away. “Diuvo!” the guildsman shouted, and the flap closed. There followed an argument he could not make out. Finally, after long moments, the wagon started moving again. After an eternity of wooden wheels grinding and stopping on stone, someone tapped his boot.

“You can get up now,” Vaseto said.

Neil took the coins from his eyes and sat up. “We’re through the gate?”

“Yes, no thanks to you,” Vaseto grumbled. “Didn’t I tell you it would work?”

“He [garbled] of me. In another instant he would have reckoned I was still warm.”

“Probably. I didn’t say it was without risk. But the Sefry played their parts well.”

“What did they tell him?”

“That you died of the bloody-pus plague.” She smiled. “The makeup helped.”

Neil nodded, scratching at the counterfeit welts the Sefry had made of flour and pig’s blood.

“He’s probably off praying right now,” she added. She jerked her head. “Come on.”

He poked his head out the back of the wain. They were in some sort of square surrounded by tall buildings. One, with a high dome, was likely a temple. People bustled everywhere, as strangely and colorfully dressed as the caravaners at the bridge.

They went around to the front of the wagon, where three Sefry sat under an awning, swaddled thickly against the sun.

“Thank you,” Neil said.

One of the Sefry, an old woman, snorted. The other two ignored him.

“How did you get them to help?” Neil asked Vaseto as she led him across the square.

“I told them I would reveal the hidden space in their wagon where they were carrying their contraband.”

“How did you know about that?”

“I didn’t,” she said. “Not for certain. But I know a thing or two about Sefry, and that clan almost always carries contraband.”

“That’s good to know.”

“They also owe me a few favors. Or did. We just used up most of them. So don’t waste this chance. Keep that wig on. Don’t let your straw mat show.”

Neil plucked at the horsehair mummer’s wig that had been pulled over his own close-cropped hair. “I don’t care for it,” he muttered.

“You’re a true beauty with it on,” Vaseto told him. “Now, try not to talk too much, especially if someone speaks to you in Hansan or Crothanic. You’re a traveler from Ilsepeq, here to visit the shrine of Vanth.”

“Where’s Ilsepeq?”

“I’ve no idea. Neither will anyone you tell. But Espinitos pride themselves on their knowledge of the world, so no one will admit that. Just practice this: ‘Edio dot Ilsepeq. Nefatio Vitellian.’”

“Edio dat Islepeq,” Neil tried experimentally. “Ne fatio Vitellian.”

“Very good,” Vaseto said. “You sound exactly as if you don’t speak a word of Vitellian.”

“I don’t,” Neil said.

“Well, that explains it. Now come, let’s find your girls.”

7 Ambria

“I like that one,” Mery said absently. She was lying stomach down on a rug, her legs kicking up behind her.

“Do you?” Leoff asked, continuing to play the hammarharp. “I’m pleased that you like it.”

She made fists and rested her chin on them. “It’s sad, but not in the way that makes you cry. Like autumn coming.”

“Melancholy?” Leoff said.

She pinched her mouth thoughtfully. “I guess so.”

“Like autumn coming,” Leoff mused. He smiled faintly, stopped, dipped his quill in ink, and made a notation on the music.

“What did you write?” Mery said.

“I wrote, ‘like autumn coming,’” he said. “So the musicians will know how to play it.” He turned in his seat. “Are you ready for your lesson?”

She brightened a bit. “Yes.”

“Come sit beside me, then.”

She got up, brushed the front of her dress, and then scooted onto [missing]. “Let’s see we were working on the third mode, weren’t we?”

“Uh-huh.” She tapped the freshly noted music. “Can I try this?”

He glanced at her. “You can try,” he said.

Mery placed her fingers on the keyboard, and a look of intense concentration came over her face. She bit her lip and played the first chord, walked the melody up, and on the third bar stopped, a look of sudden consternation on her features.

“What’s wrong?” he asked.

“I can’t reach,” she said.

“That’s right,” he said. “Do you know why?”

“My hands aren’t big enough.”

He smiled. “No one’s hands are big enough. This isn’t really written for hammarharp. That bottom line would be played by a bass croth.”

“But you just played it.”

“I cheated,” he said. “I transposed the notes up an octave. I just wanted an idea how it all sounded together. To really know, we’ll have to have an ensemble play it.”

“Oh.” She pointed. “What’s that line, then?”

“That’s the hautboy.”

“And this?”

“That’s the tenor voice.”

“Someone singing?”

“Exactly.”

She played the single line. “Are there words?” she asked.

“Yes.”

“I don’t see them.”

He tapped his head. “They’re still in here, with the rest of it.”

She blinked at him. “You’re making it up?”

“I’m making it up,” he confirmed.

“What are the words?”

“The first word is ih,” Leoff said solemnly.

“Ih? That’s the servants’ word for I.”

“Yes,” he said. “It’s a very important word. It’s the first time it’s been used like this.”

“I don’t understand.”

“I’m not sure I do myself.”

“But why the servants’ language? Why not the king’s tongue?”

“Because most people in Crotheny speak Almannish, not the king’s tongue.”

“They do?” He nodded.

“Is that because they’re all servants?”

He laughed. “In a way, I suppose so.”

“We all of us are servants,” a feminine voice said from the doorway. “It’s only a matter of whom we serve.”

Leoff turned in his seat. A woman stood there. At first he noticed only her eyes, cut gems of topaz that glittered with a deep green fire. They held him mercilessly, and kept his throat tight for too long. He broke the gaze finally.

“Lady,” he managed, “I have not had the pleasure.” He reached for his crutches and managed to stand and make a little bow.

The woman smiled. She had ash-blond hair that hung in curls and a pleasantly dimpled face that was beginning to show some age. He reckoned her to be in her mid-thirties. “I am Ambria Gramme,” she told him.

Leoff felt his mouth drop open, and closed it. “You’re Mery’s mother?” he said. “I’m very pleased to meet you. I must say, she is a delight, and a most promising student.”

“Student?” Gramme asked sweetly. “Who are you? And what do you teach, exactly?”

“Oh, my apologies. I am Leovigild Ackenzal, the court composer. I thought Mery would have mentioned me.” He glanced at the girl, who looked innocently away.

The smile widened. “Oh, yes, I’ve heard of you. Quite the hero, yes? For your part in the business at Broogh.”

Leoff felt his face warming. “If I did anything commendable, it was by sheerest accident, I assure you.”

“Humility isn’t particularly fashionable in the court at the moment, but you do wear it well,” Lady Gramme said. Her eyes drifted down his frame. “You are cut from good cloth, just as I’ve heard.”

“I . . .” He stopped. He had nothing to say to that, and he tried to gather his composure. “I’m sorry, milady, I thought you knew I was giving Mery music lessons. I mean her no harm, I assure you.”

“The fault isn’t yours,” Gramme replied. “Mery simply forgot to tell me. Didn’t you, Mery?”

“I’m sorry, Mama.”

“As you should be. Fralet Ackenzal is an important man. I’m sure he doesn’t have time for you.”

“Oh, no,” Leoff replied. “As I said, she’s a wonderful student.”

“I’m sure she is. But at present my funds do not allow for the cost of tutoring.”

“I ask for no compensation,” Leoff said. “My expenses at the court are taken care of.” He waved his hands helplessly. “I would hate to see her talent go to waste.”

“She has talent, you think?”

“I assure you. Would you like to hear her play something?”

“Oh, no,” Gramme said, still smiling. “I’ve no ear at all, I’m told. I trust your judgment.”

“Then you won’t mind?”

“How could I refuse such a kind gesture?” Her lips pursed. “But still, it puts me in your debt. You must let me make it up to you somehow.”

“That’s not necessary,” he said, trying very hard to keep his voice from breaking.

“No, I know just the thing. I’m having a small fete on Saint Blight’s Eve. You’re new here, and could do with some introductions, I’m sure. I insist you attend.”

“That’s very kind, lady.”

“Not at all. It’s the least I can do for someone who indulges my little Mery. There, it’s settled.” Her gaze shifted. “Mery, when you’ve finished your lessons, come to my apartments, will you?”

“Yes, Mama,” the girl replied.

“Good day to you, then,” Gramme said.

“Good day to you, Lady Gramme.”

“You might call me Ambria,” she replied. “Most of my friends do.”

Mery left a bell later, and Leoff returned to his work, a tense excitement growing in his belly. It felt right, it felt perfect, the way his composition was growing. It felt important, too, but that consideration he tried to keep at a distance. If he thought about that too much, the task grew daunting.

Toward vespers, he heard footsteps and a small rap at his door. He found Artwair standing there, dressed much as when he had first met him, in traveling clothes.

“My lord!” he said, reaching for his crutches.

“No, no, keep your seat,” Artwair said. “Surely we’ve no need for that.”

Leoff smiled, realizing just how good it was to see the duke again.

“How are you getting along, Leoff?” Artwair asked, taking a seat on a stool.

“The queen came to see me,” he said. “She’s commissioned a work, and it’s going—well, very well. I’m very hopeful for it.”

Artwair looked a bit surprised. “What sort of a work? Not a requiem, I hope.”

“No, something much more exciting. I tell you, it’s something that has never been done before.”

Artwair raised an eyebrow. “So? Well, have a care, my friend. Sometimes the new isn’t always the best thing for the moment. The local clergy is already muttering about you.”

Leoff waved that away. “The queen has confidence in me. That’s all I care about.”

“The queen is not the only power to be reckoned with in this court.”

“It can hardly be worse than Broogh,” Leoff said.

“It most certainly can,” Artwair said, his voice suddenly as serious as Leoff had ever heard it. “These days, it most certainly can.”

Leoff forced a chuckle. “Well, I’ll try to keep that in mind. But it is a commission, you know, and from the queen.” He paused, again taking in Artwair’s clothing. In the court he had dressed in brocades and linens. “Are you traveling soon?” he asked.

“Yes, actually, I’ve just stopped in to tell you good-bye. There’s a bit of trouble in the east I’ve been asked to handle.”

“More wayward musicians?”

Artwair shook his head. “No, something a little more demanding, I’m afraid. The queen has asked me take an army there.”

Leoff’s heart stuttered a beat. “Are we at war? Is it Hansa?”

“I’m not sure it’s war, and I don’t think it’s Hansa. Some of the locals have turned into man-eaters, it seems.”

“What?”

“Sounds ridiculous, doesn’t it? People running around naked, rending their neighbors limb from limb. At first it was hard to credit, even when the praifec said it was true. Now—well, several villages have been destroyed, but last nineday they killed everyone in Slifhaem.”

“Slifhaem? I’ve been there. It’s a town of some size, with a fortress.” He paused. “Did you say naked?”

“That’s how we hear it, and more of them every day. The praifec says it’s some sort of witchery. All I know is, I’m to go and put a stop to it before they go pouring into the Midenlands.”

Leoff shook his head. “And you’re warning me to have a care.”

“Well, I’d rather take the field any day and see my death coming on the edge of a sword than die from the nick of a pin or a goblet of poisoned wine here in Eslen,” he said. “Besides, I’ll be strapped in armor with a good sword in my hand and have five hundred excellent men around me. I don’t reckon a bunch of naked madmen will have much chance to do me in.”

“What if they have creatures with them, like the basil-nix? What if it’s the Briar King himself driving them on, making them mad?”

“Well, I’ll kill him, too, for good measure,” Artwair said. “Meantime—ho, what’s this?”

Leoff watched as Artwair picked up a shawl from the carpet. “You’ve been making a few acquaintances, auy?” Artwair said, winking. “The sort that gets comfortable enough to leave things lying about?”

Leoff smiled. “Not of the sort you mean, I’m afraid. Mery must have left that.”

“Mery?”

“One of my students. Lady Gramme’s daughter.”

Artwair stared at him, then gave a low whistle. “That is interesting company,” Artwair commented.

“Yes, I got that reaction from the queen, as well,” Leoff said.

“I should think so.”

“But she’s a delightful child,” Leoff said, “and an excellent student.”

Artwair’s eyes widened. “You don’t know who she is?”

“Yes, I just told you—Ambria Gramme’s daughter.”

“Auy, but do you know who she is?”

Leoff had a sudden sinking feeling. “Well—no, not exactly,” he said.

“You are pleasantly naive, Leovigild Ackenzal,” the duke said.

“A role I’m growing tired of.”

“Then you might ask a few questions, now and then. The lady Gramme is the girl’s mother, yes. I might better say, she is the daughter of Ambria Gramme and the late King William the Second.”

Leoff was silent for a moment. “Oh,” he finally said.

“Yes. You’ve made friends with one of the king’s bastards—not a popular person with the queen, right now.”

“The poor girl can’t help her birth.”

“No, of course not. But Lady Gramme is one of many who have visions of a crown in her future, and she isn’t afraid to try anything that might bring that vision to pass. She’s the queen’s bitter enemy. Mery’s lucky she hasn’t met with some sort of . . . accident.”

Leoff straightened indignantly. “I can’t believe the queen would imagine doing such a thing.”

“A year ago, I might have agreed with you,” Artwair replied. “Now—well, I wouldn’t get too attached to little Mery.”

Leoff glanced off down the hall, hoping the girl wasn’t within earshot.

“Ah,” Artwair said. “It’s too late for that, I see.” He walked over and rested his hand on Leoff’s shoulder. “The court is a dangerous place, just now,” he said. “You’ve got to watch what sort of friends you make. If the queen ever suspected you had been drawn into Gramme’s snares—well, then I’d be worried about you experiencing a bad fall.” He lifted his hand. “Take me seriously,” he said. “Keep away from Gramme. Don’t attract her attention.” He showed his teeth. “And wish me luck. If things go well, I’ll be back before Yule.”

“Best of luck, Artwair,” Leoff said. “I’ll ask the saints to keep you safe.”

“Auy. But if they don’t, no bloody requiems, please? They’re damn depressing.”

Leoff watched the duke leave, his heart sinking further. Artwair was the only adult he really knew in Eslen, certainly the only one he might call a friend. After him, there was only Mery.

And as for that, and Ambria Gramme—Artwair’s warning had come a few hours too late. He had already attracted her attention.

8 Trust

When Cazio burst into the courtyard, Anne was huddled near the cookfire, patching a shawl. The nights had grown cooler, and she had no money for a new wrap.

She smiled thinly at Cazio, who seemed—as usual—very pleased with himself.

“I’ve got a present for you,” he announced.

“What sort of present?”

“Ask me nicely, and I’ll tell you.”

“What sort of present, please?” she said impatiently.

He frowned. “Is this as nicely as you can manage? i was hoping for something more in the way of a kiss.”

“Yes, well, without hope, we’d have little to drive us on, would we? If I gave you that kiss, what would you have left to hope for?”

“Oh, I can imagine a thing or two,” he leered.

“Yes, but you could never truly hope for them,” she said. Then she sniffed. “Never mind. Unless your present is a new shawl, or a warmer suit of clothes, I doubt that I’ve any need of it.”

“Oh, no? How does passage on a ship sound?”

Anne dropped her darning needle. Then she frowned and picked it back up. “Don’t tease,” she said irritable.

“A fine one you are to talk,” he said.

“I’ve never—”

“I’m kidding,” Cazio said. Then, quickly—“Not about the ship. It’s all arranged. Passage for the four of us.”

“To where?”

“Paldh. That’s near Eslen, is it not?”

“Very near,” Anne said. “Near enough. Is this true? You’re not baiting me?”

“Casnara, I am not. I’ve just spoken to the captain.”

“And it’s safe?”

“As safe as we’ll find.”

Anne blinked at Cazio. After all this time, she’d begun to stop thinking about home, tried to live in the present, to get from one day to the next. But now—

Her room. Decent clothes. A crackling hearth. Warm baths. Real food.

Safety.

She got up and very deliberately planted a kiss right on Cazio’s lips.

“For this one instant,” she said, “I adore you.”

“Well,” Cazion said, his voice suddenly a little strained. “How about another, then?”

She considered. “No,” she said at last, “the moment’s gone. But I’m still grateful, Cazio.”

“Ah, you’re a fickle one,” Cazio said. “All I’ve done for love of you, and so little in return.”

Anne laughed and was startled that it felt genuine. “You love me, you love Austra, you love any young thing in a skirt.”

“There is love, and there is true love,” Cazio replied.

“Indeed. And i wonder if you will ever know the difference.” She plucked at his sleeve. “I do appreciate your help, though I suspect that the fact that my father will pay—” She stopped suddenly.

She had forgotten.

Cazio noticed the change in her features. “Never mind thoughts of pay,” he said. “I’m already the best swordsman in all of Vitellio. I’ve a mind to see if I have a match anywhere else, and your country is as good a place to start as any.”

Anne nodded, but she was unable to return to the banter.

“In any event, you should pack your things,” he continued. “This ship leaves in the morning, assuming you still want to take it.”

“You’re sure it’s safe?”

“I know the captain. I don’t like him very much, but he’s a man of his word, and utterly trustworthy in a dull sort of way.”

“Then we have to go,” she said. “We must.”

At the moment, a cry went up on the street. Anne looked past Cazio and found Ospero standing in the doorway. Outside, she saw men gathered.

“What’s happening?” she asked.

“They’ve found you again,” Ospero replied. He had a dagger in his hand.

Neil breathed deeply of the sea air, and for the first time in a long while he felt at home. The language was unfamiliar, the clothing of those around him was strange, and even the scent of the sea was different from the cold, clean spray of Skern or Lier, but it was still the sea.

“Sit down,” Vaseto said. “You’ll attract attention.”

Neil looked down at the woman, who sat cross-legged on the stone steps of the sea-guild hall, eating a greasy handful of fried sardines she’d bought from a vendor.

“In all of this?” he asked, tilting his jaw to indicate the streams and eddies of merchants, sailors, vendors, and vagabonds that surrounded them. He was still wearing his disguise. “I scarcely think we stand out.”

“There are others here watching these boats. The reward for your friends is substantial.”

“I haven’t seen anyone else watching.”

“That’s because they know what they’re doing,” she replied. “If you appear to be watching the ships, someone will notice that.”

“I suppose,” he sighed. “I tire of this game of disguise, this tactic of hiding.”

“Your friends are hiding, with good reason, and they seem to have found a rather good place to hide. There is little more than unreliable rumor on the street as to where they might be.”

“Maybe they’ve already gone.”

“I don’t think so,” she replied. “There is some word that they have been seen, and not long ago. If they’re trying to book passage on a ship, here is our best chance. The other watchers are probably working by description. You know the girls and might spot them even if they are disguised. I know Cazio and z’Acatto. That is our advantage.”

“It still rankles. And we’ve been at it for four days already.”

“They’ve been here much longer than that.”

“Yes, but why?”

“Looking for a ship going the right direction, at a price they can afford. The girls have been seen working.”

“Working? Both of them?” The princess of Crotheny, working? Anne, working?

“Yes. As washerwomen, scullery maids, and the like.”

“Unbelievable.”

“Passage on a ship costs money. Coming from the coven, they wouldn’t have much, would they? Perhaps nothing. From what I know of Cazio, he would have none at all, and if he did, z’Acatto would drink it up in short order. It could take them another month or two to earn the fare.”

“There must be some other way to find them. I can’t wait so long.”

She licked her finger and gave him a disgusted look. “Take a walk. Pretend to look at the fish, or something. You’re starting to annoy me.”

“I don’t mean—”

“Go!” She waved the back of her hand.

“I’ll check the other ships,” he muttered.

He walked down the quay, trying to contain his frustration, trying to think of some strategy that Vaseto had not. But he knew little of cities, especially foreign ones and ones of this size. He had never imagined so many people would crowd into one place. Eslen had seemed unimaginably huge to him when he’d first seen it, but z’Espino was so vast, he had trouble comprehending it even when he was in the midst of it.

He pretended, as Vaseto suggested, to examine the wares of merchants and the cargo being unloaded from ships, but his attention drifted always to the ships themselves, and his desire to have one beneath his feet again. He hadn’t felt the sea road under him since arriving at Eslen with Sir Fail. He hadn’t realized how much he’d missed it.

Far down on his right, he saw the sky-spearing masts of a Saltmark brimwulf, and decided to walk the other way—the brimwolves were the favorite man-o’-war of the Hansan navy.

Walking left, his eyes traced a three-masted galley from Ter-na-Fath, from whose bow stared the carved wooden face of Saint Fronvin, the sea-queen, her hair carved to resemble churning waves. Moored just beyond was a langzkef of Herilanz, so like the galleys of the weihand raiders Neil had grown up fighting, with single sail, fifty oars, and an iron head for ramming. A battered, gallean shrimper was just putting in, its crew casting lines onto the dock.

Past the shrimper was a neat little boat, sleek of line as a porpoise, not too big, but with five masts in all. She would be quick in the turn, a wave-dancer. The cut of her looked northern, but nothing identified her origin immediately to his eye. She flew no standard, and she had no name painted on her. He stopped, scrutinizing the craft, challenged by its anonymity. A few men were working on board, light of skin and hair, which said northern, also. He couldn’t hear if they were saying anything.

A little shock ran through him, as he realized someone was watching him from the porthole in the fo’c’sle. Someone with intense blue eyes, and a face so young, beautiful, and sad it made his heart tremor. For a long moment, their gazes were locked. Then she turned away, retreated into the darkness of the ship.

Embarrassed, he looked away. He’d done just the thing Vaseto told him to avoid—he’d been noticed.

He moved away from the dock, and his heart lifted a bit when he saw an achingly familiar sight—the mast-shaped spire of a chapel of Saint Lier. Without hesitation, he entered.

It had been too long since he had prayed. When he emerged a short time later, his step felt lighter. As he walked back to where he had left Vaseto, he studiously avoided looking at the strange ship.

“There you are,” Vaseto said when he arrived. “I knew it would be good luck to send you away.”

“What do you mean?”

“Cazio. He just boarded that ship.” She waved at a four-masted merchantman.

“That’s a Vitellian ship,” he said.

“Yes. Bound for Paldh. Don’t watch too closely.”

“Were Anne and Austra with him?”

“No. Look at me.”

With some difficulty, he tore his gaze from the ship and looked into Vaseto’s brown eyes.

“There,” she said. “Pretend you’re interested in me, not the ship.”

“I—” the image of another pair of eyes flickered through his memory—those of the woman he’d seen on the ship. And then, with a guilty start, Fastia’s.

Vaseto must have seen something in his face, for the taut lines of her own softened, and she reached a gentle hand to stroke his cheek. “You call out a name in your sleep sometimes. Did you know that?”

“No,” he said.

“Is she dead?”

“Yes,” he said.

“You saw her die.”

This time he only nodded.

“The pain will pass,” she said. “Like any hangover.”

He managed a humorless chuckle. “That’s a strange comparison,” he said.

She quirked her shoulders. “Perhaps an unfair one. I have only observation to go by, not experience.”

“You’ve never lost anyone you loved?”

She cocked her head, and a strange look came into her eyes. “I have never loved,” she said. “I never will.”

“How can you possibly know that?”

“It’s part of who I am. I will never know the touch of a man.”

“That’s not the same thing as love,” he pointed out.

“No, I suppose not. Yet I feel certain that I will never love.”

“I hope that is not true.”

“You can say that, when it has brought you such pain?”

“Oh, yes,” he said.

“When she died—could you have said it then?”

“No,” he replied. “I wanted to die myself.”

She smiled and tousled his hair. “And that is why I shall never love. Now, don’t look, but our friend has left the boat.”

He started to rise, but she grabbed his hand. “Be still,” she said.

“But we must speak to him.”

“If we do, any others who are watching will see.”

“Let’s follow him, then.”

“I’m not sure that’s a good idea, either.”

“But what if he did not take passage on that ship? What if we don’t see him again? No. Right now he is my only link to Anne, and I cannot let him leave my sight.”

She considered that, and then sighed. “You may be right,” she said. “I may be too careful in this matter. But Anne—” She stopped abruptly, and for the first time Neil realized that Vaseto was somehow uncertain. And that she had said something she shouldn’t.

“What about Anne?” he said.

“I cannot tell you. But she is important for more reasons than you know.” She rose. “Come. Put your arm around me. Walk with me as you might a lover, and we’ll follow Cazio.”

He did as she said, slipping his arm around her waist. She was very slight, and it felt very awkward.

“That’s him, there,” she said. “In the plumed hat.”

“I see him,” Neil said.

They followed him through winding streets to a dim and dilapidated part of town, where rough-seeming men watched them pass with blandly hostile faces. At last Cazio went up the steps to a building and entered it.

Neil quickened his pace, but Vaseto dragged at him.

“Wait,” she said, then gave a cluck. “No, never mind. It’s too late.”

Neil saw what she meant. Men seemed to have appeared in the street, all around them, armed with knives and clubs. Neil reached beneath his cloak and felt for the pommel of Crow, but it wasn’t there. Like his armor, it was back in their lodgings.

Vaseto began speaking sharply in Vitellian, but the men continued to close in.

“Stay back,” Ospero advised.

Ignoring him, Anne pushed past, trying to see. Ospero’s men had surrounded a man and a boy. The man drew a knife, turning slowly. The boy was shouting something about how they were friends of Cazio’s.

She looked at Cazio, who had a look of concentration on his face.

“You know him?” she asked.

“I think so,” he replied. “I think he was a guest of Orchaevia’s, from time to time. I don’t know the other fellow.”

“Wait,” Anne shouted. “See what they want.”

At the sound of her voice, the stranger’s head snapped toward her. “Anne!” he shouted. “I’m sent by your mother!”

He was speaking the king’s tongue, with an island accent. Anne’s heart spun like a top.

“Ospero, tell your men to leave him alone, please,” she said. “I think I know him.”

“Let him come closer,” Ospero said.

The boy said something low to the man, whose gaze had not left Anne. He nodded and walked to the door. As he did, he removed a wig, revealing the blond hair beneath.

“Sir Neil?” She gasped.

“Yes,” he said, going down on one knee.

“No, no, get up,” she said quickly.

He quickly obeyed.

“Mother sent you?” she asked. “How did you find me?”

“That’s a long tale,” the knight answered. “I went to the coven, and found it destroyed. The countess Orchaevia directed me here.”

“I—” something seemed to explode in Anne then, like a glass bottle in a fire. Tears burst from her eyes, and though she barely knew him, she threw her arms around Sir Neil and wept.

Neil held Anne awkwardly in his arms, not knowing exactly what to do. He felt her tremble, and closed his eyes. And the sounds of the world dimmed.

Though sisters, Anne and Fastia did not look much alike. But Anne felt like Fastia. The scent of her neck was the same. Anne trembled, and Neil felt Fastia’s dying shudder. His own tears suddenly threatened.

“Sir Neil?” Anne said, her voice muffled in his shoulder. “Sir Neil, that’s—that’s quite tight enough.”

He released her and stepped quickly back. “I’m sorry, Pr— I’m sorry,” he said. “I’ve just been searching for so long, and your mother—”

He felt a joy at saying that that nearly eased the swell of grief. He hadn’t failed this time. He’d found Anne. Now he had only to get her home, and he could return to the queen’s side, where he belonged. “My mother? Is she still well?”

“Your mother is well,” he affirmed. “She grieves, but she is well.”

She lifted her chin. She didn’t wipe at her tears, though, but left them to crawl down her face. “You were there, Sir Neil?”

He nodded, feeling his throat clutch. “I was there,” he said. “I was there with your sisters. Your father was in another place.”

Cazio coughed quietly and said something in Vitellian. One of the words sounded like Roderick. Anne rolled her eyes briefly and shook her head. Neil stood impatiently while the two conferred, with Vaseto putting in something now and then.

When they were done, Anne nodded at Cazio. “Sir Neil, this is Cazio da Pachiomadio da Chiovattio. He has proved himself a friend to me. Without his aid, Austra and I would never have escaped the coven.”

Neil bowed. “I am honored to meet you,” he said.

Cazio bowed, as well, and then Anne introduced Neil to the Vitellian. Neil presented Vaseto to both of them. When that was all done, Anne turned back to Neil.

“Cazio knows that I am a noble of Crotheny,” she said. “He does not know my family name.”

“You do not trust him?”

“I trust him. But I am cautious.”

Neil nodded, trying to get Anne’s measure. He hadn’t known her long or well in Eslen, but she seemed very different from the willful brat he had heard described. She had certainly learned Vitellian quickly enough, and the roughness of her hands was proof that she had indeed been engaged in labor that few of royal birth could begin to imagine. That did not suggest a spoiled brat, but rather a woman who was learning to do things for herself. Learning to do the things that had to be done.

“I’m going to get your gear,” Vaseto told him. “The ship Cazio has found passage on leaves in a few hours. You will be on it with them—the countess sent funds for your passage, and Cazio believes the captain will take on another passenger.”

“You aren’t going?”

Vaseto’s face scrunched almost comically. “Go on the water? No, I don’t think so. My task was to bring you this far. No more.”

Neil bowed. “I am forever grateful, lady. I hope it was not too onerous a task.”

“Not too. But remember your gratitude when we meet again.”

“I hope we shall.”

Vaseto smiled slyly. “No, there is no doubt. It has already been seen. Now, stay here, and I’ll return with your things.”

“I can come.”

Vaseto shook her head. “You may be needed here, especially if others have followed.”

Neil nodded at the sense of that. “Very well,” he said.

Cazio plucked at Anne’s sleeve. “A word with you alone, please, casnara?” he said.

Anne started to wave him off impatiently. She needed to talk to Sir Neil. She had so many questions—but then she saw the genuine concern reflected in Cazio’s eyes, and stepped aside with him into the courtyard. Besides, Neil was talking to the strange little woman.

“Quickly,” she said.

Cazio folded his arms. “Who is this man?” he asked.

“I’ve already told you, it’s not Roderick. He is a servant of my mother’s.”

“And you trust him completely? He has something of the look of those knights who attacked you at the coven.”

“He was my mother’s most trusted servant,” Anne assured him.

“And is he still?”

Anne paused at that. Sir Neil said that he had come from her mother. But she had no proof of it. From what she remembered he had come to court only a short time before she’d been sent away. True, he had saved her mother’s life at Elseny’s party, but what if that had been a ruse? The murderers of her father and sisters had not been named in the cuveitur dispatches. What if Sir Neil had been one of them?

With a cold shock, she suddenly understood how well it all fit. Only her mother and Erren had known that she had been sent to the coven Saint Cer. And perhaps, as her mother’s bodyguard, Sir Neil. That would mean Roderick wasn’t her betrayer. Not that she had ever really believed that, but . . .

Cazio observed the change in her eyes and nodded soberly. “Yes, you see? It is all too suspicious. Just as I finally find us passage on a ship, along he comes.”

“It— Mother trusted him.”

“But you don’t,” he said. “Not now that you’ve thought about it.”

“Not now that you’ve put the idea in my head,” she said miserably.

She noticed that the little woman was gone. Neil now stood by himself, trying to appear uninterested in their conversation. For all she knew, he was fluent in Vitellian.

“Go find Austra,” she whispered. “And z’Acatto. All of you go to the ship. I will follow in a short while.”

“Why not go with me?”

“Because he’ll insist on going. Even if he is who he says he is, and he is true to my mother’s service, he won’t let me that far from his sight now that he’s found me.”

“But he may murder you the moment I am gone.”

That was true.

“Ospero,” she said. “Do you think he will help?”

Cazio nodded. “He’s still just outside. I’ll tell him to watch you,” he said.

She nodded. Then they returned to the street.

“Cazio’s going to get the others,” Anne told Neil. “I’m going upstairs to pack my things. Would you keep watch here?”

“I will,” Neil said. He looked wary. “Is there something I should know?”

“Not at the moment.”

He nodded. When she went up the stairs, she was relieved that he did not follow.

She did feel a pang of guilt. If he was telling the truth, Sir Neil had come a long, hard way to find her, and she was betraying him.

But she could not take the risk, not when she knew him so little. If she was wrong, he could return home the way he had come, and she would apologize.

She would apologize a great deal.

9 Life or Death

“He looked fine when he went into the fane, and he didn’t look hurt when he walked out. Wasn’t until he left the mound that he collapsed.”

“Still—”

“Winna.” He tried to keep his voice gentle, but he felt the harshness creeping into it, like a burr caught in his throat.

He sighed. “Winna, I’m a holter. I know nothing of fanes or saints or shinecraft. That was Stephen. All I know is how to track things, find things, and kill things. That’s what I’m supposed to do. That’s what I will do.”

“That’s what the praifec ordered you to do,” Winna said. “But it’s not like you to be so obedient.”

“He’s destroying my forest, Winn. And I’ll tell you, if I do know anything about greffyns and utins and evil fanes and what’s happened to Stephen, it’s this—things like this didn’t happen before the Briar King stopped being a boygshin story and started walkin’ around. When I stop him walkin’ around, I reckon everything will go back to the way it was.”

“And if it doesn’t?”

“Then I’ll find whoever built that shrine and kill them, too.”

“I know you, Asp,” Winna said. “You aren’t made of death.”

“Maybe not,” he said, “but she follows me close.” He put his head down then raised it back up. “Winna, here’s what we’ll do. You and Ehawk, you go back to Eslen. Tell the praifec what we saw here, and what Stephen said about it. I’m going on.”

Winna snorted. “Not likely. You’re going to drag poor Stephen around this forest by yourself?”

“He’ll stay on Angel. Maunt this—I almost lost you to the utin. I’ve had Black Marys about it ever since. I can’t think straight, not really, not with you in danger.”

“There’s only one arrow, you know. When we meet him, there’s nothing anyone can do but me, and I’ll do that best without any distractions. And you’re right—Stephen thought there was something about that fane that needed dealing with. None of us kann enough to know what to do, and if we all find our ends out here, the praifec will never know what we’ve learned.”

Winna’s lips compressed. “No,” she said. “That doesn’t make nearly the sense you think it does. You think you can do everything by yourself? You think the rest of us do nothing but drag you down? Well, you were by yourself when you came stumbling down to the monastery d’Ef, weren’t you? If Stephen hadn’t found you, you’d have died. If he hadn’t stood for you against the other monks, you’d have died. How are you going to feed yourself? If you leave Stephen to hunt, something will come gnaw on him.”

“Winn—”

“Stop it. I made the same promise to the praifec that you did. You think I have no stake in this? My father lives in the King’s Forest, Asp—at least I pray saints he still lives. Ehawk’s people live out here, too. So you’re just going to have to live with your fear for me. I can’t fight like you, and I don’t have Stephen’s knowledge, but if there’s one thing I’m good for, it’s to make you more cautious than you would be normally. That’s how I’ve saved your life, and don’t deny it, you big stupid banf.”

Aspar regarded her for a moment. “I’m the leader of the expedition. You’ll do what I say.”

Her face went cold. “Is that how it is?”

“Yah. This is the last time you go against me, Winn. Someone has to be in charge, and that’s me. I can’t spend every moment arguing with you.”

Her face relaxed a bit. “But we’re all staying together.”

“For now. If I change my mind again, that’s the way it will be, understand?”

Her face hardened again, and he felt a little wind suck out of him. “Yah,” she said at last.

The next morning the sky pulled on a gray hood of clouds, and the air was as wintry as Winna’s mood. They moved almost silently, save for the snorting of the horses and wet plod of their hooves on the leaves. More than ever, Aspar felt the sickness of the forest, down in his bones.

Or maybe it was arthritis.

They found the trail of black thorns and followed it into the Foxing Marshes, where the ancient yellow stone of the Lean Gable Hills broke into steps for a giant to walk down to the Warlock. For normal-size folks like Aspar and his companions, the steps were a little more difficult to negotiate—they had to hunt for the places where rinns had cut their way and then gone dry. Where the thorns hadn’t choked everything, the land was still green with ferns and horsetails that grew almost as high as the heads of the horses. Leaves from hickory and witaec drifted as constantly as a soft rain.

And it was quiet as if the earth were holding its breath, which kept Aspar’s spine crawling.

As always, he felt bad for being hard with Winna, which irritated him in its own turn. He’d spent most of his years doing exactly what he wanted, the way he wanted, without any leave from much of anyone. Now a smooth-handed praifec and a girl half his age had him dancing like a trained bear.

Sceat, Winna thought he was tame now, didn’t she? But how could she understand what he was, at her age? She couldn’t, despite the fact that she somehow seemed to.

“The Sefry came this way,” Ehawk said softly, interrupting Aspar’s quiet fume. He looked down to where the Wattau’s chin was pointing.

“That’s awfully clear sign,” he muttered. “Is that the first you’ve seen of ‘im?”

“Yah,” Ehawk allowed.

“Me, too.” Of course he’d been so busy thinking about Winna, he’d missed even that.

“Looks like he’s trying to lead us off again,” Ehawk said.

“South.” Aspar nodded. “He figured we’d come this way, following the thorns, and now he’s left a roadsign.” He scratched his chin. Then he glanced at Winna. “Well?” he asked.

“Well, what?” she retorted. “You’re the leader of this expedition, remember?”

“Just checking to see that you do,” he grumbled back. He studied the lay of the land. South was upcountry again, a stretch of ground he knew pretty well, and he had a feeling he knew where the Sefry was going.

“You two backtrack to the clearing we passed at noon,” he said. “I’m going to follow this trail a bit. If I’m not back by morning, then I’m probably not coming back.”

“What is that supposed to mean?” Winna asked.

Aspar shrugged.

“What do we do if you don’t come back?”

“What we discussed earlier. Head back to Eslen. And before you start thinking it, the reason I’m going alone is because I can move more quietly that way, and not for any other reason.”

“I wasn’t arguing,” Winna said.

His heart dropped a little, but at the same time, he felt a bit of satisfaction. “Well, then. That’s good,” he said.

If Ogre resented climbing back up the hills he’d just come down, he didn’t let on, ascending without the slightest whicker to the high-canopied forest of oak. By the time they came to the relatively flat tableland, Aspar was certain where the trail was headed and quit following it, in case some unpleasant surprise had been left in his path. Instead he circled around so as to approach the place from another direction.

The sun was slanting hard and orange through the trees when he heard voices. He dismounted, left Ogre near a stream, and crept closer on foot.

What he found wasn’t really a surprise, but he still wasn’t fully prepared for it.

The place was called Albraeth by those few who still called it anything. It was a cone-shaped mound of earth, bare save for a few struggling, yellowish weeds and a single gnarled tree, a naubagm with bark like black scales and leaves like drooping, serrated knives.

Some of the branches dipped low, and the rotting remains of rope still clung to some, though it had been years since the king’s law had forbidden their use. It was here that criminals had once been hanged in sacrifice to Grim the Raver. It was here that Aspar had been born, on that sickly grass, below a fresh noose. Here his mother had died.

The Church had worked to end those sacrifices. Now they were busy with their own.

A perimeter of wooden beams had been planted in the ground around the mound, each about four kingsyards high, and to each beam a man or woman had been nailed, with their hands above their heads and their feet pulled straight down. Aspar could see the blood leaking from the holes in their wrists and ankles, but there was plenty more blood to see.

They had been cut open, each of them, and their entrails pulled out and arranged in deliberate designs. Some were still being arranged, and those who were doing so wore the robes of the Church. He wasn’t certain what order. Stephen would know.

He counted six of them. He had twice that many arrows. Mouth tight, he pulled out the first, considering how to go about what had to be done.

He was still working that out when a greffyn paced out from behind the mound.

It was smaller than the one that had almost killed him, its scales darker and sheened with green, but there was no mistaking its hawk-like beak and the sinuous, catlike play of its muscles. He could feel its presence, even at this distance, like heat on his face, and he felt a wave of dizziness.

The touch of the beast—even its glance—was deadly poison. That he knew from hard experience, and from the corpses of its cousin’s victims. So poisonous, in fact, that even those who touched the corpses contracted gangrene, and most died. Even maggots and carrion-eaters would not touch a greffyn’s kills.

But the monks weren’t dying. They didn’t even seem concerned. And to his astonishment, one even reached out to stroke it as it walked by.

He took a deep breath, trying to sort that out, wishing Stephen were with him. He would recall some ancient tome or legend that would force this all to make sense.

Six monks would be hard to kill, especially if they were of the order of Mamres. Six monks and a greffyn would be impossible—unless he used the arrow again.

But that one was meant for the Briar King.

First one, and then all the monks suddenly straightened from their tasks and looked to the east, as if they had all heard the same secret call. Their hands went to their swords, and Aspar tensed, realizing that he would have to run from this and find help.

But then he understood that they hadn’t found him out at all, that something else had their attention. He could hear it now, a distant howling, like dogs yet unlike dogs, terribly familiar and utterly alien.

Grim.

He remembered when he’d first met Stephen, they’d been on the King’s Road when they’d heard howling off in the distance. Aspar had recognized them as the hounds of Sir Symon Rookswald, but he’d fed the boy’s fear, told him it was Grim and his host, the hounds that carried off the damned souls who haunted the King’s Forest. He’d put a good scare in the lad.

Now he found his own heart beating faster. Had they summoned Haergrim? Had they summoned the Raver?

The howling grew louder, and there was a rushing through the leaves. He realized his hand was shaking, and felt a momentary anger at his own weakness. But if the hidden world was waking, why not Grim? Grim the heafroa, the one-eyed god, the lord of the birsirks, the bloody wrath, as mad as any ancient, pagan god could be.

The greffyn had turned at the sound, too, and the sparse hairs along its spine stood straight. He heard it snarl.

And behind him he heard a voice, whispering soft in the Sefry tongue.

“Life or death, holter,” it said. “You have a choice to make.”

10 Betrayal

Neil was still waiting for Anne when the sun began to dim and Vaseto returned, leading Hurricane. On the horse was a pack carrying his armor and other few personal possessions. He walked out into the street and patted the stallion’s muzzle, noting with amusement and concern the stares with which those in the neighborhood regarded them both.

Vaseto noticed, too. “I don’t think they see horses in this part of town very much,” she said, “much less warsteeds.”

“I suppose they don’t,” Neil said, remembering he hadn’t seen anyone mounted since they passed through the large square at the city gate.

Hurricane tossed his head restlessly.

“There, lad,” Neil whispered. “Soon we’ll be back where we belong. I promise you a good leg-stretching in Newland. You’ll need it after passage on the ship.”

“If they’ll let you take her on,” Vaseto pointed out. “Berth for a man is one thing. Berth for a horse is something else again.” She shrugged. “But with what the countess passed along to you, you should be able to afford the room if they have it.” She flashed him a smile. “In any event, it’s now your problem. I have to get back to my dogs.”

Neil bowed. “I still don’t know who you really are, but thank you again.”

“You know more about me than most,” Vaseto said. “But if I were you, I would worry more about who you are. That’s likely to be more useful to you.”

With that cryptic comment, she walked up the street and vanished around a corner.

After a bit of reflection, Neil decided to put on his armor. If the men searching for Anne had had the same luck as he had, he might need it.

A bell later it occurred to him that not only hadn’t Anne come back down, but that he hadn’t seen Austra or Cazio, either. Cazio had talked as if there was something of a hurry, and yet where were they all?

He glanced at the old man they had called Ospero. He’d been watching Neil, not too pointedly, but without trying to hide it either. He’d been doing that since Anne had spoken to Cazio and had slipped upstairs.

“Can you tell me where Anne’s room is?” he asked.

“Ne comperumo,” the old man said, shrugging.

Neil looked around, hoping to spot someone who might speak the king’s tongue. Still, Cazio wasn’t back yet, and he had presumably gone to make the final arrangements.

Unless . . .

His heart fell like the bottom of a great storm swell.

Why? Why would Anne try to escape him? Were her Vitellian friends in league with the enemy?

No, there was a better explanation. What an idiot he was for not having seen it sooner. Anne had heard her father and sisters had been killed, but it was unlikely that she knew much more than that. Why should she trust a knight she barely knew, just because he claimed to have been sent to protect her?

It doesn’t matter now, he told himself, trying to stave off panic. His duty was still his duty, whether Anne believed him or not. One way or another he would bring her home, safe.

He knew where the ship was—and Anne wouldn’t be aware of that. He could still catch her, as long as they hadn’t set sail already.

He nodded to Ospero and swung himself up into the saddle. Ospero grinned faintly and raised his hand to wave. Neil saw the flash of steel at the last instant. He twisted in the saddle and ducked, and felt something graze along his arm, which was where his heart had been a moment or two before. Grimly he whirled Hurricane and drew out Crow. As if on cue, men were bunching into either side of the street. In just a few moments there would be more, but Neil wasn’t going to give them those moments. They were armed with knives and clubs, but one had a spear. If they managed to injure or immobilize Hurricane, his chances weren’t good.

Ospero was shouting, and Neil cursed himself again for not knowing Vitellian.

He pointed Hurricane at the man with the spear and charged. To his credit, the fellow seemed to know what to do. He knelt and braced the butt of the pole arm against the cobbles and aimed the point at the spot beneath Hurricane’s breastbone.

Neil’s breath was coming cool now, slow, in and out. He saw the men’s faces, their scars, whether they had shaved or not.

At the last possible moment, he turned Hurricane to the side, avoiding the spear altogether. Using the cut known as reaper, he sent one of his attackers down to the street, where the stone drank blood from his headless corpse. Hurricane reared savagely and kicked down at another. Neil felt a blow to his leg, but then he was free of them, clattering down the darkening streets.

He felt down to his leg, but the armor had turned away the blow. Hurricane seemed unhurt, and so he kept the pace, watching pedestrians scatter, listening to their unintelligible remonstrations, and beginning to hate the whole adventure. The novelty of foreign places was definitely wearing off.

She should have given me a token, he thought angrily. Something to convince Anne she really had sent me.

His anger at the queen was a shock followed by shame. Who was he to question her?

He urged Hurricane on, hoping he still had time.

Anne had recovered from her pangs of conscience by the time they reached the docks. When she saw the ships, she finally understood that she was really going home. Home, where she didn’t scrub clothes or make cheese or get invited to become a whore.

In the back of her mind, she still knew it was going to hurt, too, to enter the castle and find that her father and sisters were really gone, but that moment was still far away. For now, she could cling to the good part.

“But why are we leaving Sir Neil?” Austra whispered near her ear. Cazio had found her washing the dirty plates at a carachio near the great square. Anne had worked there before, her mouth watering at the smell of the lamb roasted with fennel and garlic. Austra smelled like that now.

“Cazio didn’t explain?”

“Yes, but Cazio does not know Sir Neil,” Austra said.

“I can’t believe it,” Anne said. “You’re questioning Cazio’s judgment?”

Austra flushed a bit. “He knows more about Vitellio than we do,” she said. “And he is very clever. But how can he know Sir Neil’s heart? It seems wrong. He always seemed very honest to me.”

“Austra, we don’t know Sir Neil. For all we know, he killed my sisters and now he’s come after me.”

“He wasn’t with the knights who attacked the coven.”

“How do you know? We didn’t see them all.” She took Austra’s hand. “The point is, we can’t know. And if I’m wrong—why, he’ll be fine. He made it to Vitellia, he’ll make it back.”

Austra frowned doubtfully.

“Not to interrupt,” Cazio said, “but there’s our ship just ahead.”

Z’Acatto, who had been entirely silent since he had joined Anne in the alley behind their building, suddenly grunted. “I know that standard,” he said. “Had you told me, I would never have agreed to this.”

“Hush, old man,” Cazio said in a low voice. “I did what I had to.”

“You don’t surprise me very often, boy,” the fencing master muttered. “But today you’ve managed it.”

“What’s he talking about?” Anne asked.

“Nothing,” Cazio replied quickly.

She turned to z’Acatto and saw that his eyes were very strange, as if he were angry, even furious. And then she realized his sword was already in his hand, its tip just clearing the scabbard. She wasn’t afraid yet, just very curious as to why the old man was going to kill her. But she could feel the fear arriving as he grabbed her.

Z’Acatto pushed, and she stumbled to the cobbles, one knee striking the stone. She gasped at the pain and looked up, trying to understand what was happening.

A man—a man she did not know—was staring at z’Acatto’s blade, which vanished somehow into the fellow’s throat.

Cazio shouted then and drew his own sword, and suddenly men were everywhere, some in armor.

“Run!” Cazio shouted. “Run onto the ship!” Anne scrambled that way, trying to regain her feet, but suddenly armored boots were there, and she looked up to see a steel visage staring down at her. The knight raised a sword that seemed to be only half there, a blur like the wings of a hummingbird, but moving through the colors of the rainbow with each heartbeat.

She stared up, frozen, as the blade cocked above her. Cazio’s blade drove over her head and took the knight in the gorget, and Cazio came flying behind it. “Z’ostato en pert!” he shouted.

The knight stumbled back beneath the force of the blow, but Cazio was still airborne, and crashed into him, punching the man’s visor with the guard of his weapon. The knight toppled and slammed to the ground. Anne scrambled up, helped by Austra, who took her hand, and both ran for the gangplank.

She could see a crowd of faces on the ship, watching in astonishment. Among them was one that seemed a little familiar, a dark, lean mustachioed face.

“Help us!” she shouted. None of the sailors moved.

Two more men suddenly appeared between her and the ship, and everything seemed to slow to a stop. In the corner of her eye, she saw that the knight with the glowing sword was already up on one knee, dealing Cazio a thunderous backhand with his mailed glove. Z’Acatto was holding off at least four men, but two were starting to push around him. She and Austra were trapped.

Something snarled up in her, and she yanked out the dagger Sister Secula had given her, determined to give at least one cut. The men between her and the ship were more lightly armored than the knight, in chain and leather. They wore no helmets at all.

They laughed when she raised the weapon. Then, oddly, one suddenly toppled, his head grotesquely changing shape somehow as a long pole of some sort struck it. And then something huge exploded into the other man, knocking him away as if he were made of rags and straw.

Even as she realized it was a horse, she also realized it was falling. Another armored figure slammed to the dock a kingsyard away from her with a clang, but for a moment the way to the ship was clear. She bolted for it, tugging Austra behind her.

She hadn’t gone more than halfway up the gangplank when she remembered Cazio and z’Acatto, and she turned to see what was happening.

The horse had regained its feet and was galloping madly about the dock. The knight who had fallen from it had risen, as well, and she suddenly understood by the rose on his helm that it was Sir Neil. As she watched, he cut savagely at the knight with the glowing sword, hitting him so hard, he actually left the ground. Then he turned on the men pushing past z’Acatto and decapitated one.

Cazio hesitated, but z’Acatto didn’t. He quickly disengaged from his foes and charged toward the ship. After the slightest of hesitations, Cazio joined them.

Anne suddenly felt movement beneath her feet and realized the gangplank was being withdrawn. She was turning when two of the sailors grabbed her and yanked her the rest of the way up onto the ship. Not quite knowing why, she screamed and kicked, noticing as she did so that they had Austra, too. Z’Acatto leapt with an agility that belied his years, landing on the retreating ramp and bounding onto the boat, followed closely by a whooping Cazio.

On the dock, Sir Neil was a blade storm, beating the enemy away from the ship. There were at least eight against him, not counting the knight with the glowing sword, who was—against all things natural—rising again.

“Sir Neil!” she shrieked. “Come on!”

The sailors all around her were frantically cutting lines and pushing at the dock with long poles.

“He’ll never make the jump,” z’Acatto said. “Not in that armor.”

“Go back for him!” she shouted. “Go back this instant.” She slapped at the nearest sailor, the one who had looked familiar. “You can’t leave him there!”

He caught her hand and glared down at her. “I am Captain Malconio, and this ship is leaving port. If you strike me again, I will have you hanged.”

“But he’ll die!”

“I see no reason to care about that,” he said.

Through a red haze, Neil cut left, then right, hit a man in chain and breastplate at the shoulder joint and saw it cleave, the blood spurting as he yanked the edge back out. Grasping the blade of his weapon with his mailed left hand, he rammed the pommel into the face of the next opponent, then reversed the weapon and, still gripping it like a staff, plunged the tip down between the lip of the breastplate and chest. He felt the breastbone crack, and the man fell away.

He shifted both hands to the grip and struck at the next enemy, who managed to stumble out of the way, and Neil felt a cut from his left thud against his shoulder. He couldn’t see where the blow came from, but he set his legs wide and sliced that way, waist-level. As he felt his blow land, he turned so the fellow was in his field of vision. He was another of the lightly armored ones, and his eyes went wide as blood started from his mouth, and he fell clutching a crushed rib cage.

That turn also brought him back to the knight with the glowing sword who—instead of being dead as he should have been—was stepping up to make a cut at him.

Behind the knight, Neil was vaguely aware that the ship was farther from the dock than it had been. He could see Anne’s red hair, and so knew she had made it aboard.

The oncoming knight chopped down, left to right, and Neil stepped in and thrust upward into the blow with the thickest part of his blade. The jolt of the impact went all the way to his feet—his opponent was strong, very strong, and his blade was moving much faster than it ought. Crow felt strange, too, lighter, and Neil suddenly understood that half his weapon had been sheared away. The glowing sword was coming back up from its downswing. Neil plunged his left arm down and caught the man’s gauntlet, then hammered what was left of Crow into the enemy’s visor.

An armored elbow came up under his jaw, and he lost his hold on the man, stumbling back. The cut came again, this time from the side, and he was too far away to grab the man’s arm again, too slow even to interpose his hand. The witch-weapon sheared into his armor, cutting though it as it had Crow.

Desperately, Neil threw himself in the direction of the blow, even as the pain of the world sheeted through him. He lost the ground, saw the sky, then hit something that yielded strangely, and understood that he had thrown himself off the dock into the water. He twisted to try to see if Anne’s ship was safely far away, but the water closed over his head, and the sounds of tumult vanished.