60. Aedon
60
Aedon’s heart thundered with the thrill of evasion as he vaulted from Brand’s back. The shadow of the giant wings over him vanished as the Aerian soared away, Erika still within his arms for her own mission. Aedon landed upon the battlements with a soft thud, cushioning the impact with his knees. He pressed himself down to the ground and into the shadows and stilled, surveying his surroundings. Tournai at night. The city never slumbered. It thrummed with life, though a different tune to its daytime cacophony.
Seeing a fleeting gap between the patrolling guards, Aedon flowed from shadow to shadow. With a running leap, he vaulted from the wall onto the roof of a nearby building. Before he could be spotted, he slid down the rough thatch, stopping just before the edge—and the perilous drop to the cobbled street below.
Checking his handholds before he committed, he swung from the roof onto a shuttered window sill below, and from there—after confirming he had escaped notice so far—used his momentum to grasp a hanging sign closer to the ground, swung once, and jumped, alighting on the ground with a wet slap.
Aedon groaned. “Of course I’ve landed in a pile of?—”
“Oy! What’re you doing here? There’s a curfew in this quarter, lad. Stop!”
There was no time to shake the excrement from his boots. Aedon launched into a sprint as two watchers gave chase. Down streets and up alleys he ran, but they knew the city far better than he and he could not shake them from his trail.
When he heard the two of them separate, he swore under his breath. It was a predictable move. They were going to cut him off. He turned a corner, slipped into a shadowed doorway, and made himself one with the night, at the same time sending a shadowy phantom of himself up the street. The watcher thundered past him, each loud step matching the drum of Aedon’s heart. As soon as he passed, Aedon peeked from the shadows. The man was already halfway up the street after Aedon’s spectre. Aedon grinned, slipped from his concealment, and ran the other way.
It was easier to lose himself in the inner city where the curfew was much later. The taverns were full, the brothels were fuller, and the streets thrummed with throngs of people still going about their business. Markets hawked their last wares of the day. Traders came and went. Aedon slipped between them all, his cloak wrapped around his body, his head shadowed by the generous hood. Though he was nowhere near safe, he relaxed slightly. This was where he belonged, on the edge of the thrill, where he felt most alive. He wound up to the higher city, leaving the bright lights behind as he ascended into the quieter, affluent quarters of Tournai. Now his smile faded, his gaze roving this way and that, and his senses rolled out as far as he could send them. Once more, he skulked from shadow to shadow, following the dagger’s pull from underneath his cloak. This way. This way, it called to him. Faster. She’s here.
Far above him, the castle walls rose, but for a well practiced climber, they were easy to scale. Aedon liked to think he could get anywhere a mountain goat could—and then some. Even so, the trip was perilous and fraught with danger, for if anyone happened to look upon the walls, he would be exposed. With the calculated mind of an experienced thief, he used the shadows of trees and houses to conceal his climb before forcing his screaming, straining joints and muscles to haul him over the lip and into the gardens on the other side.
Aedon leapt into the dark, safe arms of the tree branches before stilling to survey his surroundings. It had been decades since he had last come to this part of the palace—as an honoured guest, no less. He pushed the thought from his mind and gritted his teeth as he slipped down the tree trunk to stalk through the once familiar terraces of the royal gardens. It was a part of the royal quarters that was seldom guarded. Who could scale such a wall? In the king’s arrogance was his weakness. Aedon still despised Toroth just as much as always, though he had once been the king’s most favourite and trusted pet.
Through the palace he crept, avoiding wards and guards with ease, following the growing pull of the dagger—then he saw her. It took a beat longer than normal to register Harper’s presence, because he did not recognise her. He ducked into the shadows and pressed against the wall as she—they—passed. Questions and doubts assailed him. Harper looked like a guest, as if she belonged there, wearing the very king’s livery herself. She was clean, her hair braided, and her eyes bright. Yet the bruises blooming across her face were not lost upon him. The sight stirred anger in his belly.
And Dimitrius… She walked beside him as an equal, seemingly without fear. Aedon chanced a glance and watched their retreating backs with disbelief. She walked freely, without restraints—magical or otherwise. Her back was ramrod straight, and his miniscule glimpse of her face had shown a serious visage.
Suspicion uncurled in his stomach. Had he been mistaken? Had she duped them after all? Did she know Dimitrius? It had not seemed to be the case when they had met Dimitrius in the woods. Aedon watched as he placed a gentle hand upon the small of her back and guided her around a corner. She did not shirk away, but smiled at him. It was tight-lipped and serious, but a smile nonetheless.
They are far more familiar now than ought to be the case.
Aedon’s feet moved of their own accord, sneaking after Harper and Dimitrius, pulled by curiosity and a burning need to understand what was happening. They halted outside the king’s audience chamber. Aedon, shrouded in wards, dared not approach or follow them farther. For the first time, he saw Harper look up at Dimitrius with worry. He answered with a smile of reassurance and a light touch on her arm, before the guards opened the door and the two entered. At the physical contact, cold pooled in Aedon and his skin prickled. Aedon normally considered himself an excellent judge of character and an almost infallible detector of lies. Harper had seemed entirely honest when she had been with them. But she lived another life here. Did Harper need liberating at all, as they had thought? Which Harper was the ‘real’ one? The doors boomed shut behind them, leaving Aedon with only his raging thoughts and dumbfounded disbelief. None of it made any sense. He dared not ask himself the greater question. Was I taken for a fool?