CHAPTER 28 ALEK
ALEK
I’ve barely slept in days, but we’re probably going to be dead in a matter of hours, so I imagine I can put it off a little longer.
Callyn is finally sound asleep, so I brush a kiss along her temple and slip out of the dusty bakery.
The rain has eased off a bit, turning to a drizzle from a gray sky.
It’s turned the lane into a pit of mud stretching all the way back to the forge.
Jax has been hammering for an hour, and maybe that’s why I can’t sleep.
I honestly have no idea what could be taking all this time. That bolt wasn’t that big.
Clouds block the sun, but they don’t block the heat, making for a miserable day.
If the Truthbringers come, they’ll practically be able to take us unawares.
My eyes scan the landscape, looking for Tycho, but I only see those two Emberish soldiers sitting sentry at the end of the lane.
Now that it’s summer, the trees are lush and green, so I can’t see much beyond them, and I definitely can’t see very far into the forest. My lip curls, because they should be walking a patrol instead of just sitting there, and I’m ready to walk out and give them a piece of my mind.
Just as I’m about to step away from the bakery, one of them salutes the other, then heads into the trees himself.
Good.
No. Not good. I don’t know who I’m fooling.
He’s one man. I myself used to travel with two guards.
I know what kind of skilled warriors will be among the Truthbringers.
Tycho’s soldiers could be the best in the whole army and it won’t matter.
They can’t hold off dozens of armed men backed by scravers and magic.
I hate everything about this.
On the other side of the mountain, they’d likely say I deserve this ending, that fate brought this outcome to my doorstep for plotting against the king.
Luckily I don’t believe in fate.
I sigh and make my way up the lane to the forge.
I’m forty feet away when Jax notices me. He doesn’t look up, but he goes completely still for one spare second, and then his hammer resumes the rhythmic motion. Even at this distance, tension crackles between us. Earlier, in the barn, I could tell he wanted to take a swing at me.
Good. He can try. We’ll see how he feels about my sword.
He’s ignoring me now, so I don’t break my stride. When I’m ten feet away, he makes absolutely no acknowledgment of my presence, but it’s clear he knows I’m here.
“Where is the queen?” I call over the clanging of his hammer. “I need to speak with her.”
He completely ignores me.
I don’t have time for this. I stride forward, stopping when I’m on the other side of his anvil.
He stops hammering, but he still doesn’t look at me, instead turning to thrust the small piece of metal back into the flames.
He pulls at the bellows, and sparks fly, smoke billowing into the air.
It’s so hot in here, I don’t know how he can stand it.
Sweat blooms on my forehead immediately.
“I asked you a question,” I snap. “Where is the queen ?”
He yanks the iron out of the fire, then turns for the anvil. His movement is faster than I’m ready for, the glowing steel held out in front of him as he swings it wide.
I jerk back without meaning to, and he smirks, making me wonder if that was deliberate. But he just smacks the metal against his anvil and starts hammering again.
I don’t care if we’re outnumbered. I’m going to stab him.
No. I can’t. At least not until the weapons are done.
I inhale sharply through my teeth, but he glances up. “She’s sleeping,” he says, as if I’m an idiot for not figuring that out myself. He looks back at his task and starts swinging again. Plink- plink- plink. “So shut up.”
Ire swells to fill my chest, and I can’t imagine why Lady Karyl ever agreed to leave a note with this man. If fate exists, maybe it’s been foretold that I should shove him into the forge.
“If the queen is sleeping,” I grind out, “then where is Tycho?”
“I’m right here.”
He speaks from right behind me, and I jump a little.
They’re both so different from what I remember, and it’s putting me off balance.
Tycho and I have never liked each other, but in my eyes, he’s always been like a kitten swiping with its claws from the shadows beside a lion.
Powerless on his own, but an adversary couldn’t strike back without risking the wrath of the bigger predator.
But now it’s like he’s grown his own set of fangs. His eyes shift past me to Jax. “Did he touch you?”
I remember what he said in the barn about breaking every bone, and I immediately bristle, ready for a fight I don’t want. But I glance at the weeping wound on his shoulder, and my eyes narrow. Tycho is pale, his eyes shadowed with a combination of exhaustion and bruising.
“And what would you do if I did?” I say.
His expression darkens further, but Jax looks up without a break from his hammering. “He didn’t touch me,” he says flatly. “I told you before, no one wants to mess with hot iron.”
With that, he turns away from the anvil to thrust the small piece of metal into a waiting bucket of water. A bit of steam rises, and then he tosses the tiny steel onto the table.
It’s only then that I realize he’s fashioned a narrow arrowhead. Several of them are already lying on the table, waiting to be strung into arrows.
“Good.” Tycho’s brown eyes shift back to me. He might be injured, but there’s enough fury in his gaze that a lesser man might back down.
I don’t.
“What do you want?” he says. “If you’re here to cause trouble, you’re just wasting time—”
“I’m not.” I nearly feel my lip curling as I consider this next part, but I say, “I came to talk to you. We should have a plan.”
He stares at me for a solid ten seconds. “You want to make a plan with me.”
“Your soldier has already declared he will not act on the order of the queen—”
“And he shouldn’t. Would you obey Grey’s order?”
“That is beside the point—”
“What is your point?”
“If you’d shut up for a moment,” I growl, “I’d tell you.”
He clamps his mouth shut and glares. Beside us, Jax glances up, but then he thrusts the shortened length of Iishellasan steel into the fire and pulls at the bellows again.
“If you’re both going to be in here,” he says, “start sharpening those.” He nods at a pile of odds and ends toward the other end of the table. “There should be a whetstone or two under there.”
For a moment, neither of us moves, but then Tycho shifts past me, moving scraps of wood and lengths of dried leather until he unearths a few dusty stones. He takes two in one hand and brings them back.
He sets one on the table in front of him, and then, without warning, he flings the other one at me.
I swear and scramble to catch it. But because he immediately gets to work one- handed, I do the same. For a little while, the workshop is full of sounds: Jax and his hammer, and us with steel against stone.
But I’m glad for the work, because there’s something settling in this. Maybe it’s just because I’m doing something. An hour ago, Callyn chastised me for not doing exactly this, and maybe I should’ve taken it more seriously.
Eventually, Tycho says, “Alek. What were your thoughts?”
If he said it belligerently, I’d throw this whetstone back at him, but he sounds fairly genuine, so I keep my eyes on my work. “You’re injured, but you have two soldiers. Are they capable?”
“Yes.” Tycho glances at the blacksmith. “And Jax. He’s got killer aim.” He pauses, glancing past me down the lane. “And I’ve seen Callyn swing a sword.”
“So have I.” I set down the first sharpened arrowhead. “But she’s never fought in a battle.”
“She was in a battle right here,” Jax says coolly.
I want to scoff, but Tycho looks at him. “But she didn’t fight,” he says quietly. “There’s a difference.”
I wait for Jax to argue, but he doesn’t. He hesitates, and then he nods.
“You stopped the Truthbringers here once before,” I say. “How did you do it?”
“We got lucky,” he says. “And they didn’t have a scraver lending magic from their side.”
“But still,” I press. “How?”
“The king and I stood our ground from here,” says Jax. “I took out as many as I could with a bow, and he used his sword for any who got past. Tycho set a fire in the woods to trap them in the lane.”
I look between the two of them, waiting for more, but that’s all he says.
“That’s it?” I say.
Tycho nods. “Nakiis showed up with Igaa and some others, and they were able to help in the end, but for the most part . . . that’s it.”
I look down the lane toward Callyn’s barn again. “Does he have more scravers who can help?”
Tycho shakes his head. “I don’t think so. Not since Xovaar started terrorizing everyone.” He sets down an arrowhead and picks up another. “You saw what Nakiis looked like.” He gestures at his own shoulder. “You see what I look like. Do you blame them?”
“No.” I finish my second and reach for a third. “So that’s our advantage,” I say. “High ground?”
“Yep,” says Tycho.
“And because Lady Karyl has bonded with this Xovaar, she can heal any injuries more efficiently?”
“Yep.”
“And our entire armed force consists of”— I quickly count—“seven people?”
“Ah . . . yep.”
“Well, that’s a piss- poor plan.”
Tycho picks up his next arrowhead. “You can always leave if you don’t like it.”
I bristle again, and I have to remind myself of Callyn’s words in the carriage, about the way I set myself up as an opponent. It’s just so difficult to see the world through any other view.
“I came to you to discuss a way to succeed,” I say tightly. “Not to flee.”
His hand goes still against the whetstone, and then he nods. “That’s true. You did.” He pauses, then looks at me. “Forgive me.”
This might be the first time Tycho has ever offered me a genuine apology, and it’s so freely given that I’m nearly knocked sideways. I almost have to clear my throat. “The road is muddy, so that will slow the Truthbringers on foot.”