Five Lands Saga Box Set 1 (Five Lands Saga Box Sets), page 59
Nikaenor looked beaten, even though the soldiers hadn’t assaulted him the way they had Kenton. Perhaps Nikaenor would have felt better if they had. An atonement of sorts for the guilt of placing his family in such danger.
Kenton remembered what it was like, watching an attack on his own family.
“Nikaenor,” Kenton said, his voice quiet, scratchy against his bruised throat. He knew the guards outside would be paying close attention to everything they said, but if he spoke softly, secretively, they might think he was stupid enough to not realize they could hear him. A small advantage, but in their current situation, Kenton would take what he could get.
“It’s over,” Nikaenor said, his voice sullen.
“It’s not over.” He mulled over what false piece of information to let out to the soldiers, but his mind couldn’t seem to focus. The throb of pain that pulsed along the left side of his face was terribly distracting.
“It’s over,” Nikaenor repeated firmly. “He’s got us, and there’s nowhere for the others to go. There are too many soldiers. We’ll all be captured or killed. And my family—”
“They’ll all get out. They’ll find a way. They’ll make it to Berlaith.” He cringed as he spoke the last part, willing Nikaenor to not point out that Berlaith was the last place they would go. Let Erich wonder about that.
Nikaenor didn’t seem to notice. “It’s impossible. And my family—I don’t know what they’ll do to them. My father . . .” His voice choked off.
“Is still alive,” Kenton said. It was an even guess, really. He couldn’t let Nikaenor seep into paralyzing despair. Although they had no plan of escape now, an opportunity could present itself at any time, and they both had to be ready to take it. “I saw him move as they took us away.”
Nikaenor sucked in his breath. “Really? I . . . I was so sure that . . . but what if the soldiers took him, too?” His voice broke. “My sister—”
“There’s no reason to hurt her. They have us now, and short of Daniella, we’re who they’re after. Not your family.” Kenton felt around the ground as well as he could with his hands tied; unfortunately, there weren’t any sharp rocks or anything he could use. It appeared they had done a good job in clearing the ground.
Neither of them said anything for a long stretch of time. Kenton tried to work various escape scenarios through in his mind, but he knew too little about the layout of the encampment, and there were too many variables in how things might progress from here. He would simply have to stay alert and watchful for any slip of the guards, any indication of weakness.
It was hard, though, to keep his mind from wandering in the empty darkness. He wondered how truthful his words to Nikaenor had been—was his family really going to be spared? He tried not to dwell on the fact that if he was in Erich’s place, he would take the family prisoner and use them to manipulate Nikaenor, whether for information or as a precaution against escape.
Still, hope was fragile, tenuous as spider webbing, but there was no way he would deprive Nikaenor of it.
Or himself.
Gods, what of Perchaya? That soldier had followed her away and they hadn’t returned to the tavern. He knew she’d been trying to help—and succeeding, all credit to her. Yet it still galled him that she had come into danger at all, and now he had no idea if she was safe. And there was nothing he could do about it.
Not to mention the others. One of the chosen locked away by Diamis to rot would frustrate their plans indefinitely. Kenton thought about them each in turn. Sayvil. Jaeme. Even Daniella.
He didn’t want harm to come to any of them.
“Kenton?” Nikaenor said quietly.
“Yes?”
Nikaenor paused before asking, “What do you think they’re going to do to us? I mean, they think we know where the others are, don’t they?”
Kenton sighed. “Whether or not they really think we know, they have to act like we do. We’re the only potential source of information they have.” Hopefully.
“But I don’t have any idea where they are,” Nikaenor said.
“I know,” Kenton replied.
“What if they don’t believe me? What will they do to me?” The stark fear in Nikaenor’s voice was evident, despite his efforts to keep his tone even.
A thick sadness settled over Kenton. The kid shouldn’t have to deal with this, with the expectation of torture amidst fear for his family and friends. “They’ll believe you soon enough. You reek of honesty. That’s why I never told you our plans, because I knew you’d be likely to blurt it out with our drink order.”
“You know where they’re hiding?” Nikaenor asked, ignoring the jab to take the real bait.
Perfect, Kenton thought. He kept his voice low, but not too low. “Yes, I do.” There. If there were soldiers listening, this would convince them that Kenton didn’t suspect their presence. And it might save Nikaenor and his family members from the more unsavory methods of interrogation.
“Oh,” was all Nikaenor said.
Silence fell between them, and Kenton shifted again, trying to relieve the pressure on his wrists, though he could do nothing for the pounding in his head.
Footsteps passed outside, and finally the tent flap opened. A soldier bent through the door, ringed by lantern light. “The general will see you now,” he said, grabbing Kenton by his feet and dragging him from the tent.
Joy, Kenton thought. And he let himself be hauled away.
There was no way for Perchaya to know how long she waited in the hidden room in the basement of the Fish Hook. Her muscles ached from holding bleary-eyed Emaline for what felt like ages, the girl staring into space, unseeing but unable to sleep.
When the inn above had been silent for a long while, Ronan spoke to Perchaya in a low voice.
“The soldiers,” he said. “They came here looking for the red-haired girl. What was her name?”
Perchaya swallowed against her dry throat. She knew they needed to move under a cover of secrecy, but Diamis already knew where they were. If he had had somehow gotten ahold of a blood sample from one of them—Nikaenor’s perhaps? Did she really get all of it out of Lukos’ hands?—he might have been watching through their eyes all along.
“Daniella,” she said. “Daniella Diamis.”
Ronan said something in Foroclaean, and from beneath the table, Aralie tsked at him.
“What in the waves was the daughter of Diamis doing here?” Ronan asked. “And with my brother?”
Perchaya kept her voice as calm as she could. “Your brother is the bearer of Mirilina.”
Now Ronan scoffed. “My cursed little brother—”
“He’s not cursed,” Perchaya said. “His transformation is the sign of the chosen. It’s a gift, and it’s come in handy more than once.” She didn’t mention that most recently it had come in handy for running down a hallway, drawing guards in circles as a full fish person. She’d let Nikaenor share that story, if he chose to.
From beneath the table, Aralie peeked out. “The bearers are supposed to be called to prevent the release of Maldorath,” she said. “He can’t be chosen unless—”
“Unless Diamis means to break the seal,” Perchaya said. “Unless Diamis is taking over all of the Five Lands in an effort to subdue our resistance, so that Maldorath can take full control.”
“Gods-damned bastard,” Ronan said, and Aralie tsked him again, looking meaningfully down at the sleeping Tam in her arms.
Ronan continued undeterred. “I knew we should fight. We didn’t lose the war so much as just give up. We should have fought until there were none of us left standing.”
“Hush,” Aralie said. “If they had, Dad would be dead.”
“Or we would have won,” Ronan said.
“Regardless,” Perchaya said. “You’re right. Now we need to fight. We all do, with everything we have. We have to resist Diamis, and recover your brother, and make sure the others are safe. If we don’t, our children won’t be born to say the same of us.”
There was a chilly silence, and then Ronan nodded his agreement.
Good, Perchaya thought. Aralie might worry, but Perchaya was grateful for Ronan’s fire. If Kenton and Nikaenor were alive—and Perchaya had to believe they were—they were going to need all of that they could get.
The floorboards above creaked, and they all tensed but stayed silent. But when a single set of footprints descended the stairs at last and rapped lightly on the sliding door, Perchaya’s muscles ached with relief. The door hadn’t opened. This person hadn’t had to search—they’d known right where to come.
Ronan kept tight hold of his frying pan but lowered it when the door slid aside to reveal an older man to whom he bore a striking resemblance—though this man’s beard was longer and scruffier than Ronan’s.
“Are you all right?” Ronan asked.
Nikaenor’s father gently touched the side of his head, and his fingers came away streaked with blood. “I think so. Took a bad lump is all.Where’s your mother?”
“She was upstairs in the tavern,” Perchaya said. “Her and Nikaenor and Kenton, and the little girl—”
“Esta,” Emaline said. “They took Esta.”
Nikaenor’s father reached for the wall like he needed it to steady himself, and he let out a shaky breath. “They aren’t among the dead. They must have been captured. By the gods, why would they take them?”
“She says Nikaenor’s a bearer, Dad,” Emaline said.
Perchaya’s eyes widened. She hadn’t known the girl had been paying attention.
“A bearer,” the man said. He shook his head. “Gods, I always wondered, but—”
“What?” Ronan and Aralie said together.
Nikaenor’s father looked a bit sheepish. “He had the mark. And what could Nikaenor have ever done to be cursed? It seemed like a blessing, from Mirilina’s perspective anyway. A curse from the goddess of the sea would be for the water to kill him, not for him to be better suited to it.” He looked to Perchaya. “Is that why they took him? How would they have known?”
Perchaya wasn’t sure how to begin to answer that last bit. “He is desperately important to stopping Diamis,” she said, avoiding it entirely for now. “We have to get him back. And your wife and daughter.” And Kenton, she added like a prayer.
“We do,” Nikaenor’s father said. “But how is another matter.”
It certainly was. Surely the guards wouldn’t have taken only Kenton and Nikaenor’s bodies, leaving their own dead behind. They had to be alive, and might even have had time to escape. But if Kenton had, he would be tearing this place apart looking for her. He would have guessed she was still in the inn. They would have heard him by now.
The five of them moved out of the cramped space of the hidden room. Nikaenor’s father secured the door, and then offered her his hand. “I’m Feldan,” he said.
“Perchaya,” she said. “I’m traveling with Nikaenor and the others, who are also bearers, and we’re here for the godstone of Mirilina.”
Feldan stared at her like this was far more difficult to believe than that his own son might be a bearer. Feldan looked at Ronan, who stared defiantly back at his father. Perchaya held her breath, not sure what he was going to say. “The soldiers were here for you all, then.” His tone was tense, a string being pulled too tight.
Perchaya nodded. “Me. Kenton. Nikaenor. The other chosen.”
“And Daniella Diamis!” Ronan said. “I rubbed arms with a gods-damned princess.”
“Ronan,” Aralie said. “Watch your tongue.”
But Feldan looked far more stunned by the news than the swearing.
“Diamis’ daughter in my tavern?” he asked.
“She’s working with us,” Perchaya said. “She’s no threat.”
“Like hells.” Feldan’s hands balled into fists. “You all brought this down on us, bringing her here, and now my wife and my children—”
“We brought it on ourselves,” Ronan snapped. “By failing to resist.”
Feldan shot his son a look. “Hold your tongue. You don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“I’m talking about fighting,” Ronan said. “I’m talking about doing what has to be done.”
“Yes,” Perchaya said. “What needs to be done for all of them.” Perchaya was glad she was still wearing her long gloves over her Drimmish ring—she wasn’t sure Feldan would take any more kindly to having hosted a Drim than he did to Diamis’ daughter.
She was also glad for Ronan’s insistence. She would need help, and a lot of it. She was not a strong fighter and in previous battles had relied upon luck and instinct to survive. That wouldn’t be enough, now. Not if she wanted to bring the townspeople through this alive.
First, she would need to discover where the others were being held. “Where did all the soldiers come from?” Perchaya asked Feldan, who had turned away to glare at the basement food stores as if they, too, might be responsible for his family’s suffering. “Have they been here long? Do they have a camp? Or did they just appear tonight?”
Feldan turned back, still glaring, and shook his head. “I’d heard rumors of a few extra soldiers nosing around the docks, bothering the ship captains for their passenger registries. They had some descriptions of who they were looking for, but no one would tell them a thing. No one ever speaks to the soldiers in this town.”
He sounded proud of this. Perchaya was loath to correct him, but there was at least one person in town informing on them. She turned to Ronan. “Do you think there are others in the town who will join us?”
Ronan looked at his father, weighing the level of disapproval. Feldan’s face was all barely checked anger—he clearly didn’t like where this was going.
But Ronan must have decided he didn’t care.
“Yes,” Ronan said. “I know others who will fight. Especially after what happened here tonight. I heard the commotion on the street before I found you. They were beating down doors, searching houses. Everyone in Ithale will be in a rage.”
“Good,” Perchaya said. “Because we have to act immediately, before it’s too late.”
Nine
As Jaeme moved through the swamp, Daniella and Sayvil following behind, a heavy deadness hung around them, the only sounds of life the sucking of their feet pulling rhythmically up from the mud, punctuated by the occasional croak of a lone frog defying the smothering silence of the dank paths. The smell was thick in his lungs—of wet clothes left in a bunch overnight, of roots newly pulled from the dirt.
As they reached a cluster of rocks, Jaeme paused, letting the women catch up. They’d fallen behind him several paces, and Daniella had long since let go of his hand, even though he’d tried to pull the reeds aside in front of her consistently enough that she wouldn’t have to.
“Do we need to rest?” Jaeme asked.
Daniella sat down on a rock before she even answered. She wrapped her arms around herself. “I am definitely not dressed for this.”
None of them were, and the muck had soaked clean through Jaeme’s boots. He took a moment to smooth the top of a rock with his hands. The stone softened beneath his fingers, and he formed it into a seat and motioned for her to take it while he fashioned one for Sayvil a bit farther off. Finally, he made one next to Daniella for himself. He sat as close to Daniella as he could without shoving her off the rock.
He looked over at Sayvil, noticing her torch growing dim. “Do you have any oil for that?”
Sayvil shook her head. “I’d thought to buy some in Ithale. Didn’t expect to be leaving so soon.”
Now that they had stopped, Jaeme heard noises in the swamp, beyond the hum of the insects. Somewhere off to his left, a low sound like a creaking floorboard set the hairs on the back of his neck on end.
“It’s a frog,” Daniella said. Then, less certain. “Isn’t it?”
“Well, it isn’t a legendary Nichtee,” Jaeme said. “I’m confident of that much.”
Daniella jumped at another noise behind them, this one different, starting with a flat hum and opening into an “oh” before ending with the harsh hiss.
“Here,” Sayvil said, reaching out for a reed and pulling it from the foliage. “These burn, if they’re mature enough.” She held it to the torch, and sure enough, the thing burst into flame, then settled to a deep ember, giving off light. “They won’t last long,” Sayvil said. “I’ll go see if I can find some more. And maybe some whistlemoss. We’re going to need a good disinfectant in the morning, if we don’t want our feet to rot in our boots before we arrive in Haidshir.”
She handed Jaeme the proper torch and headed off through the muck, glowing reed in hand. Jaeme was glad for a second source of light, though he hoped it wasn’t theirs that ran out first.
Jaeme let out a long sigh and ran a hand through his damp hair before returning his arm to rest on his knee. Daniella shivered beside him, the skirt of her thin nightdress soaked through with swamp muck, and he wished he had a cloak or a blanket, anything to offer her besides his own thin shirt. She must be as tired as he was, or more so, being unused to this kind of travel.
Not that Jaeme had spent a lot of his life pressing through swampland.
Jaeme shifted closer to Daniella, and their arms touched. He gave her a moment to pull away, but she didn’t, so he reached out and put an arm around her, pulling her against him.
She leaned into him rather than away, and Jaeme smiled.
After several moments of silence, Sayvil gasped, somewhere off to their left.
Jaeme jumped immediately to his feet, heart pounding. “Sayvil?” he called. “What is it?”
“Gods, that can’t be . . .”
Jaeme’s blood went cold, and then Sayvil let out a shriek that sounded oddly . . . excited. “It’s plianth leaf! It’s here! I’d recognize the leaf-pattern anywhere. It’s very distinct, but I’ve never been able to locate it . . . and here it is!” She practically giggled with glee, and Jaeme wondered if that burning marsh reed contained some kind of hallucinogen.
Kenton remembered what it was like, watching an attack on his own family.
“Nikaenor,” Kenton said, his voice quiet, scratchy against his bruised throat. He knew the guards outside would be paying close attention to everything they said, but if he spoke softly, secretively, they might think he was stupid enough to not realize they could hear him. A small advantage, but in their current situation, Kenton would take what he could get.
“It’s over,” Nikaenor said, his voice sullen.
“It’s not over.” He mulled over what false piece of information to let out to the soldiers, but his mind couldn’t seem to focus. The throb of pain that pulsed along the left side of his face was terribly distracting.
“It’s over,” Nikaenor repeated firmly. “He’s got us, and there’s nowhere for the others to go. There are too many soldiers. We’ll all be captured or killed. And my family—”
“They’ll all get out. They’ll find a way. They’ll make it to Berlaith.” He cringed as he spoke the last part, willing Nikaenor to not point out that Berlaith was the last place they would go. Let Erich wonder about that.
Nikaenor didn’t seem to notice. “It’s impossible. And my family—I don’t know what they’ll do to them. My father . . .” His voice choked off.
“Is still alive,” Kenton said. It was an even guess, really. He couldn’t let Nikaenor seep into paralyzing despair. Although they had no plan of escape now, an opportunity could present itself at any time, and they both had to be ready to take it. “I saw him move as they took us away.”
Nikaenor sucked in his breath. “Really? I . . . I was so sure that . . . but what if the soldiers took him, too?” His voice broke. “My sister—”
“There’s no reason to hurt her. They have us now, and short of Daniella, we’re who they’re after. Not your family.” Kenton felt around the ground as well as he could with his hands tied; unfortunately, there weren’t any sharp rocks or anything he could use. It appeared they had done a good job in clearing the ground.
Neither of them said anything for a long stretch of time. Kenton tried to work various escape scenarios through in his mind, but he knew too little about the layout of the encampment, and there were too many variables in how things might progress from here. He would simply have to stay alert and watchful for any slip of the guards, any indication of weakness.
It was hard, though, to keep his mind from wandering in the empty darkness. He wondered how truthful his words to Nikaenor had been—was his family really going to be spared? He tried not to dwell on the fact that if he was in Erich’s place, he would take the family prisoner and use them to manipulate Nikaenor, whether for information or as a precaution against escape.
Still, hope was fragile, tenuous as spider webbing, but there was no way he would deprive Nikaenor of it.
Or himself.
Gods, what of Perchaya? That soldier had followed her away and they hadn’t returned to the tavern. He knew she’d been trying to help—and succeeding, all credit to her. Yet it still galled him that she had come into danger at all, and now he had no idea if she was safe. And there was nothing he could do about it.
Not to mention the others. One of the chosen locked away by Diamis to rot would frustrate their plans indefinitely. Kenton thought about them each in turn. Sayvil. Jaeme. Even Daniella.
He didn’t want harm to come to any of them.
“Kenton?” Nikaenor said quietly.
“Yes?”
Nikaenor paused before asking, “What do you think they’re going to do to us? I mean, they think we know where the others are, don’t they?”
Kenton sighed. “Whether or not they really think we know, they have to act like we do. We’re the only potential source of information they have.” Hopefully.
“But I don’t have any idea where they are,” Nikaenor said.
“I know,” Kenton replied.
“What if they don’t believe me? What will they do to me?” The stark fear in Nikaenor’s voice was evident, despite his efforts to keep his tone even.
A thick sadness settled over Kenton. The kid shouldn’t have to deal with this, with the expectation of torture amidst fear for his family and friends. “They’ll believe you soon enough. You reek of honesty. That’s why I never told you our plans, because I knew you’d be likely to blurt it out with our drink order.”
“You know where they’re hiding?” Nikaenor asked, ignoring the jab to take the real bait.
Perfect, Kenton thought. He kept his voice low, but not too low. “Yes, I do.” There. If there were soldiers listening, this would convince them that Kenton didn’t suspect their presence. And it might save Nikaenor and his family members from the more unsavory methods of interrogation.
“Oh,” was all Nikaenor said.
Silence fell between them, and Kenton shifted again, trying to relieve the pressure on his wrists, though he could do nothing for the pounding in his head.
Footsteps passed outside, and finally the tent flap opened. A soldier bent through the door, ringed by lantern light. “The general will see you now,” he said, grabbing Kenton by his feet and dragging him from the tent.
Joy, Kenton thought. And he let himself be hauled away.
There was no way for Perchaya to know how long she waited in the hidden room in the basement of the Fish Hook. Her muscles ached from holding bleary-eyed Emaline for what felt like ages, the girl staring into space, unseeing but unable to sleep.
When the inn above had been silent for a long while, Ronan spoke to Perchaya in a low voice.
“The soldiers,” he said. “They came here looking for the red-haired girl. What was her name?”
Perchaya swallowed against her dry throat. She knew they needed to move under a cover of secrecy, but Diamis already knew where they were. If he had had somehow gotten ahold of a blood sample from one of them—Nikaenor’s perhaps? Did she really get all of it out of Lukos’ hands?—he might have been watching through their eyes all along.
“Daniella,” she said. “Daniella Diamis.”
Ronan said something in Foroclaean, and from beneath the table, Aralie tsked at him.
“What in the waves was the daughter of Diamis doing here?” Ronan asked. “And with my brother?”
Perchaya kept her voice as calm as she could. “Your brother is the bearer of Mirilina.”
Now Ronan scoffed. “My cursed little brother—”
“He’s not cursed,” Perchaya said. “His transformation is the sign of the chosen. It’s a gift, and it’s come in handy more than once.” She didn’t mention that most recently it had come in handy for running down a hallway, drawing guards in circles as a full fish person. She’d let Nikaenor share that story, if he chose to.
From beneath the table, Aralie peeked out. “The bearers are supposed to be called to prevent the release of Maldorath,” she said. “He can’t be chosen unless—”
“Unless Diamis means to break the seal,” Perchaya said. “Unless Diamis is taking over all of the Five Lands in an effort to subdue our resistance, so that Maldorath can take full control.”
“Gods-damned bastard,” Ronan said, and Aralie tsked him again, looking meaningfully down at the sleeping Tam in her arms.
Ronan continued undeterred. “I knew we should fight. We didn’t lose the war so much as just give up. We should have fought until there were none of us left standing.”
“Hush,” Aralie said. “If they had, Dad would be dead.”
“Or we would have won,” Ronan said.
“Regardless,” Perchaya said. “You’re right. Now we need to fight. We all do, with everything we have. We have to resist Diamis, and recover your brother, and make sure the others are safe. If we don’t, our children won’t be born to say the same of us.”
There was a chilly silence, and then Ronan nodded his agreement.
Good, Perchaya thought. Aralie might worry, but Perchaya was grateful for Ronan’s fire. If Kenton and Nikaenor were alive—and Perchaya had to believe they were—they were going to need all of that they could get.
The floorboards above creaked, and they all tensed but stayed silent. But when a single set of footprints descended the stairs at last and rapped lightly on the sliding door, Perchaya’s muscles ached with relief. The door hadn’t opened. This person hadn’t had to search—they’d known right where to come.
Ronan kept tight hold of his frying pan but lowered it when the door slid aside to reveal an older man to whom he bore a striking resemblance—though this man’s beard was longer and scruffier than Ronan’s.
“Are you all right?” Ronan asked.
Nikaenor’s father gently touched the side of his head, and his fingers came away streaked with blood. “I think so. Took a bad lump is all.Where’s your mother?”
“She was upstairs in the tavern,” Perchaya said. “Her and Nikaenor and Kenton, and the little girl—”
“Esta,” Emaline said. “They took Esta.”
Nikaenor’s father reached for the wall like he needed it to steady himself, and he let out a shaky breath. “They aren’t among the dead. They must have been captured. By the gods, why would they take them?”
“She says Nikaenor’s a bearer, Dad,” Emaline said.
Perchaya’s eyes widened. She hadn’t known the girl had been paying attention.
“A bearer,” the man said. He shook his head. “Gods, I always wondered, but—”
“What?” Ronan and Aralie said together.
Nikaenor’s father looked a bit sheepish. “He had the mark. And what could Nikaenor have ever done to be cursed? It seemed like a blessing, from Mirilina’s perspective anyway. A curse from the goddess of the sea would be for the water to kill him, not for him to be better suited to it.” He looked to Perchaya. “Is that why they took him? How would they have known?”
Perchaya wasn’t sure how to begin to answer that last bit. “He is desperately important to stopping Diamis,” she said, avoiding it entirely for now. “We have to get him back. And your wife and daughter.” And Kenton, she added like a prayer.
“We do,” Nikaenor’s father said. “But how is another matter.”
It certainly was. Surely the guards wouldn’t have taken only Kenton and Nikaenor’s bodies, leaving their own dead behind. They had to be alive, and might even have had time to escape. But if Kenton had, he would be tearing this place apart looking for her. He would have guessed she was still in the inn. They would have heard him by now.
The five of them moved out of the cramped space of the hidden room. Nikaenor’s father secured the door, and then offered her his hand. “I’m Feldan,” he said.
“Perchaya,” she said. “I’m traveling with Nikaenor and the others, who are also bearers, and we’re here for the godstone of Mirilina.”
Feldan stared at her like this was far more difficult to believe than that his own son might be a bearer. Feldan looked at Ronan, who stared defiantly back at his father. Perchaya held her breath, not sure what he was going to say. “The soldiers were here for you all, then.” His tone was tense, a string being pulled too tight.
Perchaya nodded. “Me. Kenton. Nikaenor. The other chosen.”
“And Daniella Diamis!” Ronan said. “I rubbed arms with a gods-damned princess.”
“Ronan,” Aralie said. “Watch your tongue.”
But Feldan looked far more stunned by the news than the swearing.
“Diamis’ daughter in my tavern?” he asked.
“She’s working with us,” Perchaya said. “She’s no threat.”
“Like hells.” Feldan’s hands balled into fists. “You all brought this down on us, bringing her here, and now my wife and my children—”
“We brought it on ourselves,” Ronan snapped. “By failing to resist.”
Feldan shot his son a look. “Hold your tongue. You don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“I’m talking about fighting,” Ronan said. “I’m talking about doing what has to be done.”
“Yes,” Perchaya said. “What needs to be done for all of them.” Perchaya was glad she was still wearing her long gloves over her Drimmish ring—she wasn’t sure Feldan would take any more kindly to having hosted a Drim than he did to Diamis’ daughter.
She was also glad for Ronan’s insistence. She would need help, and a lot of it. She was not a strong fighter and in previous battles had relied upon luck and instinct to survive. That wouldn’t be enough, now. Not if she wanted to bring the townspeople through this alive.
First, she would need to discover where the others were being held. “Where did all the soldiers come from?” Perchaya asked Feldan, who had turned away to glare at the basement food stores as if they, too, might be responsible for his family’s suffering. “Have they been here long? Do they have a camp? Or did they just appear tonight?”
Feldan turned back, still glaring, and shook his head. “I’d heard rumors of a few extra soldiers nosing around the docks, bothering the ship captains for their passenger registries. They had some descriptions of who they were looking for, but no one would tell them a thing. No one ever speaks to the soldiers in this town.”
He sounded proud of this. Perchaya was loath to correct him, but there was at least one person in town informing on them. She turned to Ronan. “Do you think there are others in the town who will join us?”
Ronan looked at his father, weighing the level of disapproval. Feldan’s face was all barely checked anger—he clearly didn’t like where this was going.
But Ronan must have decided he didn’t care.
“Yes,” Ronan said. “I know others who will fight. Especially after what happened here tonight. I heard the commotion on the street before I found you. They were beating down doors, searching houses. Everyone in Ithale will be in a rage.”
“Good,” Perchaya said. “Because we have to act immediately, before it’s too late.”
Nine
As Jaeme moved through the swamp, Daniella and Sayvil following behind, a heavy deadness hung around them, the only sounds of life the sucking of their feet pulling rhythmically up from the mud, punctuated by the occasional croak of a lone frog defying the smothering silence of the dank paths. The smell was thick in his lungs—of wet clothes left in a bunch overnight, of roots newly pulled from the dirt.
As they reached a cluster of rocks, Jaeme paused, letting the women catch up. They’d fallen behind him several paces, and Daniella had long since let go of his hand, even though he’d tried to pull the reeds aside in front of her consistently enough that she wouldn’t have to.
“Do we need to rest?” Jaeme asked.
Daniella sat down on a rock before she even answered. She wrapped her arms around herself. “I am definitely not dressed for this.”
None of them were, and the muck had soaked clean through Jaeme’s boots. He took a moment to smooth the top of a rock with his hands. The stone softened beneath his fingers, and he formed it into a seat and motioned for her to take it while he fashioned one for Sayvil a bit farther off. Finally, he made one next to Daniella for himself. He sat as close to Daniella as he could without shoving her off the rock.
He looked over at Sayvil, noticing her torch growing dim. “Do you have any oil for that?”
Sayvil shook her head. “I’d thought to buy some in Ithale. Didn’t expect to be leaving so soon.”
Now that they had stopped, Jaeme heard noises in the swamp, beyond the hum of the insects. Somewhere off to his left, a low sound like a creaking floorboard set the hairs on the back of his neck on end.
“It’s a frog,” Daniella said. Then, less certain. “Isn’t it?”
“Well, it isn’t a legendary Nichtee,” Jaeme said. “I’m confident of that much.”
Daniella jumped at another noise behind them, this one different, starting with a flat hum and opening into an “oh” before ending with the harsh hiss.
“Here,” Sayvil said, reaching out for a reed and pulling it from the foliage. “These burn, if they’re mature enough.” She held it to the torch, and sure enough, the thing burst into flame, then settled to a deep ember, giving off light. “They won’t last long,” Sayvil said. “I’ll go see if I can find some more. And maybe some whistlemoss. We’re going to need a good disinfectant in the morning, if we don’t want our feet to rot in our boots before we arrive in Haidshir.”
She handed Jaeme the proper torch and headed off through the muck, glowing reed in hand. Jaeme was glad for a second source of light, though he hoped it wasn’t theirs that ran out first.
Jaeme let out a long sigh and ran a hand through his damp hair before returning his arm to rest on his knee. Daniella shivered beside him, the skirt of her thin nightdress soaked through with swamp muck, and he wished he had a cloak or a blanket, anything to offer her besides his own thin shirt. She must be as tired as he was, or more so, being unused to this kind of travel.
Not that Jaeme had spent a lot of his life pressing through swampland.
Jaeme shifted closer to Daniella, and their arms touched. He gave her a moment to pull away, but she didn’t, so he reached out and put an arm around her, pulling her against him.
She leaned into him rather than away, and Jaeme smiled.
After several moments of silence, Sayvil gasped, somewhere off to their left.
Jaeme jumped immediately to his feet, heart pounding. “Sayvil?” he called. “What is it?”
“Gods, that can’t be . . .”
Jaeme’s blood went cold, and then Sayvil let out a shriek that sounded oddly . . . excited. “It’s plianth leaf! It’s here! I’d recognize the leaf-pattern anywhere. It’s very distinct, but I’ve never been able to locate it . . . and here it is!” She practically giggled with glee, and Jaeme wondered if that burning marsh reed contained some kind of hallucinogen.
