The Dagger's Path

by Glenda Larke

  He shrugged. “I’m still going to follow ’em.”

  She drew in a deep breath to control her building exasperation. “As you wish. I can’t stop you; it is a public way.”

  He nodded.

  “There’s a shrine further up, isn’t there?” she asked.

  “Yes. The Oak on the Clouds. Da and me stopped there awhiles. We should reach it this morning.”

  He drained the rest of the gruel and handed back the cup. This time when their gazes met, she thought his eyes looked dead. He sat and drew on the boots, wincing in pain at every move. She had to suppress a shudder. Beggar me speechless, how had he ever found the nerve to pull his father’s feet out of them?

  She bent to help him do up the laces.

  The time for speed would only come once she was in a position to overtake the men, so when she mounted up, she let her horse amble. She kept her eyes on the track ahead, until she reached the first curve and could not resist peeking over her shoulder. Peregrine was trudging after her.

  She continued on around the bend.

  Another hundred paces further along, she reined in, her thoughts jumbled. Why couldn’t the wretched dewberry do the sensible thing and just go on to Twite where he’d be safe? She didn’t want to be responsible for him! Yes, he’d had an unspeakable thing happen to him, but it wasn’t her fault. And she had work to do.

  Leak on the fool-born lad!

  Urging the horse into a walk once more, she rode around one more bend, then sighed and stopped. This time, she was more annoyed with herself than with Peregrine.

  Rot you, Gerelda Brantheld. You are better than this. What a rattle-brain she was to think she could just ride away.

  When Peregrine reached her side, he stopped, squinting up at her out of his puffy, scratched face, his good arm supporting his elbow on his injured side, his eyes dulled with pain.

  “Can you ride?” she asked, dismounting.

  “Never been on a horse. Used to ride Tucker sometimes, though.”

  “Well, you’re going to ride now. I’ll help you up, and I’ll lead the mount.”

  If he tried to hide the pain he felt climbing into the saddle, he failed miserably. By the time he was seated, he was white-faced and shaken. He did not, however, complain. He had mettle; she had to admit that.

  She took the reins and plodded up through the mist that thickened as they climbed higher. And all the while, she silently cursed the mud, fate and that toadspotted whoreson, Valerian Fox, the pizzle of a man probably responsible for all this horror, if she had the right of it. She hadn’t wanted to believe it, but the evidence was growing.

  Your reverence, you aren’t going to like any of this…

  She’d heard about the shrine under the lip of the pass, although she hadn’t been sure why it was called the Oak on the Clouds until they emerged from the fog of the forested slopes into the clear air of mountain meadows and serrated crags. Ahead the peaks soared into cloudless blue sky, and to the right of the track were the sunlit crown and branches of the shrine-oak. The base of the shrine was still mired in ground mist melting away but slowly in the chill air. She halted, awed by the ethereal beauty of an age-old oak, floating on cloud.

  She snorted. Getting soft in your old age, Gerelda? Fobbing shrine keeper has probably been murdered.

  Although doubtless the Pontifect would disagree, she was by no means sure that a pretty oak and its guardian would save a Shenat elder of Va-faith if the men who ate Perie’s father decided otherwise.

  “We’ll rest there awhile,” she said, pushing the thought away. “The horse needs to graze and you and I need to eat something better than gruel.”

  “We ate here, my da and me.” He paused for a moment, leading her to wonder if he had the same thought she’d had about the shrine keeper’s safety. When he spoke again, it was to change the subject. “Why do you ride a mare? My da used to say owning a jenny was never worth the trouble.”

  “I paid for a witchery from a shrine keeper over in Staravale horse country. He made sure she never comes into season.”

  “Oh! What’s her name? You never call her anything.”

  “I never name my mounts. Why should I? I know which animal I’m riding. I’ve had this mare four years. She’s a good beast. Never lets me down.”

  He looked at her in amazement. “I’ve never met anyone before who didn’t give their horse a name.”

  “I’m not sentimental,” she said with an indifferent shrug. “I’ve never understood the desire folk have to name their animals. They don’t care.”

  “Tucker knew his name,” he said, and for a moment his composure slipped. A tear trickled down his dirty cheek and he wiped it away with the back of his hand. “He cared.”

  “Well. All right. Maybe.”

  As they approached closer and the mist dissipated, she saw the shrine building was simple, hardly more than a few pillars and a sod roof of meadow grass encircling the free-standing trunk of the oak. When they reached it, she helped Peregrine to the ground. He didn’t make a sound although dismounting left him white-faced. Tying the reins to the saddle, she loosed the mare into the meadow. “What’s the name of the shrine keeper?” she asked.

  “Red Trefoil. Those men were here; I can taste the smudge of them. They might’ve killed him.”

  Gerelda had already noted that the ground in front of the shrine was churned up with footprints and hoofprints. She ducked under the drooping branches of the oak to step inside the building.

  “Va’s blessings,” she called out. “Is there anyone there?”

  Beside her, Peregrine gasped. “The tree! Look at the trunk.”

  The bark of the oak had been slashed and scored, as if several men had attempted to chop it down with axes too blunt for the task. The scarred trunk was scorched black, the bark freshly charred in places, the smell of burning still pungent. Someone also had tried–and failed–to set the tree alight.

  Her heart skipped a beat. If she’d needed confirmation of the kind of men they’d been following, she had it. No one ever harmed a shrine oak. Va rot you, Valerian Fox, if this is your doing. You are a canker on the face of the earth.

  “No need to put yourself in a fidget, lass!” a kindly voice said from above her head.

  She looked up to see an old man sitting on a bough above. No, not old, ancient. His skin was rough as tree bark, his hands and his face as knobbled as oak galls.

  “The oak will heal,” he said. “And I’m not so easily slaughtered neither. Sorry to be giving ye a startle; I just popped up there in case your intentions were of nefarious inclination.”

  “Do you need some help to come down?” she asked, eyeing the aged fragility of his arms and legs with concern.

  He laughed, a quavering cackle of mirth that just reinforced her impression of great age, and swung down unaided to the ground with supple ease. “I’m a mite chary of trail folk after the last passel of miscreants,” he said, regarding her with rheumy eyes. “But ye’re appearing harmless enough.”

  “What happened?” she asked.

  “Evil men with A’Va-dark souls paid a visit. They thought to destroy the shrine and kill its shrine keeper. But the oak protects its own. Those seeking to harm the sacred oft end up scored with their own axes. Those seeking to burn sacred wood are in turn singed. Those seeking a shrine keeper, murder in their hearts, cannot see their quarry hiding in the sacred tree.” He gave a sly grin. “It was a cheery sight to see them flee, to be sure.”

  “I rejoice to hear it.” She eyed him cautiously, having trouble reconciling his agility with his appearance. “I’ve heard that shrine keepers died by the number when the Horned Death visited the Shenat Hills. The oak didn’t do much to protect those holy men and women then.”

  The smile vanished from his face. “Evil deeds, indeed.”

  “I heard shrine keepers don’t die of the Horned Death in Lowmeer.”

  “Makes ye wonder about the nature of the Death, don’t it? Mayhap it was not the same plague in
Lowmeer as here.”

  “What did they look like, these evil men who attacked the tree?”

  “Birds of a flock,” he said. “All of the same plumage. Grey as a storm sky. Mean men with bitter intention, speaking little, madness in their eyes and darkness in their hearts. Beware if ye share their road. If they follow anything, it is A’Va, all that Va is not.” He turned his attention from her to Peregrine then, staring at him, hard. “We’ve met before, not a day or two past. Ye’ve gone all a-warpskew since I saw ye last, though. Or is it skew-warped, that I mean? Or possibly widdershins. Anyhow, ye’ve been touched by witchery. But it be twisted. Never seen the like, ere this. Come to think on’t, never seen a young ’un your age with a witchery of any sort. Where’s your da, the scribe?”

  She opened her mouth to answer, but Peregrine spoke first. “Those men killed and ate him. And now I will kill them. Every one.”

  Pickle me sour.

  While she was scrambling to think of something to say, Red Trefoil remarked, “That may well be an idea, but I doubt it’s aught that ye can be doing, lad, not yet awhiles. Ye’re a mite too young. Mayhap ye’d better learn how to handle a sword before you go taking on those churls. Or a bow and arrow.” He rubbed his chin. “Wondrous is the Way of the Oak, lad. Ye’ll come into your time. What’s your witchery?”

  “I feel those men,” Peregrine replied. “I didn’t see them, but I know where they’ve been. I feel the grime of them, right here.” He had his hand on his chest again.

  The old man tilted his head thoughtfully. “Wise men say that A’Va leaves his foul smutch on those who follow him, and that others of their ilk can see that besmirching. Perhaps ye’ve been granted that sight, the better to deal with them.”

  She felt uncomfortable as she listened. “Deal with them? He’s in no state to deal with anyone! He’s been to Va-less hell and back. His father was murdered and he was thrown down a steep hillside. He probably has broken bones, and he’s hardly had any rest since it happened.”

  Red Trefoil threw up his hands. “Well, now, why didn’t ye say? One of my witcheries is the gift of healing! I can’t be mending bones with a glance, but I can put them in their proper place and hasten up the mending to days instead o’ weeks. Come, come!”

  He led them to the back of the shrine, but there wasn’t much to see. Some large standing stones at one end made a sheltered corner under the roof, and the bed there, cobbled out of boughs and sacking covered with woollen fleeces, seemed comfortable enough. Peregrine sat down on it with an expression of relief.

  Red Trefoil cackled. “Let me take off your shirt, lad, and then we’ll have ye lying down. Ye’ll feel better in the wink of a bee’s eyelash when I’ve done with ye.”

  Gerelda watched as he prodded softly at Peregrine’s ribs. Good, she thought. Perhaps I can get on my way and leave the pesky lad here. “Do you have any food?” she asked. “Perie will be wanting to eat soon, and I really didn’t have enough for the both of us.”

  “Oh, to be sure. Those wretches didn’t find my larder, or they’d have absconded with the lot. I’ve plenty of cheese and turnips, nuts and mushrooms.” As he talked, he ran his hands over Peregrine’s shoulders. His touch must have been gentle, because the lad closed his eyes and looked at peace for the first time since they’d met.

  “He sleeps,” the old man said. “He must tarry here a few days.”

  “I can’t linger. I’m on my way to warn folk. And see the Pontifect.”

  He glanced at her with a nod. “Ye one of her writ-wrights? Ye have the look.”

  She smiled at the ancient expression he used. “I’m one of her proctors, yes. You’ll look after the lad?”

  “I’ll see him right.”

  “He’s obsessed with those men.”

  “Not to be wondered at. Don’t vex yourself on’t. Ye and him be tied like twins; your binding to him is as clear to me as the bark of yon oak. Ye’ll meet again. And lass, if he can read A’Va’s smutch, ye’ll need him.”

  She snorted, disbelieving. “A’Va has always sounded like a hobgoblin to me, made up by folk who see boggles behind every bush in the dark.”

  “If ye believe in the evil done by evil men, then the name of who or what they follow doesn’t matter: demon, ill, bane, devil-kin, A’Va… or naught at all. All that matters is that ye know ’em when ye see ’em.” As he spoke, his fingers gently probed Peregrine’s chest. “Ye were right. A broken collarbone and two broken ribs. They’ll mend. Ye’ll need him soon,” he said, his voice soft, “more’s the blighted pity.”

  7

  Caged

  Overwhelming terror without end…

  Screaming without sound…

  Struggling without achieving movement…

  Fear, endless fear…

  Mathilda woke. Sweet Va, a nightmare, only a nightmare. You are in your own bed. Breathe in. Deep. You are safe in Ustgrind Castle.

  She wasn’t really bound to a wagon wheel on top of a pole, left there to die on the orders of Regal Vilmar because he’d found out she’d given birth to twins. Ryce hadn’t really been there, saying, “I’ll help you if you ask me,” when she couldn’t utter a sound because her tongue had been ripped out. He hadn’t really shrugged, and said, “I’m glad you don’t need me,” while she tried to scream as he walked away.

  The birds hadn’t really come to peck out her eyes…

  Lying still in her bed, stiff with fear, she tried to steady her breathing. It wasn’t easy.

  The trouble was that she was not safe, not really. Vilmar would indeed kill her like that or in some other cruel way if he found out the truth. If he knew she’d given birth to twins, and connived with Sorrel to whisk the firstborn away. Or worse still, if ever he discovered that it was virtually impossible they were his children anyway.

  She’d never be safe. Too many people knew her secrets. Sorrel, Saker, Aureen, Ryce, her father, Valerian Fox–they all knew things that could lead her to the chopping block, or the stake, or the wheel. They all knew something that would justify her execution under the law of the land. Any one of them had the means to betray her.

  Pulling her covers up around her ears, she tried to snuggle back to sleep, but her thoughts jumped from one imagined disaster to another. And always, they returned to the same question: who was the weakest link in the chain, the one most likely to snap?

  The answer was always the same.

  Aureen.

  An illiterate chambermaid, with some experience as a midwife, but without breeding. She wouldn’t have a sense of what was honourable; such people didn’t. Aureen would have her price. She didn’t like it here in Lowmeer. She’d been scared witless when those men had threatened her. What if she sold the secret in exchange for a passage back to Ardrone? What if Prince-regal Karel grew up looking nothing like his supposed father? Would Vilmar grow suspicious? If he did, he’d torture Aureen to find out the truth. She wouldn’t be brave enough to resist even the threat of pain.

  Aureen was the weakness, the most obvious point for betrayal and discovery. She bit her lip, hurting herself just thinking about it. Aureen was all she had left of her old life, the only person who understood her predicament, yet the woman was also her greatest danger.

  Sweet Va, what did I do to deserve this?

  No one must find out. Ever. She must fight for her son to take his place on the Basalt Throne, no matter who his father was. And if she couldn’t be absolutely certain who’d fathered her son, then how would anyone else ever be sure?

  Maybe it was time the Vollendorn line came to an end anyway. They were the ones who had acceded to this vile bargain, this so-called Bengorth’s Law that gifted one in every set of Lowmian twins to A’Va in exchange for A’Va’s guarantee that their corrupted backsides would sit on the Basalt Throne. She was glad she’d cheated Vilmar, and if the Prince-regal was not his son, then Va would thank her for terminating the Regal’s bloodline.

  Karel had royal blood anyway: hers! And by Vilmar’s own admission, Bengorth
Vollendorn was a usurper in the first place. She giggled. An Ardronese baby on the Lowmian throne, now that was something to chuckle about. Thank goodness Karel had been tiny when he was born, smaller even than the sister the court knew nothing about, so no one had been suspicious of the early birth.

  And that horrid idea of killing twins because one of them was supposed to be a servant of A’Va… that had to stop too. She would stop it. Or her son would when he was old enough.

  She was not a Vollendorn and wouldn’t be affected by the curse that said disobeying the agreement to kill twins meant the Vollendorn line would die out. Given Vilmar’s previous lack of children, it was unlikely her son was a Vollendorn, so he wouldn’t die because Bengorth’s Law was broken.

  Besides, the Law was wicked, so it would be the moral thing not to uphold it, right? Va would protect her. She’d always said her prayers and gone to chapel. Nothing would happen to her son, or to her. A’Va was less than Va the Creator, so how could he possibly know who’d fathered her children when she wasn’t sure herself? And if he didn’t know Karel might not be a Vollendorn, he wouldn’t know Bengorth’s Law was broken…

  Just when she’d convinced herself that all would turn out well, that she and Prince-regal Karel would be the saviours of Lowmeer, doubts jostled their way back into her skull. Why had she heard nothing from the Pontifect? What if her little Karel was a devil-kin and his sister was the innocent one? What if the Vollendorn line of succession really was protected?

  Her head reeled and her stomach heaved, as they always did whenever she tried to think about the paradoxes involved.

  Oh, was there ever such a horrible pickle to be in? No, don’t think like that, you ninny! You are the Regala. You are a princess of Ardrone. You will not act like a child.

  The Pontifect was wise and she was a woman. She would know what to do. And if one of her babies really was a devil-kin, Pontifect Reedling would affect a cure.

  Va-damn, I deserve to be the mother of a Regal! It’s my reward for all I’ve suffered.

  They had sold her–Edwayn, Ryce, Fox, even Saker had been complicit–they had sold her to Lowmeer in exchange for a Summer Seas port, as if she were a roll of silk or a sack of spices! And as far as she knew, they weren’t even using the port anyway because Ardrone did not have their spice fleet launched as yet. Consign them all to beggary, she would show them what it was to be a princess of Ardrone. Bengorth’s Law would be of no more import than soured curds thrown to the pigs by the time she’d finished.