by Stefon Mears
“Kent made this stool,” Cavan said. “When he was young. Before he found his flair for gems and jewels. Tried to be a carpenter.” Cavan looked up at Ehren. “He could never get the legs even. It always teetered. But he didn’t mind. He said the best gems were the ones with a slight flaw.”
Ehren gave Cavan a moment to set down the pieces of the stool before saying, “There’s more blood over here.”
He was right. Had been a puddle. Wide across as Cavan’s hands laid side-by-side. That was the start of the trail that led to the stairs up.
“What’s behind that door?” Ehren said.
By reflex Cavan looked up at the front door. But it was locked and barred as it was supposed to be. He shook his head and looked at the other door. At the back of the room, where it would lead under the stairs to the second floor.
“That’s the cellar door,” Cavan said, relaxing his mind and stretching out with his feelings. “Still locked.”
“We should check it.”
“No,” Cavan said, shaking his head. “You misunderstand me. That’s spell-locked. Did it myself. No one could open it but Kent. Or me.” Then another possibility occurred to Cavan. “Or one of his sons. If Kent’s dead.”
“They could have made him open it,” Ehren said, soft, like if he’d said the words too loudly they would have become true.
“Not Kent.” Cavan shook his head. “He’d die before he’d bring anyone down there. He really hates thieves.”
“Maybe,” Ehren said. “We should check it anyway. They might have threatened his wife.”
“Maybe,” Cavan said, rising to his feet and dropping the seat of the broken stool. “But first, we need to check upstairs.”
* * *
Cavan picked up one of the broken stool legs to use as a club. Not as good as a sword, but better than nothing. He kept a dagger in his other hand, just in case. A thin one, edged on both sides, with a wooden handle molded to his grip. And along the blade, certain symbols Cavan had engraved himself.
Ehren wanted to lead the way up the stairs, but Cavan wouldn’t let him. Stepped in front and took the stairs one at a time for probably the first time in his life. Or at least, the first time since his legs had grown long enough to make more than one stair per stride an option.
He went slowly now.
Light filtered in through a glass window at the top of the stairs. Couldn’t see the upstairs landing yet, much less the door to the household, but he could see the gray stones of the stairs and walls.
And he could certainly see the blood. A thinning trail. Like the bleeder was running dry. Dragged up the stairs, dying. Cavan had to fight not to picture it. To keep himself from guessing if this was Kent’s blood. Or Reed’s or Alec’s. One of their wives’. Maybe even one of their children’s.
Anger burned through Cavan. Sped his heart and forced his breaths out through clenched teeth. He could feel the grip on his weapons growing white-knuckled.
He had to pause halfway up the stairs to get hold of himself. To run through a quick calming exercise and bring his focus back to the world around him. Shut out the fantasies that did not serve him.
He still felt the tightness in his gut. That he held onto. Anger had power of its own, and Cavan would not surrender it entirely.
Through calmer eyes, the blood didn’t look so fresh. Cavan could see that it was dry, as the puddle had been downstairs. Old blood. But the smell of blood in the air was still strong. The smell of rotted meat too.
Cavan started up the stairs again. He could feel Ehren behind him, more than hear him. Ehren was like a warm, silent, comforting presence at his back.
Small landing at the top of the stairs. And it was the top. These stairs went no higher. Cavan knew a separate wooden flight of stairs would lead to the top floor, the apartments Kent shared with his wife.
The landing was more gray stone, a red-and-gold striped rug running down the center. Wide enough to walk on. Or drag a body. Cavan could see spots of blood on the carpet, brown against the red and gold.
The landing was wide. Growing up it had felt big as a castle. Later he realized it was wide enough to bring in furniture.
Now the landing’s width only told Cavan that Ehren had room to swing his staff.
More important, the double doors at the end of the short hall stood open. Not a crack. Not halfway. All the way open, as though to receive guests. Straight ahead Cavan could see the hat rack and cloak rack. Still at least a dozen men’s and women’s hats on the rack, but the cloak rack looked like a barren tree of blond, oiled wood.
Cavan could hear something now. A fluttering sound. Wings?
He glanced back at Ehren. Ehren nodded. He heard it too.
Cavan waited for Ehren to join him on the landing. Not wide enough to fight side-by-side. Not really. But it would do in a pinch.
“What are we in for?” Ehren whispered.
“It sounded like…” Cavan started, but stopped as soon as he realized what Ehren meant.
“Sitting area ahead and left. Dining table farther left past that. Far left corner, a door leading upstairs.” He pointed to the wall to their left, with the chair leg. “Four rooms there. Used to be the order was Reed, me, Alec. No idea what those rooms are used for now. Last room is the kitchen.”
Ehren nodded.
Another flutter.
Cavan drew a deep breath and jumped into the room.
It looked disturbingly pristine, despite the rank smell, even stronger here.
The big, comfy blue couches Cavan remembered in the sitting area. Three of them, set up around the triangular coffee table. Big window on the wall to his right, unbroken. Big window on the far wall, unbroken. All the doors closed. The tapestry next to the sitting area window, done in red and gold like the carpet around the couches, showing the path of a gemstone from mine to necklace.
The dining table yet stood. Seven of its eight high-backed chairs empty.
In the eighth chair was a corpse, bloody and picked at by the room’s other occupant.
A hellcrow.
Big as a small dog. Eyes that blazed yellow flame. A sharp black beak that could cut through the stone walls of this house. Black wings, but the feathers of its body were white tinged with red. Like blood on snow. Black talons big enough to grab Cavan’s shoulder. If it got close enough.
The hellcrow perched atop the high back of the corpse’s chair, busily finishing off what looked like a bite of cheek when Cavan jumped into the room.
The hellcrow looked up, coughed almost like a normal bird, and cawed.
The caw was nothing like any normal crow could produce. Loud as the screams of the damned, and piercing as its beak. Every window in the room shattered, scattering glass to the streets below.
Cavan nearly dropped his weapons, reeling from the pain. He slammed his wrists against the sides of his head to try to shut off that hellish racket, but too late. His ears must have burst. He was sure he could feel blood trickling down his jaw.
And the world went silent as the grave.
Ehren sped past Cavan into the room. A golden glow surrounded both him and his staff, but Cavan could see blood trickling from his ears as well.
Cavan ran forward to join him.
The hellcrow took to the air. Closed the distance between to Cavan with a single flap.
Cavan’s chair leg and dagger came up by reflex, between himself and the flying creature. Sparks flew where a talon ground across the dagger blade, and Cavan could feel the heat even through the grip. His chair leg thumped against the hellcrow’s body, but if he hurt it he couldn’t tell.
But he kept that beak from his throat for at least a first pass.
Cavan whirled, trying to keep the hellcrow in sight while it circled them for its next attack.
Golden sunlight flared out of Ehren. A dome? No. An attack. Like a wave of power in all directions at once, but only striking the hellcrow.
Cavan imagined a splatting sound he couldn’t hear, like swatting a fly.
/> If only.
The hellcrow was knocked back against the wall.
Cavan threw his dagger. Caught the hellcrow in the chest. Black blood trickled out, and the rotted meat smell grew stronger.
The hellcrow leapt back into the air with a mighty flap.
Cavan screamed words he couldn’t hear. Words keyed to the symbols he’d carved into that thin dagger. Words to trigger the spell those symbols represented.
Green fire burst out from the blade.
The hellcrow flew into the ceiling. Green flames spreading through its body, burning the thing away from the inside. The hellcrow’s beak snapped nonstop, as though cawing or crying in pain. But Cavan could hear nothing.
The hellcrow fell to the floor, and the fiery yellow light in its eyes went out.
Cavan struck the body once with his chair leg, just to be sure, but it looked dead.
He pulled back out his dagger.
A hand on his shoulder. Cavan whirled, weapons high.
Only Ehren, who pulled his hand back tapped his ear while his other hand held his goldenwood staff at the ready.
Cavan shook his head and shrugged. He pointed his dagger at his ear, then made a cutting motion. He turned to see about that corpse at the dinner table.
Ehren sighed, and Cavan thought he saw exasperation. The priest held up one hand to keep Cavan from turning away.
Ehren’s lips moved as if in prayer, then he kissed his fingers and touched each of Cavan’s ears.
Sound rushed back into the world. Shouting from outside. Sounded like orders. Wind whistling through the broken windows. Boots on the stairs behind him.
Cavan whirled in time to see Jamse lead his guardsmen into the room, crossbows pointing.
Jamse looked at the dead hellcrow, then up at Cavan.
“Guess you didn’t need the help,” Jamse said.
“We’re not done here yet,” Cavan said.
* * *
Cavan had never felt so guilty to be grateful someone was alive.
The corpse hadn’t been Kent, or either of his sons. And the corpse had been male, so it couldn’t have been any of their wives. An adult male, which meant it couldn’t have been any of Alec’s or Reed’s children. If they had children.
And the moment Cavan realized that, relief washed over him. But guilt followed hot on its trail, because a man was dead. To lay a trap for Cavan.
The dead man had to have been Kent’s assistant. Either someone to help out while Alec and Reed were traveling, or perhaps to do their work, if they’d opened up shops of their own.
So long. Cavan had been away so very long. Didn’t know Kent had hired an assistant, much less the man’s name. He didn’t even know if Alec and Reed were married — much less had children — or if they’d founded shops of their own. Or moved. Or if they were still living in their old rooms.
Their rooms had looked much the way Cavan had remembered them, but that told him nothing. Cavan’s own room sat waiting for his return.
And Jamse had never gotten along with Alec and Reed. Once Cavan left, Jamse had scarcely even kept an eye on Kent.
But that body, the one the hellcrow had been dining on, that wasn’t Kent. And it wasn’t Reed or Alec. And Cavan couldn’t help the swell of hope that all three were still alive, even if they were probably being held somewhere, as bait for him.
If they were still alive, Cavan could try to keep them that way. But if they were dead, then the gods themselves would not keep Cavan from Duke Falstaff’s throat.
Nothing else in the place had been touched. The fresh blood and rotted meat smell had come from the hellcrow, and with the windows broken, the afternoon breeze cleared the smell away soon enough.
Kent’s rooms upstairs were just the way Cavan remembered them, down to the way he arranged his pillows — four feather pillows forming a rectangle at one end of the large, wide mattress. Oh, a few things were different, but nothing that couldn’t be explained by his marriage to Rena. Nothing that looked out-of-place, or like a signal to Cavan.
Even Kent’s family sword was still there. Well, Kent called it his family sword. His father had served in the king’s army for a time, during the Winter War. Came home with a longsword and hung it on the wall. Kent, his father’s only son, inherited it, but neither Alec nor Reed wanted it. So it had stayed on the wall above Kent’s bed.
It needed oil and a whetstone, but Cavan took that longsword and its scabbard, and hung them from his belt. He’d need a new one of his own soon enough, but the image of swinging Kent’s father’s sword while fighting to rescue Kent and his sons appealed to Cavan.
Ehren agreed with him.
Nothing odd down in the basement either. Except for the dust. Kent always dusted that room himself, in part because he wasn’t willing to let anyone else do it, but mostly because he insisted that his work area be dust free.
Dust in the basement meant that even Kent’s abductors hadn’t been able to get past Cavan’s wards. Good.
Now Cavan stood with Ehren just inside the half-open green back door. Jamse and his men were gone. They’d stayed long enough to inspect the scene, then Jamse had sent two of his men for boards to cover the broken windows. They’d helped nail the boards in place — while Ehren cleaned up the blood — before Cavan warded the windows as well.
Amra was not back yet. With the rest of the house locked up, that was the only reason to stay and wait.
“Why kill an innocent?” Cavan said. “The assistant. What did it serve? A warning? I already know they’re after me.”
“Food for the hellcrow,” Ehren said. “They couldn’t know how long it would take you to arrive. Needed the hellcrow satiated enough to wait.”
“Yeah, I imagine it would have attracted attention if it started killing locals at random.”
“What’s this about killing locals?” Amra said, stepping up to the doorway. Her eyes immediately spotted Cavan’s new sword, but she said nothing.
Cavan blinked at her sudden arrival, wondering why he hadn’t heard her horse approach on the cobblestone streets. He shook his head and brought her up to speed.
“You killed a hellcrow without me?” she said.
“Might not be the last we see,” Ehren said. “Someone summoned it. They could summon another.”
“And that’s all there was to learn here?”
“Not quite,” Cavan said. “Someone locked the place up with the hellcrow inside it.”
“So how’d they get out?” finished Amra, voice full of thought. “Magic, I assume.”
“Teleportation isn’t easy,” Cavan said. “Gods know I can’t do it. And it isn’t quick, even for a master. A lot to risk around a hellcrow. They aren’t known for their patience or loyalty.”
“Whatever they did,” Ehren said, “it does suggest a wizard. Even the Lady of Ways doesn’t transport people outside from inside something.”
“True,” muttered Cavan, “and the Hawkspeaker’s style of magic couldn’t have done it either.”
“So we’ll face a wizard before all this is over,” Amra said with a shrug. “Die the same as anyone else, if you cut their head off.”
“Speaking of dying,” Ehren said, “how was your reconnaissance?”
“Nobody on any of the roofs. I did find a room with a window that would have given archers a shot at us whether we came in the front or the back. Odds are, that’s where the ambushers were.”
“What makes you say so?” Cavan said.
“Small room. Four men. Smelled like they’d been there a few days. Cleared out only minutes before I got there, which means after you two showed up with guardsmen and crossbows. Set of stairs that would dump them out in an alley where most people wouldn’t notice.”
“Anything from the innkeep?” Ehren said.
“Denied anyone’d been there at all.”
“Paid him off,” Cavan said.
Ehren gave Amra a look. He had this way of raising one eyebrow that was both asking a question without asking, and render
ing judgment without judging. Cavan would have loved to be able to do what Ehren could do with a raised eyebrow.
Unfortunately, Amra had had years to build up an immunity to its effects. She only fluttered her eyelashes at him and smiled with more innocence than she had any right or claim to.
“Amra?” Ehren made her name a question.
“Yes?”
“Are you going to make me ask?”
“Fine,” she said with a sigh. “I didn’t hurt the innkeep. I didn’t even threaten him, or anyone in his employ. Wouldn’t have done much good anyway. Odds are, he wouldn’t have told me anything I hadn’t figured out already.”
“Which is?” Ehren said.
“Most of it I told you,” she said. “Four men, in a good vantage point for archers. Obviously they had to be the duke’s men, and just as obviously his hunters, not his soldiers.”
Cavan nodded.
“Here’s the thing,” she said, holding up her hands as though she could illustrate her point, but not doing any more with them than moving them a little, for emphasis. “See enough campsites, and you start noticing little details. How they look when the food’s bad. How they look when the campers don’t know how to take care of their horses.”
Amra smiled. “How they look when the warriors hate each other. And in that room, two of the men hated each other. Wouldn’t come near each other.”
“How could you—” Ehren started, but Cavan cut him off.
“The chief huntsman and the southerner,” Cavan said. “The one who spoke Ruktuk, said he wasn’t a dog.”
When Amra nodded confirmation, her gave her a grim smile.
“You think these were the same hunters?” Ehren said, eyes widening.
“Persistent bastards,” Cavan said. “Must have found someone in Riverbend, could teleport them after they got healed. But I didn’t even know Riverbend had a wizard.”
“She keeps a low profile,” Amra said. “Probably already moved.”
“You know her?” Ehren said.
“Used to. Long story.”
“Doesn’t matter right now,” Cavan said. “We need to get moving. Which way did they go?”
“Wish I knew.” Amra shook her head. “They were careful when they left. No way to tell. Not on cobblestones.”