Eventide (Meratis Trilogy Book 2)

by Krista Walsh

  Cassie gasped. “That’s horrible!”

  “Why do you think it’s related to Raul?” asked Brady.

  “The men at the table were deep in their cups when I spoke with them, so the details were a little vague, but they remembered very clearly the corpses were drained of blood.”

  Jeff stared ahead at the empty road and wondered how many times they would come so close to Raul only to miss him. He hoped the queen’s men had more luck. He felt someone watching him and turned his head to see the assassin’s sharp gaze narrowed in his direction. Accusing him.

  He wondered if it was such a good idea to be talking about Raul in front of her.

  Jayden prompted his mount and sped into a faster trot.

  The last leg of the trip was almost too calm. The assassin only tried once to escape, and Jeff had been impressed by how well she bided her time. She waited until Michael’s arms were no longer around her to throw herself from the horse. She managed to roll down a hill into a small stream.

  Unfortunately for her the water had no current, and she only ended up hopping along the shore, her greying clothes soaked through. It took all of three minutes for Michael to dismount, grab her back up and throw her over the back of the saddle. Her arms and legs draped over the sides, and he tied her wrists to her feet under the horse’s belly.

  After that, the ride went smoothly, right up until the road heading to the Keep. Jeff’s jaw went slack as he took in the destruction along the lane. Blackened homes beside dead crops, the dense forest nothing more than green shoots in a mess of charred tree trunks and ash.

  His eyes started to sting with the pain of it.

  “Where is everyone living?” he asked, thinking of the Tavens, the Hunters, the other families he’d met on his first visit.

  “Many still live within the walls of the Keep,” Brady replied. “We lost so many people under Raul’s siege, we’ve needed as many survivors as possible close by to get the basics running again. Rebuilding homes, reforming our trade connections to try and keep revenue steady. The rest have left to stay with family in other towns until they can afford to rebuild. With the drought last year, no one has the money.”

  “We’ve done what we could,” Jayden threw back over his shoulder, quick to defend his name. “Done our best to make sure none of our people starved over the winter, given small subsidies to help people start over. But we can’t pay for hundreds of people to build from nothing.”

  “You’ve done more than many leaders would,” Brady assured him. “It’s been difficult to watch. Once we get through the gates you’ll see how far we’ve actually come.”

  They continued on down the road, and the gates soon appeared up ahead, the Keep in the distance up on its hill. So many memories came with that view. The first time he’d seen it from a distance, the number of times he’d had to ride back to give bad news: first Corey’s death and the deaths of the missing villagers, and then to ask for help because Raul had abducted Cassie. Now they were coming home to announce Raul was back and up to his same old games, that someone was trying to kill Jeff, and that there might be a conspiracy plot to overthrow the queen.

  Jeff hoped he never had to ride through this gate again.

  Although when they did pass through, he saw what Brady meant about rebuilding. In the six months he’d been gone, they’d turned back time in the village. All of the shops in the horseshoe centre were open, the crowds between the shops as thick as the Christmas rush; the clang, clatter, and thwump from the training yard echoed from the road; the cottages repaired, rethatched, and full of life in a way they hadn’t been last year. Despite their tragedies, these people had found a new way to go on. Everything outside the Keep was just a façade, something to make their enemies think they had won when really the Feldallians were stronger than ever.

  Jeff’s chest puffed out with pride, and he smiled at everything. For the first time since Raul’s spell, he felt sincerely happy to be back in this world.

  They rode towards the stables and deposited the horses with Paul, the same teenage stable-boy that helped Jeff acclimatise to riding last year. This time, the kid didn’t so much help as stand there with his mouth open, staring at the new arrivals. Jeff looked around to see how the entourage must look. Himself and Cassie back for another Meratis trip; Jayden and Brady in their strange attire; a tall, gaunt man on the sidelines; strange soldiers with a prisoner bound between them.

  Jeff wondered if they should have sent word ahead that they were coming.

  A horse whinnied from a stall inside and Jeff grinned. Leaving Allegria with a gentle pat on the neck, he ran inside to the bay that stood with his nose hanging out into the aisle. The horse saw Jeff and danced in his stall as Jeff danced outside of it. Once both had settled, Jeff threw his arms around Swish’s neck and the gelding chewed on his hair.

  “I missed you most of all, horse,” he said.

  “I think he missed you, as well,” a woman spoke up behind him. Jeff spun on his heel, hand still on Swish’s neck, to see Jasmine Feldall leaning against a post across the aisle. In many ways she hadn’t changed at all, the same sharp green eyes and lithe build. But Jeff noticed that she’d lost some weight, her usual dark green tunic loose on her shoulders, the leather corset bound a little tighter. “He actually pined. For you!”

  The amusement in her eyes took the sting out of her words and Jeff’s smile returned as he combed his fingers through Swish’s mane.

  “What the hell are you doing here?” Jasmine asked. She came closer to pet Swish’s other side. “Pretty sure the point of the mission was to send my brother and Brady to you, and summon them back with Raul.”

  “There was a change of plan.”

  “You messed up?”

  Jeff bristled. “Well not just me. It was a group effort.”

  “Uh huh. Come on, let’s go inside and you can explain to us how a group effort brought you back here. And what the hell happened to your face.”

  “I’m not your only surprise guest,” Jeff warned as they made their way outside.

  Jasmine gaped at the crowd in the stable yard, and then, in her way that Jeff admired, masked her shock and officially greeted the new arrivals, casting an odd glance at the stranger bound and gagged at Michael’s side. Her eye fell on Cassie, and the faces of both women lit up. They had clicked instantly on Cassie’s first visit, and, as they embraced each other and made promises to catch up soon, it looked like they would pick up right where they left off.

  “Shall we head inside?” she asked. The entire crowd followed, including Harold, Jeff noted with surprise.

  “Isn’t your job over now?”

  “My job is to gather information. It would be irresponsible to turn back before we learn more of your late night visitor.”

  Sounded as good a reason as any, so Jeff didn’t push the matter. As they entered the foyer, Michael passed the stranger off to one of the Feldall guards.

  “Take her down to the dungeons for now. Let her sit in the dark until we have time to deal with her.

  “No!” Jeff exclaimed without thinking.

  Everyone turned to look at him, confusion on their faces. He shifted his weight, staring at the woman, who looked younger now next to the guards than she had the night before. Hardly more than a girl, not quite twenty.

  “Leave the torches lit, at least,” he said. “No one deserves to be caged where they can’t see.”

  The guards stood there, staring at Jeff, until Jayden snapped his fingers in front of the woman who had taken hold of the prisoner. “You heard the man, leave the torches going.”

  The guard bowed her head and steered the stranger down the stairs. Jayden looked at Jeff. “You’re a strange one, showing mercy to someone who tried to kill you.”

  “Hardly mercy. Just humanity.”

  He felt Cassie’s eyes on him, but ignored her. His demons were his own.

  Jasmine led the way up to her office and the eight of them filed in behind her. She ordered one of the servan
ts to fetch Maggie from the Haunt, and then settled behind her desk, waiting for everyone to arrange themselves. Jayden, Cassie, and Harold sat in the three chairs in front of her desk, while Brady and Jeff chose opposite walls to lean on, and Michael and Darcy stood in the centre of the room, legs apart and arms crossed.

  Jasmine bent down to grab at something under her desk, and came back with Jayden’s sword across her arms. “I believe you forgot this?”

  A grin broke through the dour look on Jayden’s face as he took back his blade, setting it across his lap. “I missed you, my friend. How did you get it?”

  Jasmine frowned. “When you two didn’t come home, Maggie opened the vortex long enough for me to see into Jeff’s apartment. You were gone, your sword was there. Doing nothing but gathering dust, by the looks of it. I thought it best someone retrieve it.”

  “Isn’t it great,” said Jeff, “when friends are so close, they no longer see the need to ask for an invitation into your home?”

  “Dire circumstances,” Jasmine said, as if that excused the social impropriety. “Speaking of which, would anyone care to begin to explain what happened?” She looked pointedly at her brother.

  Jayden cleared his throat and shifted his weight, the chair creaking beneath him. “We didn’t get Raul.”

  “I can see that. You didn’t find him?”

  “No, we did. Turns out he found lackeys in Jeff’s world. Was living the high life on their gold.”

  “Of course he was,” Jasmine said. She puffed a loose strand of hair out of her face, a gesture Jeff remembered well. “Even when stepped on, the cockroach continues to breed. So why are you back here if he’s not with you?”

  Jayden and Brady exchanged a glance, and Brady picked up the thread, describing their abduction, the spell, and getting arrested by the queen. They filled her in on the corpses, and the stranger who tried to kill Jeff. With everyone’s contributions, hardly a detail was missed, and it felt like it took hours to tell.

  Early on, Maggie sneaked into the room, giving Jeff a poke in the side and a finger wave before settling on the wall beside him to listen to the story.

  By the time they finished, both Jasmine and the enchantress could only stare.

  “That’s a lot of information to process,” said Jasmine after a long pause. She narrowed her eyes at Jeff. “You really couldn’t have just tackled the man?”

  Jeff pushed away from the wall and flung his arms up in defeat. “I tried! I would have liked to see any of you have more success.”

  “It hardly matters now, does it?” Jayden asked. “Raul’s here. He’s up to something. He’s already killing people to get it done. We followed his trail halfway here, but lost it on the road. You haven’t heard any rumours about a strange group headed west?”

  “We did, but it turned out to be you,” Maggie replied. “No one else has passed this way.”

  “Shit.” Jayden ran his hand over his face. “So now what?”

  “I suggest we start with the woman in the dungeon,” said Brady. “She may have information regarding Raul. She knew where to find Jeff—it’s no coincidence she was at that inn.”

  “It would be a waste of time,” Harold spoke up, until then a silent presence in the room. “We don’t have time for the games she’s playing. Our priority has to be Raul and if we wait until she has something to say, we could miss our moment. If she knows anything about him at all. My recommendation is to send out your troops and begin the search, make that our primary focus. House by house if you have to. The queen’s men have had almost a week’s headstart and you promised Her Majesty you would do what needed to be done. Let me try and speak with the girl.”

  “I’ll go with you,” said Jeff. “I know I said I wanted to go home, and I will, but I have to know who she is. She was after me. Who knows how long she was following us before she found the opportunity.”

  “We’ll find out the truth, boy,” Michael assured him. “She wanted you dead that badly, she’ll want you to know why. She’ll talk.”

  “Not tonight,” Jasmine said, standing up. “It’s late, and you’ve had a long journey. Tomorrow we’ll talk to her. But Harold is right. I’ll give orders tonight to have as many scouts as we can spare ride out to the nearest counties. In two hours’ time, there will be almost a thousand men searching for him. If we don’t hear anything in a week, we’ll ride out ourselves. The country isn’t that big. We’ll find him.”

  “Here’s hoping before it’s too late,” Jeff added under his breath.

  The servants came to show the guests to their rooms, one assigned to Jeff to take him to the Healing Ward. After a quick clean of his cuts, they let him go, leaving him to find his own way back to the Green Room, the same guest room he’d been given last time. He set off, confident that he remembered how to find it.

  Following the familiar tapestries, he found his way to … the library.

  “Well, dammit,” he said. But at least it was a start. From there, he found the tapestries showing the history of House Feldall—the one with the fish dragon—and that one took him the right away.

  His room was just how he remembered it. Green quilt on the bed, green sofa and chairs around a walnut table on the other side of the room. The wardrobe with the woodcut engraving. He’d only spent a couple of weeks here, but still the place felt like his.

  Going to the window, he pushed open the thin glass and leaned on the sill, staring down on the village. The setting sun cast pink and orange shadows against the stone. The crowds around the shops had died away, and now the cottages were the source of activity. Families sat out on porches, smoking and playing music, while kids chased each other between gardens.

  He hated that it was all at risk again with Raul being back. He hoped this time they could stop it before their lives took another blow.

  As for his own situation, Jeff knew he should get out. He knew he should march downstairs to Maggie right now and ask to be sent home. He swore he wouldn’t get involved, and the universe was determined he would be. It was easy to believe the assassin was doing the bidding of someone else, maybe Raul like her reaction suggested, maybe for this mystery conspiracy, but now that he’d had some time to think it over, he wasn’t sure. Her rage was personal, more direct. There had been sincere hatred in her eyes when they’d looked at each other that morning. But as far as he knew, he’d never crossed paths with her, never wounded her in any way.

  Outside the Keep…

  The lightbulb flicked on, and suddenly the stranger’s hooked nose was more than familiar.

  Jeff knew exactly who she was, and it was no surprise she wanted him dead.

  Chapter Twelve

  The stairwell down to the dungeon was dark, but farther down the corridor Jeff could see the flicker of torchlight against the walls.

  He watched his feet as he went down the steps. The dancing light made the stairs looks narrow, and he didn’t want to make an ass of himself right away by somersaulting up to her cell.

  Once on the floor, the two torches in front of the last cell provided enough light to see. Three empty cells, holding shadows captive behind their metal bars, came first, and in the fourth the assassin huddled in the corner, knees up to her chest. The pose was that of a child, of fear and vulnerability, but when she looked over her arms at Jeff, her stare radiated anger. Just because she was the one locked on the inside didn’t make Jeff feel any less trapped by the power of her hate.

  On his approach, a guard came out of a small room in the corner across from the girl’s cell. It was the same guard who had acted incredulous at the idea of giving the prisoner light, and even now she looked down her nose at Jeff.

  “Anything you want?”

  Jeff shook his head. “Just to talk with the prisoner. Alone, if possible.”

  The guard sniffed. “Be my guest.” At a volume Jeff didn’t know if he was supposed to hear, she added, “Might as well get some use out of the light. Waste of money keeping them lit for her.”

  She disappea
red back into the guardroom and shut the door.

  Jeff rocked up on his toes and back on his heels, looked up and down and corridor for something to sit on. A stool sat next to the guardroom, and he pulled it closer, perching on the edge of it a safe distance from the bars.

  The girl remained statue-still. Dampened by the frolic in the stream, her short hair stuck out in all directions, the dirt washed away to show its true blue-black colour. In contrast, even in the dim light, her blue eyes appeared lighter, more striking.

  At first he hoped she would be the one to break the silence, but when it became clear that wouldn’t happen, he said, “It’s pretty strange, being on this side of things.” He waited, tapped his fingers on the underside of the stool. “Your sister kept me pretty good company when I was in your place.”

  A faint hiss echoed around his ears. The young woman’s eyes narrowed at the mention of her sister, and Jeff knew he’d got it right. Was she angry he had the gall to bring her up? But she had no idea the relationship Jeff had developed with the woman who had saved his life.

  “You’re Venn Connell, aren’t you?”

  Surprise registered on the girl’s face, and she uncurled from her ball.

  “Siobhan talked about you. Often, actually.”

  That was only true in part. She’d mentioned Venn’s name only twice in their brief acquaintance, but Jeff knew her sister had been the thought behind every question, every threat.

  “Don’t say her name,” Venn growled.

  Really, if she hadn’t possessed opposable thumbs, Jeff would have thought her part animal, she was so primal, so feral. Even now her top lip curled up in a snarl, exposing straight white teeth.

  “You have no right to say her name.”

  “And you have no right to judge me for saying it,” said Jeff, getting to his feet. “I owe Siobhan the greatest debt a person can owe, and I can’t even pay it.”