“Can I do it honorably working with the executioner?”
“A man like that has a connection to the city. That’s what you need to take advantage of.”
Finn wasn’t sure how to respond. “What were they going to tell me about Meyer? I saw you and the King sharing a look. There’s something you uncovered about him. If it involves me, it matters. Come on, Oscar. You forget I’m the one who taught you how to read people. I saw the way you fidgeted when the King asked you for details about the hangman.”
Oscar shot him an annoyed look. Finn didn’t need his lessons to recognize it. “Listen. Ask your master what happens if you fail.”
“Why? You know something, Oscar. You need to tell me what it is.”
“Wolf didn’t share all of it. Only that there are repercussions if you fail. I heard him and the King talking about it. Just ask him.”
Finn waited for Oscar to say more, but he didn’t. “Why do I get the sense that whatever job the King was talking about in the Wenderwolf will be difficult?”
“You already know the answer to that. I don’t know all the details yet. Only that it’s big.”
“Bigger than what we attempted at the viscount’s home?”
“Bigger than that.”
Meyer would need to know. That was how Finn could protect the crew now. Maybe he could save them from themselves.
“I’m worried that you’re a crucial part of whatever they intend to do.” Oscar flicked his gaze past him. Finn followed the direction of his gaze, looking into the distance, trying to see just what was that he saw. Was that movement? “It’s why you need to keep away from the tavern. I know the Wenderwolf is familiar. Gods know I know that. And you want to see your friends. But for now, you’re going to be better off staying away.”
“I can help the crew—”
Finn cut off, realizing that he had seen shadowy movement.
At first, he thought that it was the King and Wolf, but there were only two, and he heard the thudding of boots over the cobblestones, a mistake he knew Wolf especially was far too skilled to make.
Archers.
Finn glanced over to Oscar. “Go. See if you can’t figure out what happened to my sister. When I went there earlier, she was gone. I’m worried that whatever she did for the hegen has gotten her into trouble.”
Oscar frowned at him. “We can look for Lena together.”
Finn shook his head. “I don’t need to.”
“You don’t have to get yourself in trouble because of me again,” Oscar said.
“Who said I was going to get myself into trouble? Didn’t you say that I have a different life now?”
Finn pushed Oscar behind him. Oscar slipped off, heading away and down the alley. Finn could hear him for a moment, but then it disappeared.
He stepped forward, raising his hands.
The Archers approached. “What are you doing out?”
“I’m Finn Jagger, apprenticed to Master Meyer.”
He wasn’t sure whether that would even work, but their demeanor changed immediately at the mention of Meyer’s name.
“The hangman sent you out? I didn’t even know he had an apprentice,” one of the men said.
It was dark, and it was difficult to see much about the man’s features. He had one hand on the hilt of his sword, and his helm concealed most of his features.
“Sure. After the Lion died—” Finn started.
“Not died. Was killed. That’s what we’re looking for. You can tell Master Meyer that we’re searching for those responsible for killing his apprentice.”
Finn nodded slowly. “I will tell him.”
“It’s awfully late,” the shorter of the two Archers said. “Why are you out?”
“Because Master Meyer sent me.”
The two men shared a look.
“Listen. If you’d like to follow me back to his home to ask him yourself, you’re more than welcome to. You can tell him how you’ve been searching for his apprentice’s killer.”
“Maybe we should do that. The viscount has wanted results. We got to uphold the damn curfew. We don’t get paid enough for that.”
“We’re going to be better off by making sure.” The other Archer looked over to Finn, and he shrugged. “You understand, don’t you?”
“I understand. I can’t help that you’ll be wasting your time, but…” He smiled.
In the distance, he caught sight of movement. Darkened shapes. Three figures.
The crew.
“You can come with me or not.”
They nodded, and Finn turned, heading along the street. He cast a glance down the street, looking toward the King and Wolf—able to see Wolf the best, given his clothing—before hurrying forward. The Archers kept pace.
It didn’t take long for Finn to lose the crew. He didn’t think the King would bother following, anyway, especially considering the Archers with him. By the time he reached the small home, he pulled the gate open, headed through the narrow garden, and opened the door.
The Archers waited on the doorstep. “You really are his apprentice?”
Finn nodded.
“We don’t need to disturb Master Meyer. Good luck,” the other man said.
Finn waited until they were gone before stepping inside, closing the door behind him, and leaning on it for a moment to catch his breath.
As he gathered his thoughts, he noticed a lantern light at the end of the hall, coming from the healing room.
He headed toward it quietly, and when he reached it, he paused for a moment to listen. There were no voices from inside. No sound of anything to suggest anyone was there.
“You can come in, Finn.”
Finn stepped in and found Meyer sitting at his desk, a stack of papers in front of him.
“What happens if I fail in my training?”
Meyer looked up. “What was that?”
“If I fail. What happens?”
“I will ensure you won’t fail.”
“There’s a consequence, isn’t there?”
Meyer nodded slowly. “There is.”
“Why don’t you want to tell me what it is? Will I be sent back to the Stone and hanged?”
“Not alone.”
“What do you mean?”
Meyer leaned forward, resting his hand on the desk, covering up the papers. “By exerting the Executioner’s Right, I pinned my fate to yours.”
The words took a moment for them to sink in for Finn. “You mean—”
“I mean that if you fail, I will join you on the Raven Stone.”
Finn stared at him for a moment. “Why would you do that?”
“My reasons are my own.”
“How long do I have?”
“You don’t need to worry about that.”
“How long?”
“You have until the Executioner Court.”
“What is that?”
“That is a gathering of others empowered by the crown to fulfill his justice.”
“Other executioners.”
“Yes.”
“They will gather and decide my fate?”
“They will gather and decide both of our fates.”
“And what do I need to do to pass?”
“That is up to the court to decide. I don’t expect you to be competent to carry out all aspects of the job before you are presented to the court, but you must have a passing familiarity with them. The testing is meant to be difficult and to prove you have worked to understand all that’s involved in serving as an executioner. It will be difficult, which is why it’s my responsibility to ensure you are ready.”
There was a moment of silence between them. “Why?”
“Why what?”
“Why did you pick me?”
Meyer held his gaze for a moment before turning his attention down to the stack of pages. “Continue your studies, Finn. Tomorrow will be another long day.”
If Finn didn’t pass this testing, then something was going to happen to him and Meyer.
Only the gods knew what would happen to his sister and mother then. And then there was his crew and the jobs they were pulling. Finn wanted to protect them, too.
How could he do it all without disappointing someone, or worse—ending up swinging on the Raven Stone?
Chapter Eighteen
The next few days went quickly.
Finn focused on his studies, working through everything Meyer gave him to learn as much as possible, trying to keep his mind off of what his crew might be doing. For the most part, days were spent on errands with Meyer, visiting prisons, questioning prisoners, and then studying in the evening while practicing knots. He hadn’t gone back to the Wenderwolf, though partly that was because he’d been busy. Rock would be angry, but hopefully he’d understand the next time Finn made it to the tavern.
There hadn’t been an execution in the time that he’d been working with Meyer. For that, Finn was thankful.
It was late, and he looked up from the book spread out on the desk in front of him. The book of anatomy was complicated, showing vessels and organs and bones that each had names, and he found himself trying to master what was depicted on the pages but struggling. He couldn’t shake feeling as if he were going to anger Meyer by being inadequately prepared.
There were now three other books stacked on the desk. Each of them was a volume Meyer wanted him to work through and master, but he’d barely gotten far with the anatomy book. How was he supposed to have the time needed to get into the others?
Finn rubbed his eyes, leaning back. This wasn’t at all what he thought that he’d be doing when working with Meyer. In a way, it was better. At least it was interesting.
He thought of what Oscar had said about boredom. There was no way for Finn to be bored when he was trying to learn anatomy like this. He had far too much he was expected to master.
Getting up, Finn headed out into the hall and heard voices near the back room. He paused there for a moment, listening, and heard Meyer with another customer seeking his healing. They always came late at night, never early in the day, though that made a certain sort of sense.
“How will I know it works?” a rough voice said.
“The head pain will begin to ease. The rest will be…”
Finn lost what Meyer said about the last, hearing nothing more than murmuring.
Meyer had moved closer to the door, and he seemed to position himself so that he blocked Finn from hearing anything else.
Why would Meyer want privacy with this?
He could remain there and see what more he might be able to observe, but that risked irritating him. So far, Meyer hadn’t welcomed him to any of his healing sessions. He kept Finn apart from that, though he had been willing to have Finn with him for other aspects.
Finn lingered near the door for a few moments, listening to see if there might be something that he could hear. If he was to be Meyer’s assistant, he needed to better understand what Meyer did and how he helped others. His interest in staying there was more than that, though. Partly, it was because he wanted to know just what it was that Meyer did. Partly, it was because this was the part of his job that Finn actually enjoyed. He might even tell Meyer what he feared with the Client and his role in the attacks in the city.
The door shut in front of him, and Finn stood for a moment.
He turned, heading back toward the room. The lantern on the desk called to him, as did the book—along with the other books he still had yet to start.
Finn sighed.
He was tired. The days had been long, and he knew he should return to his studies or even head to sleep, but neither of them were things that he really wanted to do just yet.
He stepped out of the home, standing at the threshold for a moment before closing the door behind him. Out in the garden, the smells of the flowers that drifted to him on the faint breeze in the night reminded him of Helda. Finn breathed it in, enjoying the scents around him, and looked toward the darkened gate.
It might be late, but with his role serving Master Meyer, he no longer had to fear being out in the city at night the way that he once did. Finn decided to search for his sister and check on his mother. He’d been checking each day, feeding her and making sure she got the concoction Meyer made for her and hadn’t known how often Lena had been there.
He hurried to the streets, glancing all around him as he walked, but he didn’t see anyone else out. He made his way to the Brinder section as quickly as he could.
By the time he reached it, a tension had begun to build within him. Strange that he would feel that sort of tension in the streets when he had always enjoyed being out at night before.
Of course, when he had been out at night before, there had been the thrill of fearing that he might get caught but the excitement of knowing he did something he wasn’t supposed to. Finn had rarely been caught. He usually escaped, disappearing down alleys. Now, even though he didn’t worry about the Archers, he still felt afraid.
Why would that be?
When he reached his home, he knocked briefly. It wouldn’t do for him to scare his sister. Finn stood for a moment, waiting by the door, listening for sounds of movement inside.
There was nothing.
He knocked again.
Lights in some of the nearby homes told him that other people were up. There was enough crime in the section that the people there would fear he was doing something that he should not.
Finn tested the door.
It was unlocked.
That was strange as well.
He stepped inside and immediately noted the smell in the home that seemed worse each time he came to visit.
Closing the door behind him, he fumbled around until he found a lantern on the table in the home's front entryway. When he got the lantern lit, Finn held it up, swinging around to look whether anything had changed since he last been there.
There was no sign of Lena.
“Lena?”
There was no response.
Finn carried the lantern through the home, making his way toward his mother’s room.
When he stopped in the doorway, he found her lying partially covered. It might be his imagination, but it seemed as if she didn’t sweat quite as much as she had before. She moved more as well, her legs twitching.
He stepped toward her and noted how she gripped the sheet in one of her hands, squeezing it. Finn pulled the chair toward her and sat down next to her, taking her other hand. He squeezed. “I’m here, Mother.”
Her head turned toward him.
Could she hear me?
In all the times that he had come to visit his mother recently, there had never been a response from her. This was new.
Had it been what he had given her, or had it been what the hegen had offered Lena?
Finn didn’t have any idea, but he didn’t think it was his imagination his mother had turned toward the sound of his voice.
“It’s Finn. I’m here,” he said.
There wasn’t any further movement that would suggest she could hear him. He sat there for a few moments, just holding onto her hand, waiting for there to be some other sign that she had heard him, but there wasn’t anything.
After a while, Finn got up. He looked around the inside of his mother’s room. The tray next to the bed was empty, and he had to wonder if Lena had been there recently to feed her. He didn’t see anything that she would have offered. Unless Lena had been and had cleaned it up.
There wasn’t any medicine, either.
Finn still had the vial of medicine that Meyer had given him to use on her, and he unstoppered it before giving her a few drops of the liquid. It wasn’t as much as what Meyer had wanted, or as frequent, so Finn didn’t know if it would even work.
When he was done, he headed back out toward the kitchen, where he looked around. There wasn’t a sign of Lena. He quickly put the dirty dishes away and then took a seat at the table. It was his home, but it didn’t feel like his home anymore.
It was a strange feeling. He’d been awa
y from here for so long that he no longer knew what to call it. His mother’s home? His sister’s?
Where was Lena, anyway?
Finn carried the lantern back toward the main part of the house and started heading into the other room when there was a knock at the door.
He made his way toward the door carefully. “Who is it?”
“It’s Helda. I saw the light and—”
Finn pulled the door open to see Helda standing in the street. A dark cloak wrapped around her shoulders. Worry lined her face.
“Finn.”
He smiled, but it faltered when she didn’t return it. “You look disappointed.”
“Is Lena here?”
She tried looking past him.
He shook his head. “I don’t know. I was looking for her.”
“What do you mean, you don’t know?”
“I just got here. She’s not back with Mother and not in the kitchen…”
Were she there, she would have come out after having heard him and Helda talking.
“This isn’t like her,” Helda said. “I haven’t seen her for a while. After you saw me the last time, I started to keep an eye out for her. Something hasn’t been right with her. She…”
“What is it?” Finn asked.
Helda looked up at him. “She’s been struggling, Finn. I think she’s gone to a dark place. I’ve never seen Lena like that. With your mother getting weaker, and her trying to work…” She shook her head. “I tried to get her to talk with you. Work with you even. She deserves better.”
Finn swallowed. “I should’ve been there for her.”
“She knows you’re trying.”
Finn looked up. It was strange to have Helda trying to reassure him.
“I need to try harder,” he said.
“If anything happened to her, I want to help. I can help you look tomorrow.”
“You’d help me?” He didn’t mean it to come off the way he knew it sounded.
Helda didn’t seem to notice. “For Lena. I’m worried, Finn. The city isn’t safe. Lena told me what she heard at work. There have been attacks outside the walls. The gods know Lena of all people needs to be careful.”
“Why Lena, of all people?” It wasn’t the question he wanted to ask, and he was tempted to argue with Helda, but this was his sister, and he owed it to her to help.
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