Bran nodded, then said in a low voice, “Do you enjoy serving your prince?”
Achan furrowed his brow. “Aye. So much as I enjoy the tip of a sword against my throat.”
Bran smirked and scratched the back of his head. He glanced around and stepped closer. “Sir Rigil says, should you seek a different master, he’d welcome you.”
“Leave Prince Gidon to serve Sir Rigil?”
“Not exactly. We’re joining with the Old Kingsguard. Sir Gavin’s Kingsguard. They serve Prince Oren.”
Prince Oren? Second in line to the throne behind only Gidon. Achan’s mind raced. Could this be a conspiracy rising up against Prince Gidon? How he’d love to be a part of that. But for Gren. “I…can’t. Prince Gidon, he…threatened my friend back in Sitna if I should try to…leave his service.”
“Who?”
“Gren Fen — Hoff. The Fenny and the Hoff family.”
Bran nodded, his brow pinched. “Prince Gidon’s good at scaring people. He learned from the best.” Bran looked away and sighed. “With your permission, I’ll convey this information to Sir Rigil. There may be something he could do to help.”
“I don’t know what anyone could do, but you have my permission.”
A cloud of dust in the distance signaled that the caravan had pulled out. Bran glanced at Achan one last time. “Sir Rigil says the Great Whitewolf was the greatest Kingsguard commander ever. You’re fortunate to have learned from him, even for a short time.”
Achan nodded and watched Bran jog to his horse. If he could contact Sir Gavin, he might know what to do with himself. Join the Old Kingsguard? Had that been Sir Gavin’s plan all along?
*
The procession marched on. Achan emptied the prince’s chamber pot, fetched water, and delivered message scrolls to Lady Kati, passing her husband’s angry remarks back to an amused Prince Gidon. The voices seemed to be coming to him again. At least he’d still be able to listen for Sir Gavin and talk to Scratch.
Achan’s left bicep looked wretched. Sir Nongo’s black blade had sliced a deep gash three fingers wide. Achan had cleaned it as best he could, but the pink skin around the incision boasted his failure. Most of the smaller cuts had healed. His torso was badly bruised and sore, but the bones seemed to be in place — not that he knew what broken bones felt like. His face and jaw ached. Thankfully, mirrorglass was scarce on the road. Achan didn’t want to know how his face looked.
He tried to speak to Scratch. They managed a few words here and there, but someone in the caravan always interrupted. So far Scratch had told him nothing useful. Achan wasn’t enjoying bloodvoices much. Perhaps he was too practical to invite dozens of people into his head. He had so little control and privacy in his life. His mind was the one thing people couldn’t beat, manipulate, or force to obey. He didn’t want people trampling his last sanctuary.
He hadn’t heard from that other warm and powerful voice since Cetheria’s temple. Was Cetheria really an idol? That would certainly explain a few things. He shrugged and walked on, choking on the dust of the road.
As they neared Allowntown, the Evenwall loomed to their right. The Evenwall, as Achan understood it, was a gateway to Darkness and all that hid within it. The air grew thick and misty. Achan didn’t like the feel of the moisture on his face. He remembered Sir Gavin’s warning never to set foot in the mist.
In the wide prairie to their left, women worked the potato fields, their skirts hiked up above their knees. Several soldiers hooted and called out to them. Pretty as some of them were, they only reminded Achan of how fetching Gren had looked as she stood in a tub of wool. He was thankful when the sun set on the day and the memories.
They stopped in Allowntown for the night. The procession filed through a narrow gate and into an old motte and bailey-style manor. Guards began to pitch tents within the wooden curtain wall. Prince Gidon dismissed Achan and went inside the manor to sleep. Achan wandered around, looking for Bran.
A distant allown tree caught his eye between two tents. He stepped back and stared at it from afar. It was the famous tree, the one from all the stories of King Axel’s murder, the day Darkness came. Achan walked to the tree and stood before it, mesmerized.
Warmth surged inside him and the majestic voice coursed through his veins.
Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, Achan Cham. Before you were born I set you apart.
Achan sucked in a sharp breath and glanced around. No one was paying him any mind. The heat inside him was already fading. Was that all the voice had to say? Set apart? Like this tree, set off from all the other trees? He looked up at it.
Half of the tree was dead. Half was alive. This was surely the tree from the legends. The living half, so like the allown tree back on the SiderosRiver, calmed him. But the other half…
Gnarled, black branches twisted in the air like monstrous claws, the mist so thick around them, they blurred into the black sky. A heavy wind rustled the leaves on the living side, but the barren branches on the dead side cracked and swayed like they were reaching, hoping to squeeze the life out of Achan.
He shivered, torn. It was as if the tree was his heart. He’d always felt a kinship with allown trees, as ridiculous as that sounded. This one, more so. But it repelled him at the same time. It was a most awkward emotion.
Despite the dead side of the tree, Achan lay down on the soft grass under the rustling leaves, feeling like he’d finally come home, and fell asleep.
Yet into his peace came horrifying dreams.
The voices called out. He tried to concentrate on the allown tree in Sitna to silence them, but an image of this eerie tree filled his mind instead. They knew he was here. Under the Allown Tree, where life meets death.
A woman screamed. A baby cried. A horrific sound split the night like one massive roar of thunder.
Warriors would go through the mist and bring back food. The women and children would have to wait until their return. The pale ones were hungry.
They were coming.
Part 5. The Gifted One
18
Vrell moaned and rolled all night, so vivid were the voices, the fear, the hunger in her mind. Something terrible was about to befall the young soldier. A sharp prick to her temples woke her.
Macoun Hadar.
Master Hadar was knocking. She let him inside the foyer of her mind.
Boy! he bloodvoiced. Did you hear him? The gifted one?
He must mean the soldier. Yes, Master.
Come to my chambers at once.
Vrell dressed and hurried to the eighth floor. She had not told Master Hadar about her conversations with the soldier, but she was almost certain he was the one her master sought.
She found Master Hadar sitting on the end of his bed, grotesque feet propped on the stone slab. A lantern hung on a stand beside his bed. His eyes were wide and glassy in the dim light. Out the windows, the sky was charcoal grey. Dawn had not yet broken.
“Vrell,” Master Hadar said. “You’ll go north with Jax mi Katt and find this gifted boy. He’s in danger and we must locate him quickly.”
“You know his whereabouts?”
“He slept in Allowntown last night, under the Memorial Tree. Prince Gidon’s party camped there. If he’s with them, they’ll be headed here, so finding them should be no problem. Go and bring him to me.”
“How will I know who he is?”
“Don’t be a fool. With your mind, boy, how else?”