I see now, she said.
I knew you would.
Forgive me?
“Always,” Geder said.
“Always what?” Aster asked, and Geder was back at the table, a blush rising up his neck.
“Nothing,” he said and took another forkful of the meat. “I was just… I got lost in my own mind for a moment. It happens all the time. Everyone does it. Do you want some more peppers?”
“I’m fine,” Aster said.
“Basrahip? Peppers?”
“I have no need of them,” the priest said. The bruise on his cheek was interesting, now that Geder looked at it. All through it were tiny patches of black, like spent blood.
“All right, then,” Geder said. “We’ll need to make a plan. I’ll call Emming and Daskellin. And… let me see. Palen Esteroth is in the city. He was in the court of Asterilhold for years before the conquest. He’ll be useful. I’ll have him brought in to consult with on the battle plan. I wish Dawson Kalliam hadn’t fallen under the Timzinae’s sway. He was the one that took Kaltfel last, after all, but never mind. We’ll find a way.”
“We will, Prince Geder,” Basrahip said though a wide and placid smile.
“And you said that some of your fellow priests, they… ah… they died?”
“Indeed. Gloriously and in her name.”
“Does that mean you’ll need to initiate new priests?”
“Yes, Prince Geder,” Basrahip said. “We shall need more. Many more.”
Clara
The wide, grassy plains outside Sara-su-Mar, the lush blue of its skies, and the passion of its lovers had made the backdrop of any number of small romances and ballads of youthful love. Clara had never made the journey herself, but the image of it that she held in her mind was perfect and complete. She could not say now whether her imaginings had been romantic fluff, or if violence had greyed it.
The defensive perimeter Jorey had made was clear, the army huddled behind its swords and spears as it took stock and planned. Where his patrols and scouts had gone, she did not know, nor could she ask.
Low clouds pressed down until the sky seemed no higher than the treetops, and the spitting rain soaked the road, her cloak, and the coat of her horse. It thickened the air. All along the roadside, tucked back in the cover of the trees, tents and rough cobbled-together shelters huddled. Men and women watched her pass, their faces bleak and empty. The children who sat at the roadside were too hungry to play. Their faces had taken on the grey of the land around them. They were the small people of the world. Trappers and fishers and hands on the farms so desperate that they could not postpone their business, even though there were armies on the road.
The battle that followed the ambush had lasted hours, pressing into the countryside before Jorey called their forces to regroup. The stink of churned earth and drowned fires clung to the landscape as if it had always been there, as if the devastation of war had bled back through history and poisoned all that had come before. That was not true, of course. Weeks before, this same low road had likely been cheerful and bright as any of the old songs. That it had always been so corrupted was an illusion. But it was a persuasive one.
Clara kept her cloak tight around her and her head down. She regretted now that she’d taken so fine a horse. The nut-brown gelding stood out among the half-starved nags and exhausted plow mules that shared the road with her. The question hadn’t even occurred to her. After all this time, some part of her was still the Baroness of Osterling Fells, whether she wished it or not.
A bend in the road, a grass-covered hillock to her left, and her own preoccupation hid the crossroads from her until it was too late. Five men in cloaks of undyed wool stood in the center of traffic. Their hems and boots were dark with mud, and hoods covered their heads. Their blades were in scabbards, and two held unstrung bows wrapped against the rain. One of them was speaking to a thin young man, bending toward him, interrogating. The young man’s head bobbed as he spoke, desperate for approval and rich with fear. An answering fear rose in Clara’s throat. The hooded man nodded, waved the young man on, then stepped in front of two girls traveling the same direction Clara was.
Soldiers, then, though in this blighted space she had no way to tell which side’s men they were. If they were queensmen, what would they make of an older woman with the accents of Antea in her voice and a fresh, powerful horse beneath her? And if they were Jorey’s men, how could they keep from asking what errand took her into enemy territory?
Stopping now, even hesitating, would only draw further attention to herself. She wondered, if she bolted, whether the men would be able to raise an effective alarm. They let the two girls pass, and Clara was certain one of them at least was looking at her with a vague curiosity in his eyes. Remain calm, she thought. Don’t give them more reason to notice you.
She might as well have stood in the stirrups and sung for all the difference it made.
“Hold there,” the man in the front said, holding up his hand to her as her horse stepped into the crossroad. “Rein in, grandmother. Rein in.”
Clara raised her eyebrows as she might to an impertinent servant, but she brought her little horse to a halt. One of the other men stepped in and put his hand on the reins. He managed to seem polite doing it, which she counted in his favor.
“What’s your name and your business on the road?” the lead man asked. His voice had the softer cadences of Birancour, and now that she was near him, Clara could make out the green and gold of his tunic. The wet had darkened both almost to black, but there was no doubt. A queensman.
Well, at least it isn’t one of the contemptible little spider priests, she thought, and then smiled. The words might have been in her own mind, but they had been in Dawson’s voice.
“Clara Osterling,” she said. “I’m looking for my daughter. She was staying near here before the battle, and I haven’t found her since. Her name’s Elisia. She’s a bit younger than you, I’d think. Brown hair? A mark on her left cheek?”
It was ridiculous. Antea was in her blood and her vowels, and there was no way of removing it from either. She could no more pass for Birancouri than she could be mistaken for a chipmunk. The man smiled.
“Can’t say I have, grandmother,” the queensman said.
“Then you’ll excuse me. I have to keep looking.”
“Not sure of that. I’m going to have to ask that you come over here with us.”
“What for?” Clara asked, feigning confusion.
“Agents of the enemy all around, ma’am. Just have to be sure you’re what you say.”
Clara made a soft, amused sound in the back of her throat. “Ah,” she said. “It’s my accent, isn’t it? I quite understand.”
“Then if you’d just—”
She drew her knife and slashed at the man holding her reins in a single motion. Thankfully, the blade didn’t connect, but the boy started back and his grip went loose. She kicked her poor horse’s flanks like he’d done something wrong, and together they leapt forward, scattering the queensmen like pins on a bowling green. She kicked again and the poor animal surged forward. Shouts rose behind her, and a woman’s startled shriek. Her speed drove raindrops into her bared teeth, into her eyes. Clara bent low over the surging back and held as tightly as she could, waiting for an arrow to pierce her back or a stone to stun her.
For God’s sake, she thought, don’t kill me. I’m trying to help you.