And Wynn was just too calm about it all, as if she already knew.
“What else?” he asked.
“You will take me to the gates of the guild and stop there,” she went on. “Then you will find Premin Hawes and bring her out—alone. I won’t go inside without her first coming to get me.”
That was a puzzle greater that any other she’d given him. Hawes had hardly proven herself obliging to Wynn.
“And last ...” Wynn said, heading toward the wagon.
Rodian waved off his men about to close on her. She reached into the wagon’s back and returned with a wrapped parcel in hand.
“I’ll need a private moment someplace,” she said, “to change clothes before we get there.”
Rodian shook his head. He’d salvaged his public reputation and immediate position, but it remained to be seen how he stood privately with the royal family. And yet ...
“When all is done,” Wynn added, “and when there’s time, I’ll tell you what happened here, what happened to me at the guild ... as much as is possible.”
Chapter 24
BROT’ÂN’DUIVÉ STOOD in the shadows of a warehouse adjacent to the docks and watched one particular ship anchored in the bay. He noted the rise of the moon and listened for the city’s night bells to gauge the proper timing.
He was not given to regret, but he had laid a final task on Osha, a risk as well as a burden. Osha was the only one who could accomplish it, and Brot’ân’duivé hoped the young one would manage this final piece of the plan well enough.
It was one piece that Brot’ân’duivé had added and not shared with the others.
Dänvârfij was unable to cast off doubt and fear of failure as she watched the guild’s castle. She still could not believe she had allowed Brot’ân’duivé to take her word-wood. He had known exactly how to hobble her team. Now there would be no effective way to split her forces, should the need arise. No doubt, if he found out where they hid, he would come for the second one held by Fréthfâre to cut them off completely from Most Aged Father.
The guild grounds were quiet, with little activity aside from guards walking the bailey wall. Dänvârfij’s eyelids drooped, and she forced them open, angry with herself.
A bird’s chirp carried in the night air. She ignored it until the third quick repetition.
She turned on the rooftop at that calling for attention from an anmaglâhk. It had come from the building’s side, from Old Procession Road leading to the bailey gate.
Had something happened? Which of her team had left a post to come to her?
She crept to the roof’s side and peered over the edge.
A tall figure in a light brown cloak stood below with his hood thrown back. His hair was as white-blond as hers. Some long, narrow object wrapped in canvas was strapped across his back with a length of twine running over his left shoulder. Over that same shoulder hung a traditional an’Cróan curved bow rather than the assembled style of the Anmaglâhk.
The bow was fully strung and readied, though strangely its string was over his shoulder’s back and the bow hung forward next to his left arm. A quiver protruded above his right shoulder, and the arrows within it had black feathers.
Dänvârfij watched Osha look about. Was he reckless enough to show himself in the open, alone? Or was this some trick or trap?
“Dänvârfij, are you here?” he called out in their own tongue.
He strolled to the wide street’s far side and paused, his back to her as he looked toward the bailey gate. Dänvârfij slipped her hand into the back of her tunic, reaching for the parts of her bow.
Osha cocked his head, though he did not look up her way.
“We must talk,” he called, as if he knew she was near.
She drew her bone knife instead of her bow’s handle, and hooked it on the roof’s edge. Whatever he had come here for, he had to be stopped from calling her name again. It was not a long drop from a shop’s roof. She rose from her landing, bone knife in hand, and he turned to watch her.
He appeared calm and did not move at all in the street, but he looked as tired as she felt. She took a step.
“Far enough,” he warned.
She halted and kept her voice lower than his. “What do you want?”
“Nothing but to be done with you ... all of you.”
His voice sounded so weary beneath his anger, but Dänvârfij felt no pity for him. “The damage is done; you are a traitor in trying to kill your own!”
“I have killed no one,” he returned.
“You tried, and that is enough. For that, your life is forfeited.”
The instant she took another step, he shrugged his shoulder. The bow dropped forward and he snatched it with one hand as the other quickly pulled an arrow from the quiver.
Dänvârfij faltered, for the distance might still allow him to fire. She needed room to evade, so she could then close before he drew a second arrow.
Osha simply held the arrow’s notched end between two fingers, not yet setting it to the bowstring.
“I could have killed one of yours the night they came after the first wagon,” he said. “And again this very night. Those two should soon be coming to you.”
Deep within a corner of Dänvârfij’s mind, she understood his loss and the need to lash out. He had lost his teacher, as she had lost hers, in the same instant when the two had killed each other ... over the pale-skinned monster called Magiere. But she had not acted on those drives as Osha had. She had not abandoned her beliefs, her caste, her oath, and her people.
“I came to tell you that Brot’ân’duivé has left the city,” Osha went on, bitterness and spite plain in his voice. “He slipped past yours and has taken Magiere, Léshil, and Chap on a ship bound for what is called the Isle of Wrêdelyd. You will not catch them, and there is nothing left here for you.”
Her throat closed up. This could not be possible. It was a lie!
“I do not care if you believe me,” Osha said. “I am sick of all of you. You are no better than him ... if you think killing your own will save our people. They need saving only from you ... and him. I am done with Brot’ân’duivé, as I am with you.”
Dänvârfij was almost overcome by the urge to attack, but his words burned in her ears. Had he truly abandoned the traitor greimasg’äh? Had she truly let her quarry escape?
“If you do not believe me,” Osha said, “then go and see for yourself.”
He told her of the inn where they had all been hiding, yet he still did not move or turn away. Was this the truth—had she failed yet again in her purpose? Had Brot’ân’duivé slipped away once more, and this time taken what she and hers had sought?
She had to reach the docks. Then another chirp in the dark startled her.
Without thinking, Dänvârfij glanced up the street into the city, and then looked back in panic.
Osha was gone.
She almost ran out to look for him. There were few ways he could have taken in that brief mistake of hers, but too much had been already lost. She turned, running for the shop’s wall to reach the roof once more.
As Dänvârfij finally gripped the roof’s edge, pulling herself up, Én’nish was waiting for her rather than on watch at the waterfront.
Brot’ân’duivé remained unseen in the night shadows outside a waterfront warehouse as he waited for Osha. Once the skiff came in for its arranged final trip, he would have to step out to meet it at the dock. If the skiff arrived and found no one waiting, it would simply leave.
He did not fear being seen once he left the shadows, for he believed Léshil’s plan to pull the anmaglâhk away had certainly worked. Even now, Osha should have found Dänvârfij or one of her comrades near the guild’s castle and panicked them into gathering in an effort to verify his story. Osha was then to return to the waterfront to board the ship.