Beau may never have known friendship before, but he was all too familiar with the bitter taste of rejection salted with loathing.
It was over.
Beau grabbed a lantern and headed for the door.
“You planning on running? I’ll tell Doone. He’ll hunt you down!” Nate yelled.
“I’m not leaving,” Beau lied. “But I’m not going to sleep here either. I’d rather bed down up a tree than near you.”
Not a lie.
“Good.” Nate grabbed the quilt off the second bed and threw it, along with the wool blanket he’d carried in, over his head. “I hope you freeze.”
“I probably will now.” And with that Beau left, the final wisps of what he’d thought was his first real friendship gutted like a candle burned down to the nub.
His lantern turned down low to avoid casting shadows, Beau passed through the workshop and out to the forge. If he was to be on his own, he had to change his thinking. No one—not Nate, not Doone, not even some mythical ace—was going to protect him or do what he had to do. He had to be his own ace now, find his own way to rescue Cressi and protect the children of Mastery House.
Unlike his escape from the Manor, this time he intended to be prepared, for everything. Including defending himself.
There were plenty of sharp objects to choose from in the workshop; everything from an awl to a razor to a sharp billhook—one of those curved blades for cutting wheat. But the very thought of brandishing a blade left Beau twisted up and clammy. He could never imagine pulling a knife on another person, so he opted for the smallest awl he could find. Sharp enough to be a threat, but not to inflict real harm. Or so he hoped.
All that was left to do now was to wait until the lanterns blazing out in the cookhouse were extinguished, until Trout was done with his work.
As he sat hiding out in the shadow of the forge Beau considered taking a couple of grenades with him. One or two would offer him protection, but he’d never get anywhere carrying the weight. Besides, destruction was Doone’s way, not his.
Then he remembered something Doone had said—something about how wet powder won’t ignite.
It took several trips back and forth to the water barrel, but Beau had soon moved enough water to soak Doone’s powder through and through, leaving it completely ruined. He’d always thought of revenge as something petty and base, but knowing he’d left Doone’s prized weapon useless sent ripples of satisfaction through Beau.
Not long after that the lamps in the cookhouse were extinguished. The time had come.
Ready and more than resolved, Beau turned his lamp down low and stepped out into the night. The moon was a thin sliver overhead, but there were enough stars out to light his way. He planned to avoid passing the house altogether by ducking behind the cookhouse, but then he spotted Trout’s great, hulking shadow hunched over the fire. He was still there!
The only way out now was past the house and behind the barn.
The barn.
He’d been thinking he’d have to travel by foot, at least until he could stow away in a wagon or find a willing ride. But now he had another, far faster option.
Inside the barn Beau found four horses bedded down for the night. Doone’s dappled gray stallion and Trout’s mare were in the first two stalls, their feed full and hay clean. The thought of stealing Doone’s gray was almost too tempting to resist, but it would also be borrowing more trouble than was wise. Someone could easily recognize Doone’s horse. A plow horse was stabled in the next stall, but that poor thing looked so tired Beau couldn’t even think about taking him.
There was only one more stall. Hoping against hope to find a worthy ride, Beau peered inside. Luck truly must have landed on his shoulder, for not only was this horse healthy and strong looking, the filly bore the Manor brand on her rear flank.
Beau smiled. It wasn’t stealing if the horse was already his. He gathered a handful of hay and extended it, quietly coaxing the filly to turn around. It took a couple of calls before she raised her head and looked back at him, her black speckled muzzle full of hay.
Beau nearly fell back with joy.
It was Puzzle! Dear, sweet, patient Puzzle who’d been missing for far too long.
“Hey, girl,” he whispered. “Remember me?”
The filly turned and reached for him, tapping him with her beautiful, soft muzzle.
“You do remember me!” Beau sighed happily as he slipped into the stall.
She looked good, if a bit thinner. At least she’d been newly shoed, and her coat was clean. Confident she was healthy enough to be ridden, Beau saddled her up. Just as she always used to, Puzzle playfully nibbled at his boot laces as he worked. How he’d missed her!
“Come on, girl,” Beau said as he led Puzzle out of the barn. “We have some work to do.”
Moving quietly and stealthily, they headed toward the hill when something on the ground caught Beau’s eye, reflecting the thin moonlight like so many polished gemstones.
Beau reached down to pick one up but quickly recoiled, his hand pulling back as if from a flame. It was the coins Doone had thrown down as a wager during Beau and Nate’s fight. Yet just as a flame beckons you with warmth, the coins were calling to him.
Beau gathered them up, their weight feeling solid in his hand. Useful. Familiar. As he pocketed them, he realized he wasn’t so very different from those simple pieces of copper. There were those who sought to use Beau to enrich themselves, elevate their position, claim his power. But unlike these pounded pieces of metal that had no say in how the bearer used them, Beau had agency. He had options.
Cressi had been right about him all along—it was for Beau to decide how to use his position as heir, no one else.
His choice at long last accepted, Beau headed up the hill to do what he should have done from the beginning.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Blade and Branch
When every minute of life is filled with duty, toil, and drudgery, there’s no time to wander, wonder, or just take in the day. And while Cressi’s journey through the woods certainly wasn’t for pleasure, walking the path alone felt like a revelation. No one watching her, free to set her own pace—hurrying as she saw fit, slowing down when needed. Breathing deep of the cool damp, she occasionally paused to listen to the trees, to smell what the plants along the pathway had to tell her. If she had time, she would’ve stopped to talk to every new plant she spotted, learn their secrets, and unlock their powers.
One day she’d be free to be herself, to explore, to learn.
To just be.
But for now, dark was falling around her, and she was running out of time to find Beau before Barger came after her himself.
Cressi opened the lantern just enough to light her way, then pulled the pawn from her pocket.
“Can you help me find Gerta too?”
The pawn didn’t move; this was not the reply she was hoping for.
As she traveled farther, the ground became rockier, harder, and ever more riddled with heaving roots. The trees here were thinner, more desperate, their bark shaggier, angrier. A stifling stillness filling the air, broken only by the occasional screech of raptors overhead.
And then there was the smell.
The sweet aroma of woody decay had taken on a bitter tang, becoming something crueler, bloodier. Long shadows bobbed and teased, creating illusions all around her.
Did that tree move? What about that rock?
“Where are you, Gerta?” Cressi whispered.
She thought about reaching for the blade but decided against it. For now.
“Just keep moving,” she prompted herself.
And she did, though that didn’t stop the mirages. No matter what she told herself, faces seemed to appear in broken tree trunks, rocks whispered. Finally, at the point where she thought her imagination surely had overtaken all reason, Cressi walked straight up to a fallen tree limb she was certain she’d seen move.
For all the world it looked like nothing more
than a dead log up close, but just to be sure Cressi kicked it, sending it rolling down a small embankment. The log landed in a low-lying puddle with a sigh, proof it was nothing more than what it was—a dead tree.
Cressi adjusted her pack and was about to step back onto the path when she heard it. The unmistakable crack of twigs breaking underfoot.
Charged as if by a bolt of lightning, Cressi threw off her bag and pulled the blade. No plan in mind, just pure instinct, she spun on the noise. And there it was, a figure coming toward her through the dim, moving with the speed of a panther.
Or a monster.
Cressi gripped the knife and lunged at the figure, sending it jumping back to evade her blade. Another lunge, another evasion, this one landing them farther out of reach.
There were only two choices now—Cressi could take the moment to flee, or she could face down this . . . whatever it was.
Monsters must be faced.
Cressi grabbed a rock and threw it, hoping to stop the creature’s approach. And it worked, if only for a moment. She didn’t want to kill it, whatever it was, but with no other choice Cressi launched another rock. This one made contact, sending the creature stumbling back into the mud. The creature lurched at her again, yet no matter how hard it tried, it couldn’t get a foothold—it was stuck.
Wary of the trick, Cressi crept closer, arming herself with a splintered-off limb, ready to land a fatal blow if need be.
“What are you!” she demanded.
The creature gave no reply, it just lay still in the mud, the only movement sharp, painful panting heaving in its chest.
What was this thing? And what had she done to it?
Cressi was nearly close enough to reach the creature when the ground began to shift and sway underfoot. Reflexes alight, she jumped back to solid ground. But then there was the poor creature, whimpering, sinking ever deeper into the muck.
“Hang on!” Cressi grabbed a nearby branch and extended it out. She’d nearly gotten the limb close enough when something large and absolutely human-shaped came flying at her. Cressi swung the branch but was no match for the size and speed of this new attacker. Before she could swing again something large hit her from behind, sending her crashing to the ground.
She fought to scramble back to her feet when a heavy-booted foot landed on her back, forcing the breath from her lungs, pinning her facedown to the ground.
“Get off!” Cressi howled as she kicked her legs wildly, trying to make contact with something, anything. “I have nothing worth stealing.”
“That’s not true,” came a woman’s voice. “But we’re not foes. Relax yourself. Let her up.”
And with that, the boot lifted off and a large hand reached down and pulled Cressi to her feet.
It took a moment or two for Cressi to see clearly, for the haze to dissipate. When her captors finally came into focus, Cressi thought it must be another mirage. Three men and a woman surrounded her all dressed in the same uniform of mossy-green leggings and tight-fitting jerkins, three large hunting bows aimed at her, arrows cocked and ready to fly.
Cressi lunged to make a run for it but she was immobilized, held up in midair by a clawlike hand. Try as she might to move, she was stuck as if nailed to a wall.
“I told you I have nothing you want!” Cressi shouted, fighting against her captors.
“I think it’s you that wants something of me.” The woman gestured for her two companions to lower their bows as she stepped closer to Cressi. “Otherwise why would Anka have sent you?”
“You’re Gerta?” Cressi practically spat the name out.
“Who else would I be?” the woman replied as if it were the most obvious answer. “If we were bandits, you’d not have lived to ask who attacked you. Release her, Hugo.”
Abruptly freed, Cressi collected herself, fighting to stay calm, shaking off the pain from the boot in her back.
“Take your blade. And your bag.” Gerta thrust them back to Cressi. “And don’t ever make the mistake of taking them off again.”
There was nothing in the least bit kind or even agreeable about Gerta, nothing to lead Cressi to think of her as an ally. But as with Anka, she had a surety about her. A feeling of solidity. But then she leaned in closer and it was as if she’d turned to hot molten rock. “And never, ever push one of my people into a sand pit again.”
Cressi forgot her own pain, and melted inside. “It that what it is? I had no idea.”
“Obviously,” Gerta growled as she stalked off, cutting a path through the trees.
“Wait! Where are you going?” Cressi ran after her. “You’re supposed to tell me how to find Be—”
“You want to know what I know, you come with us,” Gerta said without turning or stopping.
At that, Hugo and another of Gerta’s men stepped up and planted themselves on either side of Cressi. They made no move to control her, but the message was clear: one wrong step and they’d fell her like a rotten tree.
Cressi was bursting with questions as she followed Gerta along a rambling route that led them ever deeper into the woods. Where was Beau? How close was she to finding him? And how had they camouflaged themselves as they did? But the group walked on in a stony silence Cressi dared not try to crack. Around rocky outcroppings, past another sand pit, and up a steep hill they climbed. Gerta and her men lit small lanterns, which they fitted onto their heads with straps, but when Cressi moved to open her own lantern Hugo turned on her, a warning to leave it unlit.
“Are you taking me to Beau?” she whispered, but no one even acknowledged her, let alone answered. They kept walking. Silently.
The farther they traveled, the more Cressi began to wonder if they weren’t walking in circles. Or figure eights. They’d already passed this rock face once, hadn’t they? And that stand of dying fir trees looked eerily familiar. It was when they climbed over the jagged remains of a once solid stone wall for the third time, Cressi knew it for a fact.
“What’s happening?” she demanded. “Why are you leading me nowhere?”
“Silence!” Gerta’s warning trailed behind her like a snake through the leaves as she brought the group to a halt under the shelter of a large stone outcropping.
Cressi was certain Gerta was about to turn on her when two men came crashing through the tree line, each brandishing a large machete.
Dressed in ragged jerkins and leg wraps in place of trousers, they were gaunt and rangy. Yet more than their appearance, they had a kind of desperation about them, a hunger clinging to their bones.
Pilfers—the poorest of the poor in the Bottom. Known to be violent and reckless, they were desperate enough to do anything for their next meal.
Cressi moved to run, to shout, to pull her blade when she felt Hugo’s hand land on her shoulder, a warning to stay put.
Why just stand still waiting to be attacked? Why weren’t they running, or, better yet, stringing their bows in a show of strength?
And that’s when it happened—the pair walked right on past. They never broke their stride, never turned their heads; the bandits did nothing to indicate they even saw Cressi, Gerta, and the others standing right there.
Half-elated, half-petrified, Cressi held her breath until the pair disappeared into the woods. “What just happened?”
“What kind of charmer doesn’t recognize a charm when she sees one?” Gerta tutted.
“A charm?” Cressi repeated. “Why didn’t Anka say you were a charmer?”
Gerta’s shoulders heaved in a way that said she had little time or interest in offering explanations. And she didn’t. She simply stepped out from under the rock outcropping and walked away, her two companions close at hand.
“Why won’t she answer?” Cressi asked Hugo, who was sticking close to her side.
“She’s not going to talk out here, and neither should you. Inside.”
“Inside where?” There was nothing around, just trees and rocks. But like Gerta, Hugo offered no reply as the group tramped down the same hill once aga
in, across the same dried-up stream, and into the same broken up stand of fir trees.
Cressi was beginning to think she’d stepped into a trap when right before her very eyes Gerta disappeared.
Vanished.
And then so did her two companions.
Cressi checked herself. It had to be a trick of the night.
But then Hugo stopped short of where they disappeared and asked, “You coming or not?”
Cressi could hardly move, for that’s when she saw it.
A flash, a spark, a momentary vision of a cluster of small cabins lit up by a large bonfire.
Cressi grappled to understand. This was not her imagination, it was another charm, a powerful and unimaginable charm obscuring the cabins from view.
“How?” she asked.
“You want answers, you follow.” Hugo walked into the tree line, his large frame momentarily breaking the illusion as he passed through to the other side.
A shiver ran up Cressi’s spine and over the top of her head. But this wasn’t a quiver of fear, it was the thrill of recognition as the pawn warmed and jumped in her pocket, pressing her to step through the veil.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Found and Lost
After racing away from Doone’s, Beau and Puzzle finally slowed to a walk. As far as Beau could tell no one had followed them. Yet. At this rate, he’d be back in the Lower Middlelands before sunrise. Almost halfway to the Manor.
Almost halfway to Cressi.
But every good plan needs to leave room for luck, both good and bad. There were too many pitfalls in the Bottom, dangers lurking around every turn. He had to stay vigilant.
At least for now, though, the woods were quiet. Beau urged his mind to do the same, but he couldn’t keep thoughts of Nate and their broken bond from pushing in.
During all those years sitting alone in his apartments, Beau had been certain friendship was the key to finding happiness. An end to loneliness, a call to adventure. And that’s exactly what it looked and felt like when he met Nate. But apparently Himself had been right when he said friendship was useful only if it served a purpose. No one sought to make a friend of anyone unless they had something to gain from it. The sooner Beau understood that, the happier he’d be.
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