Havilar didn’t seem to notice, her expression closed and her hands clinging tight to Farideh’s arm. If her thoughts had moved away from Brin, from her missing glaive, from poor Mehen left in Cormyr, she gave no sign at all. She moved as if she just wanted Farideh to get her to Tam so they could right everything again.
But could they right anything, Farideh wondered, if Sairché’s spell hadn’t merely moved them? If perhaps, it had snatched away a season when it was cast?
She couldn’t see another option, and it made her whole body jagged with fear and nerves. It was, inescapably, winter. Late winter. It was late winter and they were both frailer, thinner. And Sairché had cut their hair-to hide the loss of time? Five months, she thought, or six or seven or more? She had to find out before Havilar did, that was sure.
You will fix it, Farideh told herself. There is nothing so broken here you can’t find a way to fix it.
“Come on,” she said to Havilar, and pulled her up to the bar and the tavernkeeper. “Well met,” Farideh said. She swallowed and dropped her voice. “We need to see Master Zawad.”
The tavernkeeper’s expression was puzzled. She shook her head. “Don’t know him.”
Terror poured down Farideh’s bones. Calm, she told herself. They like their secrets. “He’s a friend,” Farideh said, “and it’s urgent. Please.”
“Can’t help you,” the tavernkeeper said. She cut her eyes to the left, to where a lean human with pale skin and freckles was watching without watching.
“Please we-”
“You going to order?” The tavernkeeper gave Farideh a pleasant smile, an empty smile.
“I need to talk to Tam, I need to talk to him right now.”
“Because if you’re not going to order,” she went on, “I think you ought to be on your way.”
“Gods damn it!” Farideh hissed. “I know he’s here! He’ll see us.” Or maybe he won’t, she thought, maybe he’s given orders to keep us away. Maybe he died. Maybe the Harpers moved. “He will,” she added softer, a plea. “He has to.”
The woman shook her head. “Don’t know who you mean,” she said, sounding apologetic. “Maybe you should try the Rusted Anchor.”
He wouldn’t be at any Rusted Anchor. If he wasn’t here, she had no idea where hewould be, and they would have no one who might help them find Mehen, find Brin. She squeezed Havilar’s hand. She reached for the necklace in the pouch at her belt-a bribe, maybe a bribe would do it. She said a silent apology to Lorcan.
“Farideh?”
She looked up to see a tall man with gray eyes and several days’ worth of stubble on his chin. He looked tired-so tired it took her a moment to recognize him.
“Dahl,” she said, almost a sigh of relief. The Harper agent had been assigned to Tam-he’d know where the priest was. If not, Dahl was the one who’d taught Farideh rituals. He knew the sending spells. He could help them. It would be all right.
But he was staring at her as if she were some terrible beast, risen up and asking politely about the weather. Her stomach clenched. They hadn’t parted angrily-she and Dahl had had their share of clashes, but things were settled enough between them. He had no reason to be angry at her.
Unless word had gotten back that she’d made a deal with Sairché. “Please,” she said. “Whatever Tam thinks we’ve done-”
“Nera,” Dahl said to the tavernkeeper, “I need a room. The griffon room. Send up. .” He shook his head and looked the twins over. Farideh shifted uncomfortably. “Bread, cheese, and some tea? And whiskey. A pot of it. Come on,” he said to Farideh, “I’ll take you to Tam.”
He led them to the stairs at the far end of the taproom, passing a petite woman with short dark hair. As they passed her, Farideh heard him whisper, “Go get Tam. This is the very next thing he needs to deal with.”
Farideh’s pulse was speeding. This was the next horrible step. They knew, they had to know. Her stomach churned, but she held tight to Havilar’s hand and pressed forward. What had happened had happened, she told herself. Now you just hear it and fix it.
But a little part of her was starting to worry that this time, there was too much to fix.
Dahl led them into one of the rooms. As they entered, Farideh felt the faint itch of a spell cast over it. There was a bed, a table with four chairs, and a writing desk with a soot-smudged painting of a griffon tearing into a sahuagin over it. Dahl opened the heavy curtains wider to let in more of the cold, bleached light. He lit candles. He moved the table out of the way. He wouldn’t look at Farideh again.
Farideh kept Havilar’s hand in a firm grip. When she found out that they’d lost half a year, she would be frantic. Furious. She wouldn’t understand the perils of the devils that could be after her, not right away. Farideh steeled herself for the inevitable fight.
Dahl finally ran out of things to fuss with and turned to the twins again.
“Do you want to sit?” he asked. “He’ll be a moment.”
Farideh would rather have stood, but Havilar dropped into a chair, and it was easier to land beside her, still holding her hand. She didn’t like the way Dahl was watching them. They couldn’t know about Sairché, she reasoned. Why would Brin tell the Harpers anything, after all?
“Thank you,” she said.
Dahl nodded absently. “Where have you been?” he asked after another interminable pause.
Farideh swallowed against the pulse in her throat. “It’s a long story.”
“What do you mean?” Havilar asked. “Where should we have been?”
“Well,” Dahl said carefully, “the last I heard. . people seemed to believe that you had died. On the way to Cormyr.”
Farideh drew a sharp breath. For Dahl to have heard would have taken time-time for Brin to give up, time for him to get to somewhere he could get a message to Waterdeep, time for that to filter down to Dahl.
She was right. Sairché had snatched them away. A whole summer, a whole winter just gone.
Havilar squeezed her hand tighter, and Farideh could not look at her. “Where did you hear that?” she asked. “How did you hear that? We’ve only been gone a month.”
Dahl eyed her again with a puzzled expression. “It’s longer, isn’t it?” Farideh said.
Dahl seemed to struggle to answer. “Yes.”
The door opened, and Tam entered, his irritation evident even beneath the patina of peace he exuded. Farideh’s heart stopped cold as he smiled pleasantly at Dahl. “I hear there’s something terribly important to-” Farideh stood up, and he stopped in his tracks.
When they’d left Waterdeep, the Calishite priest’s dark hair and beard had been liberally scattered with threads of gray. Now every hair on his head shone silver as his goddess’s emblem. That doesn’t happen in a few months, Farideh thought, her head spinning. The world felt as if it were closing down on her. Even Havilar noticed-she tensed, pulling her sister nearer.
“Shar pass us over.” Tam shut the door behind him, his eyes never leaving the twins. “You’re alive.”
“Why do you keep saying that?” Havilar asked, sounding as if she dreaded the answer. “How long have we been gone?”
“She thinks it’s been a month,” Dahl said.
A pretty number, don’t you think? Sairché had said. I’ll protect you and your sister from death and from devils, until you turn twenty-seven. Farideh couldn’t catch her breath. Couldn’t slow her pulse. She looked at Tam, at Dahl, at Havilar. They weren’t just tired. They weren’t just thinner. It hadn’t been months. It can’t be, she thought. It can’t be.
“How long?” Havilar repeated, firmer.
“They turned up in the taproom,” Dahl said. “Nera had given the signal to throw them out.”
Tam shook his head. “Lucky timing.”
“How long,” Havilar demanded, “have we been gone?”
“It’s ten years,” Farideh said, hardly more than a whisper. She looked up at Tam, at Dahl. “It’s been ten years, hasn’t it?”