by Eileen Wilks
He was nattering away at Wen again, holding one of those weird, relayed conversations with one of the other councilors back in the City via two or three Ekiba. The two of them looked pretty funny—the little gnome on a baby-size pony trotting along beside the big, bald, nearly naked Ekiba on his full-size horse.
"I'll check," Steve told Cullen, and bravely poked at his horse's sides with his heels. The animal went into a fast trot.
Cynna's horse had trotted a couple times. She did not approve of trotting. "Check what?" she asked Cullen.
"Tash's scout is back, and Steve is fidgety. He's going to see if that village we're aiming for is close."
"Please, God," she said fervently. "I think the drizzle is working its way up to becoming real rain."
"In Ireland they'd call this soft weather. When it isn't raining hard, you see, it's soft."
"You been to Ireland?"
"A few times. Mum had a cousin who married an Irish lass. What they say about the incredible green of the land is true."
"How about what they say about leprechauns?"
"Ah, now, that's another story." And he proceeded to tell one, probably 90 percent fiction but entertaining.
Cullen didn't speak, act, or look like a man troubled by nightmares or some hidden trauma. But last night…
Maybe she was imagining things. Cullen was a prime manipulator. Maybe turning down sex was part of some grand scheme to get her so hot and bothered she'd agree to marry him temporarily so he'd have rights to his child. She might have imagined the flatness in his voice last night. Even if she were right about that, she might have read all the wrong things into it—that he was shook, bad shook, and needed time to pull himself together.
But she'd hadn't imagined the feel of his skin—clammy and cool, as if he were sliding into shock. Could a nightmare do that? Manifest so strongly the body reacted as if it were badly injured?
Nor had she imagined the tremors, if that was the right word… nothing as obvious as trembling, but before she woke him, he'd been vibrating like a tuning fork. She was pretty sure those tremors were what had woken her. When they hadn't woken him, she'd decided to do that herself.
So, yeah, her guesses might be all wrong. Guesses often were. But this time she didn't think so. She knew how sometimes the only way you make things okay is by pretending with everything in you that they were. Last night he'd needed her to pretend with him. He'd needed that more than sex.
But a wish ached deep inside her that he could have told her. Could have let her step into the pain with him and know what it was about.
The village parked perilously near the mountains was called Shuva. According to Tash, Shuva existed because of its market. The Ahk were not farmers, so they traded for produce at the market here and in similar small villages near their territory.
Shuva was small, the stone cottages tiny. Many of the roofs gleamed darkly in the damp—slate tiles, Cynna thought. Some were thatched, their hats dull and dark in the damp night. They rode past some larger buildings, too—a school, a store, and what seemed to be a church or temple. No voices came from inside the last one, but light flickered in the windows, and as they rode by she heard music—the wild lilt of fiddles chasing some song to its end.
She glanced at Cullen. His head was cocked and his face had fallen into an absent smile, the sort that means you don't know you're smiling. Lupi loved violins.
The light was thin here, not like the City. More candles and firelight, fewer mage lights. How did people endure three months of darkness?
Up ahead a tall man strode along beside Bilbo's horse. He was human, or looked it, with a bushy beard and long, dark hair pulled back in a rough tail. His features were Anglo; his skin, weathered in the way of a man who's spent much of his time outdoors. He had a Cossack look going—dark, heavy tunic with an embroidered band around the neck; furry vest; loose trousers tucked into workman's boots.
He was the sheriff. Sort of. One of the gaggle of children who'd met them at the fringes of the village had said, "Michael's gone to get the sheriff to meet your honors." At least, that's what Cynna thought he'd said, via the charm, but his words had gotten mixed up with the other kids shushing him, then insisting that Derreck wasn't a real sheriff. They just called him that sometimes.
The kids had followed them at first, but mothers and fathers had called them inside. Not many were out at this hour. It was probably about eight bells, which meant most people had eaten supper and were tucked up warm at home. Everyone she'd seen so far looked human.
"I thought humans stayed in the City," Cynna said to Cullen, who rode beside her. "At least… do they smell human to you?"
"Oh, yeah. They look human to my other vision, too." He widened his eyes in fake shock, "You don't suppose Bilbo misled us, do you?"
She snorted. "You think? Only I don't see why. He must have known we'd find out otherwise, so why did he bother? Habit?"
The guard riding behind them—one of the two humans—spoke softly. Cynna's charm whispered his words in her ear: "Humans are discouraged from settling outside the City, but do it anyway. They don't like it when we get out on our own because we start thinking we should be in charge of ourselves."
"Harry," the guard riding beside him said, warning in her voice. She was not human. Half-half, maybe, and sort of catlike, with those pointy ears and the short orange fur.
"What?" He glared at his friend. Cynna knew they were friends because she'd seen him humping her one night out on deck. She'd been purring, too. "Every other species in Edge has some region they dominate, where they rule according to their own ways. Not humans."
"Half-halfs don't," his friend said in the manner of one who's made the point many times before.
"Yeah, but almost all of you have human blood. That's why you're looked down on."
Cullen glanced over his shoulder. "This seems to be a human village, but the region itself belongs to…" His voice drifted off, inviting them to fill in the blank.
"Hoko," the guard named Harry said. "He's sidhe. Allied with Rohen, sometimes. Sometimes not. Hoko collects rent from the farmers around here when the mood strikes, but otherwise leaves people pretty much alone, so a number of humans have migrated to his territory."
Cynna tried a question. "Why is this Derreck not a real sheriff?"
"That would suggest they were governing themselves, wouldn't it? The village is in fief to Hoko, who probably hasn't bothered to appoint a sheriff, so the villagers elected one. Which isn't allowed if you're human."
"Why?" Cynna asked. "Why so down on humans governing themselves?"
"Because we're so damned warlike." Harry snorted. "As if the Ahk weren't."
"Babies," the female guard said suddenly. "That's the real reason. Humans are too bloody fertile—fertile with almost all the other species, too. If you were allowed to govern yourselves, you'd not regulate your reproduction the way it is now. In a few generations, Edge would be overrun with humans."
"Fertility is regulated?" Cullen asked sharply.
"Among humans, it is." Harry was bitter. "In every region of Edge. Ashwa is one of the few things everyone agrees on."
"Ashwa?"
"The practice of—"
"Harry," the female guard said, "remember when to shut up."
He shot her a sullen look. "You brought it up."
She faced forward, expression frozen. "Hsst."
Tash was riding toward them. As soon as Harry saw her, he shut up.
Tash told them about the inn. The bad news was that there weren't nearly enough rooms available. The good news was that those rooms did have beds—really large beds with feather mattresses. Cynna was excited about that as she slid off her horse at the nearby stable—and wobbled on legs suddenly turned to goo.
Cullen chuckled and slid an arm around her waist, propping her up. "We really do need some liniment, or you won't be able to move tomorrow." He asked the groom about getting some—which she knew because her charm whispered the translation.
Cynna's eyebrows went up. Obviously Cullen now spoke Common Tongue. Somehow she'd assumed the transfer hadn't taken place… but either the elf-woman had given him the spell before she glammed him, or even under a faery glamour Cullen's priorities were clear: spell first, then sex.
"What was that word Harry used? Ashwa," she said as they left the stable, Cullen carrying a bottle of horse liniment. "Do you know it?"
He shook his head. "It wasn't included in the package I got from Theera, and I didn't hear any references to ashwa when I wandered the market in the City. He wasn't supposed to mention it, was he?"
Steve came up behind them. "Mention what? Hey, is that liniment?"
"It is," Cullen said, "and we'll share. Have you heard the term ashwa?"
"Nope." He put his hand on his hips and stretched, curling his back. "Man, I ache."
"I know what it means." That was Gan, who'd had no trouble at all with her little pony. "I can't tell, though."
"Not even for an extra chocolate?" Cynna had been giving Gan one Hershey's Kiss after supper every day that she behaved. Surprisingly, the former demon behaved quite well—for a former demon. She was by turns surly, selfish, mischievous, and rude, yet she didn't create havoc for havoc's sake.
When you got down to it, Cynna thought, Gan just wasn't mean. Not the way some people were. Real meanness was an inverted empathy—knowing what would hurt others and doing it. Gan mostly lacked empathy, but it was an innocent lack, one that might be slowly filled in.
Gan's face screwed up as she considered the nature of temptation. Finally she shook her head. "Not even for two more chocolates. They might find out. Ask your Daniel Weaver. He's not supposed to tell, either, but he might because of being your family. Don't give him any of my chocolate," she added hastily.
They'd reached the long wooden porch in front of the inn. Cynna paused, checking. "Yep."
"Yep, what?" Cullen asked.
"The trail. It's muddled for some reason, but the medallion was here."
"Here in the village? Or the inn itself?"
"The inn." She closed her eyes, concentrating. "Three weeks ago, maybe less. We're catching up." She opened her eyes. "And we might be able to get a description of whoever has it. They probably don't get a huge number of travelers staying here. Bet they'll remember who was here three weeks ago."
As it turned out, they remembered very well.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
Tash straightened, shaking her head. "I can do nothing for him. No healer could—there's not enough mind left to heal. The only mercy I can offer is death."
Cynna's breath caught. "You won't, though. You won't just…"
Tash looked at Bilbo, who shook his head, "Is not deciding yet."
Tash, Bilbo, Cynna, and Cullen were in a crowded storeroom at the back of the inn. It stank of piss. A man—a human man—slumped on a huddle of blankets on a narrow cot, playing with his fingers. He didn't seem aware of his visitors. Every so often he whimpered. Once he giggled.
He had been good-looking in a brawny, rough-hewn way, Cynna thought. Now he was a bearded imbecile in a diaper.
"We can't keep him here," the innkeeper said through Cynna's charm. He kept wiping his hand on his apron—wanting to wipe Ms hands of the whole business, no doubt. "We've been waiting for an Ekiba to ride through so we could send out word, find his people. It's not our fault, what happened to him." He shook his head. "Not that I understand what happened. I can't believe what you say about Bell, though I guess… well, he did leave, but he always was something of a drifter."
According to the innkeeper and his wife, this man had arrived three weeks ago and paid for one night. When he didn't leave the next day, they checked on him and found him like this. Earlier they'd seen him talking to a kid, maybe seventeen, named Bell Hammond, who did odd jobs for them sometimes. Hammond had been a drifter, not a villager, but he'd lived here over a year. Suddenly he'd quit and left the village—hours before the innkeeper discovered his guest sitting on urine-wet sheets and counting his fingers.
"People don't drift into Ahk territory," Tash said, "unless they're idiots. You say Hammond was seen heading for the mountains?"
The innkeeper nodded unhappily. "I thought Derreck was wrong about that. Seemed like he had to be. Bell isn't all that bright, but he knows better than to enter Ahk land. Listen, you'll take this fellow with you, right? We can't keep him here."
Cynna backed out of the room, leaving Bilbo arguing with the innkeeper about whose responsibility the poor man was. If you could call what remained a man.
Cullen came with her. "Let's get some air."
She nodded. The stew she'd had for supper wasn't sitting well in a stomach turned raw by pity.
They didn't go far. The temperature had dropped, and icy pellets mixed with snow sifted through the frigid air. The porch was covered, though, and there was no wind; the cold, clean air did clear up her nausea.
Cynna stood at the porch rail watching the way white mingled with darkness in the wintry air. Cullen came up behind her. He'd let his mage light puff out, so the only light came from her own little ball of light.
"It occurs to me," he said softly, "that our thief didn't lose his mind until he lost the medallion."
He was right, The man had made it here, hadn't he? He'd seemed normal to the innkeeper until the next day… "The First Councilor said the medallion ate the mind of anyone it couldn't bond with. She didn't say the damage didn't happen until someone else got hold of it, but that's what it looks like."
"Maybe she didn't want us to think about grabbing it for ourselves."
Cynna shivered. "No temptation here. What I'm wondering is why this Bell Hammond would take it. How did he know it existed? The innkeeper never saw it. That poor man wouldn't have pulled it out to show the boy. Even if he did, Hammond shouldn't have known what it was."
Cullen shook his head. "We're missing something."
"A lot, I suspect." And her head was too thick to make sense of it tonight. Cynna sighed. "I need some sleep."
He moved up behind her, putting his arms around her. "In that damned crowded bed."
Turned out the beds were plenty big… big enough to hold three people apiece. More, if they were gnome-size people. Or that was the plan, since there were so few rooms. She and Cullen would be sharing with Steve. "Could be worse. We could have drawn Gan for a bunk-mate."
"Good point. I'm betting she's a bed hog. Ah… I'm not coming up with you yet. Tash has lost two guard and, while this inn is wonderfully comfortable compared to bare ground, it's not very defensible. Wen, Steve, and I offered to help with watches. I'm on first watch."
Cynna turned in the warm circle of his arms. Her mage light hovered near her shoulder, its glow falling softly over the beautiful contours of his face. Funny, she didn't always notice that anymore—how pulse-raisingly gorgeous he was. Mostly he just looked like Cullen to her. "I could take a watch."
"Pregnant women are excluded from guard duty."
She thought that over and decided it sounded right in principle. Applying it to herself wasn't easy, but… "I guess I won't complain about getting my full eight hours." Cullen slept eight hours only if he was healing. Otherwise, if he got in six hours, he thought he'd overslept.
The subtle ease in his features told Cynna he was relieved. He'd expected an argument. She tried to look severe. "You're telling me I'm going to be sleeping with Steve Timms for a couple hours."
His grin flashed. "You're safe. He made a point of telling me he's of the 'don't poach' school of thought."
"Poaching is for bunny rabbits. I am not a bunny rabbit."
"I know, but Steve's not the brightest bulb, socially. There is some good news—he's taking the last watch. So if you can make do with slightly less than eight hours, there will be a period when we have the bed to ourselves."
Oh. In that case… she ran a hand up his side. "How's your heart?"
He didn't answer for a moment, then said softly, "Better. It's definitely getti
ng better."
Cynna stirred when the bed dipped. "Go back to sleep, luv," Cullen told her softly, and he pressed a kiss to her forehead. "Steve's shift doesn't start for another four hours."
She did. She slept soundly, too, and was dreaming of a cat-faced woman who wanted to hump Cullen. Cynna was explaining to her that Cullen's penis was not shaped properly for feline intercourse when the door crashed open.
Cullen rolled to his feet on one side of the bed. Steve did the same on the other. An eight-foot tusked monster holding about six feet of drawn sword bellowed and surged through the doorway. Cynna, bogged down in the middle of the soft mattress, hadn't finished untangling herself from the quilts when Cullen flamed him.
His scream went on and on, mixing with other screams. His blackened body fell, blocking the door, as Cynna finally got her feet on the far side of the bed, next to Steve.
"Duck!" Steve cried—as a second monster replaced the first in the doorway.
Cullen ducked. Steve fired. The first shot seemed to startle the monster—its eyes widened, and it hesitated. The second shot hit right between those eyes.
"The window!" Cullen called, heaving one of the bodies away from the doorway. Maybe he hoped to block it if he could get the door shut.
Cynna spun, shoved open the shutter. "Shit! Two more climbing onto the roof of the porch. More—at least ten more on horseback—in the street below. Ahk," she added, her mind catching up with events. "They're Ahk."
A rumbling voice sounded behind her. Even as she whirled back to face the door, the charm was translating: "You fight bravely, but you are outnumbered twenty to one. Surrender, and we will spare all those still alive."
There was no one in the doorway. The speaker must have decided to lurk out of the line of fire.
Speaking of which, Cullen sent a jet of flame it through the doorway. "And we should take your word for that? Don't see why. I've got plenty more of this."
Rumble, rumble. The charm: "We do not kill you for that this time. You are new to Edge and do not know the Ahk. As for your tire… grieegwashabettama."