Raven's Strike

CHAPTER 11

“You want journey bread?” Alinath came out of the baking room, her face tight with dismay after overhearing Tier’s request to her husband, Bandor.

Seraph took a step back and let Tier deal with his sister.

Tier picked up a piece of bread left out as a sample and tried it. “I’ll need it as soon as you can. You know, Bandor, if you put a bit less salt in this bread”—he motioned to the plate of sample offered—“it would allow some of the other flavors to come out.”

“I’ll try that,” Bandor said. “Does the journey bread have anything to do with your guests?”

Tier nodded easily, but Seraph could feel his arm tense under her hand. “Who told you about them?”

Five strangers were a hard secret to keep, but they hadn’t told anyone about them, and no one had been to the farm since Phoran and his men had shown up.

“Apparently some youngsters—who should have work to keep themselves busy—were out that way a week or so ago and came back into town spouting nonsense,” said Alinath.

“Spying on us, are they?” Tier grinned, and Seraph could tell that he was honestly amused. “I hope they saw something more interesting than our guests.”

“They said they were nobles,” Bandor said. “And one of them the Sept’s own brother. We had the tale from the steward, who was convinced you are after his job.”

“Gods save me,” exclaimed Tier with honest horror. “What idiot would want that job?”

“Exactly,” said Alinath with satisfaction. “And so I told the steward when he came whining to me.”

“Toarsen, the Sept’s brother, is there with a group of bored young noblemen whom Tier met in Taela,” said Seraph, having found a story that might satisfy some of the curious. “They had nothing to do, and knew Tier would come here too late for planting. They’ve asked him to take them hunting in the mountains.”

“You can’t take the Sept’s brother up there,” said Alinath, horrified. “If something happens to him, the Sept will—”

“It’s all right,” said Seraph. “We’re all going. I doubt there will be trouble with all of us there.”

Alinath stopped fussing and frowned thoughtfully at Seraph. “Very well,” she said slowly. “Two dozen dozen loaves of journey bread. It’ll be ready the day after tomorrow—I’ve put all the breadmother up for today.” She gave Seraph a sudden conspiratorial smile. “And any who ask, I’ll tell them about the nobles who are paying my brother’s family for an adventure up in the mountains. Only you’d better make it somewhere more interesting—like Shadow’s Fall. Bored young boys might very well be stupid enough to ride from Taela to have Tier take them to Shadow’s Fall. They’d have the money to tempt anyone, too. I can take Rinnie, if you’d like.”

“No,” said Tier instinctively, and Seraph smiled to herself—then at Tier when he looked at her with second thoughts in his face. Is it fair to take her?

“She’ll be as safe with us as she would be here with Alinath,” Seraph said. “I think if we try to leave Rinnie again, she’ll just follow us.”

“Besides,” said Tier, relaxing a little, “the summer’s getting old. Up high it’s possible we could run into early snow. A Cormorant might be a very useful thing to have.”

Bandor patted his wife on the back. “She’ll have a story to tell her children, if that’s where you’re going. I’d like to see Shadow’s Fall once before I die.”

“I’ll take you there,” agreed Tier. “But I’ve only been once myself. It’s not easy to get to—and it is not a comfortable place to be. If you’re serious, though, I’ll take you next summer after the crops are in.”

They left the bakery with a sweet roll each.

Seraph hummed her pleasure at the sticky, warm bread.

“See,” Tier said. “If you’d been nicer to my sister all these years, you’d have had a sweet roll every time you came to the bakery.”

“Liar,” she told him cheerfully. “Until I saved her husband, it didn’t matter how nice I was to her—she was convinced I used magic to steal away her big brother.”

As they wandered up the road to Willon’s, Tier grew more serious. “I don’t like it that those boys were out by our farm, Seraph. It was Storne and his lot, I suppose. He used to be such a nice boy before he took up with Olbeck.”

“They’re not boys anymore,” Seraph said. “They’re Lehr’s age—Olbeck’s older than that. If the Path had taken over here, doubtless they’d have recruited those boys as Passerines.”

Rinnie went out to find some tingleroot for the trip. Whatever she found this late in the year was likely to be woody and weak, but it was better than none at all—which is what they had.

Lehr was still looking thin and pale, and he was sleeping too much. Jes hadn’t returned with Hennea yesterday. He was out walking, she’d said.

So Rinnie slipped out of the house while Lehr was napping and Hennea was brooding over the maps again. She hushed Gura with a stern command. She thought about taking him with her, but he didn’t always listen to her when he was excited the way he listened to the boys and her mother. She didn’t want to spend the day out chasing after him if he found a rabbit, so she commanded him to stay on the porch and started across the fields.

Phoran and his men were seated on the ground in front of the barn, playing some sort of game that seemed to involve a lot of laughter and wild grabbing for bone-dice. But when she walked past them, Phoran stood up and motioned his men to stay where they were.

“Rinnie Seraphsdaughter, where are you going in such a hurry?” he asked courteously.

She liked it that he never treated her like a ten-year-old brat (which was what Lehr called her in moments of extreme provocation).

“I’m hunting some tingleroot,” she told him without slowing her pace. “We’ve run out.”

“And this tingleroot is important?” he asked, rolling his tongue around the herb’s name.

Really, she thought, an emperor shouldn’t be so appallingly ignorant. Then she was horrified and embarrassed when he laughed because she hadn’t hidden her thoughts better.

“It’s for packing in wounds,” she said quickly. “It helps keep infection out. Mother makes an eyewash with it for smoke irritation, too.”

“My eyes are delicate,” he said, batting his eyelashes at her. “By all means let us go fetch this tingleroot.”

“It gets its name because it makes your tongue tingle, then go numb if you chew it,” she told him. “You really don’t have to come. I know the way.”

“If Jes or your parents were here, would you be off alone?” Phoran asked.

“It’s perfectly safe,” she said, miffed that he’d think she wasn’t capable of gathering herbs on her own.

“I should hope so. I wouldn’t go with you else.” He glanced back at the barn. “I’d send Kissel, surely. He’s ugly enough to frighten anything away. Or Toarsen, he’s just mean.”

“Toarsen’s not mean,” she said, then realized he was teasing.

“No.” Phoran agreed. “Toarsen’s not mean—but don’t tell him I told you so.”

She laughed. “All right, come on then.”

Rinnie was one of Phoran’s favorite things about Redern. Children weren’t something he had much experience with, and never having had a childhood himself, he was fascinated by her.

For one thing, she was competent, with skills that many a grown woman in Taela would envy. She could cook, sew—and weed gardens. She knew how to work and how to play, too.

He liked it best when he teased her into her grandame manner that he recognized she copied from her mother. But what was intimidating in Seraph was touchingly amusing in her daughter.

He wasn’t about to let anything happen to her. No matter what she said, anyplace where a troll had been killed only a few weeks before wasn’t safe. He had no idea what he’d do if they ran into a troll, mind, except run. He wasn’t sure that his Memory was up to killing a troll with the same dispatch as it had disposed of his would-be assassins. Against a chance-met wolf or boggin, though, Phoran felt himself to be more than enough of a guard.

Rinnie hiked fast enough that Phoran was hard put to keep up with her—making him glad that he hadn’t allowed any of his guards to come with him. More humiliating was that she noticed and slowed up. And apologized.

“Sorry,” she said. “I’m used to walking with Lehr or Jes. And you’re from the lowlands—Papa says that lowlanders have trouble breathing up here near the mountains.”

“Hmm,” Phoran said. “You don’t need to make excuses. Emperors aren’t expected to be able to hike out in the woods.”

She turned around and walked backward so that she could see his face. “Papa says you like it here.”

He smiled. “Your papa’s a pretty wise man.”

To his delight she gave him a solemn look that made her look like an owl just waking up. “My papa knows people.”

Just then a sharp sensation slid up his leg, and he jerked it reflexively away from… bare ground.

“That’s Mother’s warding.” Rinnie grinned. “It didn’t used to do that until she reset them after killing the troll. You should have seen Lehr jump the first time he set foot on it afterward.”

Phoran stepped cautiously past, but other than a brief, painless jolt, nothing happened to him. “I’m still alive,” he said. “I guess that means I’m not what she was warding against.”

When Rinnie finally stopped it was none too soon for Phoran. He dropped to the ground, lay on his back, and panted. Most of it was for her benefit because it made her laugh, but lying down felt good.

“Quit fooling around,” she told him. “You can help gather.”

When he obediently rolled to his feet she drew him over to a plant that looked somewhat like all the other plants around.

“Look, this is tingleroot, you can tell it because it has lacy edges on its leaves. It blooms with small yellow flowers in the spring—that’s the best time to harvest. But even a late-harvest root is better than none.” She looked at him sternly. “We never pick more than one plant in three—so that there will be more here next year.”

“I promise not to pick them all,” he told her.

Her eyes narrowed, and she leaned forward. “Your eyes are laughing. This is serious.”

“Yes, princess, I know,” he apologized. “I’m just not used to taking orders.”

“All right,” she conceded. “I can see that. The boys don’t like it when I tell them what to do—but they don’t usually laugh either.”

“Possibly because they don’t need your directions as much as I usually do.”

She tilted her head at him, then grinned. “You like it. All right. Go harvest. Remember to get a stick and loosen the dirt around the plant ’cause it’s the root we need.”

With the first plant as a template, Phoran found two or three others that were probably tingleroot. He took the whole plant though, so Rinnie could make certain that’s what he had. His search took him around a pile of boulders higher than his head, and he found a whole grove of tingleroot. Or something that looked like it to his untrained eye.

He was in the process of loosening the dirt around a stubborn plant when Rinnie’s squeak of surprise brought him into a crouch. He waited to hear something more, not wanting to charge out and make an idiot of himself.

“Hey, little girl, where’s your crazy brother this time?” It was a deep voice, a man’s voice, and the tone had Phoran setting his harvest on the ground and loosening his sword.

The stranger’s tones quieted, like a cat stalking a bird. “Or is it Lehr’s footsteps I’ve been tracking instead? Tracking the great hunter himself, the hero who slew an ogre. Did he leave you here while he went off hunting? Did he leave behind such tender meat for me?”

The avarice in the man’s voice tightened Phoran’s hand on the hilt of his sword. Phoran knew that he was going to hurt this lout now. Kill him if he was given enough excuse. Rinnie was a child; only a sick man sounded like that around a child.

“It was a troll, and my mother killed it.” Rinnie sounded calm, only a slight quiver betrayed her fear. But then she knew that Phoran was listening to them, knew that Phoran wasn’t as incompetent with steel as he was with plants.

“What are you doing here, Olbeck?” she said stoutly. “Shouldn’t you be in the middens with the rest of the swine?”

Something happened. Phoran heard it in the stretch of time between Rinnie’s comment and Olbeck’s next words. Maybe he’d struck at her, and she’d dodged his hand.

Phoran worked his way quietly around the boulders and the evergreen tree that grew next to them. He didn’t want to give Olbeck warning that she wasn’t alone and give him a chance to take her hostage before Phoran could get between them.

“My father will have your family out of that farm now,” he said. “I told him that Toarsen is here. Don’t you think I’d recognize the Sept’s brother? I’m the steward’s son, bitch. I know that Toarsen and his brother don’t see eye to eye. My father will tell Avar that his brother has been sniffing around here and planning treachery. Avar will believe him. Maybe he’ll have your father beheaded.”

“You are so stupid, Olbeck,” said Rinnie in disgust. “I wonder that you can put your clothes on right-side out every morning—or is that something one of the boys who follow you about does for you?”

“That may be,” Olbeck agreed silkily, and there was a sound of ripping cloth. “But you’re—” And then he used some words that Phoran hoped Rinnie didn’t know the meaning of.

The sound and Rinnie’s surprised cry were too much. Rather than working his way into a better position, Phoran rushed out from behind the boulders and used his shoulder to knock the stranger two or three paces down the hill—away from Rinnie, who was huddled on the ground. He didn’t take time to assess her condition before he stepped between her and the stranger.

Olbeck was nearly as big as Kissel, and Phoran found the cool resolve he’d discovered in the heart of the battle with the Path. He smiled.

Regaining his balance, Olbeck drew the sword that hung at his hip.

“Don’t hurt him,” Rinnie whispered frantically. “If he dies, it’ll go hard for my family. He’s the Sept’s steward’s son.”

“That’s right,” said Olbeck with a sneer. “Who are you? One of the twelfth sons of a fourteenth that Toarsen likes to hang about? The Sept will crush you and your friends when he comes, summoned by my father’s letter.”

Phoran hadn’t drawn his sword. He’d prefer to keep swords out of it if he could. It was better for his cause if Tier’s noble guests remained a curiosity rather than a news item. Killing this scum might just send news of Tier’s unexpected guests all the way to Taela. If Phoran ever managed to rid himself of the Memory, he didn’t want the whole of the Empire knowing where he’d been, not if he could help it.

“Rinnie’s right; you are stupid aren’t you?” he marveled out loud. “You do realize that if you were correct in what we’re up to here, you’ve just given me the ultimate provocation to kill you? That’s obviously the only thing that would keep your mouth shut.”

“He doesn’t think you can kill him,” Rinnie said in a small voice. “He’s had some training in sword work, and it impresses the other boys.”

“Since he’s outnumbered now,” said Lehr, coming around the same boulders that Phoran had crouched behind, “he’ll likely run.”

Lehr had Tier’s sword in one hand and was breathing hard. “Go back to Leheigh, Olbeck. You aren’t welcome in Redern anymore, I hear. No more are you welcome here. If your father has problems with us, I expect that he will come himself. Run back to your father, coward.”

Olbeck snarled wordlessly at Lehr, and Phoran saw the intent in his body before he charged—not at Lehr, but straight at Phoran. He probably thought that he could bull through Phoran to get at Rinnie.

Phoran dropped him cold with a fist to the chin.

“Stupid sot ran right into it,” he said, rubbing his knuckles to dull the sting. “Are you all right, Rinnie?”

The memory of the sound of ripping cloth kept him facing away from her.

“Yes,” she said. “I wish I were a Guardian like Jes. Lightning only works if I have hours.”

“Too bad,” agreed Phoran. “If someone deserved a bit of lightning to strike him down, it was that man.”

“Here, Rinnie, take my tunic.” Lehr pulled the article in question over his head and tossed it to her. “Nice right cross, Phoran. Did you kill him?”

There had been enough force to have broken his neck. Phoran bent down and rolled the big man over with a grunt of effort.

“Not so lucky,” he said. “Likely he’ll be awake in a minute or two. I could kill him for you—we could hide the body.”

“Much as I hate to admit it, Rinnie was right. Olbeck dead by human hands or missing around here is even more of a problem than Olbeck alive. Too bad about the lightning, Rinnie. That would have been an answer. I suppose we’ll just leave him.”

“Why isn’t he welcome in Redern anymore?” Rinnie, safely covered by Lehr’s tunic leaned lightly against Phoran’s arm and stared down at her attacker. She sounded collected, but she was trembling like a bird. Phoran thought again about killing Olbeck.

“Remember Lukeeth, the mercer’s son?”

“He’s one of the boys who follows Olbeck.”

“Not anymore. Olbeck killed him. Storne says it was murder, but Olbeck claimed it was self-defense. He got away with it, but his father agreed to keep him out of Redern. Get your herbs—I assume that’s what sent you hurrying out of the house this morning. We’ll leave him here.”

Rinnie nodded and turned and began picking up the scattered bits of plants. Phoran saw her wipe her cheeks when she thought no one was watching. He saw that Lehr had noticed, too.

“Likely, I broke his jaw,” he told him as consolation. “He’ll remember this every time he tries to eat for a long time.”

Lehr sucked in his breath, two red lines forming on his cheeks from gritting his teeth. “You should have pulled your punch so we could have broken a few more bones for him.”

Phoran went back behind the boulders and gathered the three plants he’d unearthed and presented them to Rinnie on one knee, holding the limp greenery stretched across both hands.

She laughed as he’d intended. “This one isn’t tingleroot.” She sorted through what he had and broke off a very few small bits. “You can leave the rest.”

She put the bits in her pouch and started back down the hill. Phoran and Lehr followed her.

“I tracked you until I figured out where Rinnie was heading,” Lehr said. “Mother left her to sort out our herbs, and I knew we were out of tingleroot. This is the best place to look for it. I’d just decided to head home when I ran across Olbeck’s trace. Thanks for escorting her.”

Phoran gave him a mock-surprised glance. “I wasn’t escorting her, she was educating me. I can harvest tingleroot now—and dill.”

“Only if there’s no reaverslace nearby,” Rinnie said repressively. “Thank you, Phoran. Someday, I’m going to tell Olbeck that it was the Emperor who broke his jaw.”

“He’ll never believe the Emperor went out herb gathering with you,” said Lehr.

A creak of a branch overhead had Lehr spinning around to get a good look. Then, with a procession of quiet thumps, Jes dropped down in their midst, hitting the ground in a roll that ended with him on his feet.

“Olbeck found his horse. I think he’s going home. He won’t get past the wards anyway.” Tier’s eldest son looked better than he had the last time Phoran had seen him. His dark skin wasn’t so grey, and he moved well as he strode beside his brother.

Phoran sighed. They were both going to have to slacken the pace for him, but he’d wait to ask in case they’d notice and slow down on their own.

“What do you mean he won’t get past the wards?” Lehr asked.

“He’s tainted,” said Jes. “Didn’t you smell it? Not so badly as Bandor was, but he still stinks of shadow.”

“You two need to slow up,” said Rinnie. “Emperors don’t run through forests like some peasant farmer’s boys.”

Phoran grinned.

Willon was alone in his shop and looked up with a smile to welcome Tier and Seraph.

“My friends, what can I do for you?”

Seraph let Tier do the talking, and turned her attention to the display shelf that Willon had set up near the front counter. Small animals of blown glass in bright colors danced across the scarred wood shelf.

“I brought those back from Taela,” Willon said. “Broke half of them getting here, but I thought they’d sell well. You didn’t come in here for glass animals, though.”

“No,” Tier agreed. “We need forty pounds of salted dried beef or venison. I’d also like to look at any other food you’ve got that will keep.”

“Are you going out trapping already?” asked Willon as he led Tier to the section where he kept foodstuffs.

“No. Seems I made some friends among the young lads that helped overthrow the Path. A group of them came down and persuaded me to give them a guided tour of the Ragged Mountains. They want to see Shadow’s Fall, but I suspect I’ll be able to talk them out of it once they see the country they’re going to have to walk through.”

Seraph left the glass animals and began sorting through the herbs on the shelves.

Pepper, she thought, and took one of the small packets. She and Tier would stop by Loni the Herbalist’s shop before they left town, but Willon carried exotic spices and Loni only the things she could grow in her garden. That meant Loni’s herbs were fresher, but Willon’s were more diverse.

“I’d like to see Shadow’s Fall myself,” Willon was saying.

“No,” Tier shook his head. “It’s a rough trip, Master Willon. I’ll take these young rascals and wear them out—it’ll be good for them. But the mountains are no place for someone not ready for them. I’ll take you next year, if you’ll spend the summer hiking with me to get into shape. I’ve already promised Bandor.”

“I travel a lot,” said Willon. “You might be surprised at how tough an old man like me can be.”

“I’m sure that’s true,” Tier said.

For a moment Seraph thought Willon wasn’t going to let the matter drop. But then he laughed and patted Tier on the shoulder.

“All right, all right. Next year then, mind. I won’t forget.”

Tier paid for the food and Seraph’s herbs after a little bargaining. When they were through, Tier gave Willon back the map he’d given Seraph.

“It was a gift,” said Willon.

“A valuable gift,” said Tier. “And as we don’t have any plans for another trip across the Empire, it won’t do us much good. Give it to someone else who needs it.”

Willon bowed and accepted it. “It’s always a pleasure to do business with you,” he said.

“Olbeck is shadowed?” Seraph sat down at the table and tried to figure out what that might mean.

Lehr, Jes, Phoran, and Rinnie had greeted them at the door with the tale of their afternoon adventures.

“He wasn’t shadowed when he attacked Lehr and Rinnie just a few days before we left,” said Jes.

Hennea sat on the table near Jes and looked at him. “You can tell that easily? The other Guardians I’ve met have to look for it.”

Jes shrugged. “They smell wrong, then I look.”

“The question is, what do we do about it?” asked Tier.

“Nothing.” Seraph said decisively. “Olbeck will wait until we get back. Though it is interesting that he was tainted after we left for Taela. Every unappealing person doesn’t pick up a shadowing just because he’s nasty. Bandor was a more usual case. A nice upstanding citizen who causes as much damage as possible for as long as the Stalker can hold him.”

“There are several ways a person can become tainted,” Hennea said. “The Shadowed is only one of them.”

“Well, we certainly have had a Shadowed around here.”

“Rinnie,” Tier said. “I think that for a while you’re going to have to make certain that someone is with you when you leave the house. Take Gura if you have to.”

“All right,” she agreed. Her lack of protest was a testament to how frightened she’d been.

Seraph caught Phoran’s eye and nodded her thanks.

They spent the next day packing and repacking sacks and bags, balancing them in pairs to be attached to the saddles in the morning. Seraph carried the Ordered gems in a bag that would ride on her hip. The mermori went into one of the horse’s packs.

Lehr and Tier went out and brought back three more riding horses for the trip, two mud-brown and a grey. That left them one horse short, but Jes could outwalk most horses anyway. None of the new horses were the quality of Lehr’s Cornsilk, but they were tough little mountain horses and would do just fine for the trip.

As if in omen, Alinath and Bandor appeared in the afternoon with the journey bread half a day earlier than she’d promised.

“Tomorrow,” Tier said.