Chapter 5
CHAPTER FIVE
O ur party travels in silence until we’re through the main gates of the Osraed outer compound, heading west toward the Nemoris border bridge.
Beans slows down to bring his massive black stallion alongside Applemint. I hadn’t realized how enormous the beast was (the horse, not the man) because he looked normal sized with Beans on his back. But Beans isn’t normal sized. Ditch—the horse’s ridiculous name—is easily so large that his back would be above my head if I stood next to him. Applemint nips at Ditch’s neck playfully as he matches her pace.
“Did the council explain our mission to you, Mika?” Beans’ deep voice rumbles.
“Princess Ofnemoris kidnapped. Dangerous. Need a sneak who can fight.” I shrug, hoping he doesn’t notice my surprise that we’re already on the mission. I shouldn’t have assumed they were only my escort into Nemoris.
“I guess that’s it in a nutshell. But there’s a lot more,” he says as he frowns toward Tovi and Riley ahead of us.
“Just over four moons past, our queen received a missive from King Stol Oferdu. A Nemorisborn man had snuck into his castle, completely undetected, and attacked his doxies. Tried to blow them up with some kind of explosive.”
Beans tips his head in my direction as if he’s trying to figure me out. I try not to squirm under the scrutiny. Switching to a smile, he continues. “The king stated that he had managed to capture the man responsible, and he was in his dungeons awaiting trial and execution. However, he wanted restitution from Nemoris, of course.” He rolls his eyes. “He demanded a Gifted healer to come and heal every single one of his doxies, and since he has many and they were in varying states of injury, it would take a few weeks. He didn’t want to risk using his own healers in case they were needed elsewhere.”
It dawns on me that we aren’t speaking about Nemuel, the 15-rev-old youngest Princess Ofnemoris, but of Amarilyss—a Gifted healer who resumed her place as first Princess Ofnemoris when she came-of-age—though only Nemoris recognizes her as royalty.
A Patron of the Divine being named a princess caused all kinds of controversy. She will never be allowed to inherit the throne, nor can she produce any heirs. The queen technically owns Amarilyss and her Gifts. Speculations ran rife about Queen Neoniri getting her hands on documents to prove that she was her daughter.
“But why send the princess?”
Beans is giving me another calculated look and I hope he’s not noticed my inner ruminations of Divine law.
“Firstly, Nemoris is the only country to treat Patrons as anything other than property, so technically Lyss wouldn’t be a princess in the king’s eyes, only a Gifted healer to be used. Secondly, his stipulations were only that it had to be a female healer. We’re fairly confident he knew that all other Gifted healers across Nemoris are male, but?—”
“Wait,” I interrupt. “Why did the healer have to be a female?”
“Because he didn’t want to risk a male touching his doxies,” Beans says patiently, even though my questions and interruptions are surely grating on his nerves.
“Well, that doesn’t clarify anything, what about the king’s male doxies?” I laugh.
Beans contemplates me for a moment, before kicking Ditch forward between Tovi and Riley.I can’t quite hear everything being said, but he’s asking about male doxies.
Beans drops back after a few moments. “Do you know for certain he has male doxies or is it speculation?”
“Either he has male doxies, or he’s lied to the Osraed council when he’s purchased male Nulls. All the bills of sale for male Nulls have said they’re to be a Royal doxy Oferdu.”
You cannot purchase a Null unless you specify exactly what position they will fill in your country. Before I was assigned work as a nanny, and during the time of the petitions to oust me, I worked in the Registry.
Each country has its own set of records separate from the Patron’s life records. Erdu was the country I looked after both times. I filed a copy of any bills of sale, updated any deaths, and mostly ticked off scheduled check-ins. My least favorite part of the work was whenever I had to check a request for information, confirming someone was who they said they were. When they weren’t, it was a safe bet that their life was forfeit.
Beans has one hand on his hip, and the other is absentmindedly stroking his neatly trimmed, bright orange beard. “Hmm.”
Tovi suddenly punches Riley in the shoulder, and then her horse is running at full gallop. Riley recovers quickly and chases after her.I look at Beans in alarm, but he smiles in their direction and shakes his head as if it’s a totally normal interaction for two people on a royal mission.
“If the princess went willingly to Erdu, how is it kidnapping?” I ask, continuing the conversation.
“Right,” he says with a start, as if I woke him from a stupor. “Well. Lyss went as requested within a few days since it would take her almost a moon to get there via horse and escort. Not wanting to waste an avyon.”
Avyon’s are enormous creatures of flight. They have the skin of a reptile with plumes of thin feathers covering their heads so that only the wide mouth full of needle-sharp teeth and beady black eyes can be seen. Originating in Sadori, countries now breed their own, though only a handful are born every decade. The creatures are so large that up to five people can be seated on their backs with the aid of a contraption, allowing them flight across the world. Avyon’s can cover a week’s travel by horse in only a day or two.
Less than twenty mature avyons in the world means they’re only used in the most special—or dire—of occasions. And a demand by a foreign country to heal your doxies doesn’t equate to an emergency.
I’ve never seen one in person, or at least not close up. From a distance or in the sky, as they shoot by at terrifying speeds, they make an impressive sight to behold. People will stop mid-conversation when the loud beat of their wings is heard to watch them in awe.
“So, a moon to get there, plus a week or two to cure every doxy, and a moon to come home. Two-and-a-half moons at most,” Beans says as he counts on his fingers. “A week after she was due to be back, the royal family hadn’t heard from her and started to worry.They contacted the King Oferdu, who said she had left as planned the moon prior, and he assumed she was already home.”
“He lied?” I ask, observing the large man with his arms crossed, trusting Ditch to know where to go.
“That’s the going assumption. We investigated for a couple of weeks, and aside from a few random people, no one saw her leave.”
“But there were people who saw her leave?”
“Well, here’s the thing. Everyone who said they saw her, eventually admitted that they didn’t see her, only that they knew someone who had. But we couldn’t find a single person that clapped eyes on her themselves.”
“Hmmm. What about her escorts?”
Beans is nodding, stroking his beard again. “Gone.None of them were allowed to be near the doxies’ wing in the castle. Oferdu guards would escort her between there and her room in the healer’s wing every morning and night. Up until her supposed departure, everything was reported as smooth.” His expression is somber as he looks down at Ditch’s neck. “Four of the best Royal guards and two Gifted Patrons all disappeared and never made it home to their families.”
“To what end? No offense to the princess, but Gifted healers aren’t exactly rare.”
“We can only speculate. She’s particularly Gifted in that she can heal what ails the mind as well as the physical body. But we are unsure why that would be worth waging a war over.”
I had forgotten about that. Amarilyss is over five revs older than me and left Osraed more than a decade past. The Gifted Princess Ofnemoris has the ability to heal the mind, but I have no idea how that works.Most healers can focus the Divine into physical wounds, encouraging them to heal rapidly. I’ve heard it described as being able to see what needs to be fixed and imagining it happening—like gluing a broken bone or knitting flesh together. But how does one know what needs to be fixed in someone else’s mind?
“What happened to the accused man? Was he trialed?”
“He was executed before Nemoris could claim him for questioning. Again, we found not one witness to his crimes, more of the same bullshit. Not that we were able to question his doxies who would have actually witnessed it. Same with his trial. Though we did confirm that his execution was a spectacle and people really did witness that themselves.”
I’m beginning to wonder what the Silent Assassin is going to be able to do when it sounds like all the investigations have been done.
Beans whistles to get Riley and Tovi’s attention after a few hours of silent riding. “Let’s find somewhere to make camp for the night in Osraed before we take the main road toward Nemoris.”
“Why are we even going to Nemoris and not straight through to the bridge into Erdu?” I ask.
“Well, we aren’t exactly going to go knocking on the king’s door and ask where he’s keeping the princess, are we? Stealth and discretion and all that,” Riley says, with amused sarcasm.
“Not what I asked, but I appreciate the input.” I roll my eyes with a smile. “Beans?”
Beans is hiding a smirk under his hand as he fingers his rather elaborate mustache. “What Riley is trying to say, is that we’re going to enter Erdu from Nemoris.”
“Won’t that take double the time?”
“Officially, we’re only in Osraed to collect you and return to Nemoris within two weeks. If we don’t, the Nemoris gate peacekeepers will file a report,” Tovi answers me, not looking at anything in particular as she runs her thumb along a full and sharp-looking eyebrow. As if waking from a trance, her vision hones in on me watching her. Large, angled eyes narrow at me, and lips—already not very full, though beautifully defined—became a thin line. She really doesn’t like me.
“That, and we have already used up every single favor we had, traveling by way of Osraed into Erdu unofficially, searching for Lyss ourselves. Next time we pass through the Erdu gate, it would be reported,” Beans clarifies, getting down from Ditch.
“Stealth and discretion?” I ask, smirking sideways at Riley, who waggles his eyebrows at me.
“Exactly. We’re headed to a small cottage in Nemoris to stable the horses and pick up one more member of our party, before continuing on foot.”
I swallow my displeasure that being on foot will mean this will be an even longer journey. I want to ask more, especially about the other person joining us, but Tovi's bored and increasingly hostile expression suggests I cool my curiosity so we can make camp quickly in the waning daylight.
It’s been a beautiful cloudy day in Osraed, even if a little cold and windy, as the season dictates. Though it’s a pretty cold and windy country most of the time, we’ve been blessed with a pleasant first evening on the road.
We’re on a flat plain away from the main road for privacy. A few massive ollie trees are dotted around, the wind making a rustling sound through the endless canopies of leaves and branches. You can stand at the base of an ollie tree and not see the sky for how dense they are, but their branches don’t actually start for easily twelve or fourteen feet up the trunk. I wonder what they’re trying so hard to hide in there. Are the rustling of their leaves actually the whisper of secrets?
Tovi is tending to the horses, Beans is chopping some firewood with a massive axe, and Riley is making some food over a basic fire.
This useless, retired assassin-nanny is standing awkwardly doing nothing but imagining the conversations of fucking trees.