by A. E. Rayne
‘Perhaps what?’ Thorgils wondered, creaking anxiously in a chair by the fire.
Astrid glanced at Jael and led Aleksander over to Thorgils. ‘Perhaps she is not fighting it? Perhaps she doesn’t want to get well? She lost such a lot of blood. It has weakened her body, and the loss of the baby has weakened her spirit. And she needs both to recover.’
The men frowned.
‘That’s not Jael,’ Aleksander insisted.
Thorgils nodded vigorously. ‘Jael knows what she has to do. What danger we’re all in. She wouldn’t give up. Nothing would stop her coming back. She’ll fight. You don’t know her as we do.’
Astrid smiled sympathetically at them, seeing both their concern and their affection for Jael Furyck. ‘Well, I hope you’re right. All I can do is keep giving her the tincture. I will bring a broth too. I left it stewing away overnight. I’ll bring that later and perhaps she will be well enough to try some?’ She headed for her basket.
Aleksander wished she wasn’t going. ‘Should we let her sleep or try to wake her?’
‘There’s no reason to wake her,’ Astrid said softly. ‘Jael must find her way back to you on her own.’
‘Mother?’
Gisila and Branwyn were waiting at the bottom of the path when Edela opened her cottage door.
‘Have you been there all night?’ Edela muttered, already anticipating the fussing that was about to begin. ‘Waiting to pounce?’
‘Well, Gant did mention that he’d found you sleeping by Furia’s Tree,’ Gisila said with a frown. ‘And in the rain, no less.’
‘And if I am?’ Edela countered. ‘I’m not some dribbling mess who needs to be tied to a chair as it stands, so if I want to sleep in the rain, I shall!’ And opening the gate, she bustled away, ignoring them both.
‘Edela!’ Biddy came rushing down the path after her, Edela’s cloak in her hands. ‘Where are you going?’
Gisila and Branwyn stared at their quickly disappearing mother in surprise before hurrying after her.
‘You will bring Sitha to me,’ Jaeger ordered, glaring at Else who stared back at him, her usual pleasant smile undisturbed by his moody scowl. ‘I want to hear her thoughts on Morana. And yours. But not until you return with Sitha. I will make a decision about how to proceed then.’
Meena gulped.
Jaeger noticed. ‘Did you have a dream last night?’
Meena stopped herself from lying because she was so terrible at it. ‘Yes.’
Jaeger dropped his spoon and picked up his wine. ‘About?’
‘Draguta.’
Jaeger’s eyes widened, the silver rim of the goblet almost touching his lips. ‘And?’ He spun around, pointing an open-mouthed Else to the door. ‘Get on your way, woman! This conversation is not for your old ears!’
Else blinked and headed for the door.
Meena watched her go, trying to think of something to say. ‘Draguta... she was alive in my dream. She looked the same. The same as she did before –’
‘And where was she?’
‘In a house. A bed. I don’t know where she was.’
‘And what was she doing?’
‘Sleeping.’
Jaeger frowned. ‘Dreaming, you mean?’
Meena dropped her head. ‘I couldn’t say.’
‘You killed her,’ Jaeger reminded her, sipping his wine. ‘I may have thrown the knife, but you made sure it killed her. I saw that, Meena. I watched you plunge it into her. You don’t want her to return, do you? Take her revenge on you?’
Meena shook her head, her hair trembling around her face. ‘No.’
‘Then we must work together, for if Draguta returns to the castle, the first person she will kill is me, and then, without me to protect you, she will quickly kill you. And if you want to live, Meena, you’re going to have to start telling me the truth. Now, what did you really dream about last night?’
Morac was eager to see how Morana was.
Evaine wasn’t.
‘Are you sure you don’t want to come?’ Morac asked, holding open his cottage door, disappointed by the intense wall of humidity that greeted him; wondering if he should go back inside and find something cooler to wear.
‘I don’t want to run into Jaeger.’
Morac sucked in a breath, immediately irate. ‘No, well, nor do I, but I am keen to see how Morana is. We need her to come back. She cannot protect us from Jaeger or Draguta while she sits there, weakening with every passing day.’
‘Perhaps Draguta put a spell on her? Perhaps she’ll never be the same again? She doesn’t look the same. Her face is all droopy. She doesn’t even know anyone’s there.’
It was what Morac feared most of all.
He didn’t know what he would do without his sister. Without The Following. Without any purpose and no protection. At the mercy of Jaeger Dragos. Waiting for Draguta to take her revenge upon them all. He looked at his daughter and saw the fear in her eyes. ‘Morana is a strong woman. She will come back to us. She will find a way to protect us. And Eadmund. He will be here soon, won’t he?’
But Evaine just turned away, wanting him to go. She needed to start thinking about how she was going to get out of Hest.
It was a chilly morning, but the sky had a glow to it that told Edela it was going to warm up soon, though in her impatience to leave the cottage, she wished she’d remembered to bring her cloak.
Rork Arnesson opened a hall door for her, holding it as Edela headed inside, nodding briefly to him. He nodded back, his lips set in a straight line, no smile in his eyes.
‘Grandmother!’ Axl stood up from his throne and strode towards her, leaving his crutch behind. His leg had healed enough now that walking was almost comfortable, and he was eager to look as competent as he wanted to feel. ‘Are you alright? Gant said he’d –’
‘I know, I know,’ Edela muttered. ‘It appears that Gant Olborn has a bigger mouth than I’d realised.’ She saw Gant and winked at him.
Gant smiled back, pleased to see that Edela was in such a fiery mood.
It was a good sign.
‘We need to talk about what is coming,’ Edela said, easing herself down onto the bench beside Amma. She glanced at the hotcake Amma was eating, realising that her cloak wasn’t the only thing she had left the cottage without.
‘Have you had a dream?’ Amma asked, quickly pushing away her plate.
Edela nodded, listening as the hall quietened around her. ‘I have. And I’m afraid that it is not good news.’
Axl was immediately at Edela’s side, eager to hear what his grandmother had to say.
As was everyone else.
‘Perhaps we should talk in your chamber?’ Edela wondered before realising that secret keeping was a bad habit that would not help any of them now. ‘No, no, let me just speak plainly.’ She took a deep breath. ‘Your sister is very ill.’
‘What?’ Axl froze.
Gisila and Branwyn had just entered the hall, and they both quickened their pace to the high table.
‘What has happened?’ Gisila demanded, her chest tightening. ‘Where is Jael?’
‘She’s with Thorgils and Aleksander,’ Edela said, smiling briefly at Isaura who was standing nearby, Mads on her hip. ‘I don’t know where, but she is in bed. I saw her.’
‘What happened to her?’ Gant frowned, taking a seat next to Edela, worry etched onto his tired face. ‘Is she injured?’
Edela avoided everyone’s eyes. ‘Well, yes, she looked injured. Bruised. But also... unwell. She cannot get out of bed. She is being cared for by a healer.’
Axl rubbed his eyes, struggling to think. ‘Does she have the book? The Book of Aurea? Did they get it?’
‘Yes. I believe so.’
‘But you don’t know where she is or what’s wrong with her?’
‘No.’
The hall was completely silent. No one knew what to say.
Jael was supposed to lead them. Save them. But now?
‘That is not all,’ Edela said c
arefully. ‘I have seen those creatures again. The dragur. We have to prepare ourselves. They will come here soon, and you, my grandson, are going to have to come up with a way to stop them. It will not be easy to defeat them.’
Axl glanced at Fyn who had walked in from the bedchambers with Runa. He blinked, realising that Gant was talking to him. ‘What did you say?’
‘Sea-fire,’ Gant repeated. ‘We need to make as much sea-fire as we can. It may be the only way to hold them out.’
Edela nodded. ‘I agree. They hate fire, so we must make more, and quickly. Every time I think about those creatures my heart races. I feel as though they are waiting out there, preparing to attack us.’
‘We need to work the men harder too,’ Axl said, thinking out loud. ‘We need to prepare as an army.’
‘We do,’ Gant murmured, nodding to Karsten and Berard Dragos as they entered the hall. ‘And we have little time to do it, so we’re going to need all the help we can get.’
Evaine couldn’t think, yet she had an overwhelming need to.
Draguta wanted the book, and Evaine wanted Eadmund, and neither of those things could be achieved if she couldn’t find a way out of Hest. She knew where the stables were, of course, and she could take a horse. It would not be easy or pleasant, but she could ride.
But how to do it without being discovered?
Sighing, she hurried towards the markets, wishing that Morana was herself again. She needed advice. Yet, Morana would not want her to take the book, and her father would not want her to leave Hest.
There was no one to turn to now.
No one but Eadmund. And she had to get to him quickly, before he grew tired of waiting for her.
Evaine pushed her way through the crowd, ignoring the imploring cries of the merchants she bustled past. Coins jingled in her purse, and she would need to spend all of them to prepare for her journey.
Draguta’s urgent voice pulsed in her veins, reminding Evaine that she had little time to waste.
‘How long do you think Evaine will take to get here?’ Eadmund wondered as he finished his breakfast. He was well rested after a deep sleep, but his mind was unsettled. Without Evaine he felt on edge. He was worried about her too. What Draguta expected her to do seemed too much for someone like Evaine who had been coddled all her life.
‘Take?’ Draguta stretched her arms above her head and yawned. The dire bed in the dire shack was worse than sleeping on the dirt floor, she was sure. Evaine could not come soon enough. ‘I have no idea, but we can only hope that the answer is not long.’ She stared at Eadmund’s perturbed face. ‘And in the meantime, I have plans for you. Something to take your mind off Evaine.’
Eadmund frowned, not wanting his mind taken off Evaine at all. ‘What sort of plans?’
Smiling, Draguta stood and smoothed down her dress. Not silk. There were no fine fabrics in Flane, but the pale colour of the linen was, at least, flattering, and it would do until she returned to Hest. ‘Come along, then, and I will show you what I have in mind.’
‘Are you sure you should be up?’ Aleksander wondered as Thorgils limped into the stables, his crutch tapping the hard dirt floor.
‘Astrid kicked me out. For all that they’re supposed to help people, healers tend to be quite bossy, I find.’
Aleksander smiled, thinking about Biddy and Edela as he held out a carrot for Tig.
‘How are the horses?’ Thorgils wondered, glancing around the small stable block. He recognised Aleksander’s horse next to Tig, and the big, white stallion who had heroically carried them both all the way from Hallow Wood. ‘Hello, Gus.’
‘They look ready to leave, even Gus, which is good news for us. Though I’ve another horse here,’ he said, pointing to the dark-brown stallion in the next stall. ‘He’s for you. His name’s Rufus.’
Thorgils ran his hand down Rufus’ dark muzzle, looking him over, wishing he’d thought to bring a treat. ‘He’s big enough to deal with me, I suppose.’
‘I’m sure Gus will be relieved to hear it,’ Aleksander smiled, moving over to give Sky a carrot. ‘Gant too. He wouldn’t want us to bring him back a broken horse.’
Thorgils looked anxious, his mind quickly returning to the night of the dragon and the fire and the fear of losing everyone he loved. He hoped Bram was recovering. That Isaura was not worrying too much. ‘You think they’re alright there, in the fort?’
Aleksander shrugged. ‘I don’t know, but I hope so. I hope they can hold on until we get Jael back on her feet. We’re all going to need her, and her sword.’
Rufus’ breath was warm on Thorgils’ hand, and he smiled. ‘Mmmm, we’re going to need Jael’s help, but for now, maybe she needs ours?’
‘Maybe,’ Aleksander said mutely. ‘She’s not one for help, though. No matter how bad things get, Jael always prefers to help herself.’
Biddy arrived with Eydis and the puppies, and Gant and Axl left them with Edela, deciding that they needed to examine the sea-fire stores. Fyn, who was mending well and using a crutch to get around now, tagged along.
‘What do you think happened to Jael?’ he asked anxiously, having heard Edela’s news from Axl. ‘It’s not like her to be unwell, is it?’
Gant shook his head. ‘No. Never. Not Jael.’ He glanced at Axl, keeping his voice low. ‘I’ve a feeling Edela knew more than she was letting on.’
Axl nodded. ‘So do I, but we can’t do anything about it either way. We have to prepare the fort and the men for when she does return, which will hopefully be before the dragur come.’
‘But we also need to start thinking about what we’ll do if Jael doesn’t come back,’ Gant muttered.
Fyn swallowed. ‘Jael will come back!’
‘I hope so,’ Gant said. ‘But if she doesn’t? Our plan can’t be to just sit here and wait for all the creatures to crawl out of the Book of Darkness. We have to decide what we’re going to do about it. Until that book is out of Draguta’s hands, none of us are safe.’
‘We unite our army with Iskavall’s and march on Helsabor together,’ Axl suggested. ‘Wulf Halvardar would listen to us. He’d let us in, wouldn’t he?’
‘Ha!’ Gant snorted. ‘Not likely. If that old goat heard about a book that powerful, he’d send his sons to claim it for themselves and find a way to make more gold. He’s never helped anyone in his life that I know of. Except himself. The only way he’ll unlock his gates is for treasure to add to his enormous hoard and we don’t have nearly enough to tempt him with. Not after the mess Lothar made of things.’
The fort looked and smelled like a charred midden heap, and as they walked past the flattened buildings of sticks and ash, it was hard not to feel despondent, especially when they lifted their eyes a little higher and saw the crumbling hole where the last bits of the decomposing dragon were being removed from the wall.
If the dragur were coming, they weren’t going to have much trouble getting into the fort at all.
‘His name is Ollvar, or something like that,’ Draguta said, pointing at the bare-chested, tattooed warrior who stood before them. ‘He is going to be training you.’
Eadmund started to protest.
‘You think you can beat Ollvar, here? Go ahead, and if you do, I won’t insist you train with him. Defeat him, and you shall be my champion, free to pine endlessly for Evaine,’ Draguta smiled.
The heavily scarred warrior, whose name was, in fact, Rollo Barda, eyed Eadmund with disdain. He had a wide mouth but such thin lips that it was hard to tell if he was smiling or grimacing. His big head was clean-shaven, shining in the glare of the morning sun, much like his oiled chest which he was proud to display. His thick arms were powerful, rippled with wounds, old and new, hiding amongst a smattering of roughly-drawn, blue tattoos that crept all the way up to his neck, curling around his ears like dragon prows.
He considered Eadmund with a raised eyebrow and a cold sneer.
Eadmund blinked, ignoring the hairless beast as he turned to Draguta. ‘Fine. As you say, it will give
me something to do while we wait for Evaine.’
‘Well, I don’t say that,’ Draguta cooed. ‘Not at all. I require you to train hard, Eadmund. All day, every day. When Evaine is here as well. I have a very particular purpose for you, and you will not be able to fulfil it if you sit around turning back into a useless ball of blubber.’
Eadmund wanted to ask what she meant, but Rollo slapped him on the shoulder, grunting. ‘Come on, then. Better to train now before it gets too hot.’
Draguta spun around, lifting the hem of her dress, ready to leave the stench of the training ground behind; eager to return to her seeing circle and watch the painfully slow demise of Jael Furyck.
Sitha had healed Jaeger’s ankles well enough, but she seemed incapable of helping Morana, which she freely admitted herself. ‘What Draguta did to her caused some sort of... apoplexy,’ she said in a calm monotone. She was a gaunt, elderly woman with wisps of fine, silvery hair that fell down to a pair of lop-sided shoulders. They drooped even further to the left as she considered the king. Having known his temper since he was a boy, Sitha was well aware of how violent he could become when provoked.
She had seen what he did to his first wife.
Varna.
His father.
Evaine.
‘And?’ Jaeger looked away from her morbid face towards Else’s sunny one. ‘What help is there for such a thing?’
‘No help that I am aware of, my lord,’ Sitha declared, glancing at Else herself, daring her to produce a different opinion.
But Else didn’t. ‘An apoplexy seems about right to me. One side of her face appears frozen. She seems to have lost the sight in that eye as well. It has a milky film over it. It does not respond at all.’
‘I’ve seen her smile. She has responded to me. To what I’ve said,’ Jaeger insisted, displeased with both old women who obviously had no wits between them anymore. ‘There must be something you can do?’