“Watch the road,” she called.
He flushed and ostentatiously turned his head.
“That’s better.”
Once the three left the water, he concentrated even more on studying the road and the hillside.
“All right,” Ayrlyn called as she finished pulling on her boots. “You can stop being so obviously a prudish martyr. You saw more than enough, and don’t tell me you didn’t.”
He couldn’t help grinning at the humor in her voice.
“It’s your turn.”
He dismounted and handed all the reins to the redhead, then pulled off his boots, then his clothes. The water was barely cool, close to warmish, as Nylan waded in, very much conscious that both Sylenia and Ayrlyn watched. The slope of the sandy part was gradual, so gradual that he had to walk almost a hundred cubits before the water reached his thighs. By then the sand had given way to soft mud that squushed up between his toes.
Finally, he plunged in, enjoying the coolness on his skin. The golden sand helped scrub away the grime of what seemed more than a season, although he kept looking toward the house on the hillside as he washed.
As he walked back up the sandy slope to the beach, he turned and glanced toward the hillside house, but could see no change, no puffs of dust that might indicate riders, just the same thin line of smoke from the chimney. Was someone baking or cooking, and just not looking outside?
For a moment, he just stood in the sunlight, wiping off water with his hands before he tried to dry himself with the small square of cloth that doubled as a towel.
Ayrlyn’s eyes flicked from the hillside toward the silver-haired angel. “Nice view.”
“Thanks.” Nylan couldn’t help flushing, even as he saw that Sylenia busied herself with not looking in his direction and holding a water bottle for Weryl. “See anyone?”
“No one, and it’s not as if there were any cover.”
Nylan wasn’t sure whether he had minded washing up in plain view, or if the tightness in his stomach came from wondering whether anyone happened to be coming. He pulled on his clothes.
Once he was dressed, he and Ayrlyn alternated washing out their spare sets of undergarments…and still no one appeared on the road.
“Maybe we should camp here?” suggested Sylenia.
Nylan and Ayrlyn exchanged glances.
Both shook their heads.
“Too open, and we need to get where we’re going,” Nylan finally said. Staying just didn’t feel right, and he could sense that Ayrlyn felt exactly the same way.
He slipped into the saddle, looking back to see that the damp undergarments remained fastened to the outside of his saddlebags.
The road curved up the hillside and past the single dwelling where smoke still drifted from the chimney, but the doors were closed, and the shutters on the lower levels were fastened tight.
“They don’t like strangers,” Nylan said.
“I can’t imagine raiders would come this far south. A xenophobic culture, you think?”
“This far away from any towns? I don’t know.”
Sylenia cast a longing look back at the blue of the lake as they rode over the hill crest.
CX
Nesslek sat on the carpet by the armchair in which Zeldyan was seated with a stack of polished wooden blocks before him. The boy chewed on the corner of one, drool coming from the corners of his mouth.
His mother read a scroll silently, while Gethen sipped chilled greenjuice from a goblet.
Finally, Zeldyan looked up. “He writes that the angels brought down fire in the night on the mines, and destroyed many of the white demons. The remainder rode back toward Cyador, leaving a blackened ruin.” She let the scroll roll into a loose cylinder and extended it toward her sire. “After vanquishing the white demons,” she added, “the angels vanished, along with Sylenia and their child. None knew where they have gone. They left a scroll saying they would return.”
“I will read what Fornal wrote later.” The gray-haired regent shook his head. “So we have a burned-out mine and no white demons. And no angels. Did they ride the winds?” A harsh laugh followed. “The last time I looked, they rode horses.”
“When mages do not wish to be seen, often they are not.”
“That be true enough, daughter.”
“I do not think they have abandoned us,” mused Zeldyan. “Though I could not say why.”
“They have abandoned Fornal.”
“Have they? They drove off the white demons.” Zeldyan offered a faint smile. “They did not even promise that.”
“The lord of Cyador will send all his forces against us,” pointed out the older regent, his right hand resting loosely around the crystal goblet. “You already prophesied that. More armsmen and lancers than we have ever seen.”
“We agreed that we had no choice.”
A wooden block thumped to the carpet, then clattered as it rolled off the fabric and across the stone tiles. Nesslek stood, holding the armchair and tugging at Zeldyan’s leg.
Zeldyan laughed, but the sound was bitter.
“Maaaa,” said Nesslek, pulling on his mother’s dark green trousers. “Maaa.”
“Oh, child.” She swung him up into her lap and hugged him.
Gethen continued after a pause. “What does your heart tell you about the angels?”
Zeldyan frowned.
“Your heart,” Gethen insisted.
“They are good,” she admitted. “Did they not drive off the Cyadorans and send us one shipment of copper?”
“That is true, but…the horses…and the firebolts and sneaking through the night?”
“They have done what needed to be done.”
“And, even should we prevail, Lornth will not be the same. That, more than defeat, is what our holders fear.”
“One way or another, Lornth will change.” The blonde regent disentangled Nesslek’s fingers from her hair. “Still…my sire…you know I have not seen with the same eyes as Fornal…but he is worried, and he must face the white demons first.”
“He has cause for worry. So do we, but-”
“We should feed the holders the fodder we have?”
“And tell them that we have done as they asked.” Gethen snorted. “And send a dispatch to Lady Ellindyja pointing out that we have reclaimed the patrimony of her grandson.”
“Best it be done quickly, before…”
Gethen nodded.
“Then we will send Fornal a scroll, telling him that we will raise what other forces we can,” added Zeldyan.
“Few as they will be.”
“Few as they will be,” she confirmed.
CXI
Nylan looked at the road ahead, almost flat as it curved westward around a low rise barely more than ten cubits high. Instead of the straggling, sun-browned stalks of the Grass Hills, the meadows flanking the road bore thicker grasses that, despite the approaching harvest time, were predominantly green. On the scattered hilltops not more than low rises, at infrequent intervals, were woodlots with borders sharp enough that they could have been trimmed flush with a laser.
Scattered holdings flanked the woodlots, joined to the main road by lanes. Unlike in the lake valley, a handful of farmers and herders were visible, separated widely. But none ventured near the road.
“Notice that?” asked Ayrlyn.
“Notice what?”
“In Lornth, the houses are close to the road. Here, they’re not. And I don’t think I’ve seen a single woman outside. Some small children, but no women. We’ve been riding two days straight since the lake-”
“We did sleep some.”
“If you call hiding in a woodlot sleeping.”
Nylan forced himself to take a long, slow breath. “I slept.”
“You and Weryl did-that’s true.”
“It was hard to sleep,” added Sylenia.
“About the women?” asked Nylan, trying to steer the subject away from his apparently ill-advised suggestion as to a place to rest.