Aidan tried not to tense. If she lied and said yes, that could be easily checked into, especially by someone of this lady’s status. If Slaíne told the truth….
Slaíne spoke. “Nay, ma’am.” Here she leaned in and said in a conspiratorial voice, “It’s been my experience that foreigners ain’t treated none so well in these parts.” She pulled back. “Besides, I did not know who I should report the robbery to.”
The two guards, who had been standing at full attention when their superior arrived, now were fully at ease, shifting their weight from side to side and throwing muttered insults at each other. Their mistress ignored them.
The woman’s age was impossible to gauge from her face, though the slight strain in her voice put her, in Aidan’s estimate, in her forties. From what he made out in his short glimpse of her, the woman seemed in decent physical shape and could easily pose a threat if Slaíne were to engage her, which he prayed she would not. A moment of awkward silence passed, and Aidan knew Slaíne should be the one introducing herself. This could be going much better than it was. “Pray, forgive me. I have not yet introduced myself. I am Lady Dewhurst.”
“Milady.” Slaíne made a half curtsy, but did not introduce herself.
“And your name might be…?”
“Slaíne Cuthbert, milady.”
There was a small pause. “Welcome to the heart of Breckstone, Miss Cuthbert. Are you in possession of anything I should know about?”
“Milady?”
“Are you carrying arms? You know, swords, daggers, and the like.”
Slaíne gave out a short laugh. “If I did, we would nay have run afoul of those highwaymen, I dare say. And I would think me clothes would be baggier.”
Lady Dewhurst returned the laugh, though it was twice as short and more than affected. With care, Aidan monitored the lady’s Pull and the Pull of her clothes and the possessions she carried on her. Lady Dewhurst, it would seem, carried nothing openly. But with a little probing, Aidan felt the repulsion he was expecting but dreading: iron. From the size, he would hazard to guess it was a small dirk in its sheath, and it was strapped to her ankle. He should be in little danger from her. Well, unless she bent down on whatever pretense she might assemble.
“Very well. I assume I won’t have to search you. Only your man.”
Aidan willed Slaíne not to react.
“Rutherford has nothing to hide.” Even as she said it, the two guardsmen of the Dewhurst estate stepped forward, kicking up dust as they came.
Aidan remained calm and still, trying to affect a resigned, servile manner. These thugs had several weapons apiece, as he had observed, and, unlike earlier, the swords and daggers could not be dealt with by Dismissal…not in front of the wife of the man who was after his blood.
The one on the left slammed into Aidan, causing him to lose his balance and his footing and topple to the ground. He shielded his face as they jumped him.
All the while as they searched him with unnecessary roughness, Slaíne remained silent, just as he would have wished her to. Putting up a fuss over a mere servant would not serve them well in the long run.
It was when they’d searched him once through and through and they started the search all over again, that Slaíne did speak up.
“Are we quite finished here?” Her words were laced with disdain with an undercurrent of boredom. “Really, you’d a’think they’s afraid of one scrawny, unarmed manservant.”
To Aidan’s surprise, the men got to their feet, giving Aidan a light kick apiece before returning to their mistress’s side. “He’s clear, milady.”
Aidan knew he was going to feel the effects of their near-brutal search later, but he feigned indifference as he scrambled to his feet, still keeping his gaze downcast.
“Well,” said Lady Dewhurst. “I apologize for any misconduct on my men’s part. They are, after all, just men and can’t always control themselves.”
“Quite.” The tone was polite enough, though Aidan could tell that she was fuming inwardly.
“My husband and I were just sitting down for our mid-morning tea, Miss Cumber.”
“Cuthbert,” Slaíne put in.
“Rather. If you would like to go around back to the kitchen, Cook should have something to refresh you.”
This was it. This was their chance. Aidan tried not to get overly excited or anxious; any reaction on his part could send things spiraling out of control quickly. Instead, he contented himself with staring at Slaíne’s boots.
“That would be lovely. Thank ye for yer kindness, Mrs. Dewhurst.”
Aidan winced. It was an obvious slight Slaíne had just made, addressing the woman by a lower rank. Lady Dewhurst, however, seemed to be ignoring it.
“Have you no horses?”
“Goblins ate him.”
“Oh, how vulgar.” A pause. “Him? You only had one horse?”
The ladies’ Pulls moved out of the woodsy area, and the two guards stalked off into the bracken. Aidan followed after Slaíne, keeping a respectable distance.
“No, the horse what was eaten were mine. The others could nay be spared.”
Slaíne was better at lying than he at first thought she would be. That put him in mind: Had she been lying about anything to him, and if so, would he be able to discern it? But he was getting distracted. Shutting out Slaíne’s Pull, Aidan reached out and explored the manor, which he had not set foot in for around two decades.
There were many human Pulls concealed within and scattered without. He felt Dewhurst’s moving to and fro in one long line. That concerned Aidan for a moment, for a pacing man was an indecisive man, and an indecisive man was a worried man. Did he suspect Aidan’s presence? No, he was getting ahead of himself. He’d better attend to the bigger threat he was sensing: repulsions. Beneath his boots, concealed deep within the earth, he at once felt as though he were not fighting gravity so hard, that he was being pushed away from the earth. To his wonder, Slaíne did not seem all too steady on her feet either, which distracted him yet again. Did iron affect her abilities as well?
He had just wondered this when the ladies came to a halt.
“The kitchen is around back. Welcome to Dewhurst Manor.”
“I’m much obliged, I’m sure,” said Slaíne in the same forcedly civilized tongue as their host.
Aidan rolled his eyes at the ground as Lady Dewhurst’s Pull retired inside the house and Slaíne’s moved forward and to the right.
“Stuck-up,” Slaíne said a little too loudly.
Aidan resisted the urge to hush her. He followed her to the back of the house, all the while feeling the repulsion of the metal beneath. Dewhurst must be expecting him someday, why else would he outfit everything with iron? It occurred to him, though, that if the metal affected both him and Slaíne, two so-called ‘Blest’, why wouldn’t it affect the seer, Larkin? She had, after all, been in servitude to Dewhurst for goodness knows how long. Aidan was missing a piece, a vital piece, but he could not wrap his head around the situation. Slaíne’s Pull and the iron’s repulsion proved too much of a distraction, and he could scarce think.
Servants scurried here and there, paying the two strangers little to no mind. Some carried laundry baskets, the contents of which they hung on a line, while others carried dead chickens by the feet, and others still buckets of water and armfuls of wood.
Slaíne led the way to the kitchen with little difficulty. She gave Aidan a look over her shoulder that said, “How do you want to do this?” But he shook his head; he was still making a plan, having not expected to be received at all into Dewhurst Manor, least of all through the kitchen. An idea struck him, however, when one of the maids dropped her share of firewood.
“Oh, blast,” she swore, swiping at her sooty brow.
Aidan took a chance. “Mightn’t I help you with that?” he said, tweaking his dialect yet again to match hers.
The woman, apparently exhausted, nodded. “Just put it by the stove, and make sure to stack it neatly. Cook’ll have yourn hide if’n you don’t.”
Aidan bobbed his head and retrieved the scattered logs from the ground, and the kitchen maid scuttled off on her harried way. Arms full, he nodded at Slaíne, who followed him into the busy kitchen. The cook, or one of the cook’s helpers, was laboring over an enormous iron pot and was too busy to notice two strangers slip into her domain. And to make things even better, the din was extraordinary. Banging pots and pans, sizzling skillets, crackling fires, clacking knives, and the chatter caused quite the racket and masked Aidan’s words to Slaíne. “Stay in the kitchen. If anything goes wrong on my end, I’ll give you a Tug. If anything goes wrong here—”
“I’ll move for the door, and you’ll feel the change in my Pull.”
Aidan nodded.
“What’re you dawdling for? Put the logs where they belong,” barked a matronly woman with a tray of burnt vittles, which she thrust at Slaíne. “I s’pose you’re the wandering woman who expects tea, even though it might be putting us out of ’ouse and ’ome.”
Aidan gave Slaíne a look that he hoped conveyed the message, ‘Behave yourself,’ stacked the wood, and found the servants’ staircase, which he assumed would lead him into a network of other staircases, one of which would hopefully lead him to Dewhurst’s study – wherever that might be.
He met no one on the first stair, which led him to a landing. The landing was occupied by two women who were puffing pipe smoke like dragons and tearing the master of the house to shreds with their tongues. They were dressed well enough for servants, both in black dresses with white aprons. Aidan assumed they would ask him where he was going, they being in a more authoritative position than the woman whose wood he’d carried. If they did stop him, he had an answer ready.
But it turned out that he needed no excuse. The two women spared him but a moment’s glance before going back to their gossip.
Mindful that Slaíne’s Pull remained stationed about where he had left her, Aidan mounted the next staircase, which was to the left and behind him. The stairs were worn from much use, and here he ran into more servants, swearing at him for getting in their way. Still no one stopped him.
He was still on the back side of the house, the servants’ network of stairs and passageways. Dewhurst’s study might be this high up, if Dewhurst were a traditional man and liked to do things fashionably. If not…well, Aidan would check the floors below and the one above as well.
This landing was deserted. He could feel the Pulls and repulsions below, distant tugs at his person, besides Slaíne’s tug at his core, but hers he was growing accustomed to. Aidan reached out and felt for human Pulls on this level of the house. There were none. Then he concentrated and discerned bits of iron repelling him from here and there, nothing larger than a penknife. But he did not allow himself to breathe easy.
Through warped glass windows, he heard busy chattering in the yard. He spared one look through the pane, satisfied himself that no alarm was being sounded, and moved with purpose through a dark, narrow doorway, which led him into the living part of the manor.
The place was resplendent, full of rich and beautiful tapestries, a glass chandelier that extended from the ceiling and down the length of a grand, weaving staircase not five yards ahead. Again he paused, felt for human Pulls and found none but two solitary ones on the floor below him. He’d best tread with a lighter foot than he had done so far.
Aidan ignored the human Pulls for a moment, then reached out and felt for paper, oilskin, and even leather Pulls. The room heaviest with paper Pulls came from the far end of the hall. He would check there first, work his way back as quietly as he was able, checking each room through the keyhole. Opening many doors would increase the risk of making too much noise and getting caught.
He took a steadying breath and began. The room at the end of the hall, the twelfth door on this level, was full of papers, stacked from floor to ceiling. He would never sort through all of this without getting caught, so despite what he’d planned earlier, he found every paper and oilskin Pull in the room and Dismissed them all. Hopefully, by the time someone discovered them missing, Aidan and Slaíne would be long gone. Just to be certain, he felt for iron repulsions that might be concealing something. He felt none and moved on.
The next room was a guest bedroom. He doubted Dewhurst would store anything of importance in there, but just to be certain, he checked for Pulls and repulsions. There was some paper, which he Dismissed, but no repulsions.
Aidan went on like this for every room. He’d been so preoccupied with his task that he’d forgotten to pay attention to the two human Pulls on the floor below him. Alarmed, he reached out, and felt that they had retreated down to ground level.
Aidan checked on Slaíne’s Pull. A second, unfamiliar Pull was sitting or standing stationary next to hers. This would be normal, he reassured himself, seeing as the kitchen had been in a frenzied state of preparation. Besides, Slaíne seemed to have the wits to handle herself. Aidan moved on.
With care, he crept back down the servants’ staircase and made his way to the next floor. Again he met no human Pulls.
Encouraged by this, he began the process all over again, starting at the far end of the hall and working his way back. Most of the rooms were bedrooms that held little to no paper, but consistently more iron. It was the last door, the door next to the servants’ entrance that he knew to be Dewhurst’s study via a look through the keyhole.
He tried the door. It was locked. Aidan felt for iron in the lock’s innermost parts. There was none. He was about to Dismiss parts of the lock, but hesitated. If he Dismissed the parts of the lock into Nothingness, he could Summon them back, but there would be no replacing them within the mechanism. In short, Dewhurst would know that his lock had been tampered with by supernatural means. He would know an enemy was near.
Again he felt for Pulls, sensed just one below him on the next floor, but now there were three on the floor above him, the one he had quit ten minutes before. He’d better move more quickly.
Aidan closed his eyes and felt for something in Nothingness that might serve to pick the lock. Nothing. If only he had thought to purchase and Dismiss a few women’s hairpins into his cache. No time for regrets now.
Opening his eyes, Aidan felt first for iron repulsions. There was a large one, right in the middle of the room, low, perhaps below the floorboards. A safe? Aidan wondered. He wouldn’t doubt it. This had to be where the map was hidden. Aidan needed to get into that room.
Aidan went ahead and Dismissed the inside of the lock, turned the knob, and stepped inside Dewhurst’s office. It was a cluttered room, something that surprised Aidan. Papers stacked high up to the ceiling, boxes of what felt like different metals in various shapes and volumes, and a neat shelf of books, all covered in dust. “Hmm.” Aidan focused on those immediately. Dewhurst, as far as Aidan knew, was not a learned man. It was no wonder the volumes were dusty. And yet…something was off about them.
He knew he might as well do the job thoroughly, so he Dismissed all the papers in the room, excluding the pages of the books. In the back of his mind he noted that there were fewer Pulls in the kitchen downstairs. Slaíne’s Pull and the stranger’s Pull remained in the same spot.
Concentrating was taking an effort, as the powers he’d used thus far had muddied his thinking. Paper was, as objects went, not too substantial and should not cause so much mental exhaustion…when Dismissed, Summoned, or Called in small batches. He’d probably taken care of at least thirty dictionaries’ worth of paper into Nothingness. The mere suggestion of the thought put a heavy weight on Aidan’s mind, and it was with difficulty that he returned to task.
Those books were off. The first shelf, the topmost one, was covered in dust, and there were no strange Pulls coming from their pages. The second shelf was the sa
me. But the third shelf looked cleaner than the others. Aidan glanced at the titles of the books: they were old with worn binding, their gilt letters fading into oblivion. He picked one up and turned the page. Durgo the Cunning’s Rise and Subsequent Downfall: A Historical Account. Unknowledgeable as to whom this Durgo the Cunning might be, Aidan replaced the book and again reached out with power and felt a small iron repulsion. Blinking, he ran his hand along the books until he found the source: a small iron key, which had been tucked inside the spine binding of the second-to-last book on the right.
Wasting no time, Aidan seized the key and Dismissed the rug covering the metal repulsion in the floor. He paused a moment, listening and reaching out for human Pulls. There was no one on the floor below him anymore, so he Dismissed the floorboards and found the source of the repulsions. It was a small iron safe box, about the size of Aidan’s torso. He got onto his hands and knees and tried the key, which clicked the lock open. Something in Aidan’s mind screamed, Too easy! but he ignored the warning bells and removed the oilskins inside. Several maps with the vaguest of hints scrawled in the legends. “This must be it,” he muttered, Dismissing the lot of them.
He’d taken enough time. Slaíne would be getting worried. Aidan did not bother Summoning the floorboards or the rug; he might drop them by accident, thus making enough noise to draw unwanted attention. So he crept out of the room, shut the door, mindful of human Pulls, and returned to the servants’ side of the upstairs. They might have to run fast and hard, but somehow Aidan thought not. Everything was going well.
He was on the second stairway leading down when he felt human Pulls fast approaching. He could retreat back up the stairs and hide behind a curtain, but if he were caught hiding, that would for certain raise the alarm. If only he could think straight! He could not Dismiss himself, lest he risk the wrath of the curse that bound Slaíne to himself, could not Summon the silver sword lest…. It was too late. The two women were upon him. They were the servants he had seen gossiping earlier, and this time they regarded him with a wary eye.
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