Beyond Dorian, who crouched holding his nose, Premin Hawes was coming closer.
The open fury on the premin’s face would’ve been daunting enough. But though her midnight blue robe thrashed, the whirling wind didn’t topple her. Wynn heard the barracks’ windowpanes rattling in the storm.
Hawes stepped purposefully forward, as if she were the eye of a small hurricane. Even the other two metaologers in the courtyard backed toward the keep’s main doors, their wide eyes locked upon the premin as they tried to shield their faces from the wind.
Wynn did so, as well, too afraid to even scoot away as Hawes neared. She had never seen any strong emotion displayed by the premin of metaology. Those fierce hazel eyes, and even her short, bristling hair waving in the storm, were enough to freeze Wynn in place.
Hawes slowed to a halt, not quite between Wynn and Dorian. The wind died so suddenly, it made Wynn shudder.
“We do not act like common thugs,” the premin said quietly, though a shout would have been less frightening. “We do not turn against our own ... like this.” Then her voice cracked like thunder, “Get up, both of you!”
Dorian obeyed instantly, as did Wynn, but she peered down the tunnel.
There was no sign of Chane or Shade. Instead, there was a somewhat chaotic group of five Shyldfälches, several trying to pick themselves up. Captain Rodian was on his feet, attempting to calm his horse as he shouted orders.
“Lúcan! Branwell! I want him alive!”
Wynn had never seen Rodian so openly angry. He normally kept his emotions in check, almost as well as Hawes. Wynn knew she was in deep now.
Premin Hawes grasped Wynn’s arm and strode toward the tunnel’s mouth. To Wynn’s frustration, the premin’s grip was like an iron shackle.
“Captain!” Hawes shouted. “Call off your guards. That man is not your concern here.”
Rodian turned from Snowbird and stared up the tunnel.
Chane nearly flew down Old Bailey Road toward the west tower, not slowing until he rounded the bailey wall’s curve below the tower and cleared another block deeper into the city. He had not chosen this path, following as Shade led the way. At the block’s far end, beyond the buildings outside the remnants of the keep’s old outer bailey wall, Shade wheeled to a stop.
Chane caught up and looked back for pursuers. He stared down the empty street, waiting for city guards to round the corner of Old Bailey Road. But they never came. Glancing down, he saw Shade peering the same way, and he slipped his sword into its sheath.
What was she doing here, and why had she run out of the gate? With Shade outside the guild, Wynn was completely alone.
“Go back,” he ordered. “Find a way inside and stay with Wynn.”
She huffed twice for “no.”
“Shade!”
She turned on him with a growl and drew back her jowls in warning. To date, Shade had been fiercely protective of Wynn. She barely tolerated him except for the few occasions they had been forced to work for the same purpose.
“We cannot leave her alone in there,” he said more calmly.
Shade ceased snarling and just looked at him with her crystalline blue eyes. She finally huffed once for “yes.”
Chane did not understand. Was that “Yes, we have to leave Wynn alone”?
In frustration, he fingered the brass ring on his left hand. That small bit of metal, which he called his ring of nothing, protected him from anyone or anything detecting his presence or anything about him except by normal senses. This included masking his nature as an undead. Unfortunately, it also dulled his senses, and hid any memory from a majay-hì like Shade. He could not even call up memories to help him communicate with her while he wore it.
Even when he took it off, their communication was limited to Shade, in turn, calling up only memories she had seen within him. And because of the ring, Shade had glimpsed very few of those. It was not the same as Wynn’s singular ability to communicate with Shade through memory-speak. The dog could share her own memories, or even the memories of others that she had glimpsed, with Wynn.
More unfortunate, with the ring off, Shade fully sensed Chane for what he was. The majay-hì were natural enemies of the undead, and somewhere in this city was another like Shade.
Along with Magiere and Leesil, Chane had to worry about Chap. He was reluctant to expose himself even for a short while. By Wynn’s accounts, Chap was more potent and aware than any other majay-hì in existence. But he saw no other option.
Chane held up his hand so Shade could see what he was about to do. He always warned her before removing the ring of nothing. Her lips curled up in distaste, but she stood waiting as he slipped it off.
The world shimmered in Chane’s eyes and his senses sharpened in the night. He could hear an insect crawling up the shop wall nearest to him. He could smell the life pulsing within the city, and it was a relief, like being unchained.
The beast stirred inside him, roused by the scents of life in Chane’s nose.
Shade snarled softly as she looked him in the eyes, and he suddenly saw a flash of memory.
He was standing on the docks the night they had returned from their southern journey back to Calm Seatt. Before he had gone off to escort Ore-Locks in taking the orb into hiding, he had handed Wynn the scroll.
Chane heard his own voice from that night as he clearly told Wynn, “For safekeeping.”
The memory faded.
He found himself further back in time, when he had crouched with Wynn in front of a city stable. She unrolled the scroll and looked at its blacked-out inner surface for the first time. This moment was from when he had first arrived in the city from halfway across the world in his search for her.
Chane had seen enough, and slipped his ring back on as he looked down at Shade in the dark. She was not protecting him, and she had not abandoned Wynn so easily. Sometimes, Shade understood Wynn far better than Chane gave her credit for.
Shade was protecting the scroll.
“All right,” Chane said, knowing he would never change her mind. “Come.”
Once again, he was acutely reminded that Shade was more than just an exceptionally intelligent beast. She had her own agenda, at least where Wynn was concerned. So long as they shared that, a truce between one majay-hì and an undead would continue.
Chapter 5
RODIAN STRUGGLED TO calm Snowbird as he absorbed all that had happened. His immediate focus was on regrouping his men, getting them into action, and seeing who had been injured, including his horse. Then Premin Hawes had shouted to let the man go ... the man who’d just assaulted his men.
Hawes stood beyond the gatehouse tunnel’s far end, holding Wynn Hygeorht by the forearm.
If he hadn’t been called to arrest the escaping man, then why was he here? Why had Wynn’s wolf attacked and then run off with the man who’d struck his horse? Rodian had seen that man with Wynn in the past, but he’d never ascertained the nature of their relationship. And Wynn had never offered much in that regard.
“Sir?” Branwell asked gruffly.
The lieutenant obviously wanted to give chase. Rodian had half a mind to let him. He again wondered what he’d just walked into.
For better or worse, Wynn Hygeorht appeared to be right in the middle of it all once again.
“Hold,” Rodian ordered, handing off Snowbird’s reins to Branwell. “Lúcan, go see to Angus. Make sure he’s all right.”
Rodian was angry and didn’t bother to hide it as he strode into the gatehouse tunnel. Hawes was almost unknown to him, as he’d never directly dealt with her before. But as he neared the inner courtyard, his attention shifted to Wynn. Her oval face had come to his mind often over the winter, though he hadn’t seen her since last autumn. Given events back then, he was at a loss for what to say to her.