Chapter 22 #3
‘Wait.’ Erann stayed her hand. ‘Anya mentioned a missing girl. A servant. Rankil sent her out on the first day of the return of the Long Day, but she never came back.’
‘That’s right, it was Sereh,’ Aras said, her sadness plain. ‘You must remember her? We grew up together – you used to play together.’
‘I remember.’
‘I told him not to order her out. But he insisted on sending her on some errand. I don’t know what.’ Her evasive tone suggested she knew exactly why Sereh had been sent out, and her look towards Anya suggested Erann would receive answers from her, not Aras.
‘But she hasn’t come back?’
‘No, more’s the pity. Rankil’s furious because she’ll be out there at the bottom of some crevasse with a broken neck. It’s a great inconvenience that he no longer has anyone to read to him.’
‘But you read,’ Erann stated, eyebrows furrowed.
‘Ah yes, but not nearly as well as Sereh,’ she allowed. ‘Alas, so far as my dear husband is concerned, I can barely read our simplest tales.’
She winked and gave him a smile before loudly excusing herself. They couldn’t risk being seen as too friendly. Too much rested on their ability to maintain the facade of their hatred for one another.
Then she swept from the room.
It was clear Rankil now thought Sereh dead. Erann decided not to tell his sister of Sereh’s survival. The less she knew the better. Still, he questioned this urge to protect Sereh. He hoped she’d have done the same for him, regardless of his behaviour towards her.
Once Aras was gone, Anya stayed with him, asking careful questions about his mother’s health. Finally, she dropped her voice even lower.
‘What your sister’s not telling you is that Rankil sent Sereh to expose his unwanted bastard child.
’ Anya’s face darkened as she spoke, her words barely above her breath.
‘The damn fool. The mother died in childbirth. The child will have perished too, and now Sereh. He’s a wicked, wicked man, Erann.
A wicked, wicked man. You must do what you can.
Don’t give up hope. I haven’t.’ Anya held his gaze.
As horrified as he was to hear of Rankil’s despicable actions, his heart bled for Sereh.
He’d been surly and cold towards her. Now, Erann was pleased he’d left his backpack with her.
Although, as Anya stood to leave, he finally realised something else had been left too.
His father’s journal. He had to hope Sereh would return it to him. Somehow.
‘I fear your mother’s ill of a broken heart. They’re always the hardest to mend. I’ll think about how best to treat her.’
Her words filled him with a flicker of hope. Erann relaxed for the first time in days in the peace and comfort of his sister’s small sitting room.
That night, though, he returned to the common room.
It was a stark change from the comfort of his sister’s sitting room, but he couldn’t have slept there.
It would’ve been interpreted as a sign of respect from his sister towards him.
They couldn’t risk that. Still, Erann was grateful for the time within her chamber.
It had restored him better than a full night’s sleep.
The other men within the room were all large and rough-looking, marked with scars and carrying weaponry that made Erann uneasy.
Few of his people carried weapons. Violence was strictly controlled, even when it came to blood feuds, and was governed by laws enforced at the Quarter Council, with the worst transgressions going to the Full Council meeting.
But Rankil was only too happy to ignore the rules, as his treatment of Erann’s father showed.
And his unwanted children. Erann couldn’t help wondering where Rankil had found such men.
At one stage, Rankil returned to the common room for his evening meal, which was meagre, consisting of small, wizened onions and a lot of water, although the peat cakes were much better, and pointedly ignored Erann, even while he spoke to his other men, who did cast him knowing looks.
Not that Erann minded being ignored by Rankil.
Being near him tested his patience enough already.
Then, for the rest of the evening, Rankil muttered quietly to two of his men, who kept glancing at Erann darkly. It made him uneasy.
As he watched Rankil and his men, Erann couldn’t help thinking he’d stumbled into something far more dangerous than expected. He also couldn’t shake the feeling that it involved him.
The feeling prickled all over his body. He wanted to demand to know what they were saying. But stayed silent. When they settled in sleep, he lay there, staring into the dark, being dripped on, as sleep defied him.
Long before the first rays of sunlight lifted the gloom from the common room, warmed only by a small fire that was more ash than flame, and lit by a stinking lantern of whale fat, and not a candle, he was already up, pulling on his furs and fastening his snowshoes.
He wanted to say goodbye to his sister, but she wouldn’t rise for some time.
And he needed to go. Now.