The Keeping Place

“I don’t like the way you keeping hinting Brydda is a traitor,” Gevan said sternly.

  “The message makes it very clear that whoever has Rushton knows where we are. And no one knows that but Brydda,” I said.

  “And Reuvan. And the Sadorians. And maybe a couple dozen others, for all we know,” Gevan added.

  Aras sat forward. “I don’t mean to interrupt, but does whoever wrote that note really know where we are? After all, a homing bird flies to its roost, so whoever released it knew the message would find us, whether or not they knew our whereabouts. And any rebel would have known the bird was a homer by its leg capsule.”

  “The note called Rushton the Master of Obernewtyn,” Alad said.

  “It didn’t,” Aras said shyly. “It only said ‘your Master.’ And since the rebels knew Rushton as the leader of the Misfits, the note might simply mean that.”

  “Truespoken.” Gevan gave the young ward a look of approval that made her blush with pleasure.

  Jak nodded. “In any case, it doesn’t change the fact that whoever wrote the note wants us to work with the rebels. And that puts us right back to wondering who it is and whether the threats against Rushton are real.”

  The others exchanged dismayed glances, and I sensed our thoughts roiling around in the air about us like an invisible thunderstorm.

  “I think we must act as if they are real,” Angina said. “Rushton’s captors must believe that we take them seriously.”

  “We should organize a meeting with the rebels,” Gevan said. “That’s what we’d do if we meant to obey, and indeed, it’s the only way we can show that we accept the terms of the note.”

  “We ought to send a note requesting a meeting,” Garth suggested. “One without any specific information or mention of the kidnapping. If Linnet leaves it at a drop in Sutrium, it will take time for Brydda to get the note and respond to it. In the meantime, she will have had the chance to nose around.”

  Merret spoke up next. “What if the meeting took place in Sawlney during the bonding celebrations?”

  “I don’t think it is a good idea to draw rebel attention to your magi,” I said.

  “The magi need not be involved in the meeting,” Gevan offered. “But it might be the perfect location, given the influx of moon-fair visitors. Sutrium is so much of a rat trap these days, I’m sure the rebels won’t object. You’d have to come in Rushton’s stead of course, Elspeth. You can ride to meet me there, and the two of us can represent Obernewtyn. If there is treachery afoot, we should be able to sniff it out between us.”

  Gevan gave me a hard look, and I pulled myself together. “Very well. I will compose a note to Brydda immediately. Linnet, choose a companion from your knights and prepare to leave for Sutrium before the sun sets.”

  Later that evening, I went to the dining hall, deciding I had best let everyone see I was not falling to pieces.

  I made a point of talking and looking purposeful and determined, though in truth my will felt as insubstantial as smoke in the wind. Unexpectedly, I found myself comforted by the bustle. It reminded me of all that Obernewtyn meant to Rushton. No matter what happened to him, I knew he would want me to put Obernewtyn’s welfare first. In a funny way, by trying to reassure the others, I ended up feeling stronger.

  Javo, Alad, and their people were discussing provisions, and I eavesdropped shamelessly, glad of the distraction. They already knew from usual winter planning how much food would be needed to take us through thaw to first harvest if we were to withdraw to the caves higher in the mountains. They seemed to feel that, with strict rationing, we would manage well enough. But they foresaw trouble if the siege continued beyond thaw, because there would be no way to restock.

  The meeting moved on to the more vexing problem of provisioning an exodus to Sador.

  “I wish I’d thought to ask Jakoby a bit more about the route,” Alad grumbled.

  Lina tapped his arm and said thoughtfully, “You know, Guildmaster, I’ve been thinking. If people only thought we’d left the mountains, there would be no one searching for us. There’d be no siege.”

  “No, but someone would take over Obernewtyn, and that would be the same as being sieged, since we couldn’t return,” Javo said.

  Lina looked crestfallen, and Alad said gruffly that they ought to stick to the matter at hand. Talk veered back to bags of dry grain versus prepared ration cakes, but I was struck by what Lina had said. I realized with some excitement that she might have hit upon the perfect compromise between two difficult solutions. To remain, yet make it seem we had gone. The only trouble was that Javo was right; Obernewtyn was too grand a prize not to be claimed by someone.

  The best answer was to turn it into a tainted ruin again. That, after all, would tally with the last official report. Of course, we no longer had Dragon’s ability to create massive illusions, but all the coercers working together could make sections of Obernewtyn appear ruinous, while strategic parts could be damaged to prevent access to intact sections.

  If we could manage that, and convince anyone searching for us that we had left the mountains, we could avoid any sort of confrontation and return to Obernewtyn when wintertime cut off the pass. I was sure Jakoby would help us by spreading the rumor that we had come to the desert lands.

  A hand descended onto my shoulder, and I started violently.

  “I’m sorry, Guildmistress,” Tomash said. “Ceirwan said you might like to know what came out of my talk with Seely. But I can just give you my notes later, if you’d prefer.”

  “No, sit,” I said, waving him to the seat opposite.

  “I’m sorry about Rushton,” he said with such graceful simplicity that my eyes blurred.

  “I’m sorry, too, but I don’t want to speak of it now. Tell me what you learned from Seely.”

  “The main thing is that the Council seem to know the Land is on the verge of an uprising, because there is at least one traitor among the rebels.”

  I felt a thrill of dismay. “The Council must know about us, if they know what the rebels know.”

  “It’s hard to be sure. Most of Seely’s memories revolve around the west coast, so I’d say the traitors are there. In which case they’re less likely to know in detail what Brydda and his people know of us. But I think we can assume that the Council is aware that Talented Misfits, disguised as halfbreed gypsies, offered their help to the rebels and were refused, since all the rebels know that much. And they probably know better than we do what took place at that meeting Brydda had with Rushton in Sutrium.”

  “How much of this did you get out of Seely’s mind?”

  “She had a lot of overheard scraps of information that were meaningless to her and meaningless in themselves, but they fitted with other scraps we already knew. I’m just giving you the bones of it, of course. Another interesting tidbit is that Cassell and Serba are bonding out of genuine love. It seems the two of them are working brilliantly together, much to the Council’s chagrin.”

  “The Council know even that, yet they wait like spiders for a fly to shiver their web,” I murmured.

  “One other thing: there have been unofficial meetings between soldierguards and Herders on the west coast…the sort that happen at odd hours in peculiar places.”

  Immediately, I thought of my nightmares. “Did you find anything in her mind about Ariel?”

  “I didn’t, and you can be sure I looked as soon as the Faction came up.”

  Relieved, I said, “We know a lot of soldierguards are in the pay of the Faction. I wonder, if it came to it, which side would they choose?”

  “Whichever they judged to be the winning side, I expect,” Tomash said.

  “These meetings occur only on the west coast?”

  “They’re the only ones Seely knows about, and Wila has no knowledge of similar meetings this side of the Suggredoon. She’s going to talk to Seely tomorrow, so she might learn something further. I’ll write up my notes and let you have them tomorrow.”

  “It would be interesting to k
now if the rebels are aware that they have traitors in their midst,” I murmured to myself as he got to his feet.

  “I was thinking that’s probably why they changed their mind about wanting us with them,” Tomash said mildly as he departed.

  I stared after him, certain that he was right. If the rebels knew they were being betrayed, who better than us to scry out their traitors?

  Deciding that I had made enough of a display of confidence to withdraw, I got to my feet. Ceirwan caught up with me as I reached the door of my turret chamber.

  “Freya wants to go wi’ th’ magi to th’ lowlands,” he puffed, having sprinted up the stairs after me.

  “Gevan will decide who is to accompany him,” I said.

  “I ken that, but if ye tell him, he’ll take Freya. An’ I think ye should. She wants to help find Rushton, an’ though she’s no coercer, she kens his mind. I was thinkin’ that she an’ I could go with Kella to Sutrium,” he said, flushing. “Freya an’ I can look for Rushton while Kella tries to get through to Domick.”

  I frowned. I didn’t like the idea of anyone going to Sutrium with things in such an ambiguous state, but on the other hand, a young man escorting his betrothed and her cousin to the city would be a far less provocative cover than a young woman traveling alone. And maybe it would be just as well, given that we had no idea how Kella would react upon reuniting with her bondmate.

  “I’m not saying yes or no right now, Ceir, but I will think about it,” I promised.

  “My thanks for that at least,” the guilden said earnestly.

  I froze as Gevan’s coercive voice boomed in my mind, warning that his people at the pass had reported riders approaching the mountains at a gallop.

  “Soldierguards?” I farsent sharply.

  “Too soon to say, but as there’s only four or five, I doubt it. It’s more likely to be some of the knights, and from the way they’re riding, I’d say they have news.”

  “Did you catch that?” I asked Ceirwan breathlessly.

  “Of course. But if it is the knights, then why are there only four or five when more than ten rode out?”

  18

  RESISTING THE URGE to hurry down and wait at the front gate, I told myself it would be some time before the riders arrived and busied myself stoking the fire and closing the shutters. As I did so, I realized that it had started to rain.

  The door creaked, and I turned to see Maruman slink into the chamber.

  I asked if he knew a bird had been found carrying a message from someone who claimed to be holding Rushton captive.

  “Marumanyelloweyes knows many things,” he sent with infuriating ambiguity.

  I sighed and slid onto the chair, pulling him onto my lap. “So many people have been killed or lost to me since I first came to Obernewtyn. Cameo and Selmar and Jes. Jik and Matthew and Dragon.”

  “I will not leave you,” Maruman sent, and he turned around and around, needling my legs through my clothes before he settled himself.

  Touched, I blinked back a scatter of tears and gazed into the fire, trying not to think about the riders approaching, trying not to hope. But it was impossible.

  To stop myself, I asked Maruman his impression of Gavyn.

  “Adantar is beastspeaker-enthraller—” Maruman began.

  “What is ‘adantar’?” I interrupted, having a vague impression it meant something like “joined” or “linked.”

  “No funaga words for this word,” he responded tersely.

  “Why does Rasial/silvertongue follow Gavynadantar?”

  “What she seeks, she sees in the adantar.”

  I frowned. “She told me she came up here to seek her dying.”

  “Just so,” Maruman sent.

  I stared at him. “Are you saying Rasial follows Gavyn because she sees her death in him?”

  Maruman sniffed, signaling the topic was closed. Then I remembered the nightmares about Ariel. I described them to Maruman, and his eye flashed. “Maruman yelloweyes knows. Who else overturned wagon? Marumanyelloweyes watches the dreamtrails. Protects ElspethInnle.”

  I gaped at him stupidly. “I don’t understand. You…you were in those nightmares?”

  “No nightmares. ElspethInnle on dreamtrails,” Maruman sent. “Marumanyelloweyes watches/follows. Protects ElspethInnle.”

  I licked dry lips, feeling as if I were slicked in ice. “Are…are you saying that I need protecting because I wasn’t dreaming?” I sent with incredulity. “That Ariel was…is after me in my dreams?”

  Maruman closed his eyes. I felt like shaking him, but Gevan sent to tell me the riders were approaching Obernewtyn and suggested I meet him at the front entrance. I slid the old cat unceremoniously onto my seat, ignoring his indignant protests, and got up to put on boots and a shawl, asking Gevan if the riders had been identified.

  I was on my way down the halls when Gevan answered. “It is Miryum, and Brydda Llewellyn rides with her.”

  “Brydda?” I sent with surprise. “But she can’t have told him about the blackmail note—the knights rode out before it arrived.”

  “Good,” Gevan sent. “I want the chance to see Brydda’s reaction when we tell him about the note.”

  “I thought you trusted him.” I was walking toward the front hall now, and my senses told me Gevan was waiting in a small chamber off the front entrance hall.

  “I trust him not to be the instigator of the kidnapping,” Gevan said. “But if he was aware of it, he could think he was sparing us the worry by keeping it a secret. Remember last year how he didn’t tell us some of the rebels were opposed to an alliance with us until you forced it out of him? He didn’t have a bad motive then, but he was still lying by omission in hopes of resolving the problem himself.”

  “Lying about Rushton’s kidnapping would be rather more than a thoughtful attempt to smooth things over,” I said aloud, striding into the antechamber.

  Gevan nodded. “Truespoken, but let’s wait and see, shall we? They should be here any minute.”

  I went to lean on the mantelpiece, where Gevan had lit a fire in the hearth, and told him what I had just learned about a traitor among the rebels.

  He looked at me sideways. “Let’s see what Brydda has to say before we tell him anything.”

  We both stiffened at the sound of horses and hurried to open the heavy front doors. Through the rain-swept darkness, I saw Brydda dismounting from his white mare, Sallah. Miryum and the coercer-knight Orys were on the ground already, as was Brydda’s right-hand man, Reuvan. But Straaka stayed on horseback, shouting over the rain that he would go with the horses down to the farms.

  “We’ve a fire blazing. You can dry out while we talk,” Gevan said by way of greeting, closing the main doors behind us.

  “Elspeth.” Brydda smiled, taking my hands. “I’m glad to see you again.” Looking up into his kind brown eyes, his long molasses curls and beard all dripping wet, I felt like howling.

  Instead I swallowed hard and said, “I’m truly glad to see you, too, Brydda, but I wish it was under happier circumstances.”

  “You’ve still had no news of Rushton, then?”

  Gevan interrupted smoothly to deflect the question, hustling us all into the antechamber and suggesting everyone remove their wet top clothes and drape them about to dry.

  “I’ve farsent Ceirwan,” I said. “He will be here soon with food, and we’ve got water heating for baths and chambers made up for you to sleep in.”

  “I won’t say no to food, but we won’t be staying the night,” Brydda said. “Reuvan and I rode out as soon as Jakoby told me Rushton hadn’t got back to Obernewtyn. We decided to ask after him all along the main road. This afternoon, we walked into a roadside tavern a few hours below Guanette, and who should we see but Miryum and a couple of her knights drinking and playing darts.”

  “We were probing the crowd for news of Rushton…,” Miryum said, then hesitated. I sensed Gevan warning her coercively to say nothing of Maryon’s futuretelling, if she had not done so alr
eady.

  “I suppose she told you we got a bird he sent after leaving Sutrium?” I said.

  “I was there when he released it from the outskirts of Sutrium. He rode off safe and well after that. He should have been back well before your moon fair, by my reckoning.”

  “So far, we’re found no one who even saw him coming up the road,” Miryum said.

  “Nor did we, but if he rode at night, it’s possible he’d go unnoticed,” Reuvan said.

  “There was no reason for him to be so furtive,” I protested.

  “Unless something happened at the meeting he had with the rebels to make him so,” the Coercer guildmaster interposed blandly.

  Brydda shrugged. “I can’t think what. We invited the Misfits to join us in the rebellion, and Rushton declined.”

  “Why did you decide to ask us to join you after everything that has happened?” Gevan asked. “I can’t believe Malik changed his mind about us.”

  “Well, he didn’t, that’s true. But since Malik has no more say than anyone else, he was outvoted.”

  “Malik was glad we refused, then?” Gevan asked.

  “Yes, though he claimed it was a deadly insult that Misfits would refuse anything to ‘true humans.’ His words,” Brydda added wryly, twisting his lips as if he had tasted something unpleasant.

  “What about the other rebels?” Gevan asked. “Were they angry that we would not join them?”

  “Not so much that as plain bewildered,” the big rebel admitted. “They could not understand why you would refuse when you’d tried so hard to join us before.” His expression grew serious. “You are wondering if any of the rebels went after Rushton on the road because he spurned our offer of alliance?”

  “Isn’t it a reasonable assumption, since he seems to have disappeared right after the meeting, and no one but your people and ours knew where he was?” Gevan countered.

  “You are assuming he was attacked by someone who knew who he was, but there are those on the road to whom a jack would seem a good target. But I can see why you might wonder about the rebels, and I admit to wanting to make sure none of them are involved myself. That’s why I want to get back as soon as possible.” The big rebel looked at me from under his lashes, and I caught his unsaid thought quite clearly.