“Cheeky,” He breathed. “Where’s your friend?”
“My bodyguard?” She said. “She bailed in Pelf. Went home after the bounty was called. Maybe I should’ve followed.” In saying so, she felt the reality click home––she would probably never see July again. Suddenly she was desperate to turn around, to run back and say a proper goodbye instead of a helpless gesture of surrender.
“Maybe so.” He straightened up, all six and a half feet of him, and stepped back. The soldier led her again, this time with one hand on her neck and the other on the rope between her hands. They moved towards the ‘V’ of carriages, one of which had long, thin windows with iron bars near the top––she presumed this one to be hers. “On the bright side, you’ll have lots of company,” He boomed. “I brought enough guards for a rebellion, let alone a doctor and a child. You––yes, you––send our fastest bird to the prince. He’ll want to know we have her.” As they neared, the company parted to form a path, then closed behind them. She took a deep breath and looked back at the boat. She could see July in the doorway, but not clearly enough to see what she was thinking. Whatever it is, I understand, she thought, regret bleeding through the walls of her heart. Sail home, Captain Casperan.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Although the battalion had already parted, carriages side-by-side, July stood in the doorway, watching the empty boardwalk. She stood like that for a long time, feeling nothing, until a hand fell on her shoulder.
“Julius,” The owner of the hand said in a low voice, “we’re leaving the boat now. Do you have any possessions inside?” She distantly recognized the voice as Damien. She felt like a capsule of air in the depths of the ocean, pressure pushing in from all sides, threatening to crush her. When that capsule ruptured, the truth would flood in, and she would have to start thinking about the future. But that pressure was too terrible to look past right now. She shook her head slowly in answer to his question. “Okay,” he said softly. “Let’s go.”
“Where?” She mumbled.
“Before I left, I wrote ahead to Ginzo to rent an apartment. You can stay there for now, and we’ll work on getting your aunt back.” He stepped past her, onto the thin wood of the pier. July let him guide her down the boardwalk, towards the city. She hardly took in any details––only blurs of brown and red, streaks of light. “Alright?”
The walk was short, and July remembered almost none of it. At some point they turned down a less populated street, and she began to walk more surely, her head emerging from its isolated bubble. Damien stopped at an unmarked wooden door, shaded by the looming buildings on either side. July wouldn’t have noticed it if he hadn’t drawn her attention to it; she got a sense that many things about Damien worked this way. She was grateful for his hospitality, but as they walked down the dim hall and into a tiny closet of an apartment, she couldn’t help but wonder what kind of lifestyle he led.
The apartment was a corridor of plaster and wood as wide as July’s wingspan, furnished lightly with a dinner table and small counter for preparing food. There was a bed laid against the far wall, only as long as the apartment was wide––a bed for a gnome, she thought absurdly. He’d have to fold in half to sleep there. Maybe he just doesn’t sleep at all. She would have to check for dhampyr fangs later.
“So, your aunt,” Damien began, leaning against the counter.
“She’s not my aunt,” July admitted. He nodded, unsurprised. “I was travelling with her, to… to her destination. I can’t really say much more.”
“Amelia Saul,” He mused. “No wonder the prince sent soldiers from his private guard. What did she do?”
“She didn’t do anything. Szukin is just a prick.” He seemed to turn over the words as he pulled his coat off. He threw it across the room, flashing a strip of leather-strapped midsection in the process. Some sort of harness, she noted. “All the Lhords are.”
“I can agree with that,” He chuckled. “Bunch of royal pricks, parading around in their wyrmskin boots.” Then he grew serious again. She guessed he was wrestling with a thought––a hard truth, maybe.
She tried the straightforward approach. “If you’ve got something to say, say it.”
“Saul has been indicted for treason before,” He said, watching her in that careful way of his. “They say she tried to poison the daughter of Gaza Sul’Lhord.”
“I’m aware,” July said, ignoring the nervous tightness in her chest. He said nothing for a moment, just mulling her over. She wondered if this was how he treated all the women who sat in his apartment, or just the ones planning to abduct political prisoners––but then, he didn’t exactly know she was a woman.
He sighed. “The evidence was quite damning. She prescribed a draught of honey, burrower oil and something else, I forget what––I just remember the name of the thing; Noah’s Kiss.” Then his eyes were on her again, taking in every piece of information she offered. She realized that she had crossed her legs reflexively. “Not poisonous alone, but she was also taking milk of the poppy.”
“And together?”
“A sleep like death, they say.” July’s thoughts turned to Cloudless, and Mel’s voice, what felt like years ago at her own kitchen table––they sleep, all day and all night. It’s as if someone turned off a switch in their heads.
“I don’t believe it,” July said. It was a half truth––she was beginning to wonder, despite her hardest efforts to simply have faith. “I know Mel. She’s a good person. If she prescribed it, I’m sure there was a reason.” She searched frantically for more proof, more ways to stop this idea from rooting in her heart. “Besides, she’s a pacifist. She hates violence.”
“What’s so violent about sleeping forever?” Damien said.
July stood up, sending the chair careening into the wall. “Maybe she made a mistake! Or maybe––maybe the Council sent her to kill the princess! I don’t really care, truth be told. Can we move on?” For once, he looked marginally surprised, and made no effort to counter her argument.
“Of course.” He sat down at the table and folded his hands. She realized she had been shouting.
“Sorry,” She said, although she wasn’t, and sat down. “It’s been a long week. Can we focus on finding Amelia? Then I’ll be out of your hair for good.”
Inscrutably, he smiled. “Yes. In fact, I have an idea of where to start.”
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
THE WAITING GAME. LAYERS OF PAINT, PT. II.
When the soldier led Mel to a wooden chair and gestured for her to sit, she began to sense a pattern forming. Just one of these times, she thought, I would like to be the one not bound to a chair. She supposed that was what she got for walking around without a sword strapped to her hip. She sat as the soldier tied his end of the rope to the tent’s heavy wooden support strut, securing her to the chair.
“Captain Bolton will want to see you again shortly,” The soldier mumbled through the metal grate of his helmet. Then he walked back to the mouth of the tent and stood guard.
The tent was tall and square, made of a thick canvas that blocked the sun. In the center of the tent’s roof, a patch of fabric was cut away, allowing a shaft of light to illuminate the surroundings. From what Mel saw on her way in, most of the camp was comprised of similar tents––temporary structures. The only remotely permanent fixture was the wooden wall constructed around the camp’s perimeter. Our own Great Wall, Bolton had called from the front of the caravan as they approached. Keeps the mice out. Barring the support beam and a few stacked wooden chairs, the rest of the tent was empty––evidently, she was the only prisoner of the prince’s war.
She began to twist her hands behind her back, getting a better grip on the knotted rope. It was thick, but the knot was relatively simple. Given time, it could be loosened enough to–
“Hello, doctor.” Bolton’s voice interrupted her thoughts. His giant frame blocked the mouth of the tent, leaving him a black tower of bitter metal. He entered the canvas room, followed by two more soldiers. The
guard stayed put. “How was the ride in? Comfortable?”
Mel spit on the ground indignantly, but said nothing else. She looked Bolton as square in the eyes as she could––it was hard, given her sitting position and his startling size. A shade of a smile passed over his face, and he nodded to one of his men. The soldier bent over and plunged his fist into Mel’s stomach. It knocked the wind out of her, and a short, pained cry of surprise escaped her lungs. She hunched over, gasping for breath, until Bolton reached down and threw her torso back into the chair.
“We’re going to ask you a few questions,” He continued, “in preparation of Szukin’s arrival. I imagine you’ll be nice and tender by then.” Mel elected to ignore him, still working on catching her breath. “The first one is easy; who sent you to Warden?”
“Who sent you?” She replied. He shrugged and nodded to the soldier again, who slapped her across the face with his knuckles. The chair rocked on its feet, almost tipping over, but she didn’t register the fact through the stinging pain in her cheek. She shut her left eye against the welling tears. “I digress. Why do you think someone sent me to Warden?”
Bolton seemed to consider this, then decided it wasn’t worth withholding. “The prince says you turned down his offer on grounds of ‘more urgent business’.”
“I did. I also don’t care for indentured service.”
“Make this easy on yourself, doctor. I’m giving you a chance to live; the prince is just as likely to kill you as anything else.” He delivered these words as if they were the pinnacle of charity––his own personal gift of salvation. “Who sent you to Warden?”
“It doesn’t matter what I tell you,” She said, avoiding the question. “You’ve already decided the answer.”
“You’re right, Saul. I already know.” He kneeled at her level––a considerable journey for a man of his size. “And the sooner you tell me yourself, the sooner we can be done with this. The Amoran Council sent you.”
Mel took a deep breath and closed her eyes. They’ve tried this before and the charges didn’t stick, she thought.
“The Amoran Council sent you to San Della to threaten the House of Lhords.”
He can’t question me forever. I just have to wait.
“The Amoran Council sent you to poison the Prince’s sister, just like you poisoned Lydia Sul’Lhord. Only you failed. You couldn’t go through with it, could you, coward? You ran away, like Amorans always do.” His face was only inches from hers now. “You crossed Zelan to avoid the Great Wall Bal’Amor. You think we won’t chase you into Warden.”
I just have to wait. I just have to wait.
“We talked to your friend Bachman, you know. He wasn’t chatty either, but in the end he told us enough. Does he work for the Council too? Not that it matters. He doesn’t work for anyone now.”
He’s lying. Just wait. She squeezed her eyes shut even tighter. Just wait.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
July followed Damien out of the city borders with tangible relief––the forest was welcome after hours of metal and granite. Warden was much wetter and murkier than Lochmount, but the tones of green and blue felt more like home than anything in Zelan. They spent another hour walking in the shadow of the trees before coming to a dirt path, wide enough to accommodate a single carriage, that split from the highway’s cracked stone.
“Is this it?” July asked, pulling her jacket closer. Without the sun glaring down, the breeze was robust.
Damien nodded. “The Lhord’s Army has a dozen outposts like this along the border, but this one is the closest. Provided they didn’t keep on the highway towards Old Amora, she should be here.” July peered down the pathway into the twisting green wilderness. If Mel was here, it was worth trying––even if they had to hit every outpost on the border, it would be worth trying.
They took to the path quickly, July leading the way. She kept a hand on the hilt of her sword, as was habit; Damien travelled empty-handed. She wondered if they should’ve found something for him before trekking into a military encampment. Too late for backwards thinking, she decided. They forged on ahead.
At the mouth of the trail, the woods opened up into a long, rectangular clearing. July had a hard time estimating exactly how long, as the field was mostly blocked from view by a wooden wall, ten feet tall and tipped with sharpened timber. Opposite the trail was a wide gate, flanked by two pairs of guards with spears. Inside the gate, she could see rows of green canvas tents, mostly small and locked into a grid pattern, with the notable exception of one large central tent. This one was more complex than the rest, with two stubby wings and a wide mouth that flashed the busy soldiers milling inside. Each tent had a number, struck on the canvas with black paint.
“What’s your assessment?” Damien whispered.
“Well,” July began, “if we walk in the front gates, we will almost definitely be impaled on the wooden spikes to ward off intruders.” She retreated into the foliage, turning back to look at Damien directly. “We could try the outer perimeter, but they most likely have guards on patrol, since there aren’t any watchtowers. We could climb the wall between patrols, I suppose…” She trailed off into deliberation.
Damien sat in the dirt. “I bet if we asked nicely, they’d just give us their weapons.”
July snorted. “I don’t think they would give their own soldiers weapons if they––oh. Okay, I’ve got something.”
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
As they came around the rounded corner of the wall, the two patrolmen stopped in their tracks. There was a body––a young man with curly brown hair, curled up against the wall’s base. His face was smeared with something shiny and red.
“Oh, gods,” One soldier gasped, pulling off his partial helm and jogging to the man’s side. He kneeled down and began to peel his glove off.
The crumpled man looked up at him. “Help me,” He mouthed.
“Don’t move,” The patrolman said, putting a hand to his neck. He couldn’t find a pulse, probably on account of his shaking hands. He looked back at his partner. “Go get Raymon from the medical tent.” The man didn’t move for a moment, then, coming to his senses, turned and sprinted back around the corner. In all the weeks he had been on patrol, he hadn’t come across a single thing worth reporting. Not a raccoon, or a teenager, or even a bush, tossed close to the wall by the violent winds that raged through Warden. He had pleaded with all sorts of deities for some action––but today he decided that boredom was a blessing in disguise.
A vulgar thump sounded from around the corner, followed by a strangled cry, which was cut off by a second, heartier thump. The kneeling patrolman’s heart stopped. He looked back to the corner, then to the man again. “Uh… don’t go anywhere. Help is coming,” He assured, standing up. He put a hand on his side, fingers grazing the handle of his knife, and crept up to the corner, listening intently.
There was a rustle. He grabbed for the knife and realized far too late that the sound was coming from behind him. Suddenly the knife was flying into the woods, and there were hands on his neck.
“You’re a kind man,” A flat, even voice said from behind him. “You’ve earned your life.” He tried to say something in his defense, some plea of mercy, but nothing would come. Then he was falling, hitting the ground with a sharp crack. He looked up and saw the wounded man, his face grim and deadly, and another figure coming around the corner, dragging the limp body of his partner.
The other figure saw him watching. “Did you like that?” It said. “I learned this trick from you folks.” He struggled to sit up, to no avail. The swelling sense of alarm inside him couldn’t abate the blackness that swallowed his vision.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
July looked over the man one more time. “Where’s his helmet? The other one had a helmet.” Damien looked back, already fully dressed in the dyed leather and crimson helm of the second patrolman, who was the taller and broader of the two.
&
nbsp; “He took it off,” He said. “I think he tossed it–”
“Oh, there it is.” She reached down and plucked it from around the corner, where it had rolled out of sight. Jamming it on her head, she felt an odd tone of nostalgia––the only set of real armor she’d worn up until that point was at the fighter’s guild in Lochan, training with Andre, and that had been even cheaper leather than she wore now. She wondered if she’d get a chance to keep some pieces for the rest of the journey. The patrolmen had worn bows at their back and knives at their hip. She took one of each.
“We should move.” Damien started off towards the front gate at an urgent pace. July followed close behind––as they had traversed the perimeter prior to attacking, they had seen a second patrol group, and knew they would be most of the way around the camp by now. She tapped his shoulder and held out the patrolman’s knife.
“In case we get split up,” She offered. He took it, cautiously turning it over like the blade might reach around and bite him. She made a note not to get split up.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
In the smallest tent, tucked away in the corner of the camp, Mel sighed. Unlike her time in the church basement, her efforts to free her arms felt counterproductive. Evidently, she was mistaken about the knot––with each twist and turn, it snuck closer to her skin, until it was biting painfully against her flesh. She stopped writhing and began looking for other options.
After it was clear she’d say no more, Bolton had left her to his two lackeys, who amused themselves for a time by seeing how far they could rock the chair on its heels by hitting her in the chest. But that lost its luster after she started to lean into the blows, and they went off to pursue other, more intellectual stimulation, like eating dirt and comparing whisker lengths. She was unfortunately exempt from these activities, not only because she was tied up, but because her left eye had swelled and closed over, and her throat burned viciously when she tried to swallow.
Mel wondered if turning the chair over might present more options. I might be able to fit my arms around the back of the chair and pull myself out, she reasoned. Then again, even if I do, there’s a guard outside the tent door, and he’ll see me trying to leave. I should be looking for ways to use him to my advantage.
Calcifer Page 13