Hinterland

  “Off to class—though by now she might have returned to her garret off my hermitage. I should be returning to my rooms myself. To change for the feast.” She shook her head sourly and stepped toward the door. “This game we must play…”

  Tylar suspected the game she referred to involved more than just the feast to come. He noted a trace of anger directed at him, but he was unsure how to assuage it. Sometimes women were as impenetrable as the most complex of alchemies.

  Before Kathryn could reach the door, a knock sounded.

  Kathryn glanced at him.

  He shrugged. He was not expecting anyone. “It might just be Delia,” he offered.

  Kathryn’s face closed up, eyes tightening. “Then I’d certainly best be going,” she said stiffly and strode more quickly toward the door.

  Tylar suddenly understood. Kathryn’s discomfort and veiled antagonism—maybe the alchemies involved here weren’t that complex. He recalled her tentative question about the Hands, inquiring about the rooming arrangements. She must have somehow gained word of how close he and Delia had grown over the past year.

  “Kathryn—”

  A gruff voice called through the door. “Is anyone going to open this door or do I have to pound my knuckles raw?”

  It was not Delia.

  “Rogger,” Kathryn said, half-irritated, half-relieved. She stepped to the latch and pulled open the door.

  The thief barged in. He was dressed in a servant’s livery, though it fit poorly, being too large and bagging hugely over his lean form. He must have been in some hurry to wear such a makeshift costume.

  “So you’re both here! If I’d a known that, I could’ve saved a thousand stairs at least.”

  “What’s wrong?” Tylar asked, responding to the man’s anxiety.

  “It’s that godling child!” Rogger practically shouted.

  “Hush,” Tylar said. “Hold your voice.”

  Kathryn touched Rogger’s elbow. “What about Dart?”

  “Maybe the two of you had better stop holing up in here—as it is, people will be chattering about the regent and the castellan. Ballads will be written…odes sung…”

  Tylar felt his cheeks heat up while Kathryn grew even paler.

  “Out with it, Rogger!” he said.

  “What is happening?” Kathryn echoed.

  “The entire Citadel is riled with talk of daemons. Daemons summoned by the castellan’s page. It seems someone has seen Dart’s little bronze friend.”

  “Oh, no,” Kathryn said.

  “Oh, yes,” Rogger said. “The entire Order is being roused to search for her.”

  Kathryn headed toward the door. “I must return to my hermitage.”

  “I’ll go with you,” Tylar said.

  “No. Argent will use such talk and rumors to discredit me. He has been seeking some way to shift attention from his own dark deeds with that cursed sword last spring. You must stay clear of all of this. Not just for your sake, but for the peace of Myrillia.”

  Tylar watched her storm from the room.

  Rogger had already discovered the spiced wine and was pouring himself a generous helping.

  “Is there any word where Dart might be?”

  Rogger shrugged. “Vanished. Like her bronze beastie.” He took a deep draught of the wine, then wiped his beard and lips on his sleeve. “But she’d best stay low. Them’s that are looking for her the hardest are those with those handsome crosses stitched on their vests.”

  Argent’s men.

  Tylar paced back to the hearth. “And what am I to do? Just stand here and wait?”

  Rogger lifted an eyebrow. “Best leave the matter to the castellan’s skill. Kathryn has the pace and breadth of the place better than you. And besides, don’t you have a feast to dress for? And you could use a bit of a shave—getting as scraggly as me.”

  Tylar scowled.

  “Or…” Rogger dangled it before Tylar.

  “Or what?”

  “I’m certain your fine feast will be delayed while Argent does his best to bend talk of daemons to his favor. Until then, there was another rumor that was being bantered about before the talk of daemons arose. Something about the storm that blew your flippercraft to port.”

  “What about it?”

  “As the storm struck, it drove all the rats out of the sewers throughout the village surrounding Tashijan. Boiled up, they did. Then they all fled and scurried into our towers and battlements.”

  Tylar shook his head at the strangeness.

  “It is said that beasts of the fields have better senses—if not sense—than any man. Something in that storm set them afoot. And you know what they say about rats. They’re the first to flee a fire.”

  Tylar nodded. “Perhaps such activity might warrant a trip beyond Tashijan’s walls.” And it would be good to be moving…to test the mettle of things here.

  A twinkle shone in the thief’s eye. “I thought you might feel that way.” Rogger tugged up the hem of his baggy shirt and pulled free what was hidden beneath its looseness. He shook out a hooded cloak that had been snugged around his bony waist.

  “You stole someone’s shadowcloak?” Tylar could not keep the shock from his voice.

  “Borrowed. Besides, you’re getting your own cloak in the morning if all goes well. A cloak to match those triple stripes on your face. In the meantime, a bit of black cloth will turn a god-regent back into a shadowknight. And with all the searching going on for a child and her daemon dog, it shouldn’t be hard for a knight and his manservant to slip out the main gates.”

  Tylar pulled the cloak over his shoulders, sensing the Grace flowing through the cloth. “We’d best be quick.”

  Rogger filled his cheeks with bread and mumbled through the mouthful. “Aye to that. The storm grows more fierce as we stand here jawing.”

  Tylar headed toward the door, still ajar after Kathryn’s sudden flight. He wondered how she would fare with the warden—and wondered even more where the godling child had gone to hide. With all of Tashijan alerted, there would be few safe harbors.

  Brant kept to Dart’s shoulder. On her other side, she rested one hand on the haunch of the massive bullhound. The twin giants leaned against the wall, eyes half-closed, exhausted but refusing to turn back until the cubbies were secured.

  They all waited while the two wyld trackers—one young, one old—sniffed through a room thick with dust and rotted furniture, long unswept and forgotten. Brant smelled the musk of rat droppings and heard the skitter of beetles.

  He kept his arms crossed, little satisfied with the pace of the search. So far, they had traversed three levels beneath the houndskeep, trailing the trickle of musky alchemies. Dart had already explained how these subterranean floors were Tashijan’s famed Masterlevels, the domain of the learned alchemists and scholars. But the hole into which the two wolf cubbies had fled apparently emptied into spaces beyond the normal lay of this subterranean warren, into crawlways and tunnels that wormed through these levels, walled away ages ago.

  “Possibly forgotten sections of the original human keep that once stood here,” Dart had explained. “Like the houndskeep itself was once a dungeon.”

  Brant considered that possibility as he waited yet again for the trackers. If Dart’s story were true, what dark purpose might the hole in the wall have once served? Currently it drained away the filth and biles and tiny gnawed bones of the houndskeep’s denizens. But before that? They had all heard tales of the barbarous human kings who had once ruled Myrillia…before the coming of the gods. How much blood had been spilled down that same stone throat from the dungeons, echoing with screams?

  “No hope here,” the elder tracker said. “Naught but a few cracks in the mortar. But we’re on the trail. I can catch a whiff or two of the musk through those cracks. Another level or two—”

  “Tracker Lorr,” the younger tracker called from another corner of the room. He held up his leech-oil lamp.

  “What is it, Kytt?”

  “The sce
nt is strong here. And I’ve found a loose brick.”

  Curiosity drew Dart and Brant inside. The bullhound tried to push after them, tongue lolling, but Dart stopped him with a palm on his wide nose.

  “Stay, Barrin. That’s a good boy.”

  He harrumphed and settled to a squat, filling the doorway. The giants looked equally discontented to be left in the hall, but the room was too low and cramped for their large forms.

  Brant and Dart followed Tracker Lorr to the corner. Kytt squatted, wide-kneed, and pointed to the bottom stone in the wall. “The block here is loose from its mortar. If we worked, we might push it free.”

  Lorr examined the stone and found that it rocked easily, like a rotten tooth. “Give me both your shoulders, lads,” he said with a nod to the young tracker and Brant.

  Brant and Kytt supported Lorr as he sat on the floor and shoved the block with his feet. As they strained, Brant found himself nose to muzzle with the black-haired young tracker. The boy had the amber eyes of his ilk. Brant found himself holding his breath, not wishing to breathe this one’s corrupted air.

  Kytt must have sensed Brant’s distaste, for he glanced away.

  Brant felt a twinge of shame, but he could not fault his upbringing. In Saysh Mal, it was considered wrong to misshape man’s natural form with Grace, whether for good or ill. Such men were forbidden from the Huntress’s forests. And, Brant believed, rightly so. Especially when it came to wyld trackers. It went against the Way to turn man into beast, then to turn around and use those same blessed senses to hunt more beasts of the field. It was a cycle of corruption that had no place in Saysh Mal—or anywhere in Myrillia.

  Out in the hallway, Malthumalbaen called to them. “Ock! Do you need an extra bit of muscle?”

  “Not yet,” Lorr said with a groan as he shoved again, edging the stone farther into its socket.

  Brant heard Dral mumble something to his brother.

  Malthumalbaen answered, “No, I don’t know what bullhound tastes like.”

  Brant found his eyes again on Kytt’s form. He remembered feeling a similar discomfort when he had first encountered the pair of Oldenbrook guards. Like wyld trackers, loam-giants were also forbidden from the cloud forests of Saysh Mal. Yet, Brant had found Multhumalbaen and Dralmarfillneer to be as big of heart as they were of limb. And hadn’t their strength saved his life in the storm? Did he not even consider them friends?

  Kytt’s eyes flashed to his, stuck a moment, then glanced away.

  Despite the contradiction, Brant found himself still bristling. Loam-giants were one matter. Trackers were another. They were an offense in both form and purpose to the Way. He felt this in his bones and blood.

  “Hold tight!” Lorr called. “Almost there!”

  Kytt and Brant braced Lorr’s back as he shoved one last time. Brant felt the tremble of the tracker’s strain. Stone scraped stone—then suddenly the block fell free, toppling into an empty space beyond.

  A wash of stale air wafted out. Even Brant caught the taint of musk that came with it.

  “There we go,” Lorr said, gaining his feet. He supported his lower back and kneaded out a kink. “The hard part’s over. All’s left is to fetch that pair of cubbies out of their stone burrow.”

  Kytt had lowered to his belly and leaned his lamp through the opening. “I think I see some steps back there. An old stair. Looks like they may go down some ways.”

  Confirming this, a faint animal whimper echoed up to them. It sounded as if lost down a deep well.

  Lorr shook his head. “So it’s not going to be as easy as I’d hoped. But no matter, it must be done.” He squatted down again, and with a slight grimace, rubbed one of his knees. “It’ll be a narrow squeeze, but Kytt and I will flush them out.”

  “I’m going with you,” Brant said.

  Lorr shrugged, but his manner was unwelcoming. The old wyld tracker had recognized Brant from his clothes and skin as someone from Saysh Mal. He knew what folks from that god-realm thought of trackers. Brant suspected the only reason he was getting any cooperation from Lorr was because of Dart’s good word on his behalf.

  So be it.

  They didn’t have to like each other to work together. Brant had learned that well enough from Liannora in Oldenbrook.

  Voices reached them from the outer hall.

  Malthumalbaen hissed toward them, “Someone’s coming. Looks like a pair of shadowknights.”

  Brant eyed Dart, who had already begun surreptitiously shooing something toward the opening in the wall.

  Pupp, no doubt.

  “I think it might be good if Dart came with us,” Brant said.

  “And perhaps we should move quickly,” she added.

  Dart matched gazes with Lorr.

  The tracker nodded at some silent message passed between them. “Then why don’t you both go first,” he said. “I’ll make sure Barrin acts the good watchdog, along with your two giants. We’d best not have any strangers spooking the cubbies while we work.”

  Dart pulled up the hood of her cloak and hurried toward the opening. She dropped to her belly and squirmed through. Brant waited until she was clear, then followed.

  Once on his feet, he found Dart a step below him. The lamplight in the far room offered scant illumination. The narrow stairs spiraled quickly into an inky darkness. Spider threads whispered overhead, disturbed by their arrival. Underfoot, the steps were well-worn into raw stone, dry and dusty as old grave bones.

  Kytt came next, brightening the stair with his oil lamp. He proceeded down a few steps, away from Brant. He busied himself with inspecting the stairs. Lorr came last with a bit of grunting.

  He passed the second lamp to Dart.

  “Tracker Lorr,” Kytt said, “come see this.”

  Lorr squeezed past Brant to join the younger tracker.

  Kytt lowered his lamp and pointed a finger. In the dust of the steps, a tiny paw print had been pressed.

  Lorr nodded and moved slowly down a few more steps.

  “They continue to flee deeper.”

  “Wolf whelpings are always snugged in the darkest hole in their warren,” Brant said. “It’s where they feel safest.”

  Lorr stood with a slight shake of his head. “Safe is not a word I would use to describe this passage.” He huffed the air, nose high for a moment. “Something…something scents wrong here.”

  Brant tested the air, but he could discern nothing but a bit of musk and an echo of bile, most likely coming from the houndskeep far overhead. Brant remembered his thoughts about its former use as a dungeon. Had the blood of the tortured once drained down these same steps? Did it still taint the passage?

  Lorr lowered his muzzle. “Mayhap we’d best wait.”

  Brant balked at this. If the whelpings’ trail grew any colder, they’d never be found. Who knew where this stair led or how much of a maze it might empty into? The best chance to secure the wolf cubbies was to keep as close on their tails as possible.

  Muffled voices reached them from the outer chamber. The knights had reached the room and were questioning the giants.

  Dart whispered, “It wouldn’t hurt to explore a bit farther.”

  Lorr reluctantly agreed. “I will go first with Kytt. But only a few more levels. No one’s walked this passage in centuries. It could all come crashing atop us.”

  Brant followed with Dart. At some point, he had offered Dart his hand to help her over a scrabble of broken steps, and she had yet to let go as they wound down into the depths below Tashijan.

  Lorr paused every few turns to inspect the steps, watching for signs of the cubbies. But Brant noted how he kept one ear cocked and sniffed the air with growing frequency. Something had raised the hackles on the wyld tracker.

  And now it had crept into him. Brant’s hairs prickled along his arms. For the moment, he wished he could borrow the trackers’ senses. He felt blind and deaf. Perhaps he should have bowed to the tracker’s earlier wariness.

  The stairs slowly tightened in their spi
ral. It now took only three steps to lose sight of the person ahead.

  Finally Lorr stopped. Brant suspected that the tracker could not be uprooted to proceed any deeper. This time Brant was not going to argue. The whelpings were wild creatures. Perhaps they would eventually find their way out on their own. And maybe that was for the best. Better than being caged.

  Lorr hissed at them, silently signaled Kytt, and both trackers dimmed their lamps and shaded them with the edges of their cloaks.

  Brant crouched down with Dart as if the falling darkness had crushed them to the stairs.

  “Lorr?” Dart breathed out softly.

  “Hush.”

  Brant’s eyes adjusted to the darkness, discovering it was not as complete as he had first imagined. The lower stairs were slightly less murky than the deep blackness above.

  Faint words reached them, rising from below, too muffled by distance to discern.

  Someone was down there.

  “I would question this squire myself,” Kathryn said.

  She stood in the middle of her hermitage. She let her outrage at the violation of her private spaces ring in her voice. Half a bell ago, she had arrived in the high hall to discover an upended beehive of confusion. Men and women, knights and masters, all scurrying about or standing dazed. The word daemon echoed all around.

  Worst of all, the door to her hermitage had been standing wide open.

  She had discovered Warden Fields already in her rooms, fists on hips, ordering the place searched from niche to cranny. By the time Kathryn had shouldered through his guards, she had been red-faced and barely able to speak. She had stopped it all with a resounding command to desist.

  Though Argent might rule Tashijan, all knew the hermitage was the sole domain of the castellan.

  “I understand your consternation, Castellan Vail,” Argent said calmly as his men cleared from her spaces. “But I have already summoned soothmancers to examine the young men, to test the veracity of their claims.”

  Off to the side, Master Hesharian stood with Keeper Ryngold. The rotund master kept his hands folded across his robed belly, looking serenely dispassionate about it all, but Kathryn read the glint of amusement in his eyes. Contrarily, the head of the house, Keeper Ryngold, shared none of the master’s amusement. He stood beside Kathryn’s maid, Penni, who still had her face covered with her hands, sobbing silently into her palms. The shoulder of her dress had been ripped. Apparently Argent’s men had manhandled her upon breaking in here. Keeper Ryngold was not pleased, almost as angry as Kathryn. Penni was one of his charges.