Tunstall got over his bit of religion and came to aid us. Together we helped Master Farmer up and slid him into his shoulder pack. I have to say, that man is one weighty piece of beef.
We were about to try for the road when Master Farmer mumbled, “A little rest and I can bury the bones again.” His eyes were shimmering only now. I could see the irises through the odd blue-green veil.
“I’d like a bit more warning, next time,” Tunstall said gruffly, looking at the ground. “I was certain Morni the Mad had you.”
That explained his fit of strangeness. Morni was the hill people’s war goddess and mad as a rabid cat. I wouldn’t want to be near her, either.
“Sorry,” Master Farmer mumbled. “You don’t usually find that much power in a hidden grave.”
“A trap,” Tunstall said. “She knew you were coming.”
“She wasn’t the only one. There were two magics in that, very strong ones. Very strong,” he repeated, rubbing his eyes.
I pulled Farmer’s hand away. “Stop that,” I said. “It’s not good to rub your eyes.”
Tunstall gave me the oddest look. I glared at him. “It isn’t. Don’t I tell you the same?”
“You do,” he said seriously. “After you’d known me two years.”
“The other mage didn’t speak at all.” Master Farmer was looking at his hand, as if he wondered why I held his wrist. I let it go. “There were two. I tried to put a hook into one of them, but I wasn’t prepared to work that kind of magic.” He glanced at me, then Tunstall, then Pounce. “It needs preparation, see. And a brazier, and at least two things I’d left in my bag, not thinking I’d need them.” The muscles flexed in his cheeks. “I will if we meet again. There’s a replacement for the brazier, if I work that ahead of time.” He stood with his weight more on his own feet now. His eyes were his own again. He still shook a bit, but mostly he looked like the Master Farmer I was used to. I slid out from under his arm. He stayed upright.
With a nod, I stepped away from them. “A moment,” I said quietly. I went to the piles of burned bones. I had no fear of the mages biting at me. It was plain they’d fled Master Farmer, and him but one man. I wondered if he’d noticed that yet.
“Black God take you gentle,” I whispered to the poor corpses. “Let his messengers guide you to the Peaceful Realms, where you’ll forget what happened here.”
The clatter of wings got my attention. I looked up. Three wood pigeons had taken to the air. They must have been in the nearby trees. Were they carrying the spirits of these poor folk? Seemingly neither mot nor gixie had any unfinished business for me. Like other slaves, mayhap they were eager to leave such a hard world.
I stood and nodded to Master Farmer. Hanging on to Tunstall’s arm, he raised the bones just enough to move them over to their grave. A mother putting her babes to bed could not have been more gentle as he settled them into the hole. Once they were down, he lifted his right hand and summoned the pile of earth that he’d set aside. It tumbled in swiftly until the grave was full again. At the very last, Master Farmer drew a sign for protection in the dirt. It shone with a steady, bright light. I didn’t believe any carrion eaters would be digging these folk up.
Tunstall asked, “Is all the barrier gone?”
Master Farmer nodded. “No one else will die here.”
Achoo, seeing that we were done with scary things, moved to a spot in the grass where a dead bird’s carcass lay in the middle of another path. Her tail was wagging again. She was sniffing, but not at the dead creature. She circled back to a spot that was spattered with brown drops—old piss—sniffed it, and returned to the dead bird. Then she ran a few feet down the path, halted, and danced.
“They didn’t take them back to the road by the path we used,” I said. “It’s a guess, but Achoo says her trail leads that way. I’ll wager that trail either picks up with the main road ahead, or leads to a village.”
Tunstall trotted back the way we’d come to get Lady Sabine and the horses.
Master Farmer sat on the grass once more. Achoo, thinking we faced another delay, whined miserably.
“Mudah,” I called to her. “We humans need a bit more than our legs and our nose to go along with.” I crouched beside Master Farmer.
“I hate the waste of it, the waste of life that criminals leave behind,” he said wearily. He fumbled at his belt, trying to undo the ties that held his water flask. I slapped his hand away and freed it, then opened it for him. Master Farmer took it with a nod of thanks. “Each of us has power, a kind of magic,” he told me, speaking as if I were a scholar like him. “We spend it somehow as we live, in great and lesser ways. Those three never even had a chance to use theirs.” He drank from his water flask and tried to fix it on his belt, but his hands still shook too much.
I took the thing from his grip and secured it to his belt again, then fed Achoo some meat strips. I said nothing, I was thinking about his words. They made sense. That was one of my reasons for doing what I did. I want more folk to make sommat of their lives, instead of losing them to slavery or prison or murder. But I’d never thought of it this way, that we each had a fire of some kind. We could each make a difference.
Tunstall returned with my lady and the horses. As Master Farmer was dragging himself onto his mount, Lady Sabine asked, “How did these mages know you were looking at this? Surely they weren’t watching all this time?”
Master Farmer smiled as he hauled himself into the saddle. It was a cold smile, a schoolmaster’s smile. “They didn’t need to. If I’d laid this trap, I’d have set the barrier with a spell, a ‘bee.’ In the unlikely event a mage who was powerful enough to break the barrier came along, the bee would go instantly to the casting mage. She wouldn’t even need her partner to spring the trap, if she’s one of the two who’s riding with that slave train.”
I dug in one of the packhorse’s bags. The mage needed to eat something. I cut a chunk off a ham that was conveniently near the top of one pack and some off the cheese that was its neighbor, and shoved them into Master Farmer’s hand. Then I cut more for Tunstall so he wouldn’t whine that I favored the mage. When I held up my knife and looked at my lady, she shook her head and raised a hand in thanks. I put away the food and mounted my own horse. Pounce jumped up onto my lap while Achoo pranced and whined on the ground.
“Maji, Achoo,” I called. I rode first down the trail following her, giving Saucebox the nudge to trot a bit.
“There’s another bad thing,” I heard Master Farmer say. “She blocked me from reaching any mage close to Gershom. I’m hoping that I’ll be able to get through down the road.”
If the other two said anything about that, I didn’t hear it. I made the Sign on my chest and prayed Master Farmer would reach my lord soon.
The trail led Achoo and the rest of us back to the main road after a couple of miles. Short of it, in a glade by a stream that followed the road for a good ways, we stopped to rest the horses and eat a proper late lunch.
“Let’s talk about our story again,” Lady Sabine suggested between bites. “We can back peasants down with talk of a Hunt and a wave of papers and seals, but that won’t work with nobles. At the level of magic we found back there, we’re going to find money. They won’t be impressed by our documents.”
“She’s right,” Master Farmer said. Even after ham and cheese by the burial ground, he’d eaten a big chunk of bread, cheese, and more ham as if he was starving. Now he eyed a meat pie that lay broken in its wrappings.
“Eat that,” Tunstall said. He lay on his back, staring at the sky and picking his teeth. “It won’t last forever. Our story. I’ve been thinking. A noble’s child’s been kidnapped, but he’s ten, see? That accounts for the four of us. They’d never send another noble and a mage out for a merchant, however rich. All we can say is the noble’s from the southeast, and there’s added trouble with Tusaine if we fail. We’ve been sworn to reveal no more, and our Birdies tell us that the kidnappers came this way.”
“We’ll be
pressed for more,” my lady said. “If we run into any powerful nobles, they won’t settle for that.”
“Give it to them bit by bit. Hint it’s mayhap a fight between father and mother, the mother being from the northern mountains. The father’s from the south.” Tunstall dug at a back tooth with the pick. When she’d found out he had this habit, my lady had gotten him a set of ivory ones, all very nicely made. “And no, we’ll give no name, no mention of politics or rebel mages. It’s a straight kidnapping. Let anyone who’s so eager to know pester Lord Gershom for it themselves, if they want it so bad.”
I chuckled. My lord was famous for his response when folk came to bother him about things he considered to be none of their business. Anyone who knew him would decide life was better if they left my lord alone. Anyone who didn’t know of him beforehand would remember forever after.
Lady Sabine fingered the moon charm she wore about her neck. “It should do,” she said at last. “For all that the nobility dislikes Dogs, they know it looks bad if they pry too deep, the way the nation’s politics are these days.”
“I’d think a mention of Ferrets would back them off as well,” Farmer observed. He was sharing the broken meat pie with Pounce and Achoo.
“We don’t need farting Ferrets,” Tunstall said, his voice a rumble of vexation. “We’re worth fearing ourselves, right, Cooper?”
I was on my feet, restless and wanting to be on the move again. “Specially anyone that’s seen us work,” I said absently. Over the far ridge I saw a hint of what might be chimney smoke. It could be a farm, a charcoal burner’s hut, or the first outlier of a village or town. “It’s a fine story, Tunstall. You always make up good ones.” I could hear them stirring behind me, collecting their gear at last. “And if they don’t believe us, I can give them the ghost eyes, you can go all big and threatening, Farmer can do his cracknob simpleton, and my lady can don her nobleness. We’ll do all right.” They were laughing as I told Achoo to maji.
As we moved on the country widened out to show us farms and orchards. Lady Sabine and Farmer got into a discussion of apples, which my lady’s family was known for growing. Tunstall listened, mayhap for ideas for his tiny flowers. None of them took their eyes off of our surroundings. Anyone could be in the weeds, trees, or bushes, watching us or following.
As the others kept an eye open for trouble, I kept my hound in view. Achoo never wavered. The scent was plain.
A courier passed us by, riding south. Tunstall halted him and gave him our latest report to Lord Gershom, wrapped and sealed, with a gold coin to inspire the courier. Official messengers are made to sign all manner of vows, which meant they were safer than most when it came to their work. Also Tunstall, like me, writes everything in private Dog codes.
We met a goatherd with his flock and a carter with a load of chickens in crates. Further on we overtook huntsmen with braces of rabbits from their night’s traps. More and more houses lined the road, along with barns and outbuildings, some with walls built of wood or stone. Folk were much in evidence, hanging clothes to dry, spinning in the sun, hoeing, tending flocks, making butter. We could see herds everywhere, sheep, more goats, one of horses. There were small roads that led away from our road to local manors, perhaps, or villages.
On our second rest of the afternoon, Lady Sabine climbed a nearby hill to have a look at what lay ahead. “We’re coming up on a small river and village,” she said when she returned. “Queensgrace Castle is beyond.”
“If we’re lucky we’ll pass the castle by,” Tunstall said.
“I never depend on luck, my dear,” the lady said, rooting in one of her long packs. She produced what looked like a three-sectioned staff. She fitted the pieces one atop the other, twisting each until it clicked into place. The whole formed a staff of seven feet in length. From the same pack she brought out a banner and fixed it to the wood. It was her shield device, the green flame above the green hill on a field of black, with the green ring and the black ring to show she was a lady knight. It seemed as though someone had shot a couple of arrows through the banner. My lady looked it over, mumbling about wedging it in the stirrup.
“Let me carry it,” Farmer said. He and Tunstall had saddled their mounts as she put her flag together. Farmer was the first to get it all done and mount up. “Beka has to stay with Achoo, and Tunstall has his pride. I don’t have any.”
“I can manage it,” my lady said, looking up at him.
“The house of Queensgrace is said to hold itself very high up. I heard of late they’ve turned to that new cult of the Gentle Mother,” Farmer told her. “They make their women ride mules and forbid them any use of weapons. One daughter was cast off when she refused to leave squire’s training.”
Tunstall said, “Let us give you all the dignity we can manage.”
“This Gentle Mother nonsense is starting to give me a pain in my parsnips,” I said as I got ready to run some more. Castles meant villages, which meant possible turns down narrow lanes and into houses and yards. I needed to be afoot. “Are they mad, hoping some cove will always be about to guard them? I’ll protect my own self, thank you very nicely. That way I can be certain the job will get done.”
Lady Sabine’s mouth twisted in a bitter smile. “They would rather their women go pure and gentle to the grave than sully themselves with an enemy’s blood,” she told me.
I gawped at her like a countryman at the fair.
My lady grimaced. “My family had me attend three of the Gentle Mother’s services four years ago. Then I threatened to become a prostitute at the temple of the Mother of Delight. After that, I was left to be ungentle.”
“Goddess be thanked,” Tunstall said, and spat.
Achoo whined. “Maji,” I said, and off she went. I ran behind her. My muscles griped a little, as they always did after a rest, but they soon warmed up. Folk watched us as we passed, but while curious, they kept their distance. No one liked strange Dogs in their districts, just as no one ever felt innocent when a Dog was in view.
When I glimpsed back, I could see that unlike before, when the local folk had passed my friends with a nod and a wave, they now stood at the side of the road, removed their headgear, and bowed or curtsied. That was the change caused by Lady Sabine’s banner. Corus folk never did that. If we did, with all the nobles in the city, we’d never get anything done. Here I had the feeling that them that didn’t act respectful saw the wrong end of the count’s riding crop, or that of his steward. These locals were just too wary as they watched us pass, even me and the hound. They were too fast to move aside for Lady Sabine and the others behind Achoo and me.
It made me growl under my breath.
As Achoo and I crested a long hill, I saw Queensgrace Castle. It stood on its own steep hill across the valley from us, commanding a river view. The inner wall stood higher than the outer, with three different towers inside that rose above the whole. The flat-topped one that would be the main keep flew three banners, those of the Count of Queensgrace and two noble guests, if my memory for such things was right. Between it and us lay a couple of miles of green land split with a winding river, the Retha on the maps. On its banks was a village with a good stone wall and a number of farms outside, but they were just dabs compared to the castle. This would be the reason for the deference of those on foot in the road. They were used to the count, his family, and their guests expecting hats off and low bows for their greatness.
Achoo led us down into the village. I rattled off fast apologies as I ducked around folk doing business or talking, half tripping over a mot who backed away too soon from the village well. I managed, barely, to keep my feet. Achoo and I thumped across the sturdy river bridge. We annoyed three young coves wearing shiny brass shoulder badges hung with Queensgrace red and gray ribbons. They shouted for me to come back, but I ignored them. My lady could deal with the men of the Queensgrace household.
I prayed for Achoo to take the turning of the road, the one with the sign marked The Galla Highway, the Great Road North,
Richcaffery. She continued straight, onto the castle way. I cursed to myself and followed. Carters and riders squalled at us as we ducked around them.
Whatever happened to the quiet life of the country? I asked myself, picking up my pace so I could be closer to Achoo. I could find as much annoyance at any palace gate. Queensgrace was no duchy to give itself airs.
The hill was monstrous long and steep. My poor thighs were quivering when I reached the top, and the lower part of my back throbbed like a bad tooth. Looking around, I saw the castle stood atop a bluff overlooking the small river that ran through the village. There was no moat, but I guessed the steep hill was hard enough on charging horses. Then I was too close to the castle to see around it. The gate ahead was as great as any at the royal palace, with no guard in sight. Times were peaceful this far from all the borders. Seemingly the count had no enemies among the nearby nobles, to leave his gate open and undefended. Of course, there were men-at-arms with crossbows patrolling the wall overhead.