Lady of Mercy (The Sundered, Book 3) (15 page)

“Vellen,” he said aloud, grinding his teeth, “you ask too much.” But that was the privilege of Lord Vellen; the privilege of Erliss was only to serve. He rose and doused the flame of the lamp. The map fell into shadow.

But before he could make ready to depart, one more knock disturbed the room’s silence. Frowning, he walked to the door; he expected no callers.

Tantaer, Sword life-sworn to Vellen, stood in the hall. He was muddied and obviously well-traveled; his face was wreathed by lines of exhaustion. In the poor light, the scars from an old political war faded into shadow; his face looked lean but not gaunt, and much younger than its years.

“Tantaer,” Erliss said, in some surprise. “I didn’t expect you until tomorrow. No, two days hence.”

Tantaer nodded. “Forgive me for disturbing you, Lord. I had news which I felt warranted the interruption.”

“Come in.” Erliss returned once again to the darkened map. With a frown, he lit the oil lamp. “What news?”

“It may be nothing,” Tantaer said, although it was obvious that he did not believe it, “but that is for you to judge. There are two roads into Senatare from Landsfall; along the northern route, Priest Kovassen holds the territory.”

“Kovassen? I don’t know him.”

“He is new to the Lesser Cabal there. Young, possibly destined for a better position.” Tantaer let his commentary lapse. “Six days ago, in Surres, the town closest to the Landsfall border, a number of items were stolen. We would never have known of them—but two of those items came from the priest’s manor.”

“What was stolen?”

“Winter wear, Lord. Food, supplies that would indicate travel in the cold. Also, a necklace that belonged to the priest’s lady; hard to miss, he says, as it’s heavy gold and large rubies.”

“And this is unusual?” It was a perfunctory question; Erliss already knew the answer.

“There were no new arrivals in town; the inns don’t see much business this close to the edge of storms.”

“Six days, you say?”

“Sir.” Tantaer nodded. “I’ve taken the liberty of offering our aid in patrolling the northern road; I left two men behind. The priest is irate enough to consider only the damage done to his pride. We are safe there.”

“Thank you, Tantaer. Dismissed.”

When the Sword had gone, Erliss allowed his relief to show. He carefully marked his map with the first sure sighting, and then stared at the lines. He knew where they had been, and when—he would never forget their battle—and he now knew, roughly, the distance they had traveled. They were not moving quickly; they almost certainly weren’t traveling by road.

Again he cursed the restrictions placed upon his search, but he did so with less venom. For it was clear, from the line drawn between Mordantari and the province of Senatare, which direction the woman traveled in.

She was heading to Illan—the province that had once been guarded by the last of the seven lines to fall.

As the knowledge sank roots and grew firm, his frustration eased. They would find her, and no word would reach the Greater Cabal that Lord Vellen of Damion had failed in his promised conquest of the end of the lines. If he wondered how she had arrived in Mordantari, he quickly put the thought aside; Lord Vellen, holder of the high seat, could deal with the mythical Lord of the Empire should trouble arise.

 

The first of the snows came. Light and powdery, it rested against bare branch and forest floor in an even shroud of white. The winter wear that Robert had somehow managed to procure—no one, not even Darin, cared to ask how—served them well, for the time being.

But setting snares in heavy winter had not been among the skills that Erin had learned; she had stayed on the southern front for most of her life, and although cold was a factor, it had never been accompanied by snow.

Darin seemed almost comfortable with the weather, although it affected him; his shoulders, as he walked, were drawn in so tightly they shook. She asked him, once, why he didn’t call upon Bethany’s power to ease the chill. He answered that Bethany’s power might be needed for more important battles than simple winter. His voice had cracked in the saying; he was growing into the title of Patriarch. She didn’t ask him again.

The food that the Lady of Elliath had provided was—as all that she touched or made had been—of a nature that defied understanding. Trethar found it most curious, and with Erin’s reluctant permission, set about studying it in the evenings as his time permitted. His time, of course, coincided with meal times, but Erin was privately relieved when he took one of these oddly hued nuts and left the campfires; it meant that Robert and he were separated, and therefore mostly silent.

But no matter how hard he might study, Trethar did not find answers to the mystery of the Lady’s gift; it remained the Lady’s gift. When eaten, even in the smallest of quantities, it
satisfied. It looked odd to sit around a fire and crack the smooth perfect shells of small golden nuts, with no other sustenance in sight. But the meat and heart of the Lady’s gift was a blessing that no one questioned after the first meal. If it was bitter to Erin’s taste, she said nothing and made no complaint.

 

After the fourth snowfall, it was clear that they could no longer travel through forested lands. The imperial roads were, if not clear, still traversable and easy to follow. They were also dangerous, and Erin was reluctant to emerge onto any path on which they might meet people. But they covered less distance daily, and the food supply was dwindling. Money—the coin of the realm, with its stamped swords crossing the relief of a crown—they had in some supply. But it had been Gervin’s gift, and one Erin had thought not to use.

“Lady, think,” Robert said, for perhaps the twentieth time that evening. “We’re barely moving, even with the path that the old man clears for part of the day.”

The old man in question narrowed his eyes at a title that seemed to have replaced his name. His brows, frosted with ice from his breath, came together in a creased V. But he did not demur or disagree with the slight thief—which was as much a sign of his approval as he ever willingly granted to Robert.

She wanted to tell them all that she was afraid of the road, afraid of touching the reality of the Empire that spanned the continent in anything other than the dreams that always came. Swallowing, she met the eyes of her three companions and nodded her grudging approval.

But they left her to the night’s call when the matter was settled. Robert returned to his snow-enshrouded retreat—fashioned at the direction of Trethar—and Darin settled in for an evening hour with his new teacher.

Erin sat in the stillness, so tired and weary that she almost prayed for a dreamless night.

 

“They have to be on the road.” Lord Vellen shuffled the papers and maps to one side of his desk and stood. The motion was stiff and formal, but it hid much.

“We’re spread too thin,” Erliss replied, his voice just shy of a whine. “I have our house guards, and your Swords, along the main roads where any traffic moves at all.”

“And?”

“Nothing.” It was best not to prevaricate. Erliss ran a hand through jet-black hair and looked up. His eyes were darkened and ringed by lack of sleep; his cheeks were hollowed, his skin almost sallow. “But they’ve only been ordered to sight and follow; fifteen of my men were not enough to stop her in Mordantari.”

Lord Vellen frowned and turned back to the desk. At his direct order, a recess to Karnari activity had been called; the Greater Cabal would not sit in official session until the beginning of the next quarter.

But he knew that Benataan Lord Torvallen was already in motion; spies had reported at least six meetings of an “informal” nature that had taken place at the Torvallen estates in the city. The nature of these meetings had been well hidden, but Vellen did not need their minutes to know what Lord Torvallen planned.

“Lord?”

“They must take to the road. You’re right, Erliss. We don’t have the resources to track them in the provinces—but we do know that they must travel to Illan. Where else can they go?” He did not need to look at the maps again; he had studied them, and he remembered them in detail. “There is only one road to Illan in the winter. They will have to either travel through the capital of Senatare, or around it. ” If he could but call his power, he would be able to find the woman; her blood-power could not be hidden from his God’s. But the power still burned and could not be controlled. Yet. Abruptly he turned and placed a hand upon the flat surface of his desk. “You have progressed well, Erliss. This will be the final test of your studies. Go to Verdann in Senatare. Find them.”

 

Robert took control of the party almost as soon as they found the road again. He was not, and had never been, a woodsman of any note, but the roads he knew well. He talked often and made as much sense as he usually did while he babbled, now at Erin, now at Darin, seldom, if ever, at Trethar. He wore the coat he had procured at the village long past with a dapper pride and a playful elegance that was completely out of place. Trethar found it annoying, but he found almost anything that Robert was prone to do or say annoying.

Robert found the inn on the road with an ease of familiarity
that no one had the energy to question—not even Erin. Rooms, real food, and a chance to get truly clean held an allure that long absence had made undeniable.

Robert dealt with the innkeeper; Erin had expected more difficulty in the transactions, but kept silent at Robert’s bidding. In the end, the slightly built man held the keys to two rooms—one for his two attendant slaves, and one for he and Erin. Erin listened as he talked, and found herself cringing at the easy way he slid into the demeanor of a housed noble.

She knew better than to even raise a whisper of protest, and weariness helped her to keep her head bowed and her attention focused on ground, the way any slave, no matter how valued, would.

“Come along,” Robert said, and she looked up. He handed a key to Darin and gestured again; she followed as he walked down the long hall to the room that would be his. “We have food, or will have food shortly, and I’ve taken the opportunity to call for a bath for the lot of you.” The wrinkled bridge of his nose was no act.

“Why, thank you, Lord,” Trethar whispered, in a tight little hiss of a voice.

Robert chose to ignore him, which was just as well; they were not yet out of the innkeeper’s field of vision.

 

When the door to Lord Talspon’s quarters—Robert insisted that the house was real, which made Erin less nervous—was opened, Erin knew that they must be the largest set of rooms in the inn. They were well decorated, with two framed paintings of simple country idylls and a vase on each of two low tables. The carpets here were blue and deep. A large fire burned in the grate, coloring the glass of the windows with orange translucent fingers.

“I know it isn’t much,” Robert said apologetically, “but you can’t expect much from a town inn. I think they’ve done exceptionally well, all things considered.”

She turned at the sound of his suddenly unfamiliar voice, her eyes leaving the carpet.

“My dear Lady, are you well?”

She shook herself and smiled. This was just another room, the bed another bed. And Robert, approaching her with his gregarious, and unwelcome, expression of concern was simply
Robert—whoever that happened to be beneath the flamboyant mask he usually wore.

He saw the turning of her expression, more eloquent than any word of warning could have been. With a shrug that was anything but subtle, he turned away and walked over to the wall—and another door, unnoticed until now.

It led into a study, with a large dark desk and yet another fireplace couched within the wall. The leaded glass caught most of her attention; all of the panes were there, and whoever had cleaned them was very good at the job.

“Come,” Robert said, “and lay the map out on the desk. There is something we need to discuss.”

She nodded, went to her pack, and came back with the tube that contained the Lady’s gift. Gently, she eased the parchment out and laid it on the desk. There was a plain, heavy ornament, made in the likeness of the inn’s crest, that served as a paper-weight for one side of the map; Robert’s hand served as the other.

“We are here, give or take a few miles.” He jabbed at a silver dot. We want to be”—and his fingers moved north in the lamplight—“here, give or take a few more.

“The road between these two points is, in the winter, the only passable road. I am sorry, as you seem so reluctant to travel this way, but we take the road. It leads to Verdann.” Robert paused, obviously expecting some reaction. After a minute, he frowned.

“My dear girl,” he said, folding his arms in a sure sign of mild annoyance, “surely you recognize the name by now?”

“Verdann is the capital of Senatare, the northernmost province of the Empire, if you don’t include Illan.” Her voice was without inflection.

“To be honest, I don’t include Marantine, war or no war.” Robert bent over the map, studying its lines as they seemed to glitter.

“No,” she said quietly. “We don’t pass through a large city.”

He snorted. Lifted and crossed his arms, letting the map curl up. “Passing around the city is possible on side roads, but those roads are neither patroled—which is good—or cleared at all in the winter; there’s also a marked increase in banditry, and the farmers are ... unfriendly. Besides,” he added, drawing himself to his full height, “I
know
the city. Well.”

Erin stared at him for a few moments. Her glance was enough to make him bristle, but then again, an early morning was enough to make him bristle.

“We can gain valuable information if we stop there. We can travel freely once we pass the gates, and there’s a quarter of the city which, while it may not be suitable for women and children, will hide us quite effectively from any would-be captors. We can get supplies there.” He took a step away from the table and let his arms fall to the side. “And we can get passage from Verdann to Dagothrin, the capital of Illan.” He took a step back and held out his hands in a poor mimicry of supplication.