"What, Tarrin?" she asked.
He reached under his red Initiate shirt and pulled out a small wooden box. "I want you to take care of this for me," he said. "It has some things in it I've owned for a long time, interesting little things I found in the forest. I don't know where I'm going to be this time next year, and I really don't want to lose these. Would you take care of them for me?"
"Of course I will," she promised, taking the box. "May I?"
"Go ahead," he said, and she opened the box. "Wow, Tarrin, these are really neat," she said, holding up the gossamer wing. "What kind of insect owned this?"
"I have no idea," he said. "That's why I've kept it. Someday, maybe I'll find out."
"Who knows?" she said, putting it back in and closing the box. She slipped it into a small pack that probably held some of her personal belongings. "I'll take good care of it, Tarrin," she promised. "It'll be just fine."
"I hope so, brat," he said with a teasing smile, picking her back up again and whirling her around, making her giggle, then carrying her back over to his parents.
"Why didn't you bring Allia, Tarrin? I wanted to say goodbye," Elke complained when they returned.
"She's asleep, and she needs to sleep," he replied calmly. "I'll tell her for you, mother. Now you have to go, before Grandfather tans your backside for making him miss the tide."
After one more round of kisses and hugs, he watched his precious family pile into the sled, and with Tomas, start off for the harbor. Janine, with a heavy robe around her to ward off the chill, stood on the porch beside him, watching them go. "They'll be alright, Tarrin," she assured him.
"I know," he sighed. "Mother and father have always made their own luck, Janine. Now that they're out of the line of fire, they'll be just fine. I'm more worried about me."
"You have time to come in for some breakfast? I'll have Deris make you some pancakes."
"No, this wasn't a sanctioned visit, Janine," he told her. "I'm going to get in trouble for this as it is. I have to get back. I just wanted to be here to say goodbye."
Janine patted him on the arm. "A year isn't all that long, Tarrin. You'll probably be there to welcome them back where they call home."
"I hope so, Janine," he said soberly. "I really hope so."
The game of Beri Bally Bell that Miranda and Jervis cooked up had taken time to develop. But it was the nature of spies and other perpetrators of intrigue to have a great deal of patience. Splitting time between her scribing duty and her planning, Miranda had managed to work out most of the details with her rabbit Wikuni counterpart in just a few days. The real time came from pulling back their people and preparing them for the mission at hand. The sudden pullback of spies on the grounds and in the city had confused Ahiriya, but it did not stop her from her aggressive blockade of all useful information, nor did it stop her hunters from trying to root out and destroy the agents the Wikuni pair had laced through the Tower, Court, or among the parlors of the noble houses.
It began later that day, when a certain agent belonging to Jervis was spotted by a Royal guard slipping quietly out of the office of Duncan, the Keeper's personal secretary. Inspection of the office had revealed several drawers and cabinets had been opened and rifled, drawers and cabinets that held sensitive information. This incensed Ahiriya, and she sent out her people to totally disrupt all operations in the Tower.
She had taken the bait.
Miranda had seemed rather smug that afternoon, as she sat quietly on a stone bench in the courtyard as Keritanima read from the book, teaching Tarrin and Allia more and more words from the Sha'Kar tongue. She had a needlework hoop in her lap, and her small needle flashed rhythmically back and forth as her precise hands created an intricate geometric pattern in one of Keritanima's frilly dresses. Keritanima, ever in tune with the subtleties of her oldest friend's moods, seemed irritated by Miranda the entire session. By the time the sun began to creep behind the living wall forming the boundary of the hidden courtyard, she looked almost completely exasperated.
The courtyard itself had become one of the Tower's great mysteries to Ahiriya and many others. They knew that Tarrin, Allia, and Keritanima disappeared into the maze for hours at a time. They knew that they had to be doing something in there for such a long period of time every day. Scouts, trailers, even attempts to follow them from the tops of the Tower all failed, however, because Tarrin and Allia knew how to cover signs of their passage, and the magic surrounding the courtyard hid it from probing eyes. People sent in to follow the trio were always left lost, wandering the maze for hours themselves, just to try to find the way out. The maze was huge, and it was very deceptive. Only a handful of people on the grounds knew their way along every twist and turn. The only ones that weren't Tarrin, Keritanima, Allia, or Miranda happened to be the four gardeners that kept the hedgerow walls neat and trimmed. And they swore up and down repeatedly that there was no courtyard within the maze, and there was nowhere other than a walkway itself where the three could go. It drove Ahiriya crazy, and it also stretched Keritanima's little game very thin.
The other thing had been the brands. Keritanima had always been very careful never to let others see them, but they had finally been seen that morning. Tarrin hadn't been the only one to leave early. She had visited the baths, and had the bad luck of crossing paths with a patrol of guards wearing nothing but a towel. The brands were in plain sight, for her fur wouldn't grow back over them, and she had little doubt that Jervis would have a report on his desk concerning them by morning. They had already talked it out, and she wasn't that worried about it. "We're starting to run out of time," she told them calmly after debating the issue. "They're moving quickly, and so are we. If I have to reveal myself, then so be it, because I have no intention of going back."
And that was that.
"And what are you so happy about?" Keritanima finally exploded at Miranda when they finished at sunset.
"Oh, nothing," she replied with a mild smile. "I've been working out a little deal with Jervis. It should be going off any minute now."
"You did what?" she gasped.
"Oh, come now, Highness, it's not like I haven't gone behind your back before," she said with a cheeky grin. "Jervis and I had an idea, and we decided to go with it. We should have the upper hand in the Tower and the city by morning."
"And what marvelous plan is this?"
"Oh, one of Jervis' men sacked Duncan's office," she said, biting the thread in two. "That made Ahiriya angry, and she overreacted, as usual. We're already in place to make her pay for it."
Keritanima blinked, and then she laughed. "Miranda! That's so blunt!"
"Yes, it was," she smiled. "Sometimes brute force does have advantages."
She laughed again. "I think I can live with Ahiriya's displeasure," she grinned.
"What difference does that make to us?" Allia asked.
"When Ahiriya goes to get Jervis' men for the break-in, Miranda's men will be there to get the drop on them," Keritanima explained. "They'll never expect Miranda to put a hand in, because what goes on between Jervis and Ahiriya isn't supposed to concern her. There will probably be open fighting in the halls of the Tower."
"Possibly," Miranda admitted. "Even if the Keeper throws most of our people out, there won't be many of Ahiriya's people left to interfere. In a scenario of smaller numbers, we have the advantage. Ahiriya has more territory to defend and fewer people to do it with. That gives us the advantage."