Chapter 8
CHAPTER EIGHT
THOMAS
Target met with Topic today. Topic seems to have strengthened ties with mages.
Assumptions based on prior knowledge of Topic and length of conversation, which exceeded three hours and featured a meal.
Overheard: “Fennix is theirs, but temporarily.” No other information.
Target did not discuss meeting despite encouragement.
Target was in high spirits and offered additional jewels valued approximately forty gold in total, accepted, and a trip to his estate, accepted, will be out of contact for some time.
Target appears amorous, emotionally connected, and trusting at the time of this missive.
Safety level: cider —Coded missive from Apple to Nightingale
La’Angi Keep
I’d been daydreaming of my Rose and my children a moment before I spotted the shadowy figure in front of my door.
Ice blew through my veins. The figure lifted a hand in a subtle but familiar gesture that thawed some of that cold dread.
My heart drummed too quick as I lifted my hand in response to their greeting.
“What’re you doing here?” I asked him, letting myself into the rooms allocated to my family.
“I won’t linger,” Kaelson promised, stepping in behind me and going straight to the fire. “Have you noticed anything odd, Tom?”
“Like?”
He tossed a log onto the coals someone must’ve fed while I was out today. “What time do you leave her door, normally?”
They’d all let themselves into the main room. Last night, I’d stood out in the cold entry chamber only briefly before I’d stomped off. I’d needed the extra sleep I’d got. I don’t usually go quite so early, but… “Always relatively early. The lady doesn’t stay up late.”
“And Chay, he doesn’t have rooms in the castle, does he? He stays in the tower.”
I tried the best I could not to imagine the way his hands had been all over her, but I felt the pulse in my temple starting up all the same. “He does.”
“So, you wouldn’t have seen if he left last night.”
The mirthless laugh escaped before I could hold it in. “No. No, I wouldn’t.”
He straightened with the click of a joint in his leg. I turned away, scrubbing my hand over the face. Shut up, Tom. She needs you to shut up. The vile cur hadn’t even married her yet.
“No love lost, eh?” Kaelson pressed.
“Not a lot.” I poured myself a jug of the now-cold tisane I’d brewed yesterday. Or was it the day before? “You think he’s your archer?”
“I think he knows who is. Did you see him flop like a fish today?”
Mayhap it was all the secrets I carried, but when Kael offered me his hipflask, so help me, I took it, and fell into closest chair. “You worried about it?” I asked, taking a pull of the knappchs and then passing it back.
He sipped, but sparingly. “’Course I am. Someone gutted the Fillbridge Boys entire outfit days ago. They left me a message, telling me off for not noticing. On my desk. The barracks was locked, Tom.”
“The Fillbridge Boys?” I asked, raising my brows as I took a turn of the flask, trying not to think about whom it could’ve been.
Audrey had held that sword like a child.
But I’d seen her with a bow in her hands. On horseback, no less. Our stewpots were full of the game she’d brought in.
“Always hoped those yellow-bellied cunts would get what was coming,” I said, trying to chase away the thoughts. “Wait for a survivor to poke their head out, tell us what’s what. Meanwhile, these pirates, eh?”
“Fuck the pirates,” Kael said, the words low. “Whoever did it, Tom, they’re scary. I need to know.” He set the flask in between us. “Chay isn’t the only one flopping, Tom. Come on.”
My belly twisted up tight. “I don’t know, Kael. I don’t.” I met his eyes, but I didn’t reach for the liquor again. “And I will not guess.”
He sat back slowly, studying my face, his eyes narrow and lips thin.
There was only one person in this crypt I’d prioritize at the cost of everything. The one person I’d sworn a blood oath to protect.
I’d betrayed her already.
The wind screamed through the room, carrying with it the bite of snow, though the shutters were closed tight.
“She’s too well rested,” he said, slowly. “Even if she could…she’s tired, but she’s not out-all-night-cutting-throats tired.”
I didn’t stop to wonder which she Kaelson suspected. “We’d know, wouldn’t we?” I asked, bitterly, hoping he might let me distract him.
“Fuck off,” he said, irritated. “If it isn’t Chay, and it can’t be Audrey, who?”
I thought of the way Isolde’s lips would curl into a smile that never once touched her beautiful soulless blue eyes. “I told you, Kael. I leave early. I didn’t see anything, and I won’t guess.”
He sat across the table from me, his face in hard lines. “Tom,” he said, quietly, “when I tell you that place was a massacre, I want you to remember that wolfrun we came across.”
The cold was so fierce it burned. My nose started to run. The stink of blood and earth filled my head. I could feel the weight of the torch in my hand. The blood had been so thick, our boots made sucking noises on our feet as we walked.
“Now, I’m not telling you that you can’t maintain your loyalty,” he said, softly. “I’m just saying when there’s someone about who can do that and not bat an eye, well, mayhap the Fillbridge Boys weren’t so bad. D’you know what I’m saying?”
I took another pull of the liquor and remembered the way Isolde had let Audrey take the lead in the hunt, how she’d been a step behind Audrey as she’d found the deer she’d downed, its eyes wide. How she’d watched in silence as Audrey slit its throat, then dressed it.
Isolde, she’d overseen it all.
“I know what you’re saying,” I promised. “But the Fillbridge Boys are dead, and that someone, they’re still here. For now, they’re working with us.”
“If they change their mind, we’ll never know it.”
A woman’s wail filled my head. I shook it, trying to dislodge the sound. The crisp sweetness of the apple liquor filled my brain, but the scream rattled around it.
“Mayhap that’s good,” I told him. “Go sleep, Kael.” I snatched the flask from the table to finish it off, knowing damned well it wouldn’t drown out the dreams but keen to try anyway. “We know better than to worry about things that go bump in the night.”
He stared at me for a time over the empty flask. When he took it, it was with grim resignation. “If that’s how it is,” he said. He stomped the snow off his boots before he left the room.
But there was no snow to be seen.