:Elene!: Her Companion’s voice, pleading in her mind.
:So sorry, Alrek.:
She felt him and the villagers straining to drag her in. The rope jerked, and her chest blazed with pain as ribs cracked. Her Companion’s mindless panic threatened to overwhelm her.
:No! Alrek—:
She fumbled with something at her belt—
Wil shot up out of bed, fighting his own blankets, spilling out onto the floor with a scream in his throat. He sat, panting, until his heartbeat settled.
Am I missing something? he thought. When will I stop dreaming about you, Elene? She had been a yearmate, an infrequent lover, a fellow Circuit rider. She could be in his head another day, week, month . . .
:Year,: Vehs said adamantly. :And in the meantime, you aren’t sleeping. Go do something about it already!:
Wil pushed a hand through his close-cropped hair, smearing sweat across his scalp. :I’d rather you sang me a lullaby.:
:Chosen—:
:No tinctures, Vehs.:
:Stubborn—bull-headed—:
But Wil’s annoyance at his Companion’s meddling had reached its breaking point—he snapped down his shields, cutting off Vehs’s rant. Not that he could block him completely. Just enough to muffle the chatter.
He curled up on his side in his bed, and sometime around midnight he finally eased into a half-waking doze that lasted until dawn.
Food and a bath briefly revitalized him, but by the time he took the stairs back to his quarters, he found his steps dragging. He flopped onto his bed and settled his eyes shut.
In the water—
Knock! Knock! Knock!
Wil jolted up and for a moment sensed something nearby, watching—
The feeling vanished. Someone was knocking on his door, but he was alone in his bedroom.
Wil lurched over to the door, yanking it open. A red-haired girl in the orange-red of a Bard Trainee waited in the hall.
“Hi!” she said brightly. “I’m Amelie!”
“Hello,” he replied, fighting the instinct to close the door again. Bard Trainees were, in his experience, never a good omen.
“Milady Lelia would like to see you.” Amelie smiled brightly. “Is now a good time?”
Wil raised a brow. “ ‘Milady’ Lelia?”
Amelie maintained her blazing smile and nodded.
Wil glanced back at the bed, then back to her. He forced himself to smile. “Now’s a fine time,” he said.
They didn’t have far to go. Wil hadn’t seen Lelia in years, so he didn’t know how the Bard had managed to win a Palace wing apartment from one of Selenay’s distant relatives, but she’d done it.
What surprised Wil was not that she had finagled it but that she had chosen to settle down. Lelia seemed the type of Bard who would wander Valdemar until her shoes wore away and her toes fell off.
Amelie led him in, and if the woman waiting for him was barefoot, he couldn’t tell because she was bundled up in a red velvet blanket.
“Wil,” Lelia said, with enough warmth to make his heart swell. She remained unvarnished loveliness, albeit with an air of fragility he did not remember seeing before.
Aging, just like me, he thought. Only with a little more grace and flair.
“Milady.” He bowed.
She rolled her eyes at his airs, pushing out of the chair to hug him. The sudden, friendly movement pushed away the melancholy he’d felt a moment before. He returned the gesture, smiling.
“I’d have given you a full day to rest and recuperate, but the last two times I did that you were gone before I could gain an audience.” She sat back down. “You just love to go, don’t you?”
I could say the same about you, he thought. He took a seat on a couch as Amelie plied him with tea, cream cakes, and other snacks. He waved them off politely.
“My protégé,” Lelia said, nodding toward Amelie as she swept out of the room. “She’s all sorts of mischief.”
“You seem to be doing well.”
She stretched her smile so wide he thought her face would crack. “You’ve no idea. How’ve you been? Stopped any assassination plots lately?”
He shrugged. “It’s been a slow year or two. Mostly citizens irate over taxation, property lines, and who owes whom for what.”
“Assassination plots sound more fun.”
“Same amount of paperwork, too.” His lips twisted in a grim smile.
She sipped tea as they talked. He gradually grew at ease with the sumptuous setting. No one disturbed them, though judging by the number of chairs, settles, and low tables, Lelia was accustomed to entertaining groups.
“When do you head out next?” she asked, topping off her cup from a nearby pot.
“Tomorrow,” Wil said. “Probably. Maybe the day after.”
“Another Circuit? So soon?”
“No,” Wil replied. “I have to go deliver bad news to Herald Elene’s family.”
Lelia tilted her head to one side. “She died a fortnight ago, near Callcreek, yes?”
“Yes.” He gave her a curious look. “You knew her?”
“No, but I make a practice of knowing for whom the Death Bell tolls.”
“Ah.” He lifted his brows sympathetically. “Right. Lyle.”
Lelia smiled. Her twin brother was a Herald; he had, in fact, been Wil’s internee.
Every time it rings, she has to wonder, he thought. Even if sometimes it’s a little more than I want, at least I know.
“I was near Callcreek when she died,” he said. “On my way back from the Border, actually. I did the footwork of finding out where, when, why, and how.”
“No ‘who’?”
“She drowned on a rescue mission. No one’s fault.” His chest twinged as he said it though, and he remembered the crushing pain from his Vision. “Her family needs to know. So I’ll be heading to Boarsden shortly.”
Her eyes lit up. “Boarsden, eh? That’s near Winefold.”
Wil knew the map of Valdemar the way parents knew the faces of their children. “Correct.”
“Would you like me to go with you?”
He blinked. “What?”
“Me. Go with you. I admit in advance I have ulterior motives.”
He swallowed around a suddenly dry throat. “Such as?”
“My family travels to Winefold around this time of year. There’s a festival to bless the fields—it’s at least a week long. Good work for traveling entertainers. I’d love to see them, and once you’re done at Elene’s you could view it as—” She cocked head again. “Brace yourself, Wil. I’m going to use a strange word on you.” She shaped it slowly. “Hol-i-day.”
:The Bard is wise.:
Vehs’s interjection startled Wil. It was the first thing the Companion had said since Wil had awakened and eased his shields.
Lelia took his silence for disapproval. “No?”
“Let me think about it.”
“Oh. Well. Do.” She drained her cup and set it next to the pot. “You’d be doing me a favor. I’m a frail little Bard, getting on in her years.” She draped her arm across her forehead and slumped. “And I surely would love the company.” She straightened and winked. “My destrier and I can be ready to go either day.”
After leaving her, he headed to the Collegium common room for supper. Trainees chattered earnestly around him as he ate and contemplated the bitter work ahead.
:You know,: Vehs said, somewhat unexpectedly, :she’s unattached. Unbridled. Available.:
Wil furrowed his brow, wiping up the last of his stew with a crust of bread. :Who?:
:Lelia.:
:What does that have to do with anything? And how do you know that?:
Vehs ignored the second question. :You liked her once.:
Wil wiped his mouth and collected his empty plates. :It’s been a while, Vehs.: