Magiere hadn't forgotten what Chap had done in the forest for Wynn, though how was still a mystery even after Wynn's tale. What the sage had described was far more astonishing than the simple swipe of tongue that Magiere had witnessed. Chap became a larger puzzle each time they learned more of him-most often with no help from the dog himself.
Wynn looked tired and weak, and Magiere wondered how much of this was her ordeal with Vordana, her mantic mishap, or their stay in the village under the sorcerer's draining presence. Leesil had shaken off his fatigue, and this gave Magiere another reason for pause. Vordana had tried to strip his life away, yet he was less worse for wear man the sage.
Then there was Wynn's description of what she'd seen of each of them in her altered sight. Magiere had shared this with Leesil. However, there were more pressing concerns to discuss for what lay ahead.
"Geza showed me a letter from his brother," she began.
"Antes fiefs are being taken from their nobles by men sent out by Lord Buscan."
"Vordana was not an isolated incident?" Wynn asked, her voice rising. "There are more like him?"
Magiere shook her head.
"I don't know. The replacements carry letters of authority from Keonsk, but I can't imagine many sorcerers still about in this time-or any time I've heard of. Geza's brother thinks this is happening in eastern Droevinka, as well, and Geza asked us to look into it, though I've no idea how."
Chap lunged forward, threw his front legs over the bench's back, and growled at her. The sound startled Port and Imp, and they pulled up, dancing sideways.
"Stop that!" Leesil ordered, shoving the dog back.
"You know he does not want us on this journey," Wynn said. "Or anywhere in Droevinka, it seems. I suppose he does not want us involved in the captain's suspicions either."
It sounded to Magiere like Wynn had become as weary of Chap's behavior as Leesil or herself.
"All right," Leesil said. "Stop the wagon."
Magiere pulled in the reins, bringing Port and Imp to a halt. "What's wrong?"
"We're not moving another league. " He hopped down, circled around the wagon's back, and climbed in to crouch before Chap. "Not until we get some answers from you!"
Chap shifted nervously on all fours, but there was little room left for him to move in the wagon's back.
"Wynn saw you in her mantic sight," Leesil said to the dog. "And she saw them… the Fay."
Chap rumbled and glanced at Magiere. She frowned at him.
"He was trying to help Wynn," Magiere said.
"Maybe that's all," Leesil replied. "Or maybe he's in a hurry to get us away from any more information we might stumble upon. Like the fit he threw about the keep near your village. Think about it. Calling his… others, kin, whatever. So much power just to banish a simple magic gone awry? Like using a sword when a knife would do."
Even Wynn now stared warily at Chap.
"A very urgent choice, I'd say," Leesil added. "Perhaps to preserve one more new piece in the scheme he's been working all these years."
Chap growled and barked twice for no.
Magiere saw Leesil stiffen, and his gaze grew distant. His eyes drooped and filled with sadness. He shuddered and blinked.
"Don't do that again!" he snapped at the dog.
Chap dropped his head, breaking eye contact.
Wynn glanced between the two of them. "What? What happened?"
"Chap's playing his memory game again," Magiere said. "Leesil?"
She watched him drop to sit in the wagon's bed. "My mother gave him to me."
Magiere's stomach turned. This journey-her journey- kept Leesil from searching for a mother who, unlike her own, might still live. Guilt wasn't something Magiere let plague her in the past, but from that night she'd convinced Leesil to head to Droevinka first, she'd had enough for a lifetime. And it felt well deserved in this moment.
"Perhaps he wants to find her, as well," she said quietly, watching Leesil withdraw into his own thoughts. "We'll go north as soon as we finish in Keonsk, and I-"
"What?" Leesil looked up in confusion. "No, I didn't mean that to sound… We'll search Keonsk, tear the place apart if we have to. " His attention turned back upon Chap. "But this deceitful four-footer is going to answer some questions."
Leesil reached into Wynn's pack and pulled out the talking hide. He slapped it down on the wagon's bed before Chap.
"Why do you want us out of here so badly?" he demanded.
Chap fidgeted again. Wynn reached out to the dog, cupping his muzzle in her palm to look him in the eyes.
"I know you helped me because you care for me," she said to him, "but if there is more, then it is time to tell us. Would the mantic sight have faded on its own soon enough?"
Chap gazed intently back at Wynn and yipped once for yes.
"Then why call the Fay?" Magiere asked. "Why the urgency? Why do you want us away from here?"
Magiere had another unsettling moment when Chap looked up at her and began pawing at the hide.
"Navaj… enemy?" Wynn translated. "Bith feith leiras… in wait?… no… is waiting, watching. Trialhi amve aicheva tu… leave before it finds you."
Magiere's eyes lit up.
"In Stefan's tale of Vordana's first visit," she said, "the sorcerer said something about being able to 'watch' no matter what Stefan did. I think Vordana tried to drain life from me during the fight and couldn't. He looked surprised, and I heard him in my thoughts. I was what he'd been waiting, watching for."
"Another clan of undead on our trail," Leesil muttered. "Wondrous! More Noble Dead worked up by peasant tales of the dhampir come to-"
Chap pawed the hide again, stopping often to look over its symbols as if trying to find something specific.
"Spiorcolh aonach… one spirit crime," Wynn said. "No, um, the first spiritual… spiritual crime… sin? The first sin-bith feith leiras-is waiting and watching. Am-na iosai
c 'tu. Not time… too soon… to know for you? Too soon… for you-for us-to know."
Wynn sat back with a deep sigh of frustration.
"Perhaps our search leads to something he thinks we are not ready to know, and that knowing would place us in danger… Or the search would reveal us to this enemy?"
'Too late for that," Magiere said. "Considering what we faced in the last village."
Wynn rubbed her brow as if it ached. Chap whined, sniffing at the hide and tilting his snout at her. He hung his head, shifting from paw to paw as his gaze wandered over the hide.
"Don't you start that again," Leesil said. "Wynn, make him tell us-"
"Enough, Leesil!" Wynn snapped, her sharp tone startling even Magiere. "He is an eternal spirit with no use for spoken words-using an animal's mind to handle a written language… and in a dialect I do not speak well myself. There is something he cannot find the words for."
The wagon lurched suddenly backward, and both Port and Imp screamed out.
Magiere grabbed the bench to keep from being spilled forward onto the wagon's hitch. Port snorted and reared. He thrashed out with his forehooves, and both horses whinnied again in panic.
A large wolf circled into view on the road and rushed in at Port. The wagon lurched again, rolling backward as the horses retreated.
"Wynn… Leesil!" Magiere shouted as she righted herself. "Someone get my sword!"