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What Kaylin needed at this very moment was not to start bleeding. Not while she was dressed for intimidating company and surrounded
by concerned Barrani who noticed and remembered everything. But she didn’t retreat from the door. The mark had been relevant
to Nightshade’s survival in the end; if she hadn’t started bleeding, she’d never have raced to his fief. It was heating up;
she lifted a hand to her cheek both to touch it and to cover it.
She then knocked on the door. Helen could open the door but wouldn’t without permission from its occupant. She accorded the
cohort the same respect for privacy that she accorded Kaylin.
The door did open. It was Mandoran. He looked at her, blinked, his eyes shading into the color of surprise before returning
to their regular blue. He took in the dress, probably noticed the ring, certainly noticed the hair, and stopped on her face.
“Your cheek.”
“Is it bleeding?”
“Can’t tell—you’re covering it. You probably don’t want to bleed on that dress.”
“It’s unlikely to be damaged or stained, unlike my regular clothing.”
Mandoran shrugged. Fair enough. “Are you here because of that?”
Kaylin nodded. “Yvonne isn’t due for another hour—”
“Forty-five minutes, dear.”
“—and my cheek was warm, so I thought I’d check in on Nightshade before I joined the rest of our forces.”
He chuckled. “Sedarias is marshaling the cohort. I’m not sure she’ll like what you’re wearing. The ring, yes. The dress?”
He shrugged. Mandoran and Terrano had argued that Kaylin’s attire was irrelevant. Helen had argued that inappropriate clothing
could be wielded against Kaylin if An’Tellarus wanted to threaten her.
Kaylin privately thought An’Tellarus would come up with her own excuses if that was her intent—she didn’t need to hang them
on anything factual.
Teela, however, had relented. If she needs to find offense, let’s make her work for it, shall we? That, Kaylin understood. It changed the intent behind clothing. Not wearing whatever happened to be both comfortable and
lying around became a statement, an act of defiance.
“Well, Teela said—”
“I heard. But . . . I’m not sure she meant for you to wear that dress. Why did you choose that one?”
“It’s the most significant dress I own? I mean, I own it for now.”
“You’re going to be in a lot of trouble if it dematerializes while it’s on you.” Mandoran stepped out of the doorway and allowed
Kaylin to enter. “Let me go get you a towel. You really don’t want to bleed on the dress.”
“On the dress in specific, or on the dress before we have guests?”
“Why can’t it be both?” He turned and sprinted through an arch to the right.
That left Kaylin alone. She walked toward the bedroom in which Nightshade lay abed.
As she approached, her cheek began to ache.
Her hand covered it, because she was certain Mandoran was right: no blood should land on this dress.
She bent over at an angle to stop blood from landing on her skirts, her palm covering the Erenne mark. She could also see
the faint trace of golden light from the exposed Marks on her arms.
Annarion rose from the chair he’d been sitting in. “What are you doing?”
Fair question; one didn’t usually stand bent over at right angles, hand on cheek. Mandoran must have filled him in, because
he approached immediately, and Mandoran wasn’t far behind. Annarion took the towel from Mandoran’s hand and immediately passed
it to Kaylin, cupping his hands beneath her face just in case anything fell before she could cover it.
“Why is your cheek bleeding?”
“I don’t know. Serralyn’s research into the Erenne mark led to Androsse, who was his usual self: a lot of condescension, not
a lot of information that might be useful. You caught everything he told us, right?”
Annarion nodded. “Lord Andellen has been investigating without pause. He believes—as you do—that the people who attacked my
brother are the same people who’ve been causing difficulty for the Lady. We also now believe that one or two of the Barrani
Terrano interacted with to free us from the Hallionne are among those attackers. Terrano likes to stay invisible because it
means he can’t be held responsible for anything he does if he can’t be seen—but it’s more than that.
“He doesn’t want the people who were our prior allies to recognize him, because he doesn’t believe we’ll be on the same side
now. He may have let slip his ability to move between dimensions—he’d’ve had to, to explain where we were and why we wanted
to escape. But he insists nothing he said could be useful to anyone who wasn’t us.”
“You don’t believe it.”
“No. Sedarias was closely vetting everything he said, and he did lie—but the lies he told were her lies. They were meant to entice. Eddorian’s brother was the most committed—but we know why, now.
He was like my brother. Like Calarnenne.
He wanted to free his abandoned brother.
He didn’t survive it whole—but that’s why Eddorian didn’t come with us.
He’s with Alsanis and his brother for the foreseeable future. ”
“If Eddorian’s brother could be healed—”
“Don’t think it. Eddorian knows what we know. He trusts you, as we do. But he won’t trust you with his brother’s safety or
well-being.”
“But if Iberrienne could talk, if he could tell us what the intent of his allies was, we might be able to intervene to save
Nightshade.” And the Consort. And possibly the Lake.
Annarion exhaled. “I know that,” he said, voice low, almost a snarl. His eyes were the darker shade of blue, his expression
gaunt. “But Eddorian’s feelings for his brother are similar to mine. He doesn’t care what Iberrienne did in pursuit of our
freedom. He only cares that he tried. He will not allow us—or Alsanis—to question Iberrienne. Even if we did, without some
mental cohesion on the part of his brother, we won’t get the information we need.” His grimace was deep, but it faded. “He’s
trying—for my sake. But Iberrienne is mentally a child—a young child. He’s happy with Alsanis. He’s happy with Eddorian—it’s
as if the memory of Eddorian is the only thing that allows him to function at all.
“It means that Eddorian was the strongest driving force of his actions.” Annarion lowered his head. “Your life was affected
by our fate. You didn’t even know about us. You didn’t come to the West March to rescue or preserve us. You came to the West
March for reasons of your own. And the green chose you. It didn’t speak through you; you weren’t the Teller. But your role
was to harmonize the jagged bits of story the green chose to bless us with. To make it clear. To make it resonant.
“And in the end, to free us. To bring us home. We don’t forget.
” He exhaled again, which was a neat trick, because his inhalation had been so quiet she’d missed it.
“The second time you wore the dress, you brought Bellusdeo her sisters. You brought the Keeper back to his garden, or his garden back to the Keeper—Serralyn’s not certain which. And you brought Mrs. Erickson home.
“Nothing bad has happened when you’ve worn that dress, but . . . it’s concerning that you’re wearing it now. An’Tellarus will
be here in half an hour.”
“Fifteen minutes,” Helen said, “if she arrives fashionably early. On time is generally fifteen minutes ahead of the stated
invitation time.”
“It’s An’Tellarus. She’s far more likely to be fashionably late, which is also accepted etiquette. Too early indicates eagerness;
too late indicates disdain. Too late implies the visitor believes consequences for disdain are, or will be, trivial.”
Kaylin had heard all this many times. Clearly, so had Annarion—but to Annarion, it was part of the bedrock of the life he’d
been born to. To Kaylin, it was unnecessary fuss. But here she was in the harmoniste’s dress, a towel pressed to her cheek.
“I really think you should change,” Mandoran said, his tone far more soothing than Annarion could manage right now. “You don’t
know what caused the Erenne mark to bleed—and you won’t know if it won’t start again while you’re entertaining your guests.”
“Start again? I don’t know if it’s going to stop in time.”
“Have you tried to heal it?”
This was a perfectly reasonable question. Unfortunately, the answer was no. Kaylin didn’t consciously heal herself; the Marks
did that. Small nicks, scratches, bruises—they didn’t persist in her daily life. She didn’t even think about them beyond a
curse word or two. But the bleeding itself, the Erenne mark, seemed immune to the power of these Marks.
“I do not advise you to make the attempt now,” Helen said, her tone unusually severe. “It appears that An’Tellarus has arrived unfashionably early.”
“She probably let Yvonne choose,” Kaylin said, pressing the towel more firmly against her cheek.
Hope squawked.
“Sure—you go downstairs and say hello while I try to stop bleeding.” To her surprise, he pushed himself off her shoulder,
gliding his way to the closed door. The door opened to allow him to leave.
Her cheek still hurt. Even pressing the towel against it, she felt like her skin was being abraded. Was it because she was
standing in such close proximity to Nightshade? Was it because he was trying to somehow communicate?
She placed the back of her free hand on his forehead. “He’s feverish,” she told Annarion—who probably knew it already.
Annarion frowned. As Kaylin lifted her hand, he replaced it with his own. “He’s not. Not when I touch him.”
This wasn’t the confirmation either of the two expected. “Mandoran, you check.”
“Sedarias is screaming in my ear,” Mandoran replied. “Yvonne isn’t at the door yet, but she’s walking toward it.” He did,
however, place a hand on Nightshade’s brow. “I’m with Annarion. He’s not feverish to my touch.” He then did what Annarion
hadn’t: he placed a hand on Kaylin’s forehead. “You’re hot.”
Great.
“Barrani don’t catch mortal illnesses, right?”
“Not usually, no.”