Fall of Thrones and Thorns Page 13

  I nod, and he grows pale. “Pa said you and yours were dead. Your place burned down. You a ghost?”

  Having had my own experiences with ghosts, I know better than to try and convince him that they don’t exist. “Nothing that exciting, I’m afraid. Just old-fashioned, boring, live flesh and blood.”

  “What’d you come back here for then?” he asks. His expression twists into one of disdain. “You talk of boring. It don’t get much more boring than this place.”

  I could do with a bit of boring, I think. I find those who long for excitement often regret the wish when it comes. And there will be a fair bit of excitement for young Bennie when we find the Shaker. But I doubt it’s the sort he’d prefer. Not if he knew.

  Makers. I’m the perfect example of those foolish dreamers; I used to be just like him. There’d been plenty of days behind the bar of The Bridge and Duchess that I’d spent longing for something to liven up the sleepy little town. If I’d had any inkling of what could happen, I never would have made such a foolish wish. And it’s my bet Bennie wouldn’t either.

  “We’re looking for a newcomer,” I say. “Noticed anyone?”

  He only looks at me, irony clear in his gaze, and I’m stricken to realize that the villagers may well see me as a newcomer now.

  “Been a fair bit of travelers coming through,” he says. “More than when you were here. Heading out of Egria and the like. Trying to, anyway.”

  That’s down to me as well. No—I correct myself—down to Langdon. He’s the one who set this in motion. People are fleeing for their lives in the face of a war.

  “This wouldn’t be someone passing through,” I say. “He would have come to the pub a few times.” I eye him, and he peeks up at me from beneath his fringe. “Maybe someone you heard was making trouble they didn’t need making?” He says nothing, and I prod again. “Maybe some trouble with Ritchie?”

  At his brother’s name, he perks up. “Ritch did say somethin’ about that weird fella that’s been around. Face-first in ale, most of the time.”

  “That’s the one, lad,” Elena says. The sound of her Clavish accent has him eyeing her mistrustfully. Outsider, he might as well be saying. She doesn’t miss it and hands the reins of the conversation back to me.

  I grimace at her apologetically, and she whispers, “Think nothing of it. Used to it, I am.”

  Olivia steps forward, brow furrowed in concentration. “He have any tricks to him, youngling?” Her green eyes are intent on him.

  “Tricks?” Bennie asks.

  “Tricks,” she repeats, a mysterious smile playing about her lips. She lifts a hand, and the wooden bar Bennie stands behind fairly ripples. He jumps back, knocking a glass down in his haste. It shatters on the ground.

  “Sorry about that,” Olivia apologizes. She lays her palm flat, and the bar’s counter returns to what it once was: still and flat.

  Bennie eyes the bar as if it will leap out and attack him. “Pa said something like that happened, yeah. But he might as well have been belly-deep in the barrel that day. Thought it was the drink talking, not that he was speaking truth. We’ve never seen any of them Elementals in Abeline before. Least, not any that were sharing what they could do. The one you’re talking about hasn’t been in here in a while though. Ritch said he popped him one good, and we haven’t seen him since.”

  The vision Tregle had shown us had been the last appearance Everett had put in, then. I worry my bottom lip, thinking. Makers, what if we’ve missed him?

  “What about the rest of the village?” I ask, unwilling to give up hope yet. “He been in any of the shops? Maybe renting a room in the boarding house?”

  Slowly, he shakes his head. “Not that I’ve heard anyone tell.”

  I sag in defeat, and Caden puts a hand on my shoulder, sensing my dismay. “We’ll get him, Bree.”

  “But…” Bennie’s voice is hesitant, but it ignites the flare of my hope. “I did hear tell that there was some smoke coming from the woods. Someone must be camped out there, and none of us in Abeline are stupid enough to go looking for trouble in those woods.”

  I raise an eyebrow, and he makes a little tch sound of disappointment. “Not anymore, anyway,” he says with a petulant glare.

  An arrogant smile slips loose as I remembering finding him and his brother there. But it quickly fades and my hand curls into a fist. “Let the others keep looking in the village. I’ll send water when we find him. The woods near the Bridge and Duchess used to be my second home. I know them like I know my own mind. He can’t hide from us there. Shaker or not, he’s on my turf now.”

  And what’s more—it’s not far from the river.

  Just let the bastard try to outrun me and my current.

  Twenty-One

  Aleta

  I draw Tregle’s arm to mine, tugging him so that he inclines his ear toward me. “We’re arriving nowhere with great expediency,” I mutter, glaring at the ground for the sole reason that it has the misfortune of being in my gaze’s warpath.

  “Patience,” he advises. I look up at him; he looks down at me. Branches turn beneath my feet, and a smile haunts his mouth, happiness dimmed in his eyes.

  My hard gaze softens as he returns his attention to our heading. Of course being here is difficult for him. I forget, sometimes, the ghosts that inhabit his past. That Tregle had served as a soldier and done Langdon and Katerine’s bidding once. This had been one of the last places he’d done so. But the cost had been great.

  So many of the places Tregle had gone, the casualties had been anonymous, able to be pushed to the back of his mind. But here…one of those casualties had become a friend.

  How difficult must it be to walk beside Breena each day and know that, if Tregle had never found her and her father in his flames, they may very well be alive and well, living their little lives, tucked safely inside their little pub, in their little town?

  I don’t know that I could face the victims of my actions every day that way, whether or not they’d forgiven me.

  The farmhouse outside the village square puffs round, happy clouds from its hearth. This had been what drew our attention as we’d repeatedly bumped into our compatriots in the heart of Abeline. For such a tiny place, Breena’s hometown has plenty of small, established businesses. With the other search parties busy in the square, we determine that we’d be of greater use elsewhere and skate the edge of town until we find a nearby farmhouse.

  We knock upon the door to question the family that lives there.

  The farmers squint at us—strangers—in distrust. Getting answers from them is very like tugging a tree stump from the ground with only bare hands to aid the effort.

  At first.

  But the instant Lady Lilia makes it clear that we don’t seek Langdon’s Shaker to sip tea and exchange pleasantries about the weather, words spill from their lips—a cup, turned over.

  The Shaker was no friend to them either, the farmer’s wife says with ire in her tone, cupping her swollen belly without conscious thought.

  Her man puts a gentle hand on her shoulder. The Shaker had stumbled away from Jowyck’s Tavern late one night, and they’d been awoken by the sound of his drunken vomiting outside their abode. When the farmer had shooed him away, he had reacted with ill humor, splitting clean in two the tree that they’d fashioned a rope swing onto for their other two children.

  He’d staggered off into the woods, they said, pointing vaguely in the direction where bare, spindly branches stabbed toward the sky. The Shaker had left only bloody puddles of vomit and the destroyed play place of their children behind.

  But what could they have done? They were not Elemental Adepts, not warriors. To demand retribution from a poor-tempered, powerful drunk of a Shaker may well have been suicide.

  They’d been angry. Their hope that we could exact some sort of vengeance where they could not is scrawled across their brows as their eyes flit to each of our faces. Until the farmer’s attention snags on Tregle.

  The farmer squ
ints at him. “I know you, don’t I?”

  Tregle blanches. He would be a poor card player, for his face hides nothing. “No,” he says softly, ducking his head. “I don’t think so.”

  “No, no, I never forget a face.” He removes his hat to scratch at his head, thinking. “You came ‘round here about a year ago, didn’t you? Had a couple friends with you. A pot-bellied sort of fellow and a blonde woman.”

  In all of the time we’ve spent together, Tregle’s face has never worn this precise brand of discomfort and agony. It’s clear he’s in dire need of a rescue.

  “My husband has a twin brother,” I snap, seizing Tregle’s hands in a protective grip. “They’re estranged. It upsets him to hear of his travels. We’ve forgotten him, and if ever there was a face that I suggest you start with forgetting, it’s his.”

  Not bothering to linger and register the expressions of the townspeople, I lead Tregle away at a march, leaving Lilia and the others behind to make our excuses and deliver whatever hasty apologies they deem necessary.

  Tregle bends to whisper, chuckling, into my ear, “Husband?” His voice is light in a way that it has not been since we set a course for this Makers-forsaken village, and a smile almost twitches the corner of my lip in response.

  “Are you complaining?” I demand.

  He lets an infant flame drift toward me on the wind to settle at my shoulder, kissing my neck. I shiver. “Never,” he vows softly.

  Perhaps, someday…

  The thought goes unspoken, but it drapes like a comfortable shawl over the both of us.

  “Shall we head toward the woods?” I ask, pretending that my control is as level as it has always been. He steps behind me, stopping when my shoulders just barely graze his chest.

  “Mmm.” He murmurs an agreement, his body at my back, his voice a low rumble against me.

  “Yes, I think that’s our best recourse,” the Shaker with us—Hermann—says, breaking the spell of the moment. The others pant as they catch up with us. “The farmer indicated that’s where the rumors place him, and there are more things that I could do there.”

  Wielder Maryna nods in agreement, checking her flask, ascertaining its volume and security. “I agree, but we’d best all be on our guard. It’s true that there are more things you can do there, but the same goes for Langdon’s Shaker.”

  She’s right. It’s good of her to caution us, lest any of us relax for even a moment. That could very well prove to be our undoing. If we don’t find anything and let our guard down for a scant second, Everett could pounce like an animal upon his prey. Between his Locus and pure Shaker abilities, we have no room to get comfortable around him.

  Lilia knots her hair back, looking grim with intent. “On guard, indeed. No sense wasting time, though. Best we get on with it.”

  We head for the edge of town.

  Twenty-Two

  Caden

  Something fractures in Bree’s eyes when we step into the woods. They grow hard and flinty.

  I reach for her hand, giving it a squeeze. “All right?” I ask quietly.

  She nods, a quick jerk of her head. “Yeah. Fine. It’s just…this is where it all started for me." Then, she laughs, shakes her head. “Well. It’s where I remember it starting for me, anyway.”

  These are the woods where she found Lady Kat and Tregle. These are the woods that will bring a close to my father’s story.

  That is, if we do what we came here to do. If we remove the Shaker, Father’s eyes on other empires like Nereidium, it will deal him a crippling blow.

  Restlessly, Meddie shifts her stance to and fro. She and Liam switch positions constantly, covering each other’s backs, trying to take in every vantage point. I doubt they even realize they’re doing it.

  Elena’s boots crunch down on branches as she walks toward us, back from surveying the immediate area, eyes alert. “There’s a break in the trees there,” she says, gesturing forward. I squint to see what she indicates. A pair of trees and dead wooden bushes, fractured and cracked—like something has crashed through them.

  “It could be an animal…” she says, sounding doubtful, but likely not wanting us to get our hopes up.

  “No. Not likely,” Bree contradicts her almost immediately, shaking her head. “We never had much big game in Abeline. Mostly rabbits, squirrels, the odd wild cat, that sort of thing. Anything that could make a gap that big wouldn’t be around here unless it was lost.”

  Then we’re on the right trail, I suppose. I squat down to get a better look at the trail, thinking that perhaps I’ll spot some footprints, but there’s nothing.

  “He may think to mask the trail his feet leave behind,” Bree says, catching my intent. Her gaze travels past the broken plant life. “Smoothing the earth over behind him as he walked wouldn’t take much concentration. But healing trees and bushes…that would take more effort. He probably wouldn’t see it necessary to expend the energy. Most people would think it the work of an animal anyway. But that wouldn’t be the case if he left behind boot prints.”

  I nod to her and stand, brushing a twig from my breeches. “Right you are. Well, no sense lingering here. Let’s find him before he finds us. We’d best go—”

  I’m cut off. Something wallops me across the stomach, knocking the wind clear out of my lungs. My throat strangles an attempt to inhale, and I gasp for air, unable to get a full breath into me until it’s funneled into my chest.

  Heart pounding, I put a hand to my chest and nod my thanks to Elena. She gives me a quick nod of acknowledgement back from the defensive crouch she’s moved into.

  We’re all silent as our eyes land on my attacker: the root of a tree, black and bulging, slithers away, rustling leaves.

  There’s but a beat as we watch it go.

  “I think we found ‘im,” Meddie says grimly. As it disappears, she takes off at a sprint, Liam not far behind her.

  “Lass, you’ll not want to be without the Adepts—!” He tosses a hurried, desperate glance to us, already drawing his sword for battle.

  Bree’s hands work furiously, uncapping her flask as we bring up the rear. A bead of water glimmers as it splits into multiple drops and streaks for the village, sending word, seeking help.

  Olivia comes alive, and the earth wakes with her. Branches reach for her, wrapping around her middle, and the trees pass her between them with great care. Soon, she’s disappeared among their bare branches. Elena’s vanished as well, the wind at her back aiding her speed; she’s not so much running as flying across the ground.

  I send a questioning glance to Bree, running alongside me. “I don’t suppose you have any tricks like that up your sleeve?”

  A bark of laughter curls around her panting breath. “That’s not a half-bad idea.” She halts suddenly, seizing my arm to keep me with her. Her eyes close as she concentrates. Beneath our feet, the light dusting of snow across the ground solidifies into something more—ice, slick and wet.

  She grins, looking pleased with the result. “Hold tight.”

  My arms wrap around her middle, and then it’s as though we’re afloat on a sea, sent down a current by a moving wave. The ice flows forward, rushing us along with it as though the path itself is moving.

  “Keep your feet steady,” she shouts to me, brow furrowed in concentration.

  Her training sessions with Izador are clearly paying off, but we’re moving at such a rapid pace, I can’t help but ask. “Do you know precisely what you’re doing?” I yell into her ear.

  “No!” she responds—with more cheer than I think she’s a right to, given our circumstances.

  There’s a rustle overhead, and I catch a flash of Olivia’s hair to our right. “Bank right!” I tell Bree, eyes scanning the trees for another sight of our comrades as she follows my instruction.

  Suddenly, the trees are a great deal closer. They bow, crowding into us, closing in until they will either crush us between their trunks or trap us.

  My grip around Bree’s abdomen tightens. “Bree�
��”

  “I know. Hang on,” she says grimly and curls her fingers. I hadn’t thought it possible, but we move even faster, hurtling toward the closing and interlocking trees, slipping through into a clearing an instant before they slam together at our backs.

  I breathe a sigh of relief, but the emotion is short-lived. Bree’s expression is arrested. Frost ices the tip of her nose, and she twists the ice beneath our feet until it’s at her back, ready and waiting to perform its mistress’s bidding.

  Wary, pulse thrumming a vibrato in my body, I follow her gaze, knowing what I’ll find.

  Shaker Everett stands in the middle of the clearing.

  Olivia dangles from the trees, ready and wary, while Meddie and Liam stand, weapons drawn and waiting.

  “Where’s Elena?” Bree asks quietly, hardly daring to take her eyes from Everett, but quickly scanning the clearing.

  Elena tumbles in from overhead, landing in a crouch and rising. “I am here.”

  All eyes are on Everett, and that includes my own as I draw my weapon. But before I move to strike, I’ll at least make the attempt to reason with him. “Adept Everett!” I call loudly. I spread my legs into a fighting stance. “I am Caden of House Capin, Prince of Egria and rightful heir to the throne.”

  Everett laughs. It’s a dark and humorless sound that turns to a cough. He swills—and then spits.

  Blood.

  “I know who you are,” he says. “You think King Langdon didn’t tell me of you and your compatriots? You’re the disgraced prince.” He takes a slow step to the side, his black Adept cloak—the mark of Father’s favor—pulling leaves behind him like the wake of a swift ship upon still waters. “The unwanted son,” he continues. His voice is soft, but it carries.

  That stings more than it should, the bite of a lash upon unprotected skin. But I swallow back the pain and weigh my sword in my hand. “Everett, your work for my father is a crime against the people of Egria and the world. I would ask that you fight with us before we are forced to subdue you.”