by Wendy Palmer
He was pleased to see San go pale. He hoisted himself in front of Mouse and led Mizzle and Faustus forward at a sedate walk. He called back, ‘There's more coming through. Watch yourself.'
They went on up the pass. Faustus spurred forward. ‘Why'd they let us go?'
'They had to,’ said Trick. ‘We belong to the same brotherhood.'
'Ah,’ said Faustus. ‘Thieves.’ He made it sound like he had just bitten into a rotten peach.
'If you object to the idea, you're quite welcome to go back and tell them you're fair game.'
'I think I can reconcile myself to the immorality,’ his cousin said loftily.
'Of course.’ Trick turned back to the trail. They still had a long climb up the pass ahead of them, but they would cross into Livania on the way down the other side.
'Why do you want to be a thief anyway, when your family can provide for your every want?'
If Faustus hadn't made that comment about wives and children back at the castle, Trick might have been polite. ‘I don't like Ullwyns,’ he said. ‘I would be happy if our dragon ancestor ate the lot of you. Is that a good enough reason for not wanting anything sullied by your touch?'
But Faustus just sniffed in the face of his open hostility. ‘This is about your father, isn't it?'
He didn't have his sword and Mouse was almost deliberately clasping around his arms as if he felt the impulse towards violence. Trick swallowed fury. Faustus could not be allowed to know he was getting under his skin.
'It's about your father,’ he said.
That turned Faustus right around. ‘What about my father?'
Trick deliberately looked to Mizzle. ‘We're tired. I want to camp for the rest of the night.'
Mizzle shook her head.
'What about my father, damn it?'
Trick waved him away, keeping his eyes on Mizzle. Bet lowered her head and snuffled, pawing at the snow. ‘I am making camp, Mizzle.'
'That would be ill-advised.'
'Like taking Mouse with us was ill-advised?'
Mouse went tense against his back, probably cursing him for drawing attention as Mizzle's silver gaze went to him.
'Tell me, boy,’ she said. ‘How did Avenir know DarkElves can dispel Illusion?'
Trick thought it a nonsensical question until he thought again. He hadn't known it, and he knew more about DarkElves than any human who had never had contact with a DarkElf, and that implied—Mouse handed him his slate and confirmed it.
I had a master in Livania. Avenir came and defeated him, and took me back as prisoner. He used a DarkElf ally to dispel our Illusions and kill my master.
It hurt him but he read it out.
'So,’ said Mizzle. ‘The boy knows more than he will admit and thinks to travel with me.'
'The DarkElves were Avenir's ally, not Mouse's,’ said Trick. ‘I wasn't wrong to bring him with us, Mizzle, you can't convince me otherwise.'
She did not look away from Mouse. ‘And why did they help Avenir?'
Mouse held his slate out. Trick read, The DarkElf was sent by Mikcul.
'Mikcul!’ By Fortune, if there was anyone he hated more than the whole cursed Ullwyn clan—
'Make camp, then.'
Her sudden capitulation surprised him and made him suspicious by turns but he took it. ‘There's a cave up ahead.'
Mizzle looked at her hands, not denying permission. He dismounted and led Bet up the slope. Faustus and Mizzle did the same with their horses. They struggled up a long diagonal to the cave, with ice underfoot and the wind threatening to knock them over.
By the time he made the cave, Trick was panting. The mouth was clogged with snow and ice and he started to dig at it with gloved hands, but Mizzle waved him aside and sent the snow away.
They went in, leading the horses. The cave was large and bare and a skeleton lay crumpled in one dark corner. But it was dry and out of the wind and with a store of firewood and room for the horses.
'Praise be to Fortune,’ murmured Faustus as he surveyed this.
'Praise be to the Company,’ said Trick mockingly. ‘I'm surprised we don't have company tonight.'
Mizzle meanwhile was unsaddling Skye on the other side of the cave. That new habit, at least, hadn't evaporated when she got her hands back on her stone. Trick joined her with Bet. Coal trailed over and nudged him in the back.
'Can we get a fire, Patrick? I can't see and I'm hungry.'
'So is your horse.'
Faustus gave an exaggerated sigh. ‘Haven't we sorted this out already?'
'Have we?’ Trick waited.
Faustus looked over and saw that Mizzle was tending to Skye. A moment later he joined her with Coal.
Trick finished with Bet and rationed out grain for all three horses. Leaving Faustus to struggle with Coal by himself, he gathered up wood, patterning it carefully in the ashes of past fires.
Mizzle knelt next to him. When he had finished, she pushed him gently aside and lit the fire with her small sourceless spark. The fire exploded into life and settled to a comforting crackle.
He rationed out food, the bread and roast chicken, leaving Faustus's share beside him. He held out Mouse's share. The boy reached for it and Trick shifted it away. ‘So this message you have to deliver is for your dead master then?'
Mouse blinked resentfully but scribbled on his slate. He handed the slate across with one hand and took the food with the other.
No.
A cheap answer for a full meal.
Trick persisted. ‘Such an important message and you allow yourself to be misdirected alarmingly often.’ He knew, no matter how difficult Mouse tried to be, that the boy had a soft heart or he would have walked out on the old couple at his first opportunity. He would answer.
Mouse took the slate back with his mouth full. Trick read over his shoulder as he wrote. My master saw talent he would not allow to be wasted. He made me forget my duty so I would become apprenticed to him. Avenir—Mouse paused to scrub out the previous writing and then went on—Avenir challenged my master and won. When he died, I remembered my duty. Avenir took me to his castle as his slave but I escaped. I stopped at the cottage for food and I found I was able to defend that piece of territory much easier than I can defend myself when running. So I stayed much longer than I meant to and could not leave. Again he cleaned the slate. His pale face was earnest as he wrote, I must get to Kiara Valley.
Mizzle could not read Bourchian, Trick knew this. But she had heard his outcry against Mikcul after she had asked why DarkElves aided Avenir. Now she asked, ‘Who is this Mikcul and how does he have a DarkElf as an ally?'
'Mikcul is the Emperor of Livania, Mizzle. He has demons for allies, why not a DarkElf?'
Faustus, finally finished with Coal, joined them. ‘You're not Livanian. What have you got against him?’ He sat and took up his ration of food.
'A sword would be nice.’ He didn't want to talk about it. Could he say I blame Mikcul for giving free rein to the Moon-Cult just as much as I blame the actual priests who held Linnet and our child on the altar? It did not matter now; he would never fulfil his ridiculous fantasies of sinking a blade into Mikcul's throat.
'DarkElves do not interact with humans,’ Mizzle said flatly.
He did not understand why Mizzle would not let this point go. It distressed her that DarkElves had become involved in Livanian affairs, where Trick could not be surprised that they would want instability among humans and work with Mikcul to achieve it.
'One does.'
He meant her, but she looked at him and nodded as if he had just confirmed a suspicion. She was thinking of Jarrett, he realised. That was why she was upset.
'Jarrett wouldn't do anything for the DarkElves.’ He had been suspicious of Jarrett's motives with Mizzle but he knew to the bottom of his soul that he would never act for the DarkElves, not when he had condemned himself to a lifetime of exile because he could not stomach their ways.
Her expression changed and he realised his generous impulse to
reassure her had given him away. He had defied her twice today, to bring Mouse with him and to make camp now, and he could not defy her again if she demanded his knowledge of Fingers.
He kept his face neutral, still hoping to salvage himself. ‘You said he was exiled. Why would he help Mikcul when that would be exactly what the DarkElves want?'
'Who's Jarrett?’ asked Faustus. He had that edge to his voice, suspicious and jealous.
Mizzle dismissed both questions with one hand and turned away from them.
Trick couldn't relax. He had not had such a slip for more years than he could remember and he wasn't convinced Mizzle was more than momentarily diverted. He wanted to blame the Livanian brandy for his careless tongue.
Which did not stop him having a few more mouthfuls before lying down to sleep.
Mouse curled up beside him, but Faustus sat up, tapping his fingers on the rock and watching Mizzle.
'You're annoying me, Faustus,’ said Trick. ‘Go to sleep.'
'Can't sleep,’ Faustus said.
Trick looked over and saw him tense and frowning.
'You didn't tell me why you don't like Mikcul.'
So Faustus was too worked up to sleep and wanted to talk about things other than Mizzle, and that meant touching on things Trick didn't like to think about. ‘He usurped the throne of Livania, is that not enough?’ He gave a glib answer and hoped to end it there.
Once he might have had such luck, but not lately. ‘And you take that as a personal affront, do you?'
Trick was appalled at himself, to be so transparent to an Ullwyn. ‘You won't find a Livanian who doesn't.'
Which wasn't true. Mikcul might have come by the throne in a questionable manner amid suspicious and sudden deaths of closer heirs and the Imperial family itself, but he had the support of the Imperial army, of the provincial lords and of the Moon-Cult. They preferred a strong, rich leader to the insecure, indecisive Emperor who preceded him. Livanian peasants who starved since Mikcul took the throne might spit at the mention of his name, but not if they were sensible.
'I heard he wasn't properly crowned anyway,’ said Faustus. He yawned, finally.
Trick shrugged. ‘The traditional crown and coronet went missing, but he had new ones made. Purists might say he has no right to rule without the real ones, but not loudly or not for long.'
He looked down at Mouse, fast asleep in his old cloak. The boy had gotten away without telling him what his oh-so-important message was about, and Trick decided to leave it alone. The boy would trust him or he would not, and he had never yet deserved a child's trust. He would not suffer to not know.
When he looked up again, Faustus had lain down and looked to be asleep already, wrapped up and warm in the close confines. Mizzle watched him from the other side of the fire and he sighed and shut his eyes to wait for sleep.
* * * *
Trick awoke to someone calling his name, not a kind awakening. A glance around showed him Faustus looking annoyed and Mouse looking frightened. Mizzle stood by the mouth of the cave, her back to him. She had saddled the horses while he slept and let the fire die. She had meant to go as soon as dawn came, but it was still dark and she was not the disturbance.
'Your friends, Patrick,’ said Faustus, just as San called out his name again.
Trick joined Mizzle. She slid a glance at him and away. No doubt she blamed him for trapping them in here. And could he truly believe that with her hearing she had not known that bandits crept to the cave mouth? ‘What do you want, San?'
'What do you think?’ shouted back the bandit. ‘The horses and a few coins will do it. We'll leave you enough food to walk back.'
The nearest town was still Dester. It was not an option. ‘You can't rob another member of the Company,’ Trick shouted.
'We're starving.’ San's voice had a thready edge to it that gave truth to his words. ‘We need this, Trick, we need it.’ He was just outside the cave.
Trick edged past Mizzle and tried to see how many men San had with him. ‘The Company will have your balls, San.'
'What'd they ever do for us but take their tithe? And what about the Dragon?’ That's what the other thieves called it, that rampaging unstoppable beast that had been the Cult on their campaign against the Company. ‘Did Filipe do a thing against the Cult while we and our families hanged?'
Trick flinched back. Linnet hadn't gone cleanly, her throat cut open on the sacrificial altar before they put her in the noose. He had blamed the Cult and Mikcul and never thought the Company or its leader Filipe could have stopped it. But Filipe took that alias as a mocking bow to the real King Fillip; who knew where his power and influence ended?
Mizzle flicked past him and outside before Trick could open his mouth to protest. Cries of alarm sang out. Faustus lunged after her, but she had already stepped back in. Her sword was at San's throat and her fingers twisted tight in his hair. She forced him to his knees, hard. His sword, useless, dropped out of his hand.
'Oh, San,’ said Trick. ‘You shouldn't stand so close to a DarkElf.'
San's eyes rolled in their sockets, white and glistening. The blade's edge whispered across his throat. Trick saw that Mizzle's hands trembled with the effort of not letting the blade bite.
'What are you waiting for?’ said Faustus. ‘Kill him.'
Her hands shook. Trick smacked Faustus on the shoulder to make him shut his mouth. ‘Mizzle, look at me.'
She didn't. She did not take her eyes off the man kneeling in front of her. Blood trickled down his neck from a shallow cut.
'Mizzle,’ Trick insisted.
The sword seemed to slip, gentle as snowfall. San toppled sideways, spurting blood from the gash in his throat. Mizzle had lost her fight against her first impulse and the stone had availed her nothing.
The horses’ hooves clattered against rock floor as the smell of blood flooded the cave. Faustus looked appalled although he had told her to do it and Mouse had gone wide-eyed and ashen. They all looked at her in silence while she looked at the blood on her sword. Trick could have said nothing even if he had found words.
Screams echoed into their cave from outside, and the ring of sword on sword. Trick turned to the boy, turned away from the body still leaking blood all over the cave floor. ‘Is that an Illusion, Mouse?’ Even as he asked, he knew it couldn't be so.
'DarkElves,’ said Mizzle. ‘My people.'
DarkElvish rang out, a call to Mizzle. She took a few steps towards the mouth of the cave as if she meant to go out there. Trick had half a mind to let her go but Faustus committed a cardinal sin and laid hands on her, grabbed her arm and jerked her back.
She didn't react, just stood with his hand on her. ‘I am a DarkElf and nothing else,’ she said. Her voice had gone dead.
Trick could feel sick with San's blood pooling on the floor and his body going stiff and cold, and still have a hurt place inside him to hear her so defeated. He could feel sick and still pick up San's useless sword to replace the one he had left at the Giant's fire.
'It must be close to dawn,’ he said. ‘If we can hold out until daylight—'
'The sun will not drive them off.'
Mouse ran to the back of the cave. Trick let him go, thinking he meant to hide but he ran back, writing on his slate as he came and almost tripping.
Tunnel, Trick read, through mountain to Livania. Room for horses
'How do you know?’ he asked.
Avenir brought me back this way. Didn't recognise cave last night
Mouse had still been dazed last night. Or had reasons for not telling them. Either way, Trick was taking Fortune's gift with both hands.
Behind them, Faustus cried out and he spun. Mizzle matched swords with another DarkElf female. She repelled the other, flinging her outside again, and took a few steps after.
'Come on,’ he said, before Mizzle could throw herself outside. ‘There's a way out.'
He grabbed up the reins of the horses. Another touch of Fortune, that Mizzle had been impatient to go.
Or she had known the DarkElves were this close and that had been behind her reluctance to make camp in the first place.
He went cold to think she had let him have his way just to prove him wrong.
Mouse waited at the back of the cave. Trick saw the entrance to the tunnel when he knew to look for it, around the curve of the wall.
It was a tight squeeze for the horses, but widened on the other side. He took Skye through and went back for Bet, both horses high-stepping with ears laid back.
Mouse held them there and he went back for Coal. The damn horse bit at him and backed away kicking while he saw that Mizzle still fought at the cave mouth and Faustus looked to be trying to join her. He would die as soon as he attracted attention.
Trick hauled the horse through the gap by main force and gave him to Mouse to hold if he could, tempted to just let the flighty beast bolt off down the tunnel and good riddance.
He shouted, ‘Come on.'
He didn't expect Mizzle to listen in her current mood, but she fell back with a last slash of her blade at a half-seen opponent in the cave mouth. She and Faustus ran over while arrows flew after them. Trick sent them through, watched a last flight of arrows come at him, and ran up behind them with a stitch in his side and his breath catching.
Mizzle turned back with stone in hand, standing just in the tunnel. Trick stood behind her and watched DarkElves pour into the cave. Males and females, they were fearsome and not remotely human.
Only when the first of them were almost to the back of the cave did Mizzle raise the stone. A rumble shook the tunnel and a great gout of dust set them all coughing. Mizzle had collapsed the roof of the cave on her clan with never a blink.
'We must go through,’ she said.
They started walking, leading the horses. Only when Trick couldn't stop coughing, bent double with the pain, did he realise the stitch in his side was an arrow and his breath came hard and thick and wet because he had blood in his mouth.
He stopped. Faustus bumped into him, jolting him hard. He bit his lip to stop from crying out. In the silence of the tunnel he could not say his wound out loud. He held on to Bet, who shied away, failing him in this one instance.