It took so much longer than Jeren would have thought to get the Holters ready to set out. Those who had mounts, herself included now, were vastly outnumbered by those on foot. The logistics of it all was staggering but she had to focus on that. She had to. To think about Shan would be a disaster. He’d left. That was that. She closed off her heart and focused on the job in hand.
She had to ensure that only those fit to travel came, as so many too young or too old were trying to inveigle their way into the troops. The Shistra-Phail helped, their veneration of the elderly, and their care for the young making them eagle-eyed in this task.
“But I’m strong enough,” one grey haired man argued. “I made it here, didn’t I?”
“Of course, elder,” said the Shistra-Phail who could well have been three times his age. “But if you, with your wisdom and experience leave, who will guard the children who must remain behind?”
Jeren left them to it, relieved to have such help. But some people were not so easily swayed.
“Doria, listen to reason!” Leithen’s voice sounded exasperated. “Lady Jeren will be fine. I’ll guard her with my life.” They stood just outside the main muster, Doria with all her belongings packed, the two children looking lost and alone beside her.
Doria just glared at him. “Oh, aye. And I can imagine what a state she’d return to River Holt in then!”
“It’s not a procession, woman!”
No, it was war, but no one wanted to say that. Least of all Jeren.
Doria opened her mouth to argue, but fell silent as Jeren approached. She swept into a far more graceful bow than one would expect of her.
“Lady Jeren, can you talk to her?” Leithen rubbed his hand across his pinched brow in frustration. “Perhaps she’ll listen to you.”
Few people did, it seemed, but it was worth a try for Jerryl and Pern’s sakes.
“What’s the problem?” she asked, as if she didn’t already know.
“Leithen doesn’t think it’s a woman’s place to take part in the ride south.”
That stung. And if he’d put it to Doria in that manner, Jeren hardly pitied him the ear bashing she must have given him. She had half a mind to lay into him herself. It was the type of stupid, overprotective thing Shan would have said. But then she looked his way and saw the concern in his gentle eyes. Not for her, but for Doria and the children. And something inside her gentled.
“Nonsense,” she replied. “If I can go, anyone can. But I had hoped...” She let her voice trail off, waiting expectantly.
She wasn’t disappointed. Doria leaned forward. “What is it, Lady Jeren?”
“Just Jeren, Doria. You know that.”
The woman flushed. “Jeren. You had need of something?”
“I’d hoped...” She caught Doria’s arm with hers, linking the two of them together like conspirators, and leading her slightly to one side. “Jerryl and Pern are among the last of the line of Roh, and as such are very precious to me. You all are. But the two of them...” She glanced back to see them hugging Leithen, small children, nothing more. “There are so few of you left and what will the future Scions of Jern do if anything happens to them? Doria, I hoped you’d stay here and guard them for me. For the future, you see? I regret asking this of you, but there’s no one else I can trust. Not in this. Not so well as you.”
The indecision strained Doria’s features and Jeren hated herself to doing it. But she had to. The Rohs would follow her to destruction, and she wanted to at least spare these two little ones, and their mother who had already lost so much.
“Is this your command then?” Disappointment deadened the former fire in her voice.
“If it must be. But I would rather you did it willingly.”
Doria nodded and tears sparkled in her eyes. “I’d do anything you ask of me, Lady Jeren, if it didn’t harm you. But you’ll need us.”
“Yes. But I’ll need you more in the future. When all this is over. And I’ll need them. Please, stay here with them, my friend.”
Doria embraced her, so like Mina in her mannerisms and her care that Jeren felt a rush of unexpected grief. She hadn’t imagined that parting from her would be this difficult. She hadn’t imagined that leaving Sheninglas would hurt so much.
The temptation to just run away, to pursue Shan now as fast as she could, still burned brightly. But she would never catch up with him. She had spent the whole morning deliberating with herself. But it seemed like all her options had gone with her husband.
She had never imagined Shan would leave her. Not like that. It hurt. There was no other way to describe it. Like an open wound, giving constant, unrelenting pain. It was her fault, after all. She had caused a rift between them with her actions. Things might never be the same.
And yet she knew she had done what she needed to do.
“I’ll guard them for you, Lady Jeren,” Doria said. “If you’ll guard him for me.” She nodded at Leithen. “He’s an old fool, but he’d lay down his life for you given half a chance.”
“Then no chance will be offered,” Jeren said solemnly. “I promise.”
Shan pushed on longer into the deepening night than he should have done had he been planning to return. He covered good ground, though in the deepening twilight he knew he wouldn’t be able to go on for much longer. The terrain was treacherous enough, without the added complication of darkness. As he walked, he tried to push the amusement of the Enchassa from his mind. She didn’t speak. She didn’t need to. She was spying on him again and his internal debate with himself was giving her all the amusement she could ask for. She didn’t even need to intervene to make it worse. There was no worse.
A soft whoosh of feathers and air brought him upright in an instant and Kiah, Jeren’s owl, landed on a nearby rock. Her yellow eyes glowed in the fading light, accusing him, baleful as a demon.
“So, Jeren sent you after me, did she?”
Kiah hooted softly, and then proceeded to preen at her feathers. Clearly she wasn’t intending to move anywhere for the moment.
“And she isn’t with you. She couldn’t be, not at this distance.”
Kiah turned her head around completely, deliberately ignoring him now.
“Well fine, then. Follow me if you will. But don’t even dream of trying to slow me down.”
The owl swooped ahead of him, spiralling and dropping, her flight effortless in comparison to his trek south. Shan squinted against darkening sky, trying to follow her. He didn’t want to pay her so much attention, but he couldn’t help it. She made him think of Jeren.
“You’re a fool, torturing yourself,” the Enchassa muttered from her niche in his mind.
“Why? Is that your vocation?”
He knew he shouldn’t engage her, but the words were out before he thought to keep them in.
The Enchassa chuckled, like someone whose pet dog just showed his teeth. “If you would have it so. Come back to me, Shan, and anything is possible.”
He refrained from calling her a bitch on the grounds that it would be an insult to bitches everywhere. He trudged on, his head lowered, his shoulders bowed. The end of summer still clung greedily to the Holtlands and it was months yet before the snow would descend.
“She’s probably used to desertion by now.”
“Shut up.”
“Very eloquent. Well done.”
He ground his teeth together and pushed on in silence.
The owl and the Enchassa were his constant companions, whether they spoke or not. Talking to the owl would only result in the Enchassa jeering him, and talking to her would only lead to frustration. And probably madness.