> “You are dancing around a question that mortals often ask me: how do the Indefinite endure the constant pain of losing the mortals we care about? They imagine it must be impossible to form any connection with somebody who will, in our terms, be gone in hardly any time at all. But that is not how we feel about it! A lifetime is still a long time, to us. And in any case…how much less endurable would an indefinite life be, without the infinite joy and variety of people to care about?” —Yngmir, Prince Ruber of Valai, Conversations With Heralds
A SURPRISINGLY COMFORTABLE BED
The Oasis, Alhulw Earthmote 09.06.03.10.01
Jerl’s first hangover, suffered long ago, had led him to question what was so great about alcohol anyway and vow never to afflict himself with another, though throughout the intervening years he’d proven himself a liar many times over in that regard.
He’d gone to bed quite braced and willing to face the consequences of intense merry-making…but what he awoke to wasn’t half as bad as he’d anticipated. The liquors of the Oasis, it seemed, didn’t poison a man’s brains so painfully as more common brews.
Still…he hadn’t completely escaped a full-body tenderness in just the right amount to remind him there was a cost to levity. And his bladder was especially insistent. He rolled out of bed and slipped away to enjoy all the comforts of his guest suite…especially the indoor plumbing.
Minutes later, and rather more comfortable, he was basking under a steady stream of hot water when long, tricky fingers slipped around his waist from behind.
That was no trick of Mind. Mouse was just silent as a breeze when he wanted to be. He kissed Jerl’s back and leaned into him.
“…Getting late.”
“How late?” Jerl asked.
“Nearly midday.”
“Hmm.” Jerl nodded, massaging around his eyes to rinse the crust of sleep out of them. “Guess we’re leaving after dark, then. It’ll take all afternoon to get everything ready.”
That had been the shape of the whole week, in fact: a pleasant cycle of working hard all day, playing hard all night. But today was the day all their hard work had been toward. Today, barring a sudden new development, they were leaving.
It wasn’t a pleasant thought.
“We should get started,” Mouse agreed. “Or…”
His hands slid lower.
Jerl couldn’t deny, it felt good. But… “…No. No, it’s time. We can’t bask here forever.”
“Aww.”
Jerl chuckled. “Last night wasn’t enough?”
Mouse sighed, and stepped around to get under the water as well. “…I’m kinda scared,” he confessed, tilting his head back to rinse his hair. “I don’t want to leave, yet.”
“I don’t either.”
“But we’d hate ourselves if we didn’t, right?”
“Mhm.”
They held each other for a bit. Then, by mutual unspoken agreement, it was time. They had an airship to prepare, a voyage to set out on, and no clear indication of how long it would be before they got back to a life where privacy, big beds and hot water were options.
But the alternative was a life where those things were never options again.
They got moving.
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There was a lot more to load into the Queen’s hold than just provisions, though that was certainly most of the work. Barrels of stockfish, salt pork, dried peas, rice, beans, ship’s biscuit, drinking water, rum, small beer, salt, spices, bacon, cheese, pemmican, citrus, dried bouillon, live hens and their feed, fuel, rifles, ammunition, leagues of rope and bagcloth, blankets and cold weather gear, climbing gear, mining equipment, barrels of charged magestones, nails, cooking charcoal, scrubbing sand, oil, spare clothes, bandages, medicinal alcohol…
From Sayf’s treasury came two boxes of gold bars, enough wealth to buy the Cavalier Queen twice over. In Jerl’s cabin, a cunning leather-padded carrying case was full of dozens of little glass vials, each containing the silvery, turbid liquid that was Ellaenie’s mind-shielding brew.
And then there was Palasarli’s gift. She had, with Jerl’s thanks, taken it upon herself to direct the Oasis’ craftsmen in giving the ship a makeover. Now, the bag was a handsome rich green, decorated to either sides with a swirling wind design in white, though she’d kept the Antage bullet-bag shape. A little longer though, just for some extra lift.
They extra lift was because Pal had also provided a dozen cannons taken from her own airship, the Wild Abandon. “After all,” she pointed out, “our foes still think the Queen is an unarmed merchant brig. A deck full of these should confound them enough that you won’t need to fire them in anger for some time. Hopefully.”
Jerl had to admit, her efforts had been thorough. The Queen’s bare-breasted figurehead was still as she had always been, but her paint had been touched up beautifully, and the hull now bore a swirling decoration mirroring the one sewn into the bag. To Jerl, there was no mistaking his ship for any other, even with the guns on her deck. But to anyone who didn’t know her…
She definitely didn’t match the description he’d read back in the Oneist mansion, except in particulars so broad they applied to half the ships in the skies. And she looked good in royal green. Very suitable.
Cannons, though! Jerl hoped that somewhere out there his dad’s Shade was feeling a pang of triumph, wherever it was. The one thing Arneld Holten had lamented all through his career, as Jerl had, was that they’d never quite got together the funds to properly arm the old girl. An airship without guns was a tragedy with a lit fuse, gift-wrapped for the pirates.
Of course, an airship with guns but a crew who didn’t know how to use them was scarcely better.
Into the gap stepped Padrig ad Sulidhan. A brave, steady man who’d stayed on through several tours with Jerl, stating confidently that private work for a free captain was far better than the life of a gunner’s mate in the Craenen navies. He’d been killed retaking the Queen at Long Drop from her impound that first time around, and he’d stayed on at Mehoom, so Jerl had no doubts of his character, courage and loyalty.
The way he whipped the Rüwyrdan elves into shape was straight out of Jerl’s own playbook: mostly cajoling, good cheer and quick wit, with just enough stick behind it to get the point across. After two days of training, the elves had started figuring out how to use their war-magic to reload the guns in a blur, achieving times that would have satisfied even the grimmest naval veteran.
Jerl’s last business before casting off and setting sail was to promote him to gunnery chief. They followed the traditional ceremony for these things, beginning with a speech by the skipper extolling his virtues, a drink and round of cheers, the formal act of promotion, and finally a minor ritual humiliation in the form of shaving his head.
Harad grumbled as he watched it unfold. “Why is this necessary?” he asked Jerl, while Marren’s razor scratched through the lather and hair. Padrig was bearing it in good cheer, smiling and joking.
Jerl shrugged. “I guess it reminds the promoted man to stay humble, and proves he can endure indignity and keep good humor?” He ventured. “Mostly it’s just tradition. We all went through it.”
“We could be underway by now. We should be.”
“Harad. I will accept your counsel on many things, but you don’t know shit about airshipmen and their ways. Don’t presume to tell me how to captain my crew,” Jerl told him, firmly.
Harad grunted in a way that could equally have signalled displeasure or approval, folded his arms, and remained silent. After a few seconds he turned and prowled away down the deck to go do whatever it was he considered a more worthy use of his time.
To Jerl’s right, Derghan scoffed. “Arrogant fucker. Almost a shame he’s so handy with a sword.”
“Has he been bothering you?” Jerl asked.
“Nahh, he leaves me alone. I think engines intimidate him.” Derghan grinned faintly. “He’s just no fun.”
“Speaking of the engines—”
“We’re in perfect shape. Better’n perfect! Some of the smiths on this mote are geniuses. I’ve swapped out some worn parts with spares I could’ve sworn I was gonna have to order from Keeghan & Sons. And instead, they made ‘em here, but better!”
“Better how?”
“Any way you like. More finely worked, better metal…you name it. You’ll see, our engines are in the best shape of their lives!” Derghan had an almost canine enthusiasm when discussing his work. Had he been fortunate enough to own a tail, it would have been beating merrily against the railing behind him.
Jerl nodded, satisfied, and watched as Marren towelled off Padrig’s newly gleaming scalp. There were some good-natured cheers, a few pats on the arms, and somebody handed him a rolled up woolly hat. Good.
Time to be the skipper. He clapped his hands together so hard the sound cracked around the deck like a whip.
“Alright! We’ve had our fun! Every man to his station, prepare to depart!”
There were a few groans of the unserious variety, banter rather than dismay. In moments, the deck was busy. Derghan vanished below into the pump room, Marren and the riggers went aloft, Padrig patrolled the deck and checked their new guns were properly secured, Sin checked the hold. It was almost as quick and efficient as it had ever been, the elfish crew having grown much in confidence and knowledge these last few weeks.
In short order, the word came back: “Ready to release the bolt, captain!”
“Thank you, quartermaster.” Jerl approached the railing. Rarely had an airship been waved away by such an illustrious company as the one now waiting on the dock: Prince Sayf, Lady Pal, Lady Ellaenie, Rheannach and Dragon, Lander and little Saoirse...
“Release!” he called to the ground crew, and raised a hand in farewell. Sayf in particular echoed the gesture, and as he did so, the perfect gust swirled up out of nowhere to gently, ever-so-gently, nudge the Queen at the exact moment the locking bolt slid out and she was released, so that she lifted out of the cradle with nary a rattle nor a bump. It was the smoothest launch of Jerl’s life, in fact.
He grinned, bowed gratefully, and stepped away from the railing as Gebby spun the wheel and turned them toward open sky. Already, he could feel his feet adjusting their step to meet the sway of the deck. Already, he could feel the breeze in his hair as the engines spun up and pushed them away. He was back in the sky. And as wonderful as the Oasis was…the sky was where he belonged.
The smile didn’t leave his face all afternoon.
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> “We are all storm-tossed. Even the big four. Perhaps especially them. They are powerful, yes, but weather that would blow cozily around a hovel and soothe a man to sleep can be the doom of an airship…” —The Shishah, quoted by Prince Ruber of Valai, Conversations With Heralds
A DIFFERENT DEPARTURE
The Oasis, Alhulw Earthmote 09.06.03.10.02
Ellaenie’s own adventure was necessarily delayed by one important consideration: her daughter didn’t want her to go, and was willing to deploy tears.
Little Saoirse already had a witch’s talent for manipulation, surely. At least, she did as far as her mother was concerned. And the fact was, Ellaenie didn’t much want to leave her for long either. But there were two important tasks to perform. One she’d been putting off for nearly five years, and another that had only arisen in the last week.
Now, it seemed, she must expose herself to some danger.
Not much. Ellaenie didn’t chafe under the idea she was too important to risk unnecessarily, and she wasn’t reckless enough to put herself in harm’s way without good reason and without reasonable certainty that the danger was minimal. But there were some things she was arguably the best-equipped person in the world to handle, and when they came up…
She gave little Saoirse a squeeze and a kiss. “I’ll bring you back something nice, okay?”
Saoirse nodded, brave now that her distress and tears had been recognized but calmly withstood. She clung to Pal’s leg—Pal had always been a second mother to her, right from the moment she’d been there to talk Ellaenie through the birth and hold her hand—and squeaked out a ‘‘kay.’
Good enough. Ellaenie gave her little girl a squeeze and a kiss then rose to shoulder her bag. A moment’s eye contact with Pal was all they needed to share…
If anything should happen—
Pal nodded, reassuringly, resting a hand lightly on Saoirse’s back, and that was enough. Ellaenie had no doubts, even if the very worst should happen, Saoirse would be loved with a full and generous heart.
Still, her own heart was heavy as she gave them both a smile, hefted her bag into place, and headed out with further promises of returning soon.
Rheannach and Sayf were waiting in the hall outside.
“How is she?” Sayf asked.
“I think some time with her daddy would help,” Ellaenie ventured.
“I was planning on doing that anyway,” he chuckled, then trailed off and took her hands with surprising seriousness. “…Do be careful.
Ellaenie kissed him. “I promise.”
“Good…That goes for you too,” he added, looking to Rheannach.
“I’ll keep us both safe,” Rheannach promised him. “We’ll be gone at the first sign of danger.”
He nodded, exhaled, then spread his hands. “…Go, then. And tell us all about it when you get back.”
Ellaenie smiled at him, tightened her pack’s strap around her waist, and nodded to Rheannach. Without any further word, they turned and headed out.
There was precious little that was natural on Alhulw Earthmote. Certainly, nothing was wild here. It was the one area where Ellaenie could find anything to criticize her husband’s otherwise infinite sense of aesthetics, was that he seemed to have a blind spot for the beauty of untamed, unmanaged, ungroomed nature. A strange ommission, considering that he was exceptionally good at cultivating just the right amount of ungroomed, unmanaged and untamed in himself.
Or perhaps it was a deliberate omission, so as not to tread on territory that was Eärrach’s. Whatever the truth, nearly all of Alhulw was parkland, orchard and groomed garden. In such circumstances, the Pathways were…reluctant.
Ellaenie certainly couldn’t find them. Even Rheannach’s powers were stretched, and they had to hike deep into the far end of Sayf’s bucolic demesnes before they finally found the thread she needed. She tugged on it with a little tweak of the craft, led Ellaenie between a mossy stone and a tree, and—
—Ellaenie’s eyes had to adjust to sudden night-time darkness, and the wind changed. It was blowing from a different direction now, far cooler, and carried on it not only a completely different repertoir of bird calls, but also the cool moist scent and rushing noise of a nearby waterfall, and the nightly concert of frogs, birds and insects.
They were back on Garanhir. She felt it in her bones, instantly and keenly and to a shocking degree. Even though their surroundings were nothing like Auldenheigh city, the thought that she was now closer to home than she’d been in eight years hammered her heartstrings like a dulcimer. Life in the oasis had kept homesickness at bay. Now, unanticipated, it stopped her in her tracks.
“…Ellie?” Rheannach gave her a concerned look.
Ellaenie gathered herself. “I…sorry. Yes.” She cleared her throat. “Where are we?”
“Cantre. About sixty miles sinister of Antage. Exactly where I intended us to be.” Rheannach allowed herself a small, satisfied grin that verged on the smug, then turned and pointed. “The Tredmothfa should be about two miles that way.”
“Should be?” Ellaenie arched an eyebrow at her friend, Mother and mentor.
“Is.”
She led the way, but Ellaenie gasped and paused again to stare in wonder as soon as they’d rounded the shoulder of a tree and she laid eyes on the waterfall.
It wasn’t high, nor was it carrying much water, being just a stream coming straight down off the mountains. But here, in one of the spots where those who knew how could twist space and step between earthmotes, it pooled to rest briefly in its headlong sprint toward the edge. Fireflies danced and flashed at each other over the swirling, clear water.
Somebody, some hundreds of years ago, had carved a large rock into the shape of a bearded, horned head, and redirected the stream so it gushed out of the effigy’s open mouth. Ages of flowing water had eroded the sculpture so that it yawned far wider than the original vision, and left slimy moss intertwined with his carven beard, but the effect was still striking. Ancient humans had known this place was special.
“Are all the pathways like this?”
“Oh, yes. They’re always somewhere beautiful, sacred or striking. Your husband claims credit for that one,” Rheannach smiled and dipped a hand in the pool to stir it and enjoy the cool water on her skin.
“Mm. It’s his sort of touch.” Ellaenie smiled fondly. She’d surprised herself with how quickly she’d fallen in love with Sayf, though in truth she’d loved the idea of him from a young age. When she came to read the Aphorisms, his passages had always been the ones that seized her most intensely.
Well, who was going to claim a fondness for beautiful things was a vice? She admired the location a moment longer, hoped they’d come back this way when they left, or better yet that the next one was just as gorgeous, and followed Rheannach down a narrow run of slightly deer-trodden earth alongside the stream that couldn’t qualify for the word “track.”
Once again, the woods made way for them. This time, though, it was Ellaenie’s doing. The gentle art of persuading wild plants to let them pass unhindered, where they might otherwise have been tripped by root and snagged by thorn, was one of her weaker skills. There was precious little opportunity to practice it at the Oasis, so she took the opportunity now.
The trick she’d found that worked for her was to imagine herself as a breeze, briefly disturbing the still air of the forest but leaving no clear trace of her coming and going. The boughs would bend and let her flow through, then return to their sleep without ever having woken to notice the human blundering through.
Not that Ellaenie blundered, any more. All those courtly dance lessons had helped her learn the lightness of step that characterized a witch in nature.
Between these two tricks and a few others, they may as well have been striding on broad, level pavement rather than picking their way through the woods. In somewhat less than an hour, they climbed a small rise, and suddently the Tredmothfa was at their feet, at the bottom of a four-foot bank supported by a retaining wall of cemented stones in a random assortment of shapes and sizes.
The road itself was as ancient as Auldenheigh. The word Tredmothfa literally meant something like “path-edge-significant” in Elvish, and for uncountable centuries before the airships’ advent, it had been the main route by which new arrivals on Garanhir disembarked from the Wandering Isles that stuck to the mote’s leading edge, and continued their journey on foot, dexterward to Crown Pass and Enerlend.
Nowadays, it served as the major artery by which wains laden with timber, rope and other supplies for the shipyards in Antage rolled down from the lumber plantations and workshops elsewhere in the duchy. Cantre’s people had been quick to recognize that the rise of airships spelled doom for their traditional way of life, and thus their only option was to either embrace the new technology fiercely, or else suffer a long and ignominious death by irrelevance.
The road as they’d maintained it was a straight, wide artery of flat, level and foot-friendly cobble, helpfully milestoned and signposted, and Ellaenie smiled as the first of these signposts was in view from the moment they helped each other down the bank and onto the ancient road.
It was quite a nice sign, actually. A red oval on a green vine proudly advertised the Rosehip Inn, just two miles away toward Antage.
“So this is where Jerl grew up…” Rheannach commented, looking around. To their right a few hundred yards away was Garanhir’s leading edge, plunging into the open sky. To their left, the deep forest. “Very pretty.”
Ellaenie, however, had an eye to the open sky. And she didn’t much like the look of those clouds one bit. “Yes,” she agreed. “Let’s hope it—”
The first spit of rain stopped her mid thought. She sighed, unslung her pack, and pulled out her leather rain cape. It seemed they were in for a wet Garanese welcome after all.
Just like home.
She had to chuckle.
The road clung to the edge cliff at a respectful distance, meaning it wasn’t straight. It looped back and forth, rolled over rises in the terrain, so that even through the white noise of the steady rain that came in on them, they heard the inn sooner than they saw it. The regular ring of a blacksmith’s hammer served as well as a chapel bell for signalling that civilization was close, and when they simultaneously rounded a bend and crested a roll, they found themselves with an excellent view of Jerl’s childhood home, its many lanterns glowing invitingly in the rainy night.
The Rosehip Inn, Ellaenie assessed, must have started life as a modest rest stop for travelers on the Tredmothfa, some indeterminate number of years ago. She could see visible seams in its brickwork where later generations had expanded and added to it, with no regard for matching the architecture to what was already there. The oldest heart of it was a high dome, like a huge pottery oven or an oversized bee skep, atop a narrow sweep of stairs overlooked by narrow archery windows which suggested the original creators had periodically needed to defend it from assault.
The later expansions were variously boxy and rounded, though none were as fortified as the original, and indeed the modern entrance was at ground level and gave the impression that the doors would be thrown wide in more clement weather. The overall impression was cozily anarchic. This was a living place, the story of a family written in mismatched and often uneven stonework.
Ellaenie fell in love with it almost immediately.
The previously-heard smithy was at the far side of the yard, under a tiled roof from which the rain streamed in thick glittering ropes. Within, a burly farrier whose broad shoulders, bronzed skin and dark hair were all very Jerl-like spared them a glance and a nod of greeting as he tucked a draught horse’s hoof between his knees to shoe it. The owner, presumably, was indoors enjoying the inn’s hospitality.
So far, all seems normal, Rheannach mused.
Ellaenie agreed; she smiled at the farrier, then hurried on across the yard and into the welcome shelter of an awning where she could shake off the worst of the water from her cloak and boots before entering.
Encouragingly, there had been no trace of mental domination or glamer about the man. Meaning, the worst-case scenario Jerl had feared for his family had not come true at least. Still, they had to remain on guard. All it would take was a single Circle member recognizing them, and things could go wrong rather quickly.
Inside, the inn was abustle with a large group of travelers, the core of whom had the look of the successful middle class. There was something about dark, serious, well-made clothing that spoke of serious wealth, and the air that hovered over them as they spoke was of intense business. These were men with some project they were most enthusiastic about, conversing in hushed but excited tones about how to make it happen. The words ’engines’ and ’railway’ occasionally drifted out of their intense huddle.
Nothing alarming there. No hint of the Circle, either.
Before Ellaenie could take in anybody else, a girl of perhaps sixteen years popped up, her red hair tied back under a white bonnet and her hands newly scrubbed. “Hello, hello, welcome to the Rosehip Inn! Come in, let’s get you a spot by the fire so you can dry off—”
Ellaenie smiled at her, and focused the Sight. Once again, she found the lass clear and untouched by Mind’s influence. Good.
“Thank you,” she said aloud.
“Not at all! Let me just get a few more logs on here for you…” the girl bustled a little more firewood into the flames, gave it a poke and a prod to settle things properly, then took their cloaks and bade them sit down. She clucked and fussed over them like a rather older woman for a couple minutes, talked them into some fresh bread and a hot drink apiece, informed them that her name was Briggit and that she’d come running if they called, and left them to enjoy the peaceful aftermath of a whirl of hospitality.
Ellaenie was more than happy to curl up, bask in the glow off the crackling wood, and resume looking around again.
The word “cozy” had been invented to describe inns like this, she decided. The walls were decorated with the trophies of generations, from paintings to brass oddities, an infantryman’s rifle and dirk hung on the wall behind the bar, a carved wooden fish, some decorative plates hung up in the ceiling beams, a rather spectacular set of antlers…
Pride of place, though, belonged to a painting of the Cavalier Queen which dominated the wall above the fireplace. You had to know the Queen to identify it was her, of course, but Ellaenie knew that figurehead…and she recognized Jerl in the photograph hung beside it. He was young in that photo, maybe fifteen or sixteen years old, posing easily alongside an older version of himself that could only be his late father Arneld.
“Handsome ship, ain’t she?” Briggit commented, returning with bread, butter and two hot toddies. She pointed to the photograph. “That’s my cousin on the right. He captains her!”
“He’s a handsome specimen himself,” Rheannach commented with a chuckle.
“Hmm, true. He’s a bit older now, though. It’s been a few years since I last saw ‘im.” Briggit dusted her hands off. “Now, you’re a bit late for supper, I’m sorry, but I’ve got cold cuts and soup I can bring out. When you want to retire for the night, I’ve got a few choices where to put you…”
Ellaenie took out her purse, having already glanced at the prices on a chalkboard above the bar. She thumbed out a couple of guild silvers. “We’ll take the private suite, please. And soup and cold cuts sounds ideal.”
“I’ll have it aired out and warmed for you, ma’am,” Briggit bobbed as she took the coin and bustled away again.
“Well. they run a damn good inn,” Rheannach commented. Her eyes roved over the other patrons, narrowed briefly, then returned to Ellaenie’s face. “But you were right.”
“Where?”
A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.
“Behind you. The little reading alcove. Older man, reading a newspaper.” She planted the image of what she had seen and the impression she’d read in the front of Ellaenie’s mind. The man looked entirely harmless, in fact: just an old, bent figure in his seventies or eighties, with kindly eyes and a flop of limp white hair above a matching beard. But he reeked of the Circle.
“Has he guessed who we are yet?”
“I don’t imagine he can have…” Rheannach shook her head as she sat back to sip her hot drink, and lowered her voice another notch. “Civorage has no reason to be subtle. If he knew we were here, he’d attack us through his agent, immediately.”
Ellaenie nodded grimly, slipped one of her potion vials from a pocket, and reflected gladly on her months of experimentation as she drank. The brew had technically been effective at its most important task for years, but the first incarnation had been…zesty. Bitter enough to hurt the mouth, followed by a kick of too-sweet cloying the back of the tongue. Utterly impossible to disguise by adding it to food or drink, even if doing so wouldn’t have denatured its effects.
The new masterpiece had no such problems. It washed across the tongue with only a faint sour tang, like milk on the cusp of turning. But no sooner had it touched her palate than she felt its effects sweep her mind in a way that, even as its creator, she still found remarkable. Focus and clarity became immediate, sharp, automatic, hard. It felt rather like seeing the world through a crystal lens that could zoom in to pick out any detail with crisp immediacy. At the same time, her nagging tension and worries became quiet. Not absent, but…rather than crawling through her back and brain, distracting her, they simply reported the possible hazards in a matter-of-fact way then stilled, like obedient hounds awaiting their master’s whistle.
Opposite her, Rheannach drank a dose as well. With their minds now shielded against the power of the Circle, the experiment could begin. They met each others’ gaze, then Ellaenie nodded and stood.
She intercepted Briggit near the bar. The girl smiled at her and then went oddly vacant as Ellaenie exerted the Craft. This was why witches were so feared on Garanhir, and frankly for good reason. Bewitchment genuinely was a morally uncomfortable power to have, not least because it smacked so closely of Civorage’s own domination and enslavement.
“What can I do for you, ma’am?” Briggit asked. her voice had gone high, soft and dreamy.
Ellaenie handed her a potion vial, maintaining eye contact. “Add the contents of this vial to a bowl of soup and give it to the old man with the white beard in the reading nook,” she instructed, keeping her voice low and conversation like she was doing nothing more than asking where she might find the outhouse. “You will forget that I asked you to do this. Forget that you added anything to the soup. It will seem like your own idea, just the hospitable thing to do.”
“This…doesn’t feel right…” Briggit answered, sleepily. “Feels…dishonest.”
Ellaenie was impressed: Briggit could only be thirteen or fourteen years old, but she had some iron in her core that pushed back against the bewitchment. She redoubled her will, pouring power into her glamer, making herself seem as trustworthy and caring as humanly possible. “I know. But it’s for his own good, I promise.”
It worked. The girl nodded distractedly and took the vial. “Okay…”
Ellaenie relaxed the spell. “Briggit? Could you point me to the outhouse?” she asked, as though the girl had been distracted and not noticed her.
“Huh—oh! Oh, I’m so sorry, I was…I was miles away.” Briggit frowned at herself, then cleared her throat. “Uh, it’s, just through that door out the back there, and turn left. We’ve got hot water out there too, from the vat over the wood stove.”
“Thank you,” Ellaenie smiled at her and slipped away.
She took her time outside, listening while Rheannach kept her updated on the goings-on inside the inn. First, Briggit fetched their cold meat and soup, then she vanished into the kitchen for a little longer than usual. When she emerged, she delivered a bowl of soup to the Oneist in a distracted way, as though not quite paying attention.
Ellaenie went back indoors just as Rheannach reported the man had shrugged and decided not to waste the unexpected free meal. They sat together and discreetly watched him sup.
The moment the potion started to work on him was quite plain. He blinked, shook his head slightly as though a fly had buzzed past his ear. Then sat back and looked around him quite sharply, as though seeing the inn properly for the first time and not knowing how he’d come to be there. Ellaenie watched his face, trying to read his mood.
This was the purpose for which they’d come here. Or at least, half of it. Jerl’s fretting about his family had given Ellaenie the idea that here was where they would most likely be able to find a Oneist agent, one of the circle whom they could break free. In doing so, maybe they’d be able to keep Jerl’s family safe so he wouldn’t have to worry about that, maybe they’d provoke Civorage into doing something they could exploit, maybe they’d gain an ally and insight into the circle…
All of those were the arguments she’d come up with. But the honest, real reason was she needed to see what leaving the Circle was like. Whether…whether he’d be grateful for his rescue, or…
…Whether there was any hope of ever rescuing Lisze.
The despair, hope, sorrow and anticipation woven tight in that tought threatened to overwhelm even her potion-reinforced focus, until Rheannach squeezed her hand to steady her. This was the great unanswered question about Civorage’s thralls. They’d gleaned from careful observation that the Circles lived in a state of perpetual communal bliss, their life an endless cycle of backbreaking toil without respite or room for any expression of personality. They just worked, communed, and worked again until it was time to go to sleep…or time to dutifully have assigned sex to produce new children for the collective.
They’d been reduced to human bees. But the worst part was, this life of slavery and both mental and physical rape was “rewarded” with blissful happiness. And that raised the question of whether they would even want to be free. Whether they would accept or whether, given the choice…
Whether they’d prefer to be worker bees.
Over on the other table, the old man raised his wrinkled, arthritic hands to stare at them then, very slowly, covered his eyes with them and started to choke out huge, wracking sobs. It was such a huge emotion that Ellanie couldn’t even tell whether he was weeping for loss or weeping for relief.
She couldn’t bear to observe any longer. She rose up, darted across the room, and sank down next to the old man to take his hands and comfort him. “Are you—?”
Wild, beetle-dark eyes shone at her from behind his leathery palms. The sight of her face calmed and slowed him, steadied him. after a second, he croaked out four words.
“…Did you do this?”
Ellaenie, poised on a knife-edge to flee, nodded slowly.
His hands clasped hers and squeezed as the tears flowed freely down his cheeks, now. “Oh! Crowns! Thank you! Thank you!!” He surged up with surprising speed and strength for such a seeming geriatric and hugged her tight, catching her despite how ready she’d thought she was to evade him. “Oh, Raksuul! I was—! I couldn’t—! They didn’t even—!”
The entire tavern had gone silent to watch this extraordinary outburst, Ellaenie noted distractedly.
She rubbed the old man’s back. “What’s your name?” she asked.
His hyperventilating slowed. “…Dennis. Dennis Beck.”
“Come on, Dennis. Let’s sit down.”
He pulled away from her, giving Ellaenie a clear look at his face. She held the witch-sight so tightly and so focused that it fairly hummed, but…no. The Circle was broken. Nothing of it lingered, suggesting even once the potion’s effects faded, he’d still be free of it.
So far, she had cause for hope. But not triumph. She wouldn’t allow herself that, yet.
As she led Dennis to their table by the fire and sat him down, a new man strode into the room, bursting in so immediately that Ellaenie had a brief surge of danger-sense. But when she glanced at him it faded again. He was no Circle member, just an inn’s landlord concerned over a commotion in his bar…and there was no doubt that here was Jerl’s uncle. He had the same bronzed skin (though heavily lined) the same dark hair (though long gone on top) and the same straight, sharp nose (rhough rather larger.) He was also a head taller than Jerl, and in his prime must have been built like a beef bull. Thick black brows scowled at them as he paused, assessing the situation…
Then dark, shrewd eyes met Ellaenie’s and his scowl deepened further. Suspicion. And worse; Recognition.
Ellaenie lifted her chin defiantly. Come and confront me, then.
There was a long pause. Then he vanished behind the bar to pour a whiskey.
It turned out not to be for himself, but for Dennis, who was still grappling with the traumatic business of suddenly being himself again when Jerl’s uncle set the stiff drink down in front of him. “Here.”
“Oh…bless you.” Dennis took the drink up and knocked back quite a lot of it. his hand shook as he set the glass down.
“You must be Baris Holten,” Ellaenie said, softly.
He folded two thick and hairy arms at her. “And you must be the witch duchess.”
“True.” Ellaenie managed to ask him what he was going to do about it just by inflection. Mercifully, he’d kept his tone too low for eavesdropping, for now.
“Missing these eight years. And now, here at my inn, bewitching my paying guests.”
“Reversing a bewitchment, in fact.”
He gave Dennis a sharply questioning look, to which the old man nodded fervently. Baris rumbled thoughtfully deep in his chest, then jerked his head sharply toward a side door.
“Your rooms’re ready. Best talk there, I think.”
“Thank you.”
He grunted, “hrrm,” and stepped aside to open the door and led them out into the garth behind the main building, where a lantern-hung oak of prodigious size did quite a lot to stop the rain from blowing in under the cloisters. Their destination was a small cottage suite at one corner, and Baris grumbled into his beard as he opened the door and found the suite cold.
“Damn the girl. Fire’s not lit, beds ain’t been warmed…”
“It’s not her fault,” Ellaenie told him. “I confess to a…small…bit of magic there.”
Indignant fury flashed in the big man’s eyes. “That’s my granddaughter, witch!”
Ellaenie held her ground. “I know. But it’s all for a good reason, as I will explain if you will allow me.”
“Or I could lock you in ‘ere and send for the sheriff.”
Ellaenie considered him a moment, then sat down. “Your nephew is worried for you,” she said. When Baris’ scowl reached new depths and his arms fairly creaked with tension, she hastened to explain. “I count Jerl a friend and comrade, if that counts for anything.”
“It might, if you’re honest. Though I haven’t seen the lad in three years,” Baris retorted. “A lot can happen in that time. ‘Specially where witchcraft’s involved.”
He was clinging to his indignation the same way a man might cling to a walking stick when he thought he was surrounded by wolves, Ellaenie judged. But he didn’t really want to have to strike out…
“He’s well,” she said, evenly. “He’d have come himself, but he was so afraid for you he didn’t dare.”
Baris’s frown didn’t shift an inch. “Afraid, you say.”
“You and your family are in danger. A danger against which I can protect you in ways that he cannot…but tell me, Mister Holten. Are you a Crowns-honoring man?”
He tipped his head slightly, either in curiosity or confirmation. “Of course. Hold ‘em dear an’ respect the Aphorisms, always have.”
Ellaenie glanced at Rheannach, who smiled, and rose to her feet. There was a heavy, rushing noise like a down duvet being shaken, and her scintillating magpie wings stretched clear across the room as she stretched them out with a roll and shrug of her shoulders.
Baris’ scowl vanished like raindrops on a skillet. His mouth worked open and shut a couple of times, fish-like, and then he tried to effect some kind of respectful bow or nod or something and succeeded only in stumbling. “I—Milady Herald! I…I never thought I’d—I mean….!”
“It’s quite alright,” Rheannach assured him, and pulled her wings back in. She favored the equally stunned Dennis with a smile, and sat down by the log stove, which she lit with a snap of her fingers. “Ellaenie is my coven-Maiden, and spouse to Prince Sayf. You have my word as Raksuul, liberator and keeper of a safe hearth to all slaves, that she is no more evil than you are, and that all the terrible things whispered about her across Garanhir are the vicious lies of her enemies. Does my word suffice for you?”
“I—of course!” Baris stammered “But I mean…begging your pardon, like, but bewitching my granddaughter is still—”
“I know,” Ellaenie said, by way of an apology. “I hope it counts for something if I promise you that I did not do it lightly, or without good cause.”
“What cause, then? What danger are we supposedly in?”
“Me,” Dennis said, so softly it was barely louder than the voice of the stove beginning to roar.
“You? Mister Beck, you’ve been a good payin’ guest, and a quiet and neat one at that, these past several weeks. I figured you were just a moneyed man looking to retire somewhere nice away from the crowds and cities.”
“No…no.” Dennis shook his head. “No, I was…up until just now, I was…not myself. I was the….the puppet of…look, Mister Holten, whatever the duchess did to your granddaughter, I promise you, it wasn’t half so terrible as what she just freed me from. There wasn’t enough of me left to even be dismayed by it.
Baris watched the old man. His brows had, by now, met in a dense knot at the middle. Quite abruptly, all the tension fled him and he pulled up a chair which creaked as he lowered himself into it.
“I think you’d best start from the beginning,” he said.
Ellaenie had to resist the urge to let her grim humor show on her face, lest he think she was mocking him.
“I think you’ll find,” she said instead, “that that’s easier said than done…”
----------------------------------------
INTERLUDE: A PUBLIC SHOW OF MERCY
Auldenheigh, Enerlend, Garanhir Earthmote 09.06.03.10.02
Reaching the point of being able to go out in public and pretend to be one of the working class had taken Adrey a long time. Eight years ago, she’d thought the difference was just cheaper clothes and a lack of education.
How times had changed. How she had changed. Eight years of study, and the role of Jessa the soldier’s wife still was one of several she could put on and take off like a coat…but it would never be one she found natural or comfortable. There were so many nuances of accent, outlook, behaviour….people were fractal, and deep. To become somebody else in full, you would have to have lived their life, from birth. Impossible. She would always, in her core, be Adrey Mossjoy, Countess of Whitcairn, Dame Celebrant of the Most Wonderful Order of the Rose.
But the Order of the Rose was a knightly order for artists, actors, architects, musicians, poets, women of fashion and patrons of the arts. And Adrey had discovered in herself quite a talent for acting, these last eight years.
She moved through the crowd in complete anonymity. Just another bonneted head among thousands, gathered to enjoy the spectacle of a public confession.
A hundred years ago, there had been a guillotine at the top of those steps. Such public executions, Adrey knew from her history lessons, had been something of a public event. People would come out to enjoy the spectacle, stay for the street food and music. Ellaenie’s grandfather had made himself quite unpopular by putting an end to that. Executions had become limited affairs, performed out of public view except for a few officials and family members. But Ellaenie and her parents had upheld the policy.
Now, under Duke Dencan of House Linavan—or more accurately, under the rule of the Oneists who’d installed him and to whose Circle he firmly belonged—execution had been replaced entirely with public confession and contrition. Which was why, in front of all the gathered people, the day’s criminal penitent, one Edwalader Roth, was on his knees in sackcloth, confessing to and repenting of a litany of crimes.
Adrey wondered how much of it was true. And, to judge by the commentary in the crowd, so did many others.
“’Ee, we’re in dark times. Witches in the palace an’ criminals in the streets…” one womans commenting to her friend as Adrey’s patrol orbited her past. She was a red-faced creature, so round in the belly and bosom that her dress may as well have been draped over a huge plum pudding, and she was sharing a bag of sweets with a much shorter, much skinnier biddy who shot the penitent Roth a tired look.
“What’s ‘e say ‘e did? Smugglin’? Don’t see ‘ow that’s a crime,” said she. “Toffs’ve got enough money anyway, let t’ common ‘av us comforts, I says.”
“Aye, ‘tis all trumped up,” Adrey interjected, swinging easily into the same outer-city accent as them. “I ‘eard as ‘ow ‘e t’worst ‘e was doin’ was puttin’ up graffiti on t’ Circle ‘ouse walls.”
This, in fact, was true.
“Lot’s o’ graffiti about,” the littly skinny one told her friend. “All them black birds on the walls. You seen ‘em?”
“Aye. Folks say as it’s meant to be a magpie. For Rheannach,” Adrey added.
The fat woman frowned, her mind clearly torn between approval of the Heralds in general, and disapproval of graffiti on principle. She refocused her attention on the kneeling penitent and sucked thoughtfully on a humbug.
“Well…’e shouldn’t ought ‘ta be drawin’ on walls,” she declared, after deep contemplation. Adrey nearly broke character to sigh, but the woman’s shorter companion was sharper in more than just looks.
“Mebbe not. But in’t it funny ‘ow ‘e went from drawin’ magpies for t’ Beloved, an’ now ‘es such a pious Oneist? I wonder what they done at ‘im? ‘As ‘e been beaten?”
“Dun’t look like it…I dunno. Mebbe ‘e just ‘ad a change of ‘eart?”
“Mebbe…” the shorter, sharper woman looked skeptical.
Judging that she’d sown the right amount of doubt for this moment, Adrey slipped away among the crowd.
That had been her role, these last eight years: to push back. Pour poison in ears, unsettle people. Never let the Oneists get away with an unchallenged moral majority. And people, even ones as simple as the lady with the sweets, were not actually stupid. They knew something was off about all this.
Up on the gallows, the public penitence reached its conclusion as Roth was lifted to his feet and granted the soft white robes to change into, signifying that he had taken the first step and could now continue his redemption by joining a Circle and working for the betterment of others. Adrey kept her grimace off her face. She’d seen what Circle life was like. She’d seen…
She’d seen Lisze, from afar through a telescope. She’d been toiling in a vegetable garden with a dopey blissful smile on her face that spoke of no thoughts, no life, no personality going on behind her glazed eyes. She’d been showing the signs of pregnancy, too. Reduced to a breeding sow, and so brainwashed she couldn’t even be upset about it.
Adrey had taken to wearing a vamdraech after seeing that. To the others, she defended it as a way of keeping her sensitive knowledge secret if the Oneists whould capture her, but they all knew the truth: if there was one fear that knotted Adrey’s belly more than any other, it was the idea of joining Lisze in the circle. Better anything than that. For an honest truth, she feared the Circle even more than she feared being Shade-taken. But she had long since decided that her course in life was to fight what she feared, however she could. And soon, she hoped, she would get her chance to do something more damaging than just spread whispers in the crowd.
Soon. If Ellaenie’s last message was correct, her weapon would soon be ready. And then…
She pushed the thought of Lisze aside and turned back to the task in hand. There were still plenty of penitents waiting their turn to lament their failings and take the white. There were still a lot of ears who needed to hear some doubt.
Still a lot of work to do. Sometimes it felt like trying to bail out the Blue Sea with a bucket. But Dragon said they were having an effect, slowing things down, creating openings.
And if Adrey had faith in anything, it was in the Heralds.
She slipped through the crowd, sowing discord as she went.
She just hoped the chance to act would come soon.
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> All language is derived from the First Language, which the Crowns granted knowledge of to the First People on the First Day. Modern Feydh is believed to differ only a little from this ancient tongue, as the long memories of elves have preserved it. —Elas Kenvayada Molosi, Tongues.
OUT IN THE OPEN SKY
The airship Cavalier Queen, en route to Stórsteinn 09.06.03.10.02
For once, the Queen’s deck was silent.
Or, more accurately, the only sounds were the kind of quiet, inanimate ones that were far more tranquil than mere silence. They’d found a good air current headed their way, and so Derghan had spun the engines down to idle, taking away their background hum. Normally there would have been the thrum and whistle of wind through the rigging, but that too was absent as the ship ran along with the wind. And they were much too far out for cliff-birds to chase them.
Low conversation, the creak of ropes, and the occasional hissing sound and scrape of metal from the cast iron caboose that signalled a good lobscouse for supper. To most, it might have been comforting to the point of soporific, but Jerl was still adjusting to the way his new cannons had altered the ship’s sounds. Their gentle shifting with the deck’s roll were a whole new noise. Welcome, but not yet part of the familiar.
Nor too was the fact that many of the voices he could hear talking quietly across the deck were doing so had elvish accents. But gratifyingly, there were no groups of Rüwyrdan sitting around on their own, keeping to themselves. The human and fey crew were completely intermingled, by now. There were some damn strong friendships forming.
With one exception.
“Mister Marren tells me you’re settling in on the rigging crew like you were born to it,” Jerl commented, as he sat down next to the ship’s one loner.
Ekve nodded slowly. He had two lengths of old rope and was practicing the art of splicing them. “He is a kind man,” he replied, evenly. His Garanese had improved dramatically since joining the crew, Jerl had noted. He’d never lose the accent, but he knew what the word ’the’ was for, now.
“He wouldn’t be if you were fucking up.”
“Even that is kindness. When he must be harsh, he does so because the rigging is what keeps us all alive, and any failure might spell disaster.” Ekve looked up at the network of ropes overhead with surprising, though reserved, warmth. “I find the work…wholesome.”
He caught Jerl’s curious expression and managed a tiny, wry smile. “Knowing what you do of me, I imagine you are surprised to hear such a sentiment pass my lips.”
“A little. Knowing what I do of you, I would have thought ‘wholesome’ was a foreign concept.”
“Indeed it was.” The former king of the elves nodded, and continued to practice his splicing.
“…What did they—?”
“They made me relive it all.” Ekve set his rope down. “Every life. Every second of every life. Every human span I snuffed out, or which was cut short as a consequence of my reign. Do not attempt to imagine it, I assure you…you cannot.”
Jerl ignored that advice and tried anyway. Tried to picture just a small cross-section of all the poor bloody slaves who’d suffered and died under the Ordfey. One might fairly make the case that literally all of their misery could be laid at Ekve’s feet. To experience all of it…
He was right. There was no imagining that. “…That explains it,” he said, instead.
“Explains what?”
“Time,” Jerl clarified. “It…it hangs on you like…I don’t know. like a heavy snowfall. I’ve met two Crowns at this point, and they’re so ancient it doesn’t even register. Trying to get a sense of how old they are is like, I dunno, like trying to picture how far away infinity is. but you? You’re still young enough to feel incredibly old. Sin feels the same way a little, but nothing like you.”
“Of course not. Bomirdd killed with her own hands. Even as gleefully as she did it, there are only so many she had time for. I, however, killed dispassionately by decree and policy, on a scale that reached across all the worlds for two thousand years. I have experienced…tens of millions of human lifetimes, truncated though most of them were.”
He sighed and looked down at his hands. “At the height of all my empire’s decadence, I would…I would lounge on silk pillows, sipping the most exquisite wine from cups of gold and crystal, watching a sweet young boy being….well. There is no need to go into the grim detail, is there? It was…sordid. An utter caving to whims I thought must be good and natural because, if they were not, why would the Crowns have given them to us? And yet I would be bored. Cold. Emotionally…absent.”
Jerl nodded, listening.
“And at the exact same moment, five miles away, a family of slaves would be huddled around a tiny rough table sharing little more than a loaf of bread and a bowl of peas porridge, and they would be happier than I had ever known was possible. And they were happy, not in spite of, but in part because they knew that it was only a matter of time before a Fey whim tore one or all of them away.” Ekve shook his head in awe. “I thought humans were pitiful, wretched creatures, that death meant your lives were without meaning. I had it completely backwards.”
“And now, here you are.”
“Yes.” Ekve looked out at the sky for a moment. “I have not thanked you properly for allowing my presence. It is most tolerant of you.”
“I have Sayf’s word on it that you’re worth tolerating. And Mouse’s for that matter.”
“Mou—? Oh. Yes. Of course. The Mindspeaker.” Ekve gave a familiar little headshake, as of one trying to dislodge something that had gotten stuck inside his brain. It seemed to be ubiquitous to Mouse’s victims. Ekve cleared his throat softly, then effected a dark chuckle from somewhere. “Given his presence, and how easily I forget him, I daresay you have rather a good assurance of the loyalty of everyone on this ship.”
“Oh, I don’t need Mouse for that—no offense,” Jerl commented over his shoulder.
“Heh! None taken!”
They grinned at each other, and Mouse wandered off, abandoning his eavesdropping. They both secretly enjoyed the way Ekve carefully withheld any reaction.
The fallen emperor shook his head, seeming dismayed mostly at himself. “To be able to have such faith in your people…I envy it. To rise to the level I once occupied…those who do are those to whom loyalty is an exploitable folly of the less ambitious. Everyone clawing their way up toward the throne, tearing down the one ahead of him, kicking down the one below.”
“Here on on an airship, we all live or die together and the man who behaved like that is only dooming himself,” Jerl replied.
“Then how did you come to be in charge?”
“Love. Family. My folks founded an inn on the Tredmothfa, oh, four hundred years ago? My uncle Baris inherited it, and when it became clear my dad and I weren’t ever going to be happy there, he took out a loan on the back of the inn’s steady business, and we used it to commission the Queen.”
“He took quite a risk for you, then.”
“Aye. We repaid him, and then some. The inn’s doing less business nowadays, now that more and more people are coming to Cantre by ship than by isle. It’s just what family does, you know?”
Ekve smiled, sadly. “I didn’t.”
“…Right.”
“As I said, it is…wholesome. And I am grateful to be here, and to learn.”
Not knowing what else to say to that, Jerl clapped him on the shoulder, then stood, realizing that somehow he actually quite liked Ekve. The elf had the deep melancholy of the penitent, of course…but he was still charming. You could see the force of personality that had driven him to the top, ages ago.
He looked up at a whistle from the rear lookout and darted to the stern, where he drew his telescope from his pocket and peered out into the midst, following the man’s pointing finger. It took him a second to spot it, but there was definitely a dark shape shadowing them amidst the clouds.
He was just about to beat to quarters when the clouds broke and he saw, rather than the hulk of another airship, a sinuous reptilian body and vast leathery wings. The wings flapped once, the body twisted lithely, and the drake vanished back into the clouds and out of sight. Jerl got the distinct impression he’d just been winked at.
He chuckled to himself, put the telescope away, and stepped away from the rail. “All clear!”
“Aye, skipper.”
For the first time in a long while, Jerl no longer felt vulnerable.
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> Not all the Heralds are seen as figures of wisdom or virtue. The Shisha in particular is widely regarded as an indolent trickster, more interested in drugs and nonsense than in higher things. Likewise, the siblings Faun and Satyr are known chiefly for their habit of seducing unwary mortals with wine and sex. Even awe-inspiring Dragon is inscrutable and closed to the point of obtuseness. Collectively, they pose questions without good answers; perhaps that is the point. —Anoloa Nwodike, The Heralds
THE ROSEHIP INN
Cantre, Garanhir 09.06.03.10.02
“Well…after my Sofi passed…I was lonely. Just an old man rattling around an empty house. My daughters all married and looking after their children, my son off on an airship somewhere…I went along to that first Circle meeting because they promised me I wouldn’t be alone any more.”
A clock ticked solemnly as Dennis recalled his life. He had an unexpectedly poetic streak in him. “…And I wasn’t. It felt wonderful, so wonderful, that first Circle. Like the words just reached in through my heart to grab my soul and take away all the pain that had knotted it up. So, I went back, again and again, and I threw myself into it, because while I was there, it was like I had a family again…”
He paused, and sighed. “And…maybe there was a little voice in the back of my head started to worry. But if I ever thought about it, the reason why seemed to slip away, like a bar of soap in the bath. I was…happy. And the happier I got, the more it consumed me, and took away…well, it took away the pain, yes? But…but I mean…”
“You were married to her for thirty-three years,” Rheannach interjected, putting her hand warmly on his. “The pain was right, and natural, it was part of your love for her. They couldn’t take it without taking part of you.”
“…That’s it, yes. That’s exactly it,” Dennis agreed. He knocked back another measure of whiskey with a shaking hand. “They had no right!”
“But they did it anyway. And each time you lost a little more of yourself.”
He nodded miserably. “Until there was naught left but the Circle. And then I put on their own garb and worked my fingers to the knuckle for ‘em and made a vow that meant nothing ‘cuz I wasn’t myself enough to mean it. And then one day I was in the infirmary ‘cuz my hands had lost all their strength again, and the Speaker told me there was a special task that I was better suited for.”
“Spying on me and mine,” Baris Holten rumbled.
“Yes. They didn’t tell me why.”
Ellaenie glanced out the window. The night must surely be nearly over by now, but Baris, for all his age, wasn’t showing any sign of noticing. He’d listened skeptically at first, then nodding, then rapt as they’d laid out what was going on for him.
“Watching for Jerl,” he surmised.
“Yes,” Ellaenie agreed.
“Why? What’s his role in all this?” Baris asked.
“Jerl found a second Word,” Ellaenie told him.
“Or, more accurately, our husbands and the others arranged for him to acquire it,” Rheannach clarified.
“…What, our Jerl?”
“Yes.”
“Why him?”
“I don’t really know,” Ellaenie answer, truthfully but incompletely. “He’s rising to it magnificently, I must say. You can be very proud of him.”
“Well, I—I am, o’ course. Him and my little brother made a damn good life for knowing it was me who’d inherit the inn. But Holtens aren’t ambitious sorts, by and large. If this family’s got a talent, it’s bein’ content with what we’ve got.”
“A worthy talent,” Rheannach commented, with a smile.
“You’re smiling, but I’m looking at Dennis here and wondering when them Oneists are gonna come and take the Rosehip away from us, now,” Baris replied. “You think they’ll take what you did to him lying down? They’ll retaliate and then me an’ mine will be just like he was before you came, and the Rosehip’ll be just another Circle house full of slaves. It’s either that or we’re driven out an’ lied about like the duchess, here. We’ve been innkeepers for hundreds and hundreds of years, and now you’re tellin’ me, I might be the last Holten to run the Rosehip.”
“That’s the fate that was coming for you anyway, I’m afraid,” Ellaenie told him. She scooted forward on her chair until she was perched on the edge to look him straight in the eye. “But we do have the means to protect you.”
His scowl returned. He had a face built for scowling, really. Funny, that this man who looked so much like Jerl and was so closely related to him could be so different in outward temper. But then his gaze flicked to Dennis. Ellaenie saw sympathetic outrage in the way his scowl deepened then relaxed again, and then he exhaled, letting his shoulders drop.
“If there’s any way I can help…” he offered.
“For now, just keep your family out of harm’s way. If they come demanding to know where Dennis is, you drink this,” Ellaenie handed him a vial, “and you lie to them.”
“…Is that all?”
“They’re going to be watching this place even more closely now that we’ve shown interest.” Ellaenie told him, then glanced at Rheannach.
“There is a place in the woods, about two miles up the road,” Rheannach told him. “A pool, with a waterfall through an old stone carving’s mouth. Do you know it?”
“That ol’ place? Crowns, I haven’t been up there since I was this high…always felt there was something special about it.”
“You’re right, there is. If the pressure ever grows too much, if you ever fear for your family’s safety, take them up there and call for me. I’ll come as quickly as I can, I swear it.”
A huge weight dropped off Baris’ shoulders. “…Thank you, Lady Raksuul.”
Rheannach nodded, then looked to Dennis. “You, on the other hand, are coming with us. And it is time for us to leave, now.”
Dennis frowned and stood. “Already?”
“Cantre is only sixty miles away, and there are horse posts all along the tredmothfa. If the Oneists sent somebody out quickly after you were broken free, somebody from the Cantre circle house could already be half-way here. And an airship? Goodness knows.” Rheannach explained. “Or they might not notice at all. We don’t know, so we aren’t taking unnecessary risks.”
“Right. I’ll…get my things, then.”
“I’ll help,” Rheannach said, and accompanied him from the room. Baris fidgeted slightly with his clothing and cleared his throat.
“I…uh…feel I owe you an apology,” he said, after a moment.
“Absolutely not.”
“I meant for…for believing all the shite the Oneists said about you, pardon my language.”
“Lies are easy to believe. Lies based in the truth, doubly so. I am a witch, Mister Holten. It’s a good thing. Your own granddaughter has some talent for it, in fact.”
“…What, our Briggit?”
“Oh yes. She resisted my magic quite well. And the lantern stones all have her signature. She charges them, doesn’t she?”
“Aye. Girl hardly needs to wave ‘em at the fire and they’re ready. And she lights ‘em with a snap of her fingers.”
“Strong-willed?”
“Holten women are, at that,” Baris grinned. “But oh, yes. She’s all fair and flowers with the guests, but I daresay she’ll rule the scullery like it’s her own duchy in a couple more years. But…a witch, though…?”
“Perhaps. It is for her to decide, and no-one else.” Though if Ellaenie had her way…she was overdue to start looking for a Maiden. And there was more virtue in the Holten family than they liked to pretend. Briggit might just be perfect.
But there were other candidates, too.
“…Your grace?” Baris prompted after a moment.
“Forgive me. I’m distracted by my thoughts.” Ellaenie picked up her bag. “Thank you again for your hospitality, Mister Holten. You’ve helped us more than you can know.”
He nodded, looking quite troubled. Ellaenie’s heart went out to the poor man; he was no coward, she judged, but he was definitely the sort who’d prefer to keep his head down and let trouble come to other people. A trait he shared with Jerl, truthfully.
But she guessed there were other traits he shared with his nephew. Men were as much the product of nurture as nature, and the Holten family seemed to be turning out good people. Here, Ellaenie felt, was somebody they could trust. She touched his arm reassuringly, projecting warmth and confidence, and preceded him through the door, to find Rheannach and Dennis packed and ready, waiting for her.
They said their farewells, with renewed promises of whatever protection and assistance they could give, and set out at a brisk pace, aiming to be off the road and back in the woods before night’s end.
The hike back to the stepping place was uneventful, though Ellaenie couldn’t shake a crawling feeling in her spine. She reassured herself that the Sight was quiescent: this was just ordinary paranoia, and the feeling of being exposed for the first time in eight years, made more intense by Dennis’ slow, halting walk.
Even at his pace, though, this was deep in the night. They made it to the grove well before daybreak without sighting another soul, and from there…
“Brace yourself, Mister Beck. this next bit can be quite disorienting.”
“What next b—?”
Ellaenie grinned as she felt the world change. Beck stopped in his tracks, blinking, then looked around wildly. It was always amazing to her that the transition was so…seamless, even though the origin and destination could be entirely different. One moment, they had been in a glade with the sound of tinkling water, now…now they were under the branches of a particularly bearded willow tree, its green curtain raining down all around them. The two places looked nothing alike, and yet, the moment of moving from one to the next was so natural it felt like looking up from deep thought and realizing one had traveled far.
“I…but we…how?” Beck stammered.
“In the ages before airships, this was the convenient way to get around,” Rheannach commented. “The Ordfey suppressed knowledge of it, so their slaves wouldn’t be able to use them to escape.”
“Where are we?”
Rheannach smiled, and brushed aside the falling willow strands.
“Crae Vhannog,” she said, in the second before her heart dropped into her boots and horror stole the happy tone from her voice.
Beyond them should have been a rolling country of golden wheat and sheep-cropped emerald grass in paddocks divided by loose stone walls and bubbling streams. And in the distance, atop a high craggy rock, sat a castle whose green and silver banners should have been flowing in the wind from its round turrets.
Instead, there was a muddy expanse of earthworks, burned crops and tents. Beyond them, the banners still flew, but not beautifully. Instead, they were tattered symbols of defiance atop beaten and bombarded walls, under a canopy of barrage ballons and bristling anti-airship cannon.
Caisteal Vhannog was under siege.