But if so, it was a paradise only the horses bothered to notice.
Jassion, as always, saw nothing but the distance stretching before them, separating him from the man he hated more than anything in this world. It seemed, at times, as though the baron's obsession was a tangible barrier he carried around him, one that hemmed him off from the rest of the world.
But for the ignoble nobleman, Kaleb cared little. No, he would reserve his concern, and devote attentions that might otherwise have noted the surrounding beauty, to Mellorin.
The young woman had drawn inward since their encounter with the ogre. Her cloak had become a cocoon, a rampart, a security blanket; her horse an island amid an otherwise empty sea. She spoke to her companions only when she must, and even then, despite her obvious anger at him, directed her queries and comments to her uncle. She'd barely met Kaleb's eyes during those many days, though she often snuck quick glimpses when she thought his focus lay elsewhere.
And Kaleb, after many nights of considered deliberation, finally had to admit that he hadn't any idea of how to deal with her. He was a man of many talents, of substantial knowledge-more than either of his companions suspected-but the eccentricities of young women lay beyond his ken.
He dropped back, ostensibly permitting his mount to crop a few mouthfuls of the deep green grass that sprouted in the shade of far more colorful trees, and allowed Jassion to move some distance ahead. Then, startling the horse with an abrupt yank on the reins, he fell into step beside Mellorin's palfrey.
Still, she would not look at him.
"It's beautiful here, isn't it?" he asked, gesturing as though she'd somehow missed the hills that rolled like playful toddlers around the feet of their mountain parents. "A man could certainly understand why even an ogre would make a home here."
Silence, save for the call of circling birds, the bleating of some distant beast.
"Mellorin," he said, far more softly, "are you ever going to speak to me?"
She offered only a soft sniff, and Kaleb had already tensed to tug at the reins and move away, a scowl forming on his lips, before he recognized it as a sound, not of disdain, but muffled grief.
"Would you truly weep for an ogre?" Only the tenderness in his tone prevented the question from becoming accusation.
Finally, finally, she turned her face his way from within the folds of her hood.
"I don't understand," he told her. "I watched you fight, when Losalis's men attacked us."
She nodded. "And it's the fact you and my uncle see no difference that bothers me. Oh, gods…" He watched her clasp hands to her stomach, as though she would physically restrain the emotions threatening to overwhelm her. "Gods, Kaleb, is everyone in this world like him? Is my father just more honest about who he is?"
For a few moments, the sorcerer struggled to form a reply, for he knew what the wrong answer might cost him. "Mellorin," he said, "do you know what happened to your uncle at Rebaine's hands?"
"I know he was a child when Denathere fell. I know he saw my father disappear with my mother."
"Your father's men didn't flee when he did. First, they slaughtered everyone in the Hall of Meeting. Nobles, commoners, men, women… Everyone."
"But-Jassion?"
"The master of Denathere's Scriveners' Guild saved him. He hid Jassion's tiny body with his own." Kaleb shook his head. "My understanding is, old Jeddeg's the only Guildsman of whom Jassion has ever spoken highly.
"Mellorin, your uncle waited in a pit of corpses, and he was conscious for every moment of it. He struggled to breathe beneath the weight of the dead, to keep their blood from his eyes and mouth, for hours, before anyone found him."
Mellorin had gone white as a corpse herself, her lips trembling. "I had no idea…"
"It's not something he shares readily, though anyone who was around in noble circles at the time has heard the tale. Jassion is-broken. I don't think he'll ever be an entirely rational person, though we can certainly hope that once he's caught up with your father, his temper might cool a little."
"And you?" There was no mistaking the bitterness that flavored her words. "What's your excuse?"
"My-?"
"The ogre wasn't a threat to us, Kaleb! I know why Jassion killed it anyway. I want to know why you didn't stop him!"
"I could tell you it wasn't my place," Kaleb said slowly, "that, appearances aside, I'm the servant in this expedition, not the master. I could," he reiterated, raising a finger as her mouth opened to interject, "but I won't."
"Then why?"
"Do you remember what I told you about my magics? About never really having been afraid?"
She nodded.
"I've also grown accustomed to doing things the, ah, expedient way," he admitted. "When you have more power than everyone else, I suppose you start to view people as just problems to be dealt with. I've killed before, Mellorin. Sometimes a lot, and often without much more provocation than your uncle."
"And you're satisfied with this?" she demanded.
He reached across the gap between the horses to rest a hand on her arm. "I used to be," he said. "Now I think I want to do better."
Yes, he thought as Mellorin tried, and failed, to repress a bashful smile. I believe I am, indeed, doing so much better. THEY STUMBLED UPON THEIR DESTINATION not long after, cresting a shallow rise into the hollow between a pair of great, grass-clad slopes only just too small to be counted among the proper mountains of the Cadriest range.
The valley sprawled wide, a cupped palm full of lush greens and bright golds, undulating where the edges of the hills failed to conform to even curves. A bucolic cottage hid shyly within the shadow of the leftmost hill, and beyond that stood a primitive but sturdy fence of wooden posts. It formed an enclosure sufficient to pen an enormous herd of barnyard animals, or perhaps one abnormally lackadaisical dragon.
It turned out, thankfully, to be the former. Scores of sheep, goats, and the occasional cow wandered about, on both sides of the fence and through an open gate. And it was only those animals that offered the newcomers any sense of scale for the whole tableau.
"You could hold a masquerade ball in that house!" Mellorin murmured after several moments.
Kaleb shrugged. "That's a guest list I'd love to see."
"Are we certain Davro lives here?"
"I'd say so," Jassion answered. "Even if Kaleb did bollix up the spell"-the sorcerer bowed sardonically at that-"I can't imagine any human hermit needing fifteen-foot ceilings."
"I know," she admitted. "It just doesn't seem very-ogrey."
"Are you sure that's not 'ogrish'?" Kaleb asked her. "Perhaps 'ogresque'?"
Mellorin grinned; Jassion looked about ready to strangle something. "Are you two quite finished?"
"Probably not," Kaleb and Mellorin told him in unison.
The baron began marching toward the house, muttering a dozen separate imprecations. With a shared chuckle, the others fell in behind.
"I'm not seeing any smoke from the chimney," Jassion said after allowing himself a moment to overcome his latest snit. "But it's warm enough here that that doesn't prove anything. I'm hoping he's out, so we can catch him unawares, but keep your eyes open."
"I-"
"Shut up, Kaleb."
The rich tang of grasses and turning leaves gave way as they neared, overpowered by the musk of, as Kaleb later put it, "Beef, mutton, wool, and leather in their hoofed larval stage." This close, they could see a few swine as well, rooting in the mud beneath a trough behind the house.
A trough that dripped with the sludgy remnants of a very recent feeding.