Mastiff (45 page)

By the time I’d finished stowing everything as I’d found it, I felt his spell-making. Every hair on my arms and the nape of my neck stood on end. There was not a sound to be heard from the woods. I was willing to bet that any creature that could walk, crawl, slither, or fly had fled or gone to ground. Even the air had gone dead still.

I made myself turn.

Farmer had taken off his boots. He was covered in a sparkling blue sheath of fire from his shaggy hair to his muddy toes. The river itself shone a sickly green in the dark, the green of mold and rot. It was threaded with Farmer’s Gift, the magics he had taken from Ironwood and Orielle, a thick gold thread, and three other colors. They surged back and forth, the green trying to overwhelm all else. Farmer held his hands palms up as he spoke in a strange language. The blue sheath that covered him sent power flowing out over the little river to its opposite bank.

An image formed over the water, bright against the dark and the magic. It was that of a woman in dull olive silk, collapsed onto a floor covered with cushions. She leaned against a hanging-covered wall, pressing the heels of her hands into her temples as if she wanted to crush her own head. She’d managed to shove a veil and round cap off hair that was reddish brown with strands of gray. Her heavy-lidded eyes were a cold blue. She had to be the Viper, and I would remember her for when I found her at last. There was no sign of the other female mage who was supposed to be traveling with the cart.

The mixed-color fires rose from the river and flowed into the image of the Viper, swirling around until they swallowed her, forming an egg-shaped bubble. Farmer was whistling now, a soft, breathless tune. I’d have thought it nonsense, save that it called a rope of white fire up and out of the river and sent it into the image. There it wrapped around the bubble, covering what was already there. Now Farmer called back his own power. Like an obedient snake the glittering blue Gift returned to him and vanished into his skin. The Viper was left with only the white fire cocoon that held her inside it. I saw nothing of Farmer’s stolen magics beneath the white fire.

The Viper’s hands slowly fell from her temples. She breathed in a couple of gasps of air, then started to stand. She was almost on her feet when she fainted.

Farmer waved his hand. The image vanished. Then his own knees buckled and he fell into the river.

I ran down into the water and got him by the arms. I was slipping on the stones of the riverbed when the dozy charm chanter began to scrabble with his legs, getting his feet under him. Even with those signs of wakefulness I did not release my hold, but towed him back and up, onto dry ground. He was coughing and choking. I turned him on his side and thumped his spine to remind him to spit out the water.

“I hope your spells worked, or we’re both dead,” I snapped in his ear.

He flapped an arm as he spit out a mouthful of water and caught his breath. “Of course they worked,” he said. “I’m not some idiot apprentice who can’t do a simple working to clean up foul water. This was just a little bigger.”

“Keep spitting,” I ordered. I got one of his arms under my shoulder and stood him up. “Gods, did you have to eat
everything
set before you at Queensgrace?”

“I practically starved myself there,” he argued. “I’m just big-boned. If you weren’t such a scrawny scrap of a thing—”

“It’s all muscle, mage, all muscle,” I replied as we walked away from the water. He was starting to shiver. “Will any of those nuts be of use to you now?”

“Almonds, please,” he said. “There’s a pouch of the shelled ones in a pocket on the side of my pack, opposite the maps.”

I risked letting him go to stand on his own. He managed it. I got the bag of shelled almonds and handed it to him. I was about to get the shawls when he said, “Beka, wait a moment.”

I didn’t see it, but I felt it. Warmth wrapped me round like a head-to-toe blanket. When it ended, having lasted but a moment, I was dry. I put a hand on Farmer’s shoulder. He was dry, too.

“I was really drying myself, but I couldn’t control the field as well as usual, so you were caught up in it. Sorry,” the bold-faced liar told me.

“And if you hadn’t said ‘wait a moment,’ mayhap I’d believe you,” I told him. He was still too pale for my liking. “Mind that magicking of me, that’s all I’m saying to you.”

“Yes, Mother,” he replied, all meekness. I was not fooled. I was also warmed as much inside as out to hear us talking as I had with Tunstall over the years, those times when we were in deep and talked to calm down. It was good, in a Hunt so filled with shadows and menace, to have another Hunter that made me feel so comfortable when we were out on our own, far from any kennel.

I got two of his shawls and draped them around him. “Have you sommat to drink that will brighten you up?” I asked.

“The flask on my pack. Seriously, Beka, I’ll be fine with a little rest.”

“I’d as soon we did our resting back with Tunstall and Sabine,” I explained, going to retrieve his shoulder pack, stockings, and boots. “I wouldn’t put it past the Queensgrace Rats to set a hunting party after us tonight.”

“They’ll have to fix the portcullises on the main and the postern gate,” Farmer said, all innocence. “They broke about midday. Strangest thing. Both sets of chains rusted through in several places. Even with the smith working at dead speed, no one’s entering or leaving Queensgrace Castle until tomorrow.”

I stopped to stare at him. Then I couldn’t help it. I laughed until I got the hiccups. In that condition I retrieved my stone lamp as well. By the time that was done, Farmer had donned his socks and boots. I’d stopped laughing and hiccupping both. Farmer’s magicked almonds and brew had restored his strength. I took his shoulder pack and he his larger bag as we followed the road to Tunstall and Sabine. Their camp was easy enough to find, because Achoo and Pounce came out of the dark to lead us. I was roaring hungry by the time we reached them.

Although they were watching the road as we approached, they’d made camp and left the horses behind a wall of rock that extended off into the forest. The wall hid the camp and fire from view. They’d thrown ham, lentils, onions, garlic, and water into a pot and let it cook. The wind was in their favor or they never would have made something so wonderfully scented. The minute I caught a whiff of it, I feared I might actually drool.

I let Farmer tell our partners what he’d done while Achoo and I ate. Pounce came out of the dark to sleep by the fire. Plainly he’d taken care of feeding himself, though he did allow me to give him a bite or two of ham.

“But I don’t understand,” Sabine remarked when Farmer was done. “Did you kill her?”

Farmer looked at his full bowl sadly. “I didn’t kill her. I returned the power of the spells she had set to her,” he said with a sigh. He picked up his spoon.

“So she can use them again?” Tunstall demanded. “What sort of crackbrained notion is that?”

“She doesn’t
know
she has them,” Farmer said with his mouth full. “No more than she saw us—I made certain of that—or that I twisted them around her.” He swallowed and explained, “She sent her spells out. I sent them back with the power fixed to her. She doesn’t know it yet. She might feel a little warm, a little confined right now. Perhaps not. She may not notice any change at all until she casts her next spell.” He shoveled another spoonful into his mouth and chewed, smiling.

“What happens then?” Sabine wanted to know. “Farmer, it’s not nice to toy with your fellow Hunters!” Tunstall drummed his fingers on his thigh.

Watching Farmer, I thought, He likes it. He likes showing off when he’s been particularly clever. Whatever he did to the Viper, that was special, and he wants to brag a little.

I wanted to laugh again and elbow him in the ribs, like I would one of my friends at home. I felt that much at ease with him, for all that I’d known him for less than a month.

Pounce looked up.
Tell us, by the dark between the stars
, he ordered.
You’re just dying to
.

Farmer swallowed and coughed. Sabine handed him a cup of tea. Once he’d taken a big swallow, he bowed to Pounce. “A fellow’s got a right to enjoy his craft, doesn’t he?” he asked. He looked at the rest of us. “The next spell the Viper sends out, it will come back to her. The stronger the spell, the harder it will return. The little ones will go through—if she lights a candle, say, or makes herself look younger. But nothing bigger than that. The poison spells won’t kill her, now.” The smile on his lips and in his eyes went as cold and sharp as a sword. “I want the Crown to do that for her. But deadly spells will hurt her very badly.”

Nobody said anything as Farmer continued to eat. The only sound was the hiss of the fire. When he put down his empty bowl and drained his cup of tea, Tunstall said, “Remind me to stay on your good side.”

“Nonsense,” Farmer replied cheerfully. “You don’t cast poison spells that could end up killing half the countryside. Do you?”

“It seems like a stupid waste of power,” Sabine remarked, refilling Farmer’s cup.

“She likes to kill,” Farmer replied. “She likes to know that people who never heard of her will mourn because they accidentally crossed something she left behind. The river spells were placed to trap or kill some of us, but she enjoyed knowing others would die.” He accepted the full cup with a quiet thank-you. “You meet them, sometimes. Mages who like to leave their mark on complete strangers. For good and for ill.” He yawned hugely.

I found his bedroll among the packs. Sabine and I opened it up. “I’ll tell you, I’m curst grateful you pulled that Viper’s fangs,” Tunstall said as he helped Farmer into the bedroll. “Any chance she can get out of it?”

“She’d need help,” Farmer murmured. And he was asleep.

“We are blessed to have that one,” Sabine remarked quietly as she returned to the fire.

“So mote it be,” Tunstall murmured.

I think I spoke the same, though I’d begun to yawn as well. Tunstall and Sabine were talking when I fell asleep where I sat. Mayhap it was Pounce who told them I would not be doing first or second watch that night. Sabine got me into my own bedroll, where I had a fine, dreamless sleep.

The Great Road North

writ as I find the chance to do so

It was nearabout dawn when soft, arguing voices woke me. From the sound, my fellow Hunters were off by the ridge of stone that hid us from the road. I don’t think they realized the stone reflected their voices so I could hear.

“—should have told us
you
didn’t ward the camp!” Tunstall was saying.

“I was bone tired! I thought
you
were wise enough to work it out for yourself,” Farmer retorted. “Elyot and the count’s mage could find us if I did. Gods alone know who else they’ve got out here looking. There’s too many poxy mages in this mess, and I’d as soon not stand up and yell, ‘We’re here! Here, tucked out of sight!’ ”

“Heskaly’s drum, what a mess,” Tunstall growled. “Too many poxy mages is right. And there’s another thing. Stop dragging Cooper into your magics. She does enough, working the hound all day.”

“Who will help me?” Farmer demanded, keeping his voice down. “You and all those charms you need to watch me do anything bigger than a hiding spell? You obviously don’t want my lady to assist me. I don’t have six arms for bigger workings.”

“Mattes, Beka has lived with Kora since Beka was a Puppy,” Sabine reminded him. “She’s comfortable with magic. More comfortable than you. She’s volunteered to assist Farmer every time. I’ll tell you something else. She’s been happier at that—at most of this Hunt—than she’s been in months.”

“Months!” Tunstall said, only barely remembering to keep it quiet. “Months? When she had Holborn, and him talking wedding plans?”

“He was, you great looby,” Sabine told him. “She’d been pulling away. She was
this close
to breaking it off. She likes working with us and Farmer. She likes being on the road, away from people saying how sorry they are he’s gone.”

I turned over in my roll, as if I still slept, so they would not see me blush red with shame. I thought I’d hidden it so well. But I should have known Sabine’s keen eyes would notice more than movement in the brush. I thought, too, it was not so bad if Farmer knew I was not sodden with mourning my dead betrothed. Then I felt guilty, but not as much as before. A Hunt clears a lot of old miseries out of the brain.

I glanced at Farmer’s sleeping spot. His bedding was already rolled up and ready to go. Atop it sat the box he used for his embroidery thread and needles, something I’d seen often during those nights in the marsh, and three lengths of crimson ribbon. Two of them were covered with designs in thread. The third was half done, a needle thrust through the cloth to keep the unfinished design from unraveling. I blinked at it. Where had Farmer drawn the magic to fill these ribbons?

“Enough,” Tunstall was saying. “Farmer, did you report to Lord Gershom?”

“A bit.” Farmer sounded troubled. “But shadows kept passing through the images, and the sound …” He hesitated, as if searching his mind. “It
fluttered
. I don’t know how much Gershom heard.” He paused, then said, “Our enemies are at it again. They don’t want us in touch with Gershom.”

I sat up, yawning. The others would be thinking as I thought, that Master Ironwood or Mistress Orielle was a traitor. “You let me sleep without taking a watch?” I asked Tunstall.

“Get used to it,” he told me. “You run all day with Achoo, or run and ride. The three of us can manage the watches. And if helping Master Cape with his magic is too much for you …” He glared at Farmer.

I yawned again, so they’d think I hadn’t been awake enough to overhear. “Well, last night you and Sabine set up camp. And at the slaves’ burial ground, Sabine watched the road whilst me’n Achoo waited to see where the trail went next. It was only reasonable I aid Farmer. I help Kora sometimes, when she does medicine work and such.” I got out of my bedclothes. Like the others, I slept in my shirt and breeches. I pulled on stockings and boots. “If you’ll excuse me, I need a visit in the bushes.”