For a brief, self-indulgent moment, Ingrey pictured himself drawing his steel and beheading his servant. Alas, the hall was too narrow for such a swing to be executed properly. He gave over the vision with a long sigh and levered himself to his feet.
Tesko, perhaps sensing Ingrey's displeasure at the ill-timed interruption, bowed him warily into his chamber. The clubfooted youth had been issued half-trained to Ingrey when he had first taken up his place as Hetwar's more-than-courier. Used to caring for his own needs, Ingrey had treated the menial with an indifference that had overcome Tesko's initial terror of his violent reputation a little too completely. The day he had caught Tesko pilfering his sparse property, however, he had replaced repute with a vivid demonstration. After that Hetwar's other servants did more to whip their junior into shape than Ingrey ever had, for if Tesko were dismissed, he would have to be replaced with one of them.
Ingrey let Tesko remove his boots, gave curt orders for the predawn, and fell into bed. But not to sleep.
He was too spun up to sleep, too drunk to think straight, too exhausted to sit up. His blood seemed to hiss through his veins, growl in his ears. He was intensely conscious of every faint creak from overhead. Did Ijada's breathing still rise and fall in time with his? He was still aroused, and more than half-afraid to do anything about it, because if she felt his every heartbeat and movement the way he seemed to feel hers…
They had surely been falling toward that moment of meeting for days. He felt coupled to her now as though they were two hunting dogs, leashed to each other for their training. So who is the huntsman? What is the quarry? The heavy click of that binding reverberated in his bones: chains thinner than gossamer, stronger than iron, less readily parted.
HE MUST HAVE SLEPT EVENTUALLY, FOR TESKO NEARLY HAD TO pull him from the covers and onto the floor to wake him again. Tesko's jerky motions betrayed a fear balanced between the dangers of dealing with an Ingrey half-awake and the dangers of disobeying; Ingrey swallowed the glue from his mouth and assured his servant that disobeying would have been worse. Sitting up proved painful but not impossible.
He let Tesko help wash, shave, and dress him, in the interest of protecting his new bandage; Ingrey frowned to see it nearly soaked through again with browning blood, but there was not time to change it now. The filthy covering on his left wrist he at last abandoned, as that wound was now better than half-healed, all black scabs and new pink scars and greening bruises. The sleeves of his town garb-gray and dark gray-covered it well enough. With sword, knife, and clean boots, he was made presentable, if one ignored the bloodshot eyes and pale face.
He rejected bread with loathing, gulped tea, and took the stairs down with a faint clatter. He glanced up through two opaque floors. Ijada still sleeps. Good.
The chill, moist air outside was tinged with just enough light for Ingrey to make his way through the streets. He arrived at the opposite end of Kingstown with his head, though still aching, a little clearer for the walk.
Color was leaking back into the world with the dawn. The stolid cut stone of the wide front of Hetwar's palace took on a buttery hue. The night porter recognized Ingrey at once through the hatch in the heavy carved front doors, and swung one leaf just wide enough to admit him into the hushed, rich dimness. Ingrey turned down the offer of a page to announce him and made his way up the stairs toward the sealmaster's study. A few servants moved quietly about, drawing back curtains, stirring fires, carrying water.
“Is the prince here?” Ingrey murmured to him.
“Aye.”
“When did you arrive?”
“We reached the Kingstown gate about two hours ago. The prince left his baggage train in the mire near Newtemple. We rode all night.” Symark hitched his shoulders, dislodging a few small lumps of drying mud from his coat.
“Is that you, Ingrey?” Hetwar's voice called from within. “Enter.”
Symark raised a brow at him; Ingrey slipped inside. Hetwar, seated at his desk, motioned him to close the door behind him.
Ingrey made his bow to the prince-marshal, seated with his booted legs stretched out before him in a chair opposite Hetwar, then to the sealmaster. Both men returned acknowledging nods, and Ingrey stood with his hands clasped behind his back to await his next cue.
Biast looked as mud-flecked and road-weary as his bannerman. Prince Biast was a little shorter than his younger brother Boleso, and not quite as broadly built, but still shared the Stagthorne athleticism, brown hair, and long jaw, resolutely shaved. His eyes were a touch shrewder, and if he shared Boleso's sensuality and temper, they were rather better controlled. Biast had become heir presumptive only three years ago, on the untimely death through illness of the eldest Stagthorne brother, Byza. Prior to those expectations falling so heavily upon him, the middle prince had been guided toward a military career, the rigors of which had left him little time to match either Byza's reputation for courtly diplomacy or Boleso's notoriety for self-indulgence.
What neither sealmaster nor prince-marshal bore was any smell of the uncanny, to Ingrey's newly awakened inner senses. The perception did not ease him much. Magical powers worked sometimes; material powers worked all the time, and this chamber, these two men, fairly resonated with the latter.
Hetwar ran a hand through his thinning hair and favored Ingrey with a glower. “About time you showed up.”
“Sir,” said Ingrey neutrally.
Hetwar's brows rose at his tone, and his attention sharpened. “Where were you last night?”
“What have you heard so far, sir?”
Hetwar's lips curved a little at the cautious riposte. “An extraordinarily garbled tale from my manservant this morning. I trust that you did not actually enspell a giant rampaging ice bear in the temple court yesterday evening. What really happened?”
“I had gone up there for a brief errand on my way here, sir. Indeed, an acolyte had lost his hold on a new sacred animal, which had injured him. I, um, helped them regain control of the beast. When the Temple returned it to its donor, Learned Lewko requested me to accompany it back through town, for safety's sake, which I did.” Hetwar's eyes flashed up at Lewko's name. So, Hetwar knew who Lewko was, even if Ingrey had not.
A small snort from Biast, with a renewed look at Ingrey's pallor, testified to the prince-marshal's amusement. Good. Better to be the butt of a tale of drunken foolishness than the nexus of out-of-control illegal magic, shattering miracle, and worse.
Ingrey added, “Learned Lewko was witness to the whole of the incident with the bear, and the only one I would suggest that you regard as reliable.”
“He is peculiarly qualified.”
“So I understood, sir.”
A passing stillness of Hetwar's hands was all that revealed his reaction to this. He frowned and went on. “Enough of last night. I am told your journey with Prince Boleso's coffin was more eventful than your letters to me revealed.”
Ingrey ducked his head. “What did your letters from Gesca say?”
“Letters from Gesca?”
“He was not reporting to you?”
“He reported to me yesterday evening.”
“Not before?”
“No. Why?”
“I suspected he was penning reports. I assumed it was to you.”
“Did you see this?”
“No,” Ingrey admitted.
The eyebrows climbed again. Ingrey took a breath. “There are some things that happened on the journey even Gesca does not know.”
“Were you aware, sir, that Prince Boleso was experimenting with spirit magic? Animal sacrifice?”
Biast jerked in surprise at this; Hetwar grimaced, and said, “Rider Ulkra apprised me of some dabblings. Leaving a young man with that much energy too idle may have been a mistake. I trust you removed any unfortunate traces, as I requested; there is no point in besmirching the dead.”