Breath of Angel (8 page)

“All right,” she said. “When I get to Redcliff, I’ll do as you say. But for now—please understand—I need to know I can trust you.”

“Can I trust you?”

She was taken aback. “Of course you can trust me. I’m a priestess.”

“I’m not talking about creeds or vows. I’m talking about you. Can you be
smart enough to know when keeping your mouth shut will save your own neck? And mine?”

“I … I don’t know.” She sank to her pallet.

“You’re never less than honest, are you?” He leaned against the window frame. “Let’s start with something small. A raiding party is camped two ridges away. Their plan was to attack us at dawn.”

“That’s something small?”

“Mouth shut.”

She pressed her lips together and folded her hands in her lap.

“I found a lookout and impressed upon him the importance of taking a message to their leader, forbidding him to attack us.” He tied two corners of his cloak to the bottom of the lattice. The moonlight split into shards as he closed the lattice, leaving the cloak hanging out the window.

Questions filled Melaia to bursting, but she swallowed them.

“I hope that works,” he said. “We’ll know when the cock crows.”

“Does the innkeep know?” she blurted, then covered her mouth.

“A question worth asking. She doesn’t know I left, but she knows raiders are near. Weapons are gathered, the city alerted. She’s placed a couple of archers on the roof.” He squatted in front of Melaia, took her hand, and slipped a hilt into it. “A knife,” he said. “Sharp. Just in case.”

A rush of warmth ran through her at his closeness. A new way to ward off the chill, she thought, immensely glad he couldn’t see that she was flustered.

“You’ve never held a knife.” His voice smiled.

“Only a kitchen knife.”

“It’s not so different. With a kitchen knife, you don’t swing it about, right? If you must use this knife, be deliberate. You’ll probably get only one chance to strike, so hit hard and up. Throat, eye, midchest under the ribs if there’s no breastplate.” He released her hand. “Lay it somewhere nearby while you sleep.”

The chill of the room returned full force as Melaia realized what he was saying. Stab someone? She closed her eyes against the vision of what the hawk
had done to the angel in Navia. To be the cause of such bloody wounds—she couldn’t do it.

She shoved the knife under her pack and wiped her clammy hands on her skirt. “If the raiders don’t come,” she said, “I’ll return your knife tomorrow.”

“Keep it. It belonged to the man on the stretcher.” Trevin dragged his pallet to the wall under the window and lay down.

“He died?” Melaia curled up on her own pallet, wrestling with both sadness and guilt. She might have helped him. Might have saved him. She’d never know.

“I should tell you I sometimes fight terror-dreams,” said Trevin. “If I wake yelling, feel free to shake me. Slap me if you need to.”

She rose on one elbow. “Truly?”

“Another question.” He yawned. “Ah, well. You’re wise not to trust me.”

T
he cockcrow woke Melaia. As the caravansary came to life, animals brayed and nickered, people coughed and spoke tersely. She sat up and rubbed her eyes. Trevin already knelt at the window, peering out the openings in the latticework. She took a pinch of anise seed and crunched on it, releasing the clean, sharp sweetness. Then she joined Trevin at the window and squinted through a half circle at the thread of light edging the horizon.

“Nothing yet.” Trevin’s breath smelled of anise. “They’ll attack as the sun blinds us full on.”

“If they attack.” She fingered the gray and red sides of his cloak knotted around the base of the lattice. She craned her neck to see if she could tell which side was displayed on the outer wall.

Trevin tugged her back down. “Some things you’re safer not knowing,” he said.

She started to question him, then bit her lip as a new thought hit her. If she wanted to trust him—and she did—maybe it truly was better not to know. This morning she didn’t want to go back to Navia. She liked this new freedom and the prospects of a new life. Surely for a priestess, affairs at Redcliff would not be as difficult as Trevin had portrayed them.

“There.” He shot up like a bird released from a snare. “On the ridge. An outrider.”

Melaia scanned the ridge under the pale-green-and-pink-streaked sky, marveling at how Trevin spotted anything so far away.

“He rode down into the cover of the trees,” said Trevin.

“But the sun’s not fully up yet.”

“Soon now. The rest of the raiders are hidden, watching for the outrider’s signal.”

Melaia hardly breathed. The caravansary churned with bumps, bangs, shouts, and the complaints of restless animals. Footsteps sounded overhead. Then the sun blinded her. She shaded her eyes and thought of the knife under her pack, but she couldn’t pull herself away from the window to get it. Trevin’s hand went to his dagger, but he made no other move as the minutes crawled by tortoise slow.

The world outside kept its silence as the sun rose. Trevin stared out the window. “The outrider again. Back up the hill.” He turned to Melaia, grinning. “They’ll not attack.”

“So you sent the raiders home empty-handed.”

“Not likely.” He began untying his cloak from the lattice. “They’ll not go home without plunder of some kind.”

“Will they attack our caravan as we travel north?” She noted that the gray side of his cape was toward the wall, the red side facing out. A signal for the outrider?

“Don’t worry about the caravan.” Trevin pulled in his cloak. “I strongly suggested the raiders go elsewhere.”

“You have that kind of authority?”

“I’m an envoy of someone who does. I sent them south.”

“South?” She gaped at him.

“That’s better than north.” Trevin slipped on his cloak, gray side out. “Pack up, and let’s get downstairs. The caravan master will want to leave as soon as he judges it’s safe.”

“And you’ll tell him it’s safe to journey north, because you sent the raiders
south
. Toward Navia.”

Trevin whirled, his finger to his lips. “I’ll not tell him, and you’ll not tell him.” His voice was low and stern. “No one is to know what you’ve seen and heard. If you let it slip, I’ll be forced to deny it and say that you and I … kept each other warm last night.
All
night.” He grabbed his pack. “I’ll meet you at the bottom of the stairs.”

Melaia glared after him, then turned and took her time gathering her belongings. Let him wait.

Amid clanking and jangling, neighing and lowing, the caravan assembled outside the caravansary walls.

Melaia perched on the front seat of the actors’ wagon beside the troupe’s stout leader, Caepio, whose eyes still held the dark puffiness of interrupted sleep. His actors, covered in cloaks, lay snoring in the back. Everyone in the caravan wore a similar groggy gaze, thanks to a short, worrisome night. Melaia suspected her eyes looked the same.

Trevin, leading his horse, walked up to her and held out a dried apricot. “This cost me dear,” he said, “but I mean it to be a guilt offering from a ruffian.”

Melaia took the golden leathered fruit. “For what?”

He lowered his voice. “For being rude to you last night—and this morning.”

“Your apology is accepted,” she said. “I absolve you of wrongdoing.”

“That sounds official.” He half smiled.

“It’s one advantage of having a priestess nearby.”

“I sent a messenger to Navia to warn them of raiders,” he said. “It’s the best I can do.”

Melaia hoped it would be enough. As she took a rich, sweet bite of apricot, a shout went up from the caravan master. Trevin mounted, and when the procession began snaking north toward Redcliff, he trotted ahead. Two draks glided high above. Melaia took some comfort in the fact that the birds didn’t look her way.

The innkeep, watching from the archway with her spear, held three fingers to her heart as the actors’ wagon passed. Caepio nodded to her and held up three fingers himself.

Melaia studied his drowsy face with its spot of dark beard in the center of his chin. “Are you an angel?” she asked. “Is the innkeep?”

He blinked at her sleepily. “Are you?”

Melaia laughed. “No, but I’ve met two. Maybe three.”

“Ah. Well, I was raised by an angel, though I can’t claim such a role myself. As for the innkeep, she’s a true angel and worthy. Which is why her inn is tolerably safe. The malevolents sense her light—an emanation of color, I’m told. At any rate the malevolents usually keep their distance.”

Melaia recalled Hanni mentioning a malevolent. “Who are malevolents?”

Caepio squinted at her. “Do my ears trick me, priestess? You know two angels but have no knowledge of malevolents?”

Melaia stared at her hands clasped in her lap atop the wrapped harp. “A fortnight ago I thought that after the fall of the Wisdom Tree, angels no longer lived in this world.”

“You’ve not heard a true and honest actor tell the tale then.” Caepio straightened and held up his forefinger. “Ah!” he began. Then he slumped. “Methinks it too early in the day to tell tales. Even true ones.”

“I’m a chantress myself. I’ve told the tale a score of times. But I think I learned the ending wrong. Does it have to do with malevolents?”

“Aye, it does, Chantress. You see, when the Wisdom Tree came to its despicable end, and the stairway to heaven with it, many angels were stranded in this world. Trapped, as it were. Some swore allegiance to the Second son. Or was it the Firstborn?” Caepio tapped the spot of beard on his chin. “Possibly both. There’s some disagreement about it. At any rate, those angels who reject the Tree are called malevolents.”

“What do malevolents look like?” she asked.

“No different from any other angel. I could be one, masquerading as an actor.” He raised one eyebrow and regarded her with an evil eye. “But I’m not.” His sleepy-eyed grin returned.

Melaia laughed. “So why do malevolents reject the Tree?”

“As it happens, Chantress, I’ve never felt like venturing close enough to a malevolent to ask. There’s great enmity between them and the Angelaeon—those
are angels loyal to the Tree. Other than that, all you need to know is to stay clear of the affairs of angels.”

“Are the raiders malevolents?”

“My guess is there’s a malevolent staging the raids. Maybe more than one. The raiders themselves are controlled by their dependence on gash, I hear. You know about gash?”

She nodded. “Do malevolents drink it?”

“They don’t need to. Physically, angels grow to their prime and age no further.”

Melaia thought about the Erielyon, Benasin, the innkeep. All in their prime. “Do you know anything about a debt between angels?” she asked.

“All I know about debt is seeing my fleshly father hauled to debtor’s prison, thus my adoptive angel parent. But I suppose angels have debts as much as humans do. Though if it’s an angel collecting, I’d not wish to be the debtor.”

Melaia curved her hand around the harp in its wraps, wondering if it could be the payment for a debt. If so, it should be in Benasin’s hands, not hers. Perhaps he was back in Navia or tracking her to Treolli. She drummed her fingers, thinking of the raiders headed south. Would Trevin’s message arrive in time? What would Hanni and the girls do?

“Do you journey to Redcliff—or beyond?” asked Caepio.

“Redcliff. I’m sent by the overlord of Navia to play the harp for the king.”

“The harp I saw yesternight? You intended to play for the wounded man, didn’t you?”

“I thought my music might soothe him, help him heal.”

“With that harp methinks you might resurrect him from the maws of death.” Caepio’s puffy eyes widened. “I saw the runes carved into it. They indicate its power. Do you know what they spell?”

Melaia shook her head.

“
Dedroumakei.
‘Awaken!’ If the runes speak true, I’d have liked to see the harp awaken the warrior yesternight.” Caepio glanced sideways at her. “You’d not consider joining our troupe, would you? We’ll be at Redcliff for a time.
After that, we journey to Navia. Then it’s south to Qanreef. With that harp—and a pretty chantress as well—we could keep any audience awake.”

“I’m pledged to Redcliff at the moment,” said Melaia.

Caepio placed his hand on his heart as if he had been wounded. “Pledged to another.” He sighed, then grinned. “Truly, if you ever wish to be free of the priesthood, you’d be welcome in our troupe.”

“Are you always traveling?”

“We circle ’round the kingdom. But when the wind blows cold, like birds we hie ourselves south, where the king keeps his winter palace. So I suppose we’ll renew acquaintance with you there.”

Melaia nodded, but she wondered if a priestess would overwinter with the court or be expected to bide the cold season at the temple in Redcliff. Where would a kingsman who worked with draks spend the winter?