The Falcon in the Barn (Book 4 Forest at the Edge series) (69 page)

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When Thorne’s eyes opened in the morning he
knew exactly where he was: the surgery wing.

He might as well have had all of his
belongings moved from his quarters considering how often he found
himself there.

He glanced down at his right hand, wrapped
extensively with bandages and strips of wood to keep it immobile,
and cursed quietly that he didn’t use his left hand instead to try
to hit Zenos. Writing back to Idumea was now going to be painful,
in many aspects. The familiar dizzy buzz of the sedation was
wearing off, allowing him to fully appreciate the aching of his
hand.

The surgeon noticed he had awakened and came
over to him. “Whenever you feel up to it, Captain Thorne, you may
leave,” Frenulum told him. “No reason to keep you here longer than
you wish. Just take it slow for a time. That hand will need to heal
for at least six weeks.”

Thorne immediately got off the cot, ignored
the swooning of his head, and staggered past the surgeon. He forced
himself upright and strode to his quarters in the next building,
pretending that his hand didn’t throb as if it were twice as big as
it should be.

He slammed the door to his room and sat down
hard on his bed. On his desk waited two files he’d brought from
Idumea: one thin, the other thick. He took a few deep breaths to
try to clear his foggy mind, then reached over and grasped the
files with his left hand. He dropped them on the bed and opened the
thinner file. He immediately closed it in disgust and threw it in
the cold fireplace to burn later.

No need for notes from his mother now on how
to court Jaytsy Shin.
Briter.
No wonder none of them were
“up to the journey” to Idumea for The Dinner.

It didn’t make any sense. He’d done
everything right, too! He’d become so close to the colonel he was
practically living under his arm. He’d said all the right words to
Jaytsy, gave her some time as she requested, then offered her the
most unrejectable invitation, which she still rejected. It was
baffling! How could she pass up such a specimen of perfected
manhood for a mere
farmer
?! She was denying her bloodlines,
allowing her impeccable traits to be mingled with a man who worked
in dirt. Why?

He pulled over the larger file and read the
name on top. Lemuel hadn’t seen it before, but now . . . of course.
It was finally making sense.

He opened the cover and skimmed the pages
that didn’t interest him four days ago when they were handed to
him. There were notes dating from several years. Lemuel felt
slightly sick to his stomach, but he didn’t know if it was because
of the sedation, the throbbing of his hand, or the words in the
file. Maybe all three.

Leaning against his pillow, he wondered again
why no one had recognized it. Even his Grandmother Cush had bravely
laughed at Qayin just a few days ago when he was on one of his
typical rants against Perrin Shin. Lemuel had tried to think of
ways to defend his colonel. Having been with him for almost two
years, Lemuel could see qualities in Colonel Shin that were lacking
in his father and grandfather. Hearing his father go on irately
about Colonel Shin tore at Lemuel’s gut. But he didn’t know how to
defend Shin without having his father considering him a traitor. It
didn’t matter they were all in the same army.

His grandmother had finally spoken up. “Now
Qayin, don’t go placing all the blame on Perrin that they didn’t
come to The Dinner,” she had said with a casual wave and a forced
chuckle. “It wasn’t
his
handwriting on the message that came
from Edge. It was
hers.
Someday you’ll understand. A man may
look at the scenery, but it’s his wife who tells him what he sees.
No married man ever has as much power as he thinks he does.”

That didn’t necessarily apply to Qayin and
Versula Thorne, but it certainly seemed to in other marriages.

Lemuel looked again at the name on the cover
of the file, written in Gadiman’s hand, with notes underneath from
Genev, and considered more recent events.

How she showed up at the camp the morning
after the offensive.

How Perrin was so angry that he pulled into
the forest. As Fadh had helped Lemuel out of the tent, he saw them
disappear into the trees, so desperate the colonel was to get his
wife out of the way.

Yet still she stayed.

And there were incidents nearly every
day.

Perrin always had time to see her when she
came to the office, even after he had turned away others.

He never wanted to be late for dinner,
sometimes leaving before all the business was finished, promising
to do it in the morning.

If she could influence even the way he worked
when she wasn’t around, what kind of control did she maintain over
him at home?

Lemuel shook his head in sympathy.

What kind of a man could Shin be without her
manipulation? And how much did she sway Jaytsy? He’d seen his
mother and grandmother nattering. They could talk each other out
of, and into, anything. How could Jaytsy
not
have wanted
him? Easily: her mother’s coercion.

Lemuel ran his uninjured hand over the file
with a new determination and purpose. In a way he felt he had
dodged yet another sword plunge by not marrying into that family.
What would it have been like with her as his mother-in-law?

No.

No, he would free them, especially Perrin
Shin. That’s how he’d repay him. Help him see just how blinded and
controlled he was all these years—release him to finally become the
man he always should have been.

And when Perrin became High General Shin,
Lemuel Thorne would, out of gratitude, be appointed as the youngest
advising general in Idumea’s history.

And then, some day, High General himself.

It would still work.

He smiled at the thick file. When
Administrator Genev gave him the record several days ago, it was
with a specific charge: “The colonel may be the Administrators’
eyes and ears, but you are
my
personal eyes and ears in
Edge. Find out the truth, and we can bring Colonel Shin home to
Idumea where he belongs. He’s not the real problem. It’s always
been her. This is will be the greatest challenge of your young
career. Should you succeed here, many more opportunities will open
up for you—situations and knowledge that you have no idea about.
This is your first and most important test. It’s up to you to
deliver us Mahrree Peto Shin.”

“
And you will have her,”
Thorne promised the file.

Chapter 27
~
“How many women—
girls
—had an old historian as
their childhood hero?”

M
ahrree’s eyes
opened early in the morning and she thought,
It’s Weeding
Season, and today they’re leaving
!

She wasn’t thinking about her daughter,
although after six weeks of marriage Jaytsy had finally moved the
last of her things over to her new home at the Briter farm. Mahrree
was startled at her mixed feelings about that. As happy as she was
to see her daughter blissfully married, removing her things a
little each day had been like peeling off a scab from a wound that
would never heal.

Her daughter had left her.

True, it was just down the road, and she
still saw her every day, but it wasn’t the same. It would
never
be the same, ever again. Mahrree hadn’t expected to
feel such a sense of loss when she, Perrin, and Peto rode home from
Mountseen, Jaytsy already off starting her new life with her
husband.

Jaytsy didn’t seem to feel any of it, though.
Her giggling actually increased, and the way she looked at Deck,
and the way he blushed back—well, Mahrree knew it was the very best
thing that could happen for both of them.

But still Mahrree felt better two weeks after
the wedding when she found Jaytsy in her old bedroom, weeping.

“
You moved Grandmother
Peto’s shelves into here?”

“
Well, yes, Jayts. To give
us more room around the table.”

“
But this was MY
room.”

“
Yes, Jaytsy, it
was.
Now you have a whole house—”

“
But this was MY
room!”

That’s when Mahrree realized her daughter
felt the loss too. They cried together for a few minutes, then
laughed about how silly it all was and picked up another crate of
her books to carry down the road.

Perrin had tried to understand what they were
experiencing, but didn’t get it. “They’re both here as much as they
always were!”

Peto thought the newlyweds were gooey and
ridiculous whenever they came for dinner and fed each other from
their plates. But then again, that’s because he was sixteen and
utterly uninterested in the opposite sex. But he was still
interested in kickball, unfortunately. For Peto’s birthday
yesterday they broke down and gave him a new leather ball. Since he
was finally the height of Jaytsy, and still growing and adding a
bit of Perrin-like bulk, Mahrree worried that the professional
recruiters who came around each year would regard her son with
renewed interest for teams in Idumea.

But for now she didn’t worry about that,
because her mind all night had been focused solely on one fantastic
possibility that may eventually take shape since
they were
leaving this morning
—

She giggled again in anticipation.

“
What?” a groggy voice said
next to her.

“
I’m sorry. I didn’t mean
to wake you,” she chuckled. “Go back to sleep.”

“
Is she here again?” he
mumbled.

Mahrree laughed out loud. “No, she’s not here
again, and neither is he! It was only once that Jaytsy came over
this early in the morning. Now go back to sleep.”

“
Well, you just never know.
She may be in a panic about something again. Deck might have
another headache.”

“
Oh, come now. You were
worried about him too.”

“
I was worried about my
back. That boy weighs more than he looks like he would. Some
son-in-law he turned out to be,” Perrin grumbled into this pillow.
“Married for only a few weeks, gets himself kicked unconscious by a
bull. How can he take care of his bride when he’s out
cold?”

“
Bah!” Mahrree scoffed.
“He’s the best son-in-law in the world! Sweet, funny, adoring, and
never complains about her cooking.”

“
That’s because they’re
always having dinner here. She may have a knack for growing food
but not for cooking it.”

Mahrree poked him. “They’re here for dinner
maybe three times a week, that’s all. You’re certainly a grump
today. And
you’re
one to talk about taking care of new
wives. When we were married for less than a season you left me for
days to chase Guarders in the forest with no word as to what
happened to you. At least Jaytsy knew her husband was on the ground
in the barn.”

“
And the next morning he
was sleeping peacefully in bed and she thought something was wrong
with him,” he muttered.

Mahrree rolled her eyes. “She wouldn’t have
been worried if you and Shem hadn’t told her that if she couldn’t
wake him up something could be wrong.”

“
Dying men don’t snore,
Mahrree.”

“
You don’t have to tell me
that. My, but you’re a bear this morning. Just how late did you get
to bed last night?”

He growled. “Don’t know. It wasn’t
last
night
anymore, though.”

“
So do you think they’re
off yet?”

“
With any luck. The plan
was for the expedition to leave before dawn, but they have some men
more skittish than squirrels. They’ll probably postpone again, but
I can’t imagine what else they could possibly need. We went through
their list at least a dozen times,” he groused. “I left the duty up
to Thorne to get them on the road. Told him they better be gone by
the time I got to the fort or I’d make him join the
expedition.”

Mahrree laughed. “Ooh, then I hope they
haven’t left yet! Maybe you should get dressed and run up there,
right now. We could get rid of Thorne for nine moons.”

Perrin finally laughed and rolled on to his
back. “I just want them to go already.”

“
I’ll admit I’m so
excited!” she squealed like a nine-year-old. “I can’t believe the
Administrators are finally doing this. It’s about time. This land
grab fever has struck the whole world. How long do you think they
had that map?”

“
The expedition leader told
me it arrived at Chairman Mal’s office right before The Dinner, so
at least six weeks,” he said, his eyes still closed. “The
Administrators thought about presenting it at The Dinner, but some
of them were too nervous about it. That’s why they waited another
two weeks before they revealed they had it. Apparently they were
arguing about what to do with it all that time. If there wasn’t
this crazed demand for more land, I doubt the Administrators would
have moved so quickly to form the expedition. The sooner we find
new places to settle, the sooner we establish peace in the villages
again. Some were seeing more violence than they ever did when the
Guarders were still active.”

“
The timing for the map to
appear couldn’t have been better,” Mahrree said. “With the weather
warming back up, I was sure everyone’s tempers would too. At least
with the thought of new territory no one’s fighting lately. They’re
content with waiting to see just how much greener the fields are on
the other side of the desert. Then they’ll start fighting again
over who gets to claim that.” She sighed, long and
heavy.