Over her head the images faded to nothing, leaving the space occupied only by two ‘kin and a very weary magician.
Arrow closed her eyes a moment, keeping her head down, every part of her being aching with weariness. She hated this part. The dragging exhaustion. The vulnerability. The leaden weight in her centre where her seals were. Her wards were a memory, worn away with her magic, senses open to the world, nothing between her and the whirl of emotion that had passed through the place, the scrape of anger from the Prime and his son, the cold of winter, the depth of the mountain.
If she had been pure-blood Erith there would be a full cadre of White Guard around her just now. Trained to work with Erith magicians, the warriors would have wards set to protect her raw senses, putting themselves, with their disciplined minds, between her and any danger. And whilst she was being fanciful, perhaps they would have some Erith tea for her, and a cloak to warm her.
Instead she was in shifkin territory with two enormously powerful ‘kin who had every reason to detest the Erith and not a single scrap of power left to defend herself.
Eventually she regained some calm and pushed herself to her feet, a little surprised by the ‘kin’s patience. She returned the paper wrapped bundle to Matthias who handed it straight to his father. Bending to pick up her bag she hissed involuntarily at the effort, heat surging in her face at her weakness. When she had settled the bag over her shoulder, a dead weight against her, she turned to find them watching her with keen, bright eyes.
“The Taellan sent you,” Zachary stated. She nodded. He moved closer, absolutely silent to her too-sensitive ears, whether through his natural magic or years of practice she could not tell. Predator. She stayed as still as possible, allowing him close, allowing him to take a few deep breaths, catching her personal scent to remember her. He hissed, an angry sound. Concentrating on not flinching, trying not to let her fear show, she kept her eyes down.
“You reek of Erith,” his voice was dark, “but you don’t smell like Erith.”
“I live with the Erith,” she said. Absolute truth.
“But you are not Erith.”
“No, Prime.”
“And not human. What are you?” From another being, at another time, that would be unforgivably rude. In this place, it was a question that required response.
“I am the Taellan’s representative. Of mixed blood. My lineage is struck from the records.”
She was mostly Erith, however much Seggerat might wish to deny it, yet she had enough other blood in her to mark her forever apart from a race that took pride in their heritage and purity. One non-Erith grandparent, a long-dead human woman, and she was shunned. Perhaps her parents would have protected her if they had lived more than a few months past her birth. Perhaps not. No one talked about her parents. Or her lineage. There was no record of her at all among the Erith.
That lack of record was an old shame and should not still hurt. The Erith loved records. Every Erith, or servant of the Erith, knew where they belonged, the lines of their heritage meticulously recorded. Apart from her. Should not still hurt, she reminded herself, even as her eyes stung.
The Prime absorbed that information in silence and took a few more deep, even breaths, testing her scent. His face, when she glanced across, gave nothing away.
“You did this thing on your own? Without aid?” He gestured around them, recalling the translucent shapes of the reconstruction.
“The mountain lent its aid,” she clarified and saw that he understood that perfectly. She bowed her head. “Otherwise, yes, alone.”
“And you don’t think the Erith killed Marianne?” The Prime’s control was excellent, but her senses were still open. There was a vein under the name. Not quite grief. Mostly anger. Not the new, raw anger of the recently bereaved but something older. Arrow had no time to follow her curiosity as to why the Prime might have been so angry, for so long, at his mate.
“I do not know, Prime,” Arrow said quietly, “but no White Guard would leave something so personal behind.”
“Personal?” Matthias’ voice. She had been so intent on the Prime she had nearly forgotten his son.
“The medallion left next to the body,” Arrow clarified. “It is …” tongue clumsy with the common language she had to search for the right words, “something sacred. Revered amongst the White Guard. No warrior would leave it.” That was not quite right, just the closest she could manage just now.
“The White Guard were framed.” Zachary’s voice was dark again, old anger giving way to something newer, and a hint of satisfaction. Teeth flashed, bright in the dying light, as he grinned. Not pleasantly. “Someone thinks to fool us.”
“Or it’s a double bluff,” Matthias speculated.
Brow furrowed, having to concentrate to follow the casual phrasing, a chill ran through Arrow that had nothing to do with the winter air. A double bluff, as Matthias put it, was something that the Erith were very capable of. Leave blatant evidence, which was impossible for any White Guard to leave, and disguise the fact that another Erith had killed Marianne Stillwater. From the Erith’s point of view, believing the shifkin to be simple, violent beings, there was an obvious course after that. Provoke the Prime, and the shifkin nation, into outrage, that could be coolly denied by the Erith, perhaps even pushing the ‘kin into violence, which the Erith would then return, the peace broken and the races spiralling down into another war.
And yet, even angry, and full of hurt, both ‘kin in front of her were thinking. Not the near-feral beasts some Erith judged them to be.
“Do you have the medallion?” Arrow asked, earning sharp, suspicious glares from them both. “I may be able to trace the owner.”
“No need,” Zachary growled. She kept her surprise to herself, wondering how the ‘kin had managed to identify the carrier of a White Guard medallion. The precious metal disks, awarded at the successful completion of the warrior’s trials, were imbued with magic, unique to each individual. Never displayed, they were worn underneath clothing, next to a warrior’s skin. They were for the living only, and went with the dead into their final journey, never left behind.
By a trick of the fading light, Arrow caught a clear glimpse of the Prime’s face, tight with emotion, cheeks hollow and eyes shadowed. He looked as worn out as she felt, as though carrying a heavy burden. Around him, first world overlaid with her second sight, she could see and sense thick tangles of shifkin magic, earthen colours almost invisible in the forest. Ties that vibrated with energy, tugging at him. Arrow had brushed against the invisible ties around ‘kin before. Ties the Erith did not understand. Ties that bound each ‘kin into its own collective unit, the muster. And from there bound them all together. Muster ties were tighter by far than the family and House connections that bound the Erith together.
Looking at that web Arrow wondered if he could feel the emotions of his muster, all the grief and anger and loss that had filled this clearing at the discovery of Marianne’s body. There was none of that grief in the Prime. Matthias, too, had damped down whatever loss he felt. The clearing was full of tight anger and determination, and suspicion. That last made her wish for her wards, although she was not sure how much use they would be against two determined ‘kin.
There was no sense of Marianne here, not even an echo, personality erased along with her life.
In the quiet of her mind Arrow remembered the vivid, silent, images of the wolf that had sprung out of the forest, running for her life, so determined to keep moving forward she had run her feet bloody. Arrow stung with the loss of someone she had never known, a scrape against her soul, and made a silent promise to Marianne, and not the Erith or the shifkin, to find out who was responsible. The promise slid through her body, binding itself as surely as the oath spells.
~
“Is this all you can do?” Matthias asked, voice sharp, breaking into her thoughts.
Arrow held a bitter laugh behind her teeth. All? All her energy, and a good deal of help from the mountain to power
a spell that fewer than one in twenty Academy graduates, an elite group of Erith magicians, could perform. It seemed the ‘kin were as hard to please as the Erith.
“What do you need?”
“Can you track? Follow a trail?” She was no ‘kin to read body language like a book, but both the question and his casual pose were subtly wrong. Too deliberate, she thought.
“Not in the way of your people,” she gave him truth, “but there are spells that allow me to trace where a person has been.”
“And?”
“I need to understand the person’s essence to do so.” A low sound from Matthias and she hastily added, “It is the magical equivalent of scent. It does not usually tell what a person was thinking or feeling, just that they were there.”
“And?”
“And I cannot do that with what I know so far,” she heard the exasperation in her own voice and swallowed before she continued, “as I do not understand Marianne Stillwater’s essence.”
“The scarf?”
Although Matthias was questioning her, the Prime was listening intently, pacing back and forth behind her. She checked an impulse to turn and follow his movement, caught between two predators, not wanting to draw any more of the Prime’s close attention.
“The scarf allowed a connection with the earth and a person’s death leaves a clear mark on the world.” For a moment she wished she was speaking Erith to another magician. Trying to translate her innate understanding into Erith words and then the common tongue was frustrating. Matthias was glaring, arms folded over his chest.
“You need something she loved.” The Prime’s voice was quiet. Arrow’s heart picked up pace, attention snagged on the understanding in those few words. Erith and ‘kin magic had nothing in common. She had not known that any ‘kin had tried to understand Erith magic.
“Yes, Prime. Something she wore regularly or had a close connection with.” Or a space that she was happy in, she could have added, staying silent because of something she had understood from the way both ‘kin had moved or behaved. Marianne had not been happy on the mountain.
The soft growl at the edge of her hearing made her twitch, an outward reaction she controlled as soon as she could. Stripped of her usual defences, wards useless, she wanted to run away, far away, from that sound. The low, involuntary noise of a master predator. But there was no safety to run to here. And on her shaking legs, exhausted from the day’s efforts, the ‘kin would run her down in moments.
“Marianne spent most of her time in Lix,” Marianne’s widower told her. The mostly human city that sat between the Taellaneth and Farraway Mountain. Arrow stilled. She was not an expert on ‘kin but she knew that mate bonds were close. For a ‘kin pair to live apart was unusual. “The house should be enough.”
“We’ll arrange access,” Matthias added.
“Thank you.” Arrow wanted to ask why the ‘kin wanted her, an outsider, to follow Marianne’s trail. The want was easily set aside; the ‘kin had a use for her. They were allowing her to live, and she would not push them. Not yet, anyway. Perhaps when she understood their tolerance of her better. Maybe then she would venture some questions, try to satisfy the curiosity that burned almost as strongly as her wish to live.
“Will you be armed there, too?” Matthias glared at her.
“Armed?” she queried, wondering if she had not understood.
“The knife,” he bit out.
“The kri-syang.” She lifted her arm, leaving the blade where it was at Matthias’ low growl. “It is a tool used in magic. No Erith would think of it as a weapon. A tool only.”
“Looks like a blade to me.” He was not satisfied, but at least did not insist she hand over the blade. As personal to a mage as the medallion was to a warrior, Erith law forbade the use of the individually bonded blades as a weapon.
Behind Matthias, Zachary remained silent, watching the exchange with fever bright eyes and no expression.
“I’ll get you the address back in town,” Matthias glanced up. “We should head back.”
Arrow followed his look and realised that it was fully dark above the trees, the snow reflecting just enough light from the stars and moons for her to see.
When she looked back to Matthias, the Prime had disappeared silently into the trees, leaving no trace of his presence left behind.
“This way.” Matthias led them back along the trail to his vehicle, Arrow deeply grateful for the guidance as they made their way through the darkening forest. Her power gone, she would not have found her way out without his help.
CHAPTER 5
To her surprise, the ‘kin had provided her with a comfortable room for the night at the Township’s only hotel, managing to convey without saying so bluntly that she should leave in the morning and wait in Lix until the appointed time for her access to Marianne Stillwater’s residence.
Refreshed from the first unbroken night’s sleep in longer than she cared to remember, and with no duties until her appointment, Arrow had been looking forward to a complete day to herself. She could not remember the last time that had happened. All she had to do for that day was get to Lix. One, simple task. Within the Taellaneth she was at the disposal of the Taellan, Eshan, Evellan and the Academy’s teaching staff, frequently on the same day. Some time of her own was a rare luxury. She had the length of the journey to Lix to plan how to use her time, fingers tapping an impatient rhythm on the steering wheel as she left Farraway Mountain.
A direct summons from the Chief Scribe, as soon as she had left shifkin territory, had cancelled her plans before they had been fully formed. She had managed curt civility for the scribe, as he would tolerate nothing less, muttering a curse into the uncaring air when the connection was cut, and the oath spells stirred, binding her to follow Eshan’s directions.
She was back in the Taellaneth by early evening darkness.
Dealing with the mechanic, who seemed convinced she had somehow harmed the vehicle, and the open sneer of the White Guard sentry at the gate, disgust equally divided between her return and human clothing, were familiar frustrations, as was having to force open the door to her residence, the untreated wood warped with winter cold.
She shed her human clothing, returning to the formal, Erith clothing that she was required to wear within the Taellaneth, a servants’ knee-length coat, slit to hip-height at front, back and sides for ease of movement, with a series of small buttons that ran to her chin, plain breeches, and knee-length boots, all in dark, plain cloth. She tugged her sleeves to even length as she walked. The Taellaneth Steward had high standards and while he was a great deal kinder than the Chief Scribe, his gentle disappointment was somehow worse than Eshan’s sharp tongue. There was nothing she could do about her unruly hair, but everything else was as proper as she could manage. Her second-hand boots were a fraction too large, the soles parchment-thin from wear so that she could tell precisely where she was in the Taellaneth simply by the ground underfoot.
Passing around the back of the scribes’ quadrangle, she breathed deeply as she entered the heart of the Taellaneth, the landscaped grounds that housed the Taellan’s residences. She paused out of habit, struck by the contrast between the extraordinary, sculpted beauty of the Taellaneth and the uncoordinated, stripped-back simplicity of the shifkin territory. The ‘kin had settled their living spaces into their territory with minimal change, while the Erith ordered the landscape to suit their will.
In the manner of the Erith, the residences provided for the Taellan were set apart from each other, half-hidden amongst mature trees, forming a gentle curve that mirrored the tables in the Taellaneth meeting rooms, the centre occupied by an expertly crafted copse of trees with a water feature that burbled contentedly, taste of fresh water in the air complementing the scent of growing even in this season.
The residences were spaced five on each side and at the far end was the eleventh manor kept in readiness for their majesties. In the fifty years that the Taellaneth had been in operation, the Erith Queen and her
Consort had visited fewer than half a dozen times that Arrow was aware of. Still, the manor was always staffed and glowed quietly in the night.
Apart from the Queen’s residence, only a few of the manors were lit. Several Taellan would have returned to the heartland and one was never occupied as the Halsfeld lords resided in the same building.
Arrow drew a slow breath in, absorbing as much of the peace of the gardens into her as she could, knowing she would need it when she entered the elder’s residence. No matter what she had done, he would be dissatisfied and find fault.
Shown into the elder’s personal study, Arrow found that he had guests, other members of the Taellan. The two Halsfeld lords, Juinis and Kester, were seated with the elder, along with Gret vo Regresan and Eimille vel Falsen.
As Arrow made her bow her mind quickened. The closeness among this disparate group was a new development, as far as she knew, and wondered if the rest of the Taellan were aware.
They were a curious group, the three oldest Taellan and two of the youngest. Gret and Eimille could be brother and sister, elderly Erith with parchment pale skin and black hair liberally streaked with grey. They, along with the elder, were clothed for their station, jewels and ornate cloth shimmering in the candlelight, the air scented from the candles and warm, spiced wine in delicate glasses at each of their elbows.
The Halsfeld lords were a study in contrast, Juinis, pale skinned with rich brown hair, Kester with pitch-black hair and golden bronze skin that blended well into shadow. Juinis was dressed for his station, as elaborately as the older three, Kester dressed almost plainly. Not related by blood, Juinis having insisted that Kester surrender his House and join House Halsfeld on Juinis’ marriage to Kester’s sister. A ruthless piece of negotiation of the sort generally admired among the Erith ruling class. And it seemed Juinis continued to be ambitious, keeping such close company with the three eldest and most influential Taellan.
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