Shade’s head whipped up, and her wide crystal-blue eyes locked on Wynn. Before the dog could even wrinkle a jowl, Kyne barreled into her. Wynn stumbled again as the bulk of the two backed farther into her legs.
“Come on, Shade,” Kyne nearly shouted, her arms wrapped around the dog’s neck. “And afterward, time for a good brushing.”
Shade’s eyes narrowed, this time to barely glittering slits, up at Wynn.
All Wynn did was mouth, Mind your manners, as she lifted her head and broke eye contact.
Shade stalked off, her head low, with a rumble and the girl now gripping the scruff of her neck. But Wynn already had her eyes on Nikolas again. When she headed across the hall and was only halfway to the hearth, Nikolas looked up and saw her. His eyes followed her the rest of the way as if she were some startling sight that had shaken him from a deep thought.
He wore the gray robes of a cathologer, just as she had until recently. She guessed him to be about nineteen years of age. When standing, he was of medium height with a slender build, but his shoulders often slumped, causing him to look shorter. His straight brown hair always seemed to be half hiding his face. Worse, his hair was no longer fully brown.
The previous year, Nikolas had survived an attack by a wraith named Sau’ilahk and, as a result, his locks were shot with white streaks.
Wynn wondered what in his past had rooted his perpetual state of anxiety. Picking up a stool at the last table she passed, she tried to smile at him.
“May I sit?”
He nodded but still appeared surprised. They had shown each other kindness or assistance in the past, but she had rarely sought him out—and certainly never to socialize. His gaze dropped briefly to her new midnight blue robe, but, like Hawes, he appeared distracted.
Wynn decided to go straight to the point. “Premin Hawes told me you’ve been called home.”
Nikolas winced and looked away toward the fire. She simply waited rather than startle him again, and, when he looked back, barely turning his head enough to do so, his eyes struck her as bleak and pained. If he wanted to talk, he might do so with her, as he didn’t have anyone else anymore.
“My father is ill,” Nikolas said quietly.
“Nothing serious, I hope.”
“No ... I don’t know. He’s getting old ... and he needs my help.”
Nikolas’s voice was so low that Wynn had to lean in to hear him.
“I don’t want to go,” he continued, looking away again. “Father says things at home are not good. The young duke was my friend in our childhood, and ... and I owe him ... much.”
There was something more missing in this last statement.
“Father says the duke is behaving strangely, that he is not well, either, and I must come and stay for a while.”
Confused, Wynn wasn’t certain what to ask next. She shouldn’t mention anything Premin Hawes had said about the second letter’s contents; perhaps she shouldn’t mention the second letter at all. Nikolas’s aging father said he was not well, yet he had asked for strange texts, at least one of which only Hawes could provide. He had asked his son to come home, but the request wasn’t just about an ailment of his own.
There were too many hinted, incomplete pieces, but more in Nikolas’s own words struck Wynn as odd.
“You don’t wish to go?” she asked. “Even for just the visit?”
“No,” he answered, his voice as hollow as his eyes. “When I came here, it was to stay. Father got me accepted, though I was a bit old for a start. And he promised that I could stay forever, if I wished. Now he’s broken his word by calling me home ... but I can’t refuse.”
For as little as Wynn understood, she had many more questions, including why Nikolas apparently never wanted to go home again. She was also afraid he might close off even more if she pressed the wrong way in ignorance.
“When will you leave?”
Nikolas shook his head at first, as if he didn’t know. “Not for several days at least. I need Domin High-Tower’s formal permission to take leave of the guild, and he will first have to make High Premin Sykion aware—though that is a formality. Then there’s funding and transportation and ...”
He trailed off with a shaky sigh. It was obvious to Wynn that the journey’s logistics weren’t his true worry.
“I don’t want to go,” he whispered. “I ... just can’t.”
Wynn didn’t know what to say except, “I’m so sorry.” She knew he wouldn’t tell her what it was about his home that made him so agitated. He couldn’t have had a happy childhood if he dreaded a return this much.
“I need to think,” Nikolas said, still staring into the flames. “Would you mind?”
“Of course not.” She stood up. “Come find me anytime. You’ve been a friend to me when others wouldn’t, and I am your friend.”
Those words made his expression twist briefly, but Wynn couldn’t place any emotion she saw there.
“I know,” he whispered.
That ended that, and Wynn headed back for the archway. “Shade,” she called out. “Come.”
Startling a couple of initiates, the dog wormed out from between the tables in a hurry. Kyne rose instantly up on her bench with wide, blinking eyes of sudden shock.
Wynn was in no mood to lecture Shade again about her behavior or to try to make an excuse to the girl. There were too many questions fighting for the forefront of her thoughts.
Nikolas’s aging father had called him home for murky reasons involving a young duke. The package Master Columsarn sent included a sealed letter for Premin Hawes with a request for guild texts. Some of those texts were of no worth to a master of Cathology who likely spent his days managing the documents necessary for running a duchy.
Another question struck Wynn as she left the common hall with Shade.
Who had Master Columsarn trusted to carry such nested and hidden communications all the way to the main guild branch in Calm Seatt? Premin Hawes had simply said that “a messenger” had left the package with the attendant at the gate.
Who had been tending the gate yesterday?
Hurrying down the passage to the entry alcove and the main front doors, Wynn stepped back out with Shade into the courtyard’s chilly air.
“We need to see Premin Hawes again,” she said.
Shade huffed in resignation.
Wynn wanted to know more about the texts that Master Columsarn had requested. But the question of the messenger, trusted to travel so far with such a package, wouldn’t leave her thoughts.
“We make one other stop first,” she added.
Shade simply huffed again.
Chane was back in his room struggling through a basic history text written in the Begaine Syllabary. He had not encountered Osha nor heard that other door across the passage open. He could only guess that Wynn’s past “acquaintance” was sitting in there brooding ... hoping to gain Wynn’s pity, should she notice that Osha had not come out to eat this night.
It was insufferable.
Trying to focus, Chane turned a page ... and a rapid, firm knock sounded at the door. He would have known it anywhere at any time.
For this was how Wynn knocked whenever she had her teeth into something of urgency.
“I am here,” he rasped.
The door opened enough for her to lean in.
“I need a favor,” she blurted. “Can you find something out for me?”
In truth he was desperate for anything to do, but her brusque manner irritated him, as if she knew he would say yes. Not yet getting up, he raised one eyebrow casually.
“What is it you want to know?”
After sending Chane off, though he’d been annoyingly difficult, Wynn hurried back to Premin Hawes’s study and arrived nearly breathless. The premin quickly drew her and Shade inside, and none of them bothered sitting. Shade sniffed about, seemingly ignoring both women.