“If that’s a shopping list, I’d love a stack of flatbread and a jar of apple butter.”
“You are hungry?” Sicarius asked.
“No, no, it was a joke.” Amaranthe immediately wished she hadn’t made it. He’d greeted her with raw fish that morning, insisting that it held superior nutrition in an uncooked state. He’d further treated her by saving the eyes for her consumption. With no other options, she’d eaten his offerings, but she willed her body to recover speedily, if only so he’d stop procuring such choice “nutritious” specimens for her. “I’m still full from breakfast. Very full.”
After a moment of shrewd consideration—Amaranthe hoped her stomach wouldn’t growl and betray her—Sicarius extended a hand toward the trail. He’d been insisting that she lead so he could walk behind, steadying her with a hand on the back when she stumbled. Accustomed to being independent, she tried to appreciate the help instead of resenting the fact that she needed it.
“You’re not going to tell me what you were working on?” Amaranthe headed down the muddy trail. “Is it a sonnet or poem for me?”
She looked over her shoulder at Sicarius, but he said nothing. That probably meant, “No.”
“In case you were wondering, that is the sort of thing that warms a woman’s heart. Even more than piles of fresh fish eyes.” She smiled to take away any sting from her teasing. As much as she loathed his culinary choices, it touched her that he was going out of his way to provide for her.
“It is a letter,” Sicarius said.
“To me?”
“You are walking in front of me. For what purpose would I write you a letter?”
“Because it’s easier to bare your heart to someone in a letter than it is when you’re gazing into their eyes, worried they’re judging you or that they’ll reject you at any moment.” Hm, maybe she should have written him a few letters.
Sicarius didn’t respond to her comment, nor did he appear particularly enlightened. She supposed that meant no poems or sonnets were coming her way any time soon. She’d have to settle for fish eyes.
“Never mind,” Amaranthe said. “If it’s not for me, who’s it for? Sespian?”
“I would rather not say.”
“And here I thought we had reached a new level of trust and sharing in our relationship.” Amaranthe said it lightly, but his secretive response did sting a little. Maybe he was afraid he couldn’t share anything private with her again, lest some enemy suck the knowledge out of her head. She sighed for more reasons than one.
“I will post it in Markworth. It is unlikely anything will come of it.” Sicarius almost sounded apologetic.
That, of course, piqued Amaranthe’s curiosity all the more, but she forced herself to admit that Forge was the priority now anyway. “Markworth, I wonder if that’s the town Retta spoke of. That’s on Lake Seventy-three, isn’t it?”
“Yes,” Sicarius said.
“That’s a resort area full of privately owned islands, isn’t it? Maybe someone’s having a meeting on their shiny new summer estate. I wish I’d thought to dig around for that information in Retta’s head.”
“Explain,” Sicarius said.
Amaranthe had been half talking to herself and had forgotten he was listening. “Retta, the person who set me free, used a Kyattese device—she called it a therapy stone—to dig out the information about you and Sespian. During the procedure, I also saw some of her memories. I’m not certain she realized it, but I know the names of the Forge founders now.”
Sicarius halted and touched her arm so she would do the same. “You did not share this information.”
“No, when I was doing my sharing last night, you distracted me with confessions of feelings.” Amaranthe smiled.
Sicarius did not.
Amaranthe spoke the truth—she’d been so worried about what his reaction would be to the information she’d given up that she hadn’t thought about her paltry discoveries—but now that Sicarius stood before her, expecting the list of names, she found herself reluctant to give it up. What if he pursued the mass-assassination tactic again? She didn’t want to have the weight of those deaths upon her shoulders, especially now that she’d learned that she knew one of the Forge founders. Ms. Worgavic wasn’t some goatee-stroking super villain from the tales of eld; as far as Amaranthe knew, she was someone who’d simply chosen a questionable route to a goal that, while perhaps megalomaniacal, didn’t seem to be willfully evil. It didn’t escape Amaranthe that someone else might very well apply that description to her and what she’d been doing in the last year.
“You will not tell me?” Sicarius asked.
“I’m… concerned that your response would be to hunt them down as you did the others, perhaps believing that cutting down Forge at the root would destroy the organization before your secret becomes public knowledge.”
Sicarius stared at her, his face a mask, his eyes giving away nothing, yet Amaranthe swore she sensed a mulish, “Yeah, so?” attitude beneath the façade.
“First off, I don’t think killing the founders would destroy Forge,” Amaranthe said. “The very fact that this meeting place is down here, close to the Gulf instead of up in the capital, makes me think the organization’s reach goes beyond the satrapy and maybe beyond imperial borders. The girl who used the therapy stone and learned to fly the Behemoth has a sister who’s been abroad for years, perhaps spreading the word about Forge and drawing in international allies. We can’t simply slay everyone who opposes us. I don’t want to create martyrs. The only solution that I can see making sense is a diplomatic one.”
Though he kept the muscles in his face from so much as twitching, a flare of intensity fired in Sicarius’s eyes at the word diplomatic. “These people have been trying to kill Sespian.”
“I know, but this goes beyond Sespian. And beyond you. We need to figure out how to get everyone out in the open for negotiations.”
“They will not negotiate with us. Other than the limited ability to threaten their lives, we have no power with which to manipulate them.”
Unfortunately, Sicarius was right about that. Unless they succeeded in spying on this meeting and some weakness was revealed that they could exploit.
“Give me time. I’ll come up with something.” Amaranthe shrugged and waved a hand, implying—she hoped—that she already had ideas and he had no need for concern. Strange, after all they’d been through, that she still felt the need to oversell herself to Sicarius. Or perhaps not. Just because he’d admitted he appreciated her didn’t mean he wouldn’t attempt to slay every Forge member at this meeting, in an attempt to end it all in the most efficient, if barbaric, way possible.
After staring at her in stony silence for a long moment, Sicarius took out his pen and the letter. He pressed the page against a tree so he could add another line at the bottom. Before Amaranthe could creep close enough to read the addressee, he finished and returned everything to his pockets.
“It is imperative that we reach Markworth as soon as possible.” Sicarius brushed past her, taking the lead this time.
“So that we can catch up with Forge or so that you can post your letter?”
“Yes.”
Amaranthe shook her head and forced her sore limbs into a semblance of a jog so she could catch up. It crossed her mind to offer to give him the list of founders in exchange for a chance to read the letter. Her conscience wouldn’t forgive her if he used the information to assassinate people, though, so she’d have to keep wondering whom he wanted to turn into a new pen pal.
Chapter 16
After two days of laborious travel, the swamplands finally gave way to sycamore, oak, and sweet gum trees. The Forge trail Amaranthe and Sicarius had been following turned onto a broad road kept clear of foliage and debris. Part of the old imperial transportation system and therefore built in an era that predated steam vehicles, the worn highway featured flat stones set into a cement-and-sand-based mortar. It lacked the smoothness of the vehicle-friendly paved aggregate highways radiating from
Stumps to all the borders, but it had the same quality of being too hard to offer signs of passersby.
“We’re not going to be able to track them on this, are we?” Amaranthe asked when Sicarius returned from one of his side trips to forage.
“If they leave the road, I’ll see it.” Sicarius said.
Unless more roads of a similar style crossed this one, allowing one to walk without leaving tracks.
“If their destination is one of the islands on Lake Seventy-three,” Sicarius added, “we won’t be able to track them into the water, regardless.”
“Maybe you should go ahead.” The thought had crossed Amaranthe’s mind numerous times that day, but this was the first she’d spoken it aloud. She didn’t want him to leave her side. Every time a twig snapped in the woods, or something scurried through the undergrowth beside the trail, she flinched like an abused dog anticipating a kick. Though she knew Pike was dead, she kept imagining him lunging out of the brush and dragging her off for another round on that table. If not him, some other sadistic bastard. They were foolish thoughts—she was armed now, after all, and she could take care of herself if she wasn’t ridiculously outnumbered—but the imagery persisted nonetheless. “You can travel twice as fast, find them, see what they’re doing, and come back to get me if there’s time.”
“Twice?” Sicarius asked.
“Sorry, was that insulting? I meant to say ten times as fast. Without breaking a sweat or breathing hard. I’d add without mussing your hair as well, but… ” Amaranthe eyed his tousled locks. Sometime when she had been sleeping, he’d scraped away the beard away and washed off the road grime, but his hair beckoned for attention. “Are you ever going to let me cut that for you? Just a trim. To even out the edges?”
Sicarius laid a bunch of berries in Amaranthe’s hand. “You are regaining your humor.”
“That’s a good thing, isn’t it? Proof that all the highly nutritious food you’re feeding me is doing its job to rekindle my strength and witty personality?” Amaranthe kept walking as she spoke, knowing he wouldn’t appreciate delays for pointless conversations.
Sicarius fell in beside her. “I will remain with you.”
Amaranthe supposed she couldn’t be offended that he’d chosen to answer the more pertinent of her questions, though she was determined to cut that hair someday. “I appreciate your presence—more than you’ll ever know, I suspect—but I’d hate for my slowness to cause us to miss this opportunity.” She popped one of the purple berries into her mouth, appreciating a hint of sweet beneath the tart.
“Meetings on how to take over the world are not over quickly,” Sicarius said.
The light response made Amaranthe pause. “Was that a joke, or are you speaking from experience?”
Sicarius gave her a sidelong look. “Yes.”
Someday Amaranthe would learn not to ask him two questions at once. “Even if a meeting between numerous powerful and opinionated people will require many days, you might want to be there ahead of time to scout around. What if the others are making their way down? This has to be the same meeting Sespian wanted to spy on, don’t you think?”
“Likely.”
“You could muster a little more excitement at the prospect of seeing him again.” Amaranthe smiled.
“I have… failed to make inroads with him.”
“He’s had a certain image of you in his head for almost twenty years. It’ll take time to change it, that’s all.”
Sicarius’s grunt of acknowledgment had a dubious tone to it. “I must tell him of our link, lest he hear it from Forge first. I do not know how to speak of it. I have avoided the straightforward, in hopes that he will find it less… deplorable if he’s adjusted his vision of me somewhat beforehand. There is no time for that now.”
He so rarely shared his concerns with her, and Amaranthe wished she had a good answer for him, one that would allay his fears and prove correct as well. She couldn’t lie to him though; she doubted Sespian would respond well. The revelation would be like pulling an arrow out of one’s shoulder—it might hurt worse than touching molten lava, but the healing couldn’t begin until it’d been done.
Since words failed her, Amaranthe clasped Sicarius’s hand. He’d been as chaste and professional as always in his physical interactions with her over the last couple of days, but he accepted the grip and, after a pause, twined his own fingers between hers.
“Perhaps I should try levity again,” Sicarius said.
“Er, on Sespian?”
“Yes.”
Thinking of how Sespian had misconstrued some of Sicarius’s earlier comments, Amaranthe feared that approach might backfire. “We’ll talk to him together when we all meet up again. I just hope he’s well. Forge… ” She stopped. No need to raise concerns that might provoke further worry.
“He better be well,” Sicarius said. “I tasked Maldynado with protecting him.”
“You tasked Maldynado?” Amaranthe’s mouth dropped. “Are you… attempting levity now?”
“Maldynado was the only one around when I left to pursue you.”
“Ah.” Not levity, desperation. “I’m sure the others are helping him stay on track.” Actually Amaranthe suspected Maldynado had the ability to take charge, if he was so motivated—and Sicarius could certainly motivate people, if not with his charisma then with his knife. “You had to choose, didn’t you?” she asked, realizing for the first time how that must have played out. “After the crash, you had to choose whether to come after me or help Sespian.”
“Yes.”
“Thank you. I… wasn’t expecting it. I mean, I understand that Sespian must be your priority.” Amaranthe cleared her throat. She hoped she wasn’t insulting him, but she hadn’t believed he’d trust the group with Sespian’s care.
“You are both priorities.”
Warmed by the simple statement, Amaranthe had to tamp down an urge to kiss him. Given her current condition, it wouldn’t be much of a reward. But Sicarius looked down at her, perhaps expecting a reaction, and she changed her mind. She rose on tiptoes to kiss him on the cheek and wrapped her arms around him in a tight hug. Knowing they didn’t have time for dawdling, she soon released him, though she retained the grip on his hand, and started walking again. She thought she caught a glint of satisfaction in his eyes.
“I still think you should go ahead and search for Sespian,” Amaranthe said. “If they’re coming on a boat, they could… ” She stopped talking because Sicarius was pointing at something ahead of them. A glint of blue water visible through the trees.
“Lake Seventy-Three,” Sicarius said. “This road will lead us through Markworth.”
“It’s not a populous town, is it?”
“Not this time of year.”
Right, if it was a water-based resort area for the upper class, then late fall wouldn’t be a popular time for visits. That might explain why they hadn’t seen much traffic on the road that morning.
Amaranthe wondered if a group of Forge folks strolling through might constitute worthy small-town gossip. If they’d taken a boat or ferry to their chosen island, someone might have witnessed it. She doubted she and Sicarius would stumble across a roadside sign proclaiming, “Secret Forge meeting held this weekend at the Randy Rooster Hotel and Eating House.”
As Amaranthe and Sicarius drew closer to the lake, they started seeing cabins and cottages set back from the road, but, alas, no giant signs.
“These are more modest homes than I expected.” Amaranthe nodded toward a one-room cabin with an outhouse perched on a knoll out back.
“Those are the people who cater to the wealthy and warrior caste. Those with means stay on the islands.”
“You sound like you’ve been here before,” Amaranthe said. It’d be handy if he knew the area.
“Raumesys came down a couple of times.”
“And invited you along to ensure his water-ball team won?”
Before Amaranthe could do more than start to imagine Sicarius in swimming tr
unks, muscles glistening in the sun as he maneuvered through the water, thrashing and dunking men to get to the ball, he gave her a flat look and said, “To deliver proof of missions completed.”
Ah, the severed head thing again. Amaranthe chose not to imagine that scenario.
“Do you want to scout around when we get to town?” Amaranthe asked. “See if you can find sign of the party’s passing, in your own assassinly way? Meanwhile, I’ll look for someone who will chat with me about the weather, the crops, and if they’ve seen any strangers wander through recently.”
“I will stay with you,” Sicarius said.
“That’s not necessary.”
“You find trouble when you chat.”
“I’m sure I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
His grunt said more than his words ever did.
Again, Amaranthe didn’t mind that he wanted to stay with her, but she hoped he wasn’t going to develop a permanent over-protective streak. Maybe he simply sensed that she wasn’t comfortable in her skin just then.
They reached the shoreline where the road branched to go separate ways around the lake. Signposts proclaimed the right headed north, to Sunders City and Armelion—the name for Stumps that nobody except cartographers and sign-makers used. To the left, Markworth was visible through the trees. Docks of all sizes and a few buildings, none more than two stories tall, lined the bank.
Along the lake, more traffic traversed the road, if one could call old, dented bicycles and mule-pulled wood carts traffic. The passing people wore homespun cotton and wool clothes in utilitarian styles. Amaranthe’s purloined military fatigues, with the cuffs rolled up, drew more than a few second glances, or maybe it was the rifle she carried. Even if it wasn’t forbidden for citizens to own firearms in rural areas, the way it was in Stumps, women certainly didn’t tote such things about in the empire. Not women who didn’t want to be gawked at and forced to answer questions, anyway.
“I may need to acquire a costume to better fit in.” Amaranthe handed Sicarius the rifle. The sleek, repeating weapon would draw looks no matter who toted it, but it fit him more. “Right now I look like… ” She eyed her oversized, wrinkled, blood—and dirt-stained clothes.
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