Chapter Two Spring Road Rumors #2
Perrit swallowed.
“Bluebank scout named Arlen Saff went missing near the west bog road. Last seen asking questions at Northroad about Redjaw tokens. His sister says his boots were clean when he left Bluebank. When one boot was found yesterday near the old reed crossing, it was caked with black mud.”
Hessa’s eyes narrowed.
“Many places have black mud.”
Perrit looked uncomfortable.
“This had pine ash in it. Charcoal flecks. Smelled of tannin.”
Noll’s face hardened.
“Pike lower yard.”
Willa looked toward the door, toward the mud where Jory had freed the cart.
Torren said nothing.
That was how Willa knew his anger had gone cold.
Perrit continued, “Someone at Northroad says Pike Hollow took him because he was asking about Redjaw. Someone else says he came here willingly and did not leave. Someone else says the feral alpha marked his mate and now kills any wolf asking old questions.”
The hall went very still.
Torren did not move.
The mark flared with his fury.
Willa breathed.
His.
Mine.
Theirs, if chosen.
She stepped to the map table and placed both hands on its repaired edge.
“Who says?”
Perrit looked at her.
“Mistress?”
“Someone is not a name.”
Hessa’s mouth curved.
“Good.”
Perrit shifted.
“A Stonewatch wagon man said the last part.”
“Name?”
“Derren.”
Noll nodded once.
He knew the name.
Torren asked, “Who said Pike Hollow took him?”
“A Frostmere salt buyer.”
Selka made a disgusted sound.
Everyone looked at her.
She lifted her chin.
“Frostmere salt buyers do not speak without being told which price to set.”
Hessa looked almost pleased.
“Name?”
Perrit swallowed. “I can find it.”
Hessa leaned forward.
“You can remember it.”
He sweated.
“Mavin Reed.”
Talm Reed’s kin, perhaps.
Willa noted that.
So did everyone else.
“And who said Arlen came here willingly?” Willa asked.
Perrit hesitated.
“That one is stranger.”
“Stranger how?”
“An old woman from Bluebank.”
“Name,” Hessa said.
“Osa Grey.”
Riksa frowned.
“I know that name.”
Hessa looked at her.
“Should I be worried?”
“Always, but not because of Osa. She knows herbs. Bad knees. Good memory. Hates men who stand in doorways.”
“Sensible woman,” Hessa said.
Willa looked at Perrit. “Why would she say he came willingly?”
“She claims she saw him speaking to a Pike Hollow wolf at the reed crossing.”
Torren’s head lifted.
Noll’s eyes sharpened.
“Who?”
Perrit looked deeply unhappy.
“She described a young man. Brown hair. Scar at the chin. Loud coat.”
The hall turned slowly toward Jory.
Jory’s mouth fell open.
“What?”
Hessa closed her eyes.
“Of course.”
“I was here!”
“When?” Willa asked.
Jory looked offended by the fact that she was asking sensibly instead of immediately defending him.
“When the scout went missing? I think I was fixing the west roof bolts.”
Hessa’s eyes opened.
“You were supposed to fix roof bolts.”
“I inspected them with intention.”
“Jory.”
“Fine. I dropped one into the gutter and spent an hour trying to get it out before Riksa saw.”
Riksa said, “I saw.”
“Then why didn’t you say?”
“I wanted to see how long you would suffer.”
“That is cruel.”
“Educational.”
Willa looked at Jory’s chin.
Scar. Brown hair. Loud coat, yes, if one considered his patched ocher traveling coat loud, which everyone did.
“Someone chose you,” she said.
His indignation faltered.
“What?”
“Someone wanted a description close enough to you to be repeated.”
Torren’s voice came low. “To make Pike Hollow deny before knowing the missing scout.”
Hessa nodded. “And to make us either hide Jory or send him out to prove innocence.”
Jory straightened.
“I can prove—”
“No,” everyone said.
He deflated.
Perrit looked from face to face as if reconsidering every life choice that had brought him into this hall.
Willa touched the edge of Letha’s note at Torren’s belt.
“Ask why the missing scout had Pike mud on his boots before he went missing,” she said.
“Before?” Hessa asked.
Willa nodded.
“Letha’s wording. She did not say after. She said before.”
Torren took out the note and laid it flat.
They read again.
Ask why the missing scout had Pike mud on his boots before he went missing.
Noll leaned over the table.
“If his boot was found after, with Pike mud, it could have been planted.”
“But if he had Pike mud before,” Willa said, “then either he came here earlier than anyone admits…”
“Or someone gave him Pike mud before he disappeared,” Hessa finished.
Riksa muttered, “Mud as correspondence. Spring is vile.”
Selka spoke quietly.
“Frostmere keeps soil samples from disputed claims.”
The hall turned.
She looked uncomfortable but continued.
“For boundary arguments. Old practice. Davra would know which mud belongs where.”
Torren’s hand closed.
The table did not break this time.
Willa noticed.
So did Hessa.
“So Davra could plant Pike mud on a boot,” Noll said.
“Davra could,” Selka said. “Stonewatch could if Frostmere supplied it. Marr too, if given access.”
Perrit raised one finger, then seemed to regret it.
Hessa looked at him.
“Speak before your finger becomes annoying.”
“Letha says the scout’s sister does not trust Bluebank’s own men with this.”
“Why?”
“Because Arlen was asking about Redjaw old coins.”
The hall chilled.
Torren’s face went still.
Willa felt the mark cool at the edges with his memory.
“Old coins,” Hessa said.
Her voice had changed.
“Yes,” Perrit said. “He thought Redjaw tokens at Red Creek were not charms only. He said some were payment markers. Old debt coins. He asked who in the north would still honor them.”
Hessa sat down.
Just like that.
Not collapsing.
Sitting because standing had become a thing she chose not to do.
Willa moved toward her.
Hessa waved her off.
“Do not.”
Willa stopped.
Torren did not move either.
The mark carried his old pain like a dark room opening.
Hessa looked at Torren.
“Your father had one.”
Silence.
Torren’s expression did not change.
The bond did.
Shock.
Old, buried, immediate.
“What?” Willa said softly.
Hessa stared at the table.
“After the massacre. In his box. I thought it was taken from one of them. A trophy. Proof. Something.” Her mouth tightened. “I did not ask. He was dead two winters later. I never asked.”
Torren’s voice was almost soundless. “My father had Redjaw coin.”
“One,” Hessa said. “Maybe.”
“Maybe.”
“I saw it once.”
The hall did not breathe.
Willa looked at Torren.
His eyes were not black.
They were worse.
Far away and too near at once.
A boy at nineteen. A father’s call unanswered. Three days feral. A box with a coin no one asked about because grief made some questions feel like betrayal.
Willa stepped beside him.
Did not touch.
Not yet.
“Torren,” she said.
His gaze found hers.
The bond reached.
He was there.
Barely.
Barely was not nothing.
“Exact,” she whispered.
The word moved through him.
He closed his eyes.
Once.
Opened them.
“Find the scout,” he said.
Noll nodded.
“Pairs.”
“Four. Not through the reed crossing. South ridge first. No one touches the boot until Riksa or Hessa sees it.”
Hessa’s head lifted.
Some color returned to her face.
“I will see it.”
Torren looked at her.
“Yes.”
Perrit swallowed. “Letha said one more thing.”
Every exhausted eye turned toward him.
“She said if Pike Hollow wants the scout alive, ask the sister what Arlen found before asking where he went.”
Willa looked at Torren.
His jaw tightened.
“Where is the sister?”
Perrit grimaced.
“Northroad.”
Hessa laughed without humor.
“Of course.”
Willa touched the mark.
The road again.
Always the road.
Torren looked at her.
Fear?
She answered aloud.
“Anger.”
His eyes held hers.
“Yours?”
“Mine.”
“Mine too.”
Hessa stood, slower now, but steady.
“Then we do not give the road first say.”
Willa looked at her.
Hessa’s face was pale but sharp.
“We send to the sister. Invite her here or meet at Red Creek. Not Northroad.”
Perrit winced.
“She may not come.”
Hessa smiled.
“Then make the invitation sound less like a trap than whatever everyone else is offering.”
“I am a trader, not a poet.”
Riksa said, “Good. Poets are how we got some of this.”
Willa looked at the map.
Bluebank scout missing. Pike mud. Redjaw coins. Hessa’s memory of Torren’s father. Northroad waiting to chew everything into rumor.
The next trouble had already begun.
And this one was not asking politely at the gate.
It was laying tracks.
Mud on boots.
Coins in old boxes.
Names in other people’s mouths.
Willa placed her hand flat on the map table.
“We find what Arlen found.”
Torren stood beside her.
“Then we find him.”
The mark warmed between them.
Not because the danger had lessened.
Because this time, when the road opened its mouth, they did not step toward it separately.
They stood beside each other while Pike Hollow gathered around the map, spring mud drying on boots, old ghosts waking under thaw, and rumors already running faster than any wolf.
Outside, the lower yard mud waited.
Black.
Ash-flecked.
Ready to be used as evidence by anyone dirty enough to carry it.