We stopped for the evening under the sparse shelter of a patch of those trees. It was warmer so I excused myself to change out of the heavy leather boots and wool pants into something a little more suitable. I opened my bag to find that Ruby had packed me only black with leather or silver accents. So much for something light. At least it wasn’t all wool. I threw on the first pants I found, switched my shirt, and laced the lightest corset over it. I threw my cloak over my arm and walked back to the camp, muttering about my red-headed wardrober.
When I saw them, I had to bite the inside of my cheek to keep from cursing. Steed was sitting opposite the human, so close that it was almost indecent. I focused on walking to my bags, across the camp from them, and putting my cloak and pack away. I took as long as I could but, eventually, I had to join the group. I thought I tasted blood.
I tried not to look at them, I really did. But I saw him touch her cheek with the back of his hand. She flushed and he grinned at her wickedly. That was the last thing I was sure of.
What happened next didn’t make any sense. I was across the camp, looking at him. But I wasn’t. I could see myself in the periphery. And my head screamed with pain. Steed moved across my line of sight as I swayed, and then blackness came as my eyes closed.
When they opened again, my head throbbed. Not the knife point, only a duller version. I tried to focus and found I was back in my spot once more, staring at Steed and the girl… but something was wrong. She had fainted? I concentrated harder and discovered Ruby staring at me accusingly.
“What?” I was on the defense again. Her eyes narrowed. She suspected I’d done something to the girl? I should. But then I looked back at them, Steed and the girl, and suddenly I knew, I had done something to her. But not what Ruby thought, not magic from where I sat. I had been in her head. Like the birds.
But ugh, the pain was horrible! Not like the birds, like the cats. Only worse. Harder, more exhausting, more painful. She was coming to now; they helped her sit up. She looked weak, tired. I lay back down and covered my head to think. Or maybe not think.
I was asleep so fast I might have blacked out. My dreams were darkness but not still. Swirling blackness surrounded me, enveloping. And then there were voices. None of them I recognized, but one of them I knew. It was familiar, though I couldn’t place exactly who it belonged to. “… they are like dumb animals… weak… she could get through to them… think of the possibilities…” I knew he was talking about me. He was talking about me and them. Was he comparing me to a dumb animal? Anger flooded me and the darkness turned to water as I struggled to reach the surface, unable to breathe.
I woke gasping and expected to find Ruby there, watching me. What I saw instead was almost as shocking as the dreams.
“There, there.” Steed was trying to comfort me, brush my bangs from my face. I jerked a little at his touch. “Rough one, was it?”
Was he teasing me? I might have glared at him. He laughed. I looked for Ruby and Chevelle. They were several yards away, watching me, pretending not to. I wanted to groan when I saw Chevelle’s tight jaw.
I sat up, wrapping my arms around my knees to bury my head. As I became fully awake, I wondered if Steed had been teasing me all along, trying to irritate me for fun. Surely he had no real interest in that human girl (curse the thought trying to surface that I was part human). I wondered how I could have such distaste for someone who was so like me. I lifted my eyes just enough to peer over my forearms. I looked for the girl and found her, sitting as far away as possible without being considered outside of the camp, with her puppy.
No, she was not like me.
Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed Steed’s grin as he watched me scrutinize her. I glared at him full force in response. All I received in reply was a light laugh as he got up and trotted across the camp to play with the puppy. I vowed not to give him the satisfaction of watching them.
But, apparently, I wasn’t one to hold to my word. Because when I saw him close to her, talking low and calling her my sunny nicknames, I found myself acting without regard to anything like dignity.
Everyone in the camp turned to stare in astonishment as the small blonde girl smacked Steed with all her might across the face. Everyone but me… because I had already been focused on them. I only had a moment to enjoy it before the pain and blackness came again.
When I woke this time, Ruby was beside me. I forced myself to sit up so I could find them. The girl was sitting alone, looking completely confused and ashamed, and rubbing her temples. Steed was standing away from both of us, talking to Grey, turned mostly with his back toward me. I could see the edge of a bright red welt on his cheek.
I smiled with satisfaction as I lay back down to recover.
Though no one could have known it was me, I was quiet the next few days. My attack seemed to have quelled the interest of the others in the human and I couldn’t have been happier about it. Silence was the easiest way to mask my contentment.
I knew they’d be getting rid of her soon, though I’d not heard any more discussion on the matter. I tried not to wonder how much longer I had before we found the council, or they us. I could see a few of them now, but I couldn’t recall their names or anything about them. Only random images had returned. I hadn’t mentioned it to anyone; it seemed hardly worth the commotion it caused. Commotion made my head ache.
The grass thickened and the trees began to look more like those of the village, though not near as large. We’d stopped near a pond to camp and I was considering going in as Ruby took the girl for her evening’s privacy. The men gathered nearby, talking in hushed voices. I decided it wasn’t worth eavesdropping so I looked out over the water, watching the dragonflies bounce just above the surface.
Their discussion became heated and I absentmindedly turned toward them. My eyes caught a flicker of movement past them, in a tree line several yards away and then, suddenly, Chevelle was gone and Steed and Grey were posted in front of me protectively before I had a chance to see what it was. Or who it was. Why hadn’t we heard the wolves signal?
Panic washed through me before I could think rationally. Who had come for us? For me?
But I knew, even if it was council, that was who we were looking for. I cursed myself again for insisting I come along. The seconds dragged on as I waited. After a few eternities, I heard a voice I recognized. Junnie. She was speaking with Chevelle in a rush, her voice low. As they drew near, Steed and Anvil relaxed slightly in front of me, Anvil stepping a pace to the side. I realized I was standing, Steed’s arm so close it was almost touching my chest as he stood, still half in front of me. As I stared past him, I noticed his muscles were tensed and I wondered why he’d still be protecting me.
And then I remembered Junnie was council. And my mother’s aunt. Confusion took over and I clutched Steed’s arm in an attempt to focus. I had no idea how to react to her. She was still speaking to Chevelle, a flood of words running together, she hadn’t even seemed to notice me.
When she finally looked my direction, it was not at me. I barely had time to turn and see Ruby approaching before it happened. The spots in my vision came just as fast. Through them, I saw a flash of Junnie’s cloak flying past as she picked up the limp body of the girl. The human.
Chapter Four
Paranoia
I should have caught on by then that the fainting was a protection mechanism. But I didn’t often think rationally. And shock wasn’t exactly an easily controlled reaction. It was just that I missed so much every time I blacked out. All the important stuff.
Before my eyes opened the first time, I heard someone. “… she took Snickers…” Recognition came. The puppy. And confusion was back. Junnie had seen the girl, the human, and her reaction was so fierce. I’d heard a low oath just before the girl’s body hit the ground with a thud. She hadn’t even waited for an explanation. My stomach churned. I hadn’t even tried.
My eyelids fluttered and the blackness came again. But this time, there were dreams.
> I was in the practice rooms. A tall, dark man with a large scar across his brow was threatening me, or pushing me too far, I couldn’t be sure. There was darkness again; it was creeping in on us, closer and closer. And then I was alone in the darkness as it swirled around me. But I couldn't have been alone because I heard voices. My chest tightened as I realized what they were saying about me. Comparing me to them, like dumb animals. It ached. How could he? I didn’t understand. I ran to my mother, she had been right.
It was a long time after I woke before I could bear to open my eyes. When I did, they were all quiet. But I didn’t question them. And I’d forgotten about the girl, about Junnie. All I could think of was the dream. It had twisted my reality. I couldn’t get it to fall in place in my thoughts. I had known the voice this time. But it couldn’t be right. My grandfather must have been killed in the massacre, he hadn’t ruled since. He must have been gone.
But the man in my dream was not gone.
Lord Asher.
My mother’s father, the one who had driven her to the massacre, the man who had pushed us both. I felt the pain associated with the memory. It couldn’t have been. How could that man have been the same Asher, the same man that had met with Chevelle? I remembered the first time I had seen him. The look he’d given me, the way his knuckles whitened as he gripped the staff, his shabby cloak. I remembered thinking it must have been a disguise because of the way he carried himself, and then chastising myself for being so paranoid.
I realized I was staring at Chevelle as I recalled their meeting. He was watching me, concern on his face. A thought flashed that maybe he knew that I was on to him. But it was all so wrong.
My head spun and I closed my eyes. I tried to find something to grasp, something to steady me before I blacked out again. I needed a way to fix the conflict. Asher couldn’t have been my grandfather. I struggled to sit up long enough to reach my pack. I felt around for the only thing real I had. My fingers finally caught the edge of the binding and I pulled the diary out, clutching it tight as if someone might try and take it from me.
I couldn’t make myself look at the others, but I knew what they’d be thinking. It was a few minutes before I could focus well enough to read. I flipped through the first pages: my mother as a child; her father’s prize.
A tear tracked down my cheek and I wiped at it absentmindedly. And then I felt their eyes on me so I hardened, biting down, determined to keep another from escaping.
I scanned back through, searching for mention of him, but I kept getting caught in the story. It was all so different now, now that it wasn’t a stranger. It was my mother’s story, my story. And Asher’s?
Lord Asher.
Page after page I kept my nose buried in the diary. No one asked me to move. But they kept close. I could feel them watching, waiting. Eventually, exhaustion won out and the dreams were back.
The next day, I was almost certain the dreams were not just dreams, they were memories. And Asher was Lord Asher. But what I could not reconcile was how he was alive, how he could have met with Chevelle, and why.
My thoughts were clearer now but that made them all the more distressing. I felt like secrets were everywhere, swallowing me.
I recalled each time I had seen him. I focused on the day we all had seen him in the tree line: how they had reacted to his single nod. I could see his braid swing behind him as he turned and disappeared into the brush. I struggled to understand and I couldn’t help but remember what had happened just before, a memory I’d not returned to willingly. I could still hear the sickening thud as the council tracker’s head landed on the ground. The sight of it rolling to a stop, the blood on my blade.
Yet I could not understand.
And so I forced myself to stop thinking of it. It was the only way to put an end to the screeching pain in my head. But when I finally calmed it to a dull throb, I could begin to feel the ache in my chest. It was tough to breathe. How could they… But I couldn’t even finish the thought before the other pain returned.
It was some time later that I broke, unable to stand the conflict in my own mind, the pain I was causing myself. The pain they were causing me? No, I wouldn’t think it. When I finally gave, I found solace in the mind of the hawk as it hovered above us, floating on the current of the wind. I stayed there, void of all other thoughts, until I surrendered and returned to my own tortured body.
In time, I found a compromise with myself. I would only allow a set amount of concentration, a set amount of worry, each day to feed my concern and distress. The rest would be devoted to the one thing I was positive of: we… no, I needed to find council, to release my mind from the bonds that felt like they were killing me.
I could only hope that it would release the memories as well, remove all of the unanswered questions, erase the doubt. Doubt that was even now creeping into every thought I had. How could they? And always, why?
Finally, I was in control of myself enough to continue. Our task was my first priority now. Find council. I focused on my memories of them, the images of their faces. It was all I had but at least it was something.
Ruby scrutinized me, obviously concerned, as we rode through a field of tall grass. I ignored her, pretending to watch my horse steal bites along the way, struggling to keep a steady pace as his head bent sideways securing generous mouthfuls.
She couldn’t stand it for long. “Frey?”
I looked at her blankly. Her eyes went wide. Well, I’d thought it was blankly. I tried to smooth out my face. “Hmm?”
She must not have planned it out, because she apparently had nothing to say. Her face looked slightly tortured. I wondered what she was reading on mine.
She glanced forward, to the backs of the others as they rode in front of us, and then again to me. “Was there something specific you were looking for, in the diary?”
It struck me that she had no idea why I had been reading it again. I’d not mentioned my dream, not my new knowledge. She must have thought I had been upset about Junnie or the human. They must have all thought that. They had no idea that I had remembered.
I realized I was smiling. Some part of me, buried deep inside, was happy about this. It relished the secret knowledge and wanted to protect it. I spoke without thinking. “No, really, it was just a shock is all. I’m fine.”
Her eyebrows knit.
“I’d been meaning to read it. You know, closure.” I almost scoffed at my own words. She was staring at me hard so I changed the subject. “So, where exactly are we going?”
Her face was concerned but she looked forward and nodded ahead to some structure I couldn’t quite make out in the distance. I hadn’t even noticed it before, so tied up in my thoughts.
We rode closer and the shapes became more defined. I kicked up my horse to fall in beside the others for a better view. In the bow of a large ring of trees, pillars of stone rose up in patterns around a massive amphitheater.
I gulped, cringing at the thought of what this place could be. “Grand Council?” I whispered.
“No,” Anvil answered, smiling.
I relaxed a little, letting out the breath I’d been holding.
Chevelle spoke from the front. “The temple of Loelle.”
I could see it more clearly now. It looked like it must have been abandoned long ago. The sandstone pillars were crumbling in places, weeds grew up between the stones. The others stopped and dismounted, leaving the horses as they entered the central building. I followed behind, still cautious. I remembered now my plan to sweep the sky each day, I’d forgotten that during the time spent fretting over Asher, and then I caught myself and focused on the present.
The floors of the temple were covered in a light dusting of the sand from the stones, which made me feel a bit more secure in my abandonment theory. Regardless of my concerns about the group’s relationship with Asher, I was glad they were here now. I knew I would be unable to stand alone to face Grand Council when the time came. Soon.
I shivered and Chevelle stepp
ed beside me, wrapping his arm around my back to place a hand on my opposite shoulder. I forced myself not to look at him, not to betray my emotions.
“We will stay here until Rhys and Rider can locate council.”
I expected to stiffen at his words but realized I already was; I had when he’d first touched me. He must have noticed too, because he dropped his arm as he continued. “You will need to train.”
He turned and walked off without another word but, as if on command, Anvil approached with two large metal rods. Ugh.
We trained through the evening as the others gathered in small groups, planning or watching or checking perimeters. I was exhausted when we finally stopped for dinner and then, almost before I’d finished my last bite, Grey was urging me to train again, practice trying to stop his disappearing acts. It was dark when I finally gave up. I had thought I’d fallen asleep by the fire but when I woke, I was inside my own small hut, complete with soft bedding. I pulled myself out of bed and found immediately that the day’s training had already been planned out. I forced myself not to groan aloud but, internally, I was doing more than my share of complaining.
By the third day, exhaustion was winning out. They pushed me harder and harder, relentless. I was too tired to even be miserable. It reminded me of something that I couldn’t quite place, forced to train, exhausted, paranoid. I cried out as Ruby’s whip cracked at my shoulder and it was a cry of defeat. I fell to my knees, spent.
“Up!” she commanded.
I huffed out a breath, having no intention of following her order.
Frey Saga Book II: Pieces of Eight Page 5