He nodded.
“When?”
“Soon as Arbanerik gives permission. Nils has sent him my request. Tomorrow if we can.” Orlad was very sure of himself now. Yesterday’s outlaw had become today’s warrior leader. He killed sons of Hrag. He was on firstname terms with huntleaders. He needed practice smiling, but he could smirk.
“You don’t speak the language!”
“I can learn it faster than you can become a man.”
She scowled. “You think you can be doge?”
“Certainly. Benard isn’t going, he says. Dantio can never produce an heir, and that’s one of a ruler’s duties.”
“I’m coming with you!”
Orlad smiled for the first time. It was not much of a smile, and it was directed at Horth, sharing amusement at Fabia’s performance. “Dantio insists Celebre has never had a female doge. They’re hardly likely to want one at a time like this.”
“But Stralg may,” she said.
His eyes narrowed. “After you have sold us to him, you mean-me and Dantio?”
“Of course not! But I am coming with you.”
Orlad rose to his feet, surprisingly tall at close quarters. Her eyes were not much higher than his brass collar.
“It’s no journey for a woman.”
“I crossed as a babe in arms.”
“You don’t understand the dangers, kitten.”
“Of course I do!” In fact she knew the Ice better than he did. She had seen a vision of her infant self almost dying there. She must not lose her temper.
“Do you?” He put a knuckle under her chin and raised it so they were eye-to-eye. “Only twice has Nardalborg sent out a caravan this late in the season, and neither one arrived. There’s death and frostbite out there, also rock boar and catbears. At the Edge there’s no air, no water. You can’t sleep, can’t breathe, your skin cracks. Rivers of dust will swallow you whole.”
“You know all this personally, I suppose?”
“Yes I do.” Nothing fazed him now. “I worked on the bridge at Fist’s Leap. Also, when we get to Florengia, if we ever do, we will have to avoid Stralg loyalists guarding the far end. The Mutineer and his men will have their own ideas about who’s going to run Celebre after Father. We may find when we get there that the city does not even exist any more. Are you still sure you want to risk your pretty little neck?”
Ignorant, arrogant boy! Saltaja was out there, bloated with evil and a much worse danger than any he had mentioned.
“Yes!” she shouted. Remembering the probationers, she dropped her voice to a whisper. “You need me!”
“Of course we do.” Orlad pulled her to him and kissed her, full on the mouth. It was definitely not a brotherly kiss, and yet somehow it did not ring true.
She struggled free, still angry at his mockery. “That means you give your permission, my lord?”
“It means we both need you and want you, tigress! We’re going to discuss it with the huntleader in the Panthers’ mess at sunset.” He headed for the door.
“My lord!” Horth said softly.
Orlad stopped, turned. “Master Merchant?”
“You know Nardalborg Pass, you say?”
“The first part of it. Not the Edge itself.”
The Ucrist smiled diffidently. “I know both passes, but only by hearsay. Nardalborg Pass is well signposted. Varakats is not. You have no hope of finding it without a guide, no hope at all. Anyone will tell you that. Have you spoken with the Pathfinders?”
Orlad shook his head. “No, but I will, right away. Thank you.”
The door banged and he was gone.
Fabia slumped down on the edge of the platform beside Horth. “This is awful, just awful! The family has been reunited just one day and already it’s splitting up-Ingeld and Benard going back to Kosord, Orlad and Dantio rushing off into the war. And I must go with them, even if it’s just to say farewell to my dying father, who deserted me, although that means deserting you, who have always been my father.”
Horth patted her hand diffidently. “Orlad and Dantio will not be rushing off anywhere, my dear.”
“What? How can you say that?”
“Because that man I was speaking to while you were buying your new gown was Pathfinder Hermesk. I have known him for years.”
She knew what that subtle little smile meant and her heart dropped. Here was a complication she had not foreseen. She should know better than to underestimate Horth Wigson.
“I confess I don’t know what pathfinders do. A guild?”
“No, no. The Pathfinders are a cult of holy Hrada. Hermesk is head of the local lodge. You could say he is the light of Hrada on High Timber, but that seems a little pretentious.”
Hrada was goddess of useful skills and crafts, like pottery and writing, but those were regulated by guilds. Offhand, Fabia could not have named a single Hrada mystery. “And you bribed… I mean you discouraged Pathfinder Hermesk from supporting any further travels over Varakats Pass before spring?”
“Not at all!” Horth said cheerfully. “He volunteered the information. He mentioned that the pass was now closed for the season. All the traders and all his cult brothers have already gone seaward. Pathfinders are restless folk, never staying in one place for long. And they cannot be bribed, my dear, any more than Werists can. If Hermesk says he is not going, then he is not going, and that is that.”
“Oh.” She huddled small while she brooded over this news. “Why can’t they be bribed?” she asked suspiciously. Bribery was one thing Horth could do better than anyone.
“I told you! They never stay anywhere long. They had to keep moving. Wanderlust is their corban. Wealth is just useless baggage for them to carry and real estate would tie them down.” Horth put an arm around her, an unusual intimacy from him. “So you need not worry any more, my dear. Spring is a long time off, and we shall have each other until then. In summer we shall know more of what is happening in your homeland. And if you still feel that you should accompany your brothers… Perhaps separation will not seem as hard a blow when we have had time to prepare for it.”
He had had half a year to prepare for it already. He was refusing to face facts. Go all the way back to Skjar just to turn around and come back here?
“You’re overlooking something, Father.”
“What?”
“Saltaja. Saltaja has escaped. I mean if Saltaja has escaped, then Arbanerik will never catch her. No matter what the risk, she’ll make a run for Florengia. Saltaja is the power behind the sons of Hrag and if she can link up with Stralg, then she may manage to turn the war around. Even if all she does is hold off the Mutineer for a while, that delay will increase the danger to Celebre.” Once Saltaja reached Nardalborg she would have Cutrath to work on-Shaping worked best on blood relatives, she had said-and who could tell how many monsters Stralg had spawned?
Horth smiled blandly. “I fail to see the connection.” He was denying the unpalatable again.
“Orlad and Dantio can’t handle her. It takes a woman to deal with a woman.” Even if the boys outside were listening, that was innocent enough.
“Fabia!” Horth said sternly. “The lady Saltaja can be harsh, I admit, but I refuse to countenance those foul slanders about her. If she were what you are hinting, she would have been brought to book years ago. I certainly fail to see that she is any business of yours. Lord Dantio and lord Orlando are much better equipped to deal with her, whatever her talents or loyalties or gender. Even,” he insisted when she tried to interrupt, “if you were a Chosen yourself and wished to oppose the lady, instead of aiding her and her Ancient Mistress, your powers and experience would be so much less than hers that you could not possibly hope to prevail against her.”
That was as far as he could go to admitting the truth he had guessed. And what did Fabia tell him now-that she had already slain four men? That it was she who had made the seer’s rescue possible last night? He would not hear what he did not wish to hear.
“Whatever happened to Quera, Father?”
He jerked away from her. “Who?”