The Verdigris Pawn

by Alysa Wishingrad

  And with that, the wagon, surrounded by the mayor and several other riders, headed out of the Upper Middlelands, carrying Cressi ever closer to the Bottom.

  As they traveled south, Woolever showered Keb and Boz with a seemingly endless string of compliments and the promise of rewards for their service. Keb and Boz blossomed under the attention, but Cressi understood their escorts were only trying to ensure they reached their intended destination. At least it gave Cressi time away from prying eyes to examine her newly increased store of herbs. Some she could name, others she couldn’t, but she quickly came to recognize them for what they were. As for the bottle of blue-green liquid, she didn’t try to open it or even look at it. She could feel its power, a strength she knew enough to avoid.

  When they finally approached the barracks’ gates the mayor and other riders insisted the wagon drive in ahead of them. Keb and Boz preened as if they were nobles getting their due. But as soon as they’d cleared the gates, two riders raced up and locked the wagon inside the compound.

  Cressi had been expecting this, but Keb and Boz were stunned.

  “You goat-faced rotters!” Boz shouted. “You tricked us!”

  “Heal the guards, stop the fever, then you’ll go free!” the mayor called back as he and the other riders set off.

  “Why they do that?” Keb whined.

  “Because they trust you as much as I do,” Cressi muttered before adding in a full voice, “Well, let’s see where we are.”

  Lit up by large torches, the forbidding fortress of stone and iron loomed up ahead, like a wolf about to pounce. But more than that, there was a pall hanging over the entire landscape—the kind of stony silence that accompanies illness and death.

  “I ain’t going no closer!” Boz declared from the safety of the driver’s seat.

  “I don’t expect you to,” Cressi said. “But I do hope you’ll leave some food and cider for my return. We’ll need the supplies as we travel on.”

  Cressi pulled a bottle of cider out of the back of the wagon and reluctantly handed it to Boz.

  “We eat and drink what we want.” Boz pulled the cork and took a long draw.

  “As you say.” Cressi dropped a quick curtsy and headed for the barracks confident they’d be asleep within minutes. She’d dosed the cider with enough ferrita berries to ensure a nice long sleep. “All right, pawn, let’s search out this Anka so we can get on to finding Beau.”

  She hadn’t gotten very far down the drive when someone carrying a torch came racing toward her.

  “How many sick you got?” a woman called out, her wrung-out urgency echoing through the dark. “I’ve barely room for even one more!”

  “None,” Cressi replied. “I’ve come with supplies. I’m looking for An—”

  “By the Goodness of Himself!” The woman’s relief was clear even in the dark. “Woolever finally heard my pleas. I wrote to him countless times, and each time the messenger returned with the same answer: ‘No one can be spared.’ Yet here you are!”

  “Yes,” Cressi replied. “I’ve brought herbs. The apothecary sends her regards. I’m looking for Anka. Are you—”

  “I’ll take any help I can get,” The woman turned and led the way inside through a cold and cavernous gallery. In better times the great hall probably would have been the place for taking meals. But now it reeked of illness and the suffering of the guards laid out on straw mattresses, many listless, too ill to move, while others tossed fitfully, moaning restlessly.

  “How many nursemaids do you have helping you?” Cressi asked.

  The woman adjusted the white cap covering her hair as she led Cressi down a series of narrow corridors. “None. It’s just me.”

  They made their way down empty halls ringing with the silence of the sick, through a small dining room, then finally into a warm, well-lit kitchen. Once inside, the woman locked the door behind them, pocketed the key, then exhaled deeply.

  “Now we can speak freely, and no one will hear us. Sit.” She gestured to the small table in the center of the room. “I’m sorry for being so short. This is the only safe place for us to speak. So the Upper Middlelands apothecary sent you?”

  “Yes. I’ve brought some herbs to help with the fever.”

  “I’m sure you have. Now tell me what you are really doing here.”

  “I—I don’t know what you mean.”

  “I told you, there are no eyes or ears in here that don’t belong. This kitchen was charmed a long time ago. It’s a safe haven. A place to keep secrets. But time is running low. At least fifteen of those guards out there are close to waking up. If they do, they’ll realize they don’t have the fever unless I get more of my soup in them and fast. If you’d tell me why you are out here, alone—”

  “They don’t have the fever?” Cressi pressed.

  “Most of them do.” The woman began filling a large soup tureen with broth she had bubbling over the hearth. “I’ve been trying to keep them comfortable and quiet. I haven’t lost any of them yet. But that left me with a few others who were so agitated by fear of the fever I was afraid of what they might do to innocent people in the name of keeping the peace. So I’ve quieted them with some black fern powder. It raises similar symptoms without the risks of dying. Only I know who is really ill and who has been sidelined.”

  “Are you a . . . a . . .” Cressi couldn’t dare say the word, for to do so would be to fully expose herself. “You are Anka, aren’t you?”

  “I am, but I am not a charmer, like you. Perhaps while you’re here you could make me a brew or two. I’ve always found truth to be one of the most effective weapons out here.”

  “I’m not a . . . Why would you say that?” Cressi balked.

  “Because it’s true.” Anka dropped the ladle back into the soup pot and turned to Cressi. “If you won’t tell me what you know, I’ll tell you what I know. Two boys ran from the Manor and were seen on a cart heading south. I know without a doubt one of those boys was Beau and the other was Nate. What I don’t know is why they’re out here now, unprepared for what lies ahead, and why you are not with them.”

  “I . . .” Cressi could hardly feel her hands, although the warmth the pawn began emitting at the mention of Beau’s name was hard to ignore. Was this for real? Or a trap?

  “Had I more time now, I’d explain how I know what I know. But I’ll say this: Scattered throughout the Land, there are those of us who have a way of remaining connected. Like roots, we spread out far below the surface. We’re here to help you. And Beau.” Anka placed the soup tureen on a tray along with several small bowls. “Redosing the guards can take some time; I’ll be back as soon as I can. In the meantime, consider this kitchen yours.”

  “I’m sorry.” Cressi rose and slowly began to back up to the door. “I don’t think you understand. I need to be going.”

  “I understand everything, and I know exactly where you have to go, which is why you must wait for my return.” Anka unlocked the door then handed the key to Cressi. “Lock yourself in. Should there be any trouble at all, that other door there will lead you to safety. But I’d hate for you to go without instructions. It would be a gross dereliction of my duties to let you go without you understanding into what you are headed.”

  “Your duties?” Cressi repeated, for she could hardly find her own words. “What am I headed int—” But Anka, tray in hand, was gone, the door slamming shut in her wake.

  Chapter Nineteen

  The Bottom

  They rode through the night without stopping.

  Even though Nate had told him to wait, Beau tried several times to find a way to ask Doone to turn north, to devise some way to get him to free Cressi and the children of Mastery House. But Doone wasn’t interested in conversation, insisting instead that Beau sleep and rest up for the day ahead. And so Beau did sleep, if only fitfully. Every time he awoke, they’d traveled farther and farther south—the terrain turning ever harder, harsher, the fields and orchards of the Lower Middlelands slowly thinning into nothi
ng more than brushwood.

  By the time the sun rose, the horses were picking their way through a tangled and thorny landscape bristling with balding trees and scrub. The only colors were a wash of brown, black, and gray. Such a sad and gloomy place could only be the Bottom.

  Doone brought his horse to a stop in the middle of the rutted and narrow road. From this point on it cut through a forest filled with young, skinny trees and bare scrub competing for what spotty bits of sunshine could fight through the gloom. Thick with damp, the air had a strong tang, a kind of acrid burning odor, both unpleasant yet somehow familiar. There were no fields, no houses, no animals skittering past. It was almost as if Beau could hear them tucking into the bushes, whispering, tittering tales that couldn’t be shared. This was a place of secrets, and it was also a place that somehow felt like home.

  “We’ll walk from here.” Doone dismounted. “The horses deserve a break. You boys lead them for us.”

  Trout pushed the half-sleeping Nate from his saddle and lumbered over to join Doone as he walked off ahead of the boys.

  Nate landed on his feet, stretching and yawning as if waking from the most restful of sleeps. “I haven’t felt this good in the morning, well, ever.”

  “Really?” Beau moaned, slowly slipping off of Doone’s horse. “I’m not entirely sure I can feel my legs.”

  “There’s the rebel spirit,” Nate teased.

  Beau rolled his neck, trying to work out the cricks. “We’re hardly rebels.”

  “Yes, we are.” Nate turned deadly serious. “That’s exactly what we are now.”

  Beau hadn’t thought of himself that way, not even as he stood watching the vexing man burn. Yet everything from going to Mastery House to escaping his apartments then running away to find his ace all been outstanding acts of rebellion. If that didn’t make him a rebel, what did?

  “But we won’t be outlaws for long,” Nate said. “One day soon, we’ll be part of the leadership bringing a new beginning to the people of the Land. Once Doone topples the Manor, ridding us once and for all of the scourge of Himself and his vile heir, everything will change.”

  Beau stopped. Fighting for freedom was one thing, but he didn’t sign up for killing. Himself was many things, but he was also Beau’s father. There had to be another way to bring about change to the Land.

  “The burning of Himself and the heir was only symbolic,” Beau insisted. “That can’t be what Doone actually means to do.”

  “So you think the Manor would just give power over to Doone? Let him rule over the Bottom? That Himself will simply roll over and say, ‘Of course we’ll let the children of Mastery House go and here’s the Land.’ That the heir won’t fight for his title?”

  “Maybe the heir doesn’t want to rule. Maybe he’d be sympathetic, want to help, try to convince Himself to change.”

  “Why would you think that?”

  “I don’t know.” Beau tried to shrug it off. “He just doesn’t seem like a bad person.”

  “You’ve seen him?” Nate drilled Beau with a look of utter confusion. “Why didn’t you say so before? Where? When?”

  “I . . .” Beau grasped for the quickest lie. “I saw him in the stables one day. He was there for a lesson while I was working. He looked like . . . well, you. Or me.”

  “Well, he’s not. He’s nothing like me or you. Nothing.”

  True. The heir was nothing like Nate. He wasn’t even like Crafty. Since meeting Cressi and leaving the Manor, Beau had done things he’d never imagined possible. The heir—the boy who was blind to everything but his own woes and knew nothing about the Land or its people—was gone.

  But if Doone truly was Beau’s ace, he’d never resort to murder. The ace relied on strategy to win, not mayhem.

  They walked on in silence, Doone and Trout leading the way far up ahead. Aside from the sound of their footsteps, everything was quiet and still. No birdsong, no rustling leaves, only silence. Yet the deeper into the Bottom they walked, the more Beau began to feel that this wasn’t the silence of nature at rest, it was something much louder. Somehow more sinister.

  And then he saw it.

  Or so he thought.

  Just off to his right he caught sight of an old dead tree that seemed to move, the bark twisting and turning like a dance or a twitch.

  Beau blinked and looked again.

  All was still.

  “Did you see that?” he asked.

  “See what?” Nate stopped to scan the area.

  “That tree over there,” Beau replied. “I thought I saw it m—”

  A loud whistle broke the air followed by Doone calling out, “Hurry up, boys. Trout will take the horses from here.”

  Nate went barreling ahead, Trout’s weary horse tagging along behind him. Beau looked back at the tree before following with Doone’s stallion, but there was no more movement, nothing. His imagination was working tricks on him.

  Doone stood waiting near a fallen tree, his boot resting on it as if he’d pushed it over himself. While Trout took the horses, Doone turned to the boys, a glint shining in his bright blue eyes.

  “Do you know what this is?” he asked.

  “Firewood?” Nate laughed.

  “No,” Doone corrected. “It’s a sign.”

  “Of wha—”

  “The runner’s code!” Nate nearly exploded with recognition. “It’s real?”

  “As real as you and me,” Doone replied. “See how one end has been shaved to a fine tip, and how it’s pointing into the woods there? It’s directing the way to the next sign. Let’s follow it and see what it says.”

  Doone stepped off the pathway and through some new growth trees beyond which lay a sunken patch of ground surrounded by burned grass and blackened moss. The earth turned boggy under their feet, almost pliable, and the tang of sulfur and peat hung heavy in the air.

  Beau recognized the odor as something dark and ugly but couldn’t place where he’d smelled it before.

  “Always skirt the edges.” Doone cocked his head at the pit. “You want to test the ground ahead, make sure it’s solid. Don’t ever get sucked into a sand pit, you’ll never get back out.”

  A sand pit, of course. Beau should have recognized the stink. The Manor’s apothecary touted the hot, molten sand as a cure for anything and everything. But Beau found all it did was nauseate the stomach and burn the skin.

  “Matron used to threaten to drop me into a pit almost every day,” Nate said. “I thought it would be more like an endless hole you’d never stop falling through.”

  “You get stuck in one of these above your ankle and soon that will be true.” Doone continued past the sand pit and stopped in front of the ragged remains of a hollowed-out tree stump.

  “Here we are.” He presented the stump as if it were a precious relic. “Look closely. Tell me what you see. Take your time.”

  The boys circled the stump. At first all Beau saw was rotting wood, but as he inspected the stump more closely, he began to see there were symbols etched into the cracked and peeling bark—one on each of the four sides.

  “You mean like this?” Beau pointed to a line crossed by five hash marks carved into the side of the tree pointing back to the road.

  “Exactly!” Doone beamed.

  “And these too!” Nate added, pointing out the other three symbols arranged on all sides of the stump.

  “What do they mean?” Beau asked.

  But before Doone could reply a high-pitched scream pierced the air, sending Beau jumping and knocking straight into Nate.

  “Calm down, Crafty,” Nate sneered. “Haven’t you ever heard a pig scream?”

  “No!” Beau confessed before catching himself. “I mean, yes, but not like that.”

  “I’d think you’d be used to hearing pigs being carried off to the slaughter,” Doone said. “Being a cordwainer’s apprentice and all.”

  “I am,” Beau bluffed. “I just, I guess I didn’t expect it out here is al—” But before Beau could finish, another cr
y echoed through the woods. This one most certainly human, a wail of despair, heartbreak.

  “Some people just get too attached to the animals they raise.” Doone shook his head in pity. “Can’t say I blame them, but everyone’s got to eat.”

  Doone turned back to the tree stump. “Anyway, this mark that Crafty spotted means there’s a safe road in that direction.” Doone pointed south. “A crosshatched square is a warning. Maybe someone was attacked by bandits over that way. And this cockeyed T on the north side means you’ll surely receive a beating if you continue down that path.”

  “Because that’s the way back to the Manor!” Nate volunteered.

  “Clever boy.” Doone winked at Nate. “You learn to follow these signs, and you’ll never get lost. Now, let’s keep moving.”

  Doone led the way back to the path.

  A short while later, the forest began to thin out, revealing the burned-out remains of a cluster of buildings, the remnants of a village. Beau stopped and stared at the charred skeletons of the abandoned homes. Though the air was clear, he could almost smell the smoke of fires long extinguished.

  “That’s Torin’s work,” Doone explained. “His weapon of choice, what they called northern fire, a flammable liquid they used to lay waste to entire villages. Burned down most of the Bottom.”

  Beau was about to correct Doone and tell him that The Histories made no mention of any such weapon. But gazing out over the destruction brought back a ghost of a memory, a footnote he’d once discovered buried deep within the text. The Manor’s power, it said, had been bolstered by Torin’s mastery of incendiarism. When he asked his tutor what it meant, he referred Beau to his father. But Himself refused to answer and instead made Beau repeat the Oath of Himself, the vow his father and seven generations before had all taken. The very vow Beau was supposed to one day take.

  “By right and by might, by virtue of the blood by which I have been born, I am the Land. My word is its credo, my actions its fate. Anointed by birth, I am the law, the truth, the past, and the future.”

  Beau hadn’t asked anything more about it for fear of incurring his father’s wrath, but now it all made perfect, horrible sense.