Dragonsbane (Book 3) (42 page)

“Well, now that we’ve got our Wright, all that’s left is to find our favorite mischief-maker,” Lysander declared. “Where’s the Dragongirl?”

Every fleeting shred of happiness he’d felt was gone in an instant, drowned in the depths of their stares.

Kael fell heavily on his knees and his eyes sank to their boots. Their voices swam in his ears. They asked him things — he couldn’t answer. He barely heard it when Morris thumped down beside him. He barely felt the stocky arm that draped across his back.

“What’s gone wrong, lad? Whatever it is, we’ll sort it out,” he croaked. “You’ve got the whole clump of us here, now. We’ll do whatever we can.”

Slowly, Morris coaxed the story from him. Kael told them of the wildmen’s battle at Hundred Bones, how the Earl had trapped them, how Kyleigh had fallen into the river. He told them everything he’d done to try to save her.

“Her bones are frozen. She won’t wake …” Kael clenched his teeth and Morris’s arm tightened its grip, steadying him. “Nothing I’ve tried has worked. I don’t know what to do. There’s nothing I
can
do. She’s just … Kyleigh’s …”

A tiny pair of hands clasped either side of his face. They turned his chin upwards, lifting him until he found himself staring at Nadine. “Take me to her,” she said softly.

The firmness of her stare made Kael’s heart lift a little — made the hope come back.

“I promise you I will not leave her side until she wakes.”

*******

They’d made their camp a few short miles from Hundred Bones. Beyond the river’s crossing lay the final season: now the wildmen stood in the winter reaches of the mountains.

Only a few scraggy trees still clung to the slope. The sparse grass was shrunken back against the rocks in surrender. And everything, from the trees to the grass was sealed in a shell of ice.

It looked as if the land had been encased in glass. Branches hung perfectly preserved, their buds frozen in time. In some places, faded blooms sat in drooping clumps — evidence that life once blossomed in the wastes. It was as if the winter had struck them so fiercely that the land hadn’t had a chance to wilt. Now it was frozen forever, trapped in a cage of ice.

Kael had the pirates and the giants set up camp at the top of a hill, while the wildmen spread out beneath them. His friends’ bodies weren’t as accustomed to the cold. He had the craftsmen mold them shelters from stone. They used the armor they’d scavenged from the Earl’s men to make little firepots, and turned their swords into spits. Even with the icy earth spread all around them, the camp was warm and well-fed.

Their biggest worry was Titus.

In the days following their battle at Hundred Bones, Kael had begun to realize that he’d made a very serious mistake. He remembered what Kyleigh had told him about how the Earl stalked his enemies. She’d said that he would only strike once, and the only blow he’d deal was the ending one.

Now as Kael thought back, he realized the fort outside of Tinnark had only been a test. Once Titus knew what the wildmen were capable of, he’d done exactly what Kael had done to Griffith: he used the warriors’ battle lust against them. He’d goaded them into a fight, knowing they would follow — he’d tricked them into leaving the craftsmen vulnerable.

But Kael had struck back. He’d countered in a way the Earl hadn’t been expecting … he hadn’t been expecting it because he’d known the craftsmen were weak. Mercy’s sake,
how
had he known about the craftsmen? Had he been spying on them?

And even though Titus had clearly hoped to destroy the craftsmen at the river’s middle, he’d been prepared for the worst. He’d brought his catapults along, knowing full well that he might have to use them — prepared to break the river and strand his army at the mountain’s top, just so long as he sank the wildmen first.

The more Kael dwelt on it, the tighter his stomach twisted. Perhaps Titus had meant to end them at Hundred Bones … but perhaps that’d merely been another test. Perhaps the
real
battle was yet to come.

For all he worried, there was one thing the Earl knew for certain: Kyleigh marched with the wildmen. He’d sent his falcons on her the moment his army began to lose its grip. Kael realized why the birds had been attacking so frantically now. Those had been Titus’s blows — he’d been trying to force her into the river, to eliminate his greatest enemy.

And unless he was completely blind, he now knew that Kael would do anything to save her.

“The thing about Titus is you’ve got to get him quick, lad,” Morris said. “You’ve got to get him before he gets you.”

Kael was beginning to understand this. He’d come to realize that every moment he sat idle would allow Titus to add another detail to his plan. But he couldn’t march on — not without Kyleigh.

Nadine had made good on her word. She’d spent the last several days with Kyleigh, tucked right in beside her. Sometimes Elena lay on Kyleigh’s other side, sometimes it was Gwen. But Nadine insisted it be someone she knew.

“A woman as strong as Kyleigh will not lose the will to fight, not even in her sleep. Familiar voices, the beating of familiar hearts — these things will heal the wounds within. If the cold is truly in her bones,” Nadine had said with a determined smile, “it will not last for long. I will speak to her until it melts.”

Kael wasn’t sure he believed that being surrounded by familiar bodies would heal her. But as he’d tried everything else, he was willing to do whatever Nadine said — even if that meant he was only allowed to visit twice a day.

The first morning he’d gone to see Kyleigh, he swore there’d been a little color in her face. That evening, he’d held her hand for as long as Nadine would let him. He wasn’t allowed to tell her how badly he wanted her to wake, or mention how furious he was with her for having tried to fight his hold at the river. Instead, he told her stories. He said things he thought would’ve made her laugh.

And slowly, it began to work.

That morning when he’d gone to hold her hand, there’d been a tiny bit of warmth beneath the frost. He’d pressed her palm against his chest and kept it there for an hour, trying to will more warmth into her blood. It was only after Nadine had stomped her tiny feet at him that he’d reluctantly gone outside.

Now it was nightfall, and Kael had circled the whole camp once already because he was far too thrilled to sleep. On his second turn, Morris had waddled out to join him.

“Titus is like a bit of arrow,” the old helmsman croaked on. “Pull him out right away, and you’ve only lost a little blood. But let him sit, let him fester, and he’ll kill you. That’s something the rebels never figured out.”

Kael nodded absently.

The clouds had retreated and frost-covered blades of grass shimmered in the moon’s unfettered glow. The fires from their camp were little more than dots in the distance. He’d wandered too far out, listening to Morris. He knew he ought to turn back … just a little further, and he would.

“I underestimated him,” Kael said bitterly. “I thought the wildmen lost because they didn’t know how to battle a real enemy. I had no idea Titus was so …”

“Smart? Aye, that he is, and he
knows
he is — and it’s a cruel sort of smart, too. That’s the worst kind, if you ask me,” Morris muttered. “But you’ve held him off well, lad. If anybody’s got a half-chance against him, it’s you.”

Kael wasn’t so sure.

They walked in silence for a moment — which seemed to be about the only amount of silence Morris could handle. It wasn’t long before his chattering billowed up once more.

“I saw an old friend of mine back in that little village. Never thought I’d see him again.” Morris’s mouth cracked into a wide grin as he looked up at the stars. “I’d always wondered what’d become of Baird.”

Kael’s stomach twisted into a knot. “You knew him?”

“Aye, he was a bard, back in the old days. When the Whispering War broke out, he signed on as a courier. He was a blasted good one, too,” Morris muttered with a shake of his head. “He carried the King’s secrets across the realm. He’d stride straight to the front lines with an order to pull back, if he had to. There wasn’t a thing he wouldn’t have done to save Midlan, and he proved it … did he show them to you?”

Morris touched a nub to the corner of his eye, and Kael’s throat tightened. “He said he cut them out himself.”

To his horror, Morris inclined his head. “Gouged them with a rock, he did. Baird could’ve talked his way out of anything — the rebels only caught him because they stuffed rags in their ears. They were going to turn him over to the Falsewright —”

“Deathtreader, you mean.”

The harsh edge of his voice wasn’t lost on Morris. The old helmsman sighed. “Figured that out, did you? Well, you’re a smart lad. You were bound to find out eventually.”

“I wish you would’ve just told me,” Kael said, quickening his pace. Instead of turning back, he marched higher up the slope.

“You wish that, eh?” Morris grunted as he tried to keep up. His breath came out in wheezes. “Well, then … how come … you never asked?”

“How could I have thought to ask whether Deathtreader was the one who led the rebel whisperers?” Kael said hotly. “How could I have possibly guessed?”

“I wasn’t talking about … Deathtreader.” Morris’s crunching steps came to a halt. “I meant … about
these
.”

When Kael turned, Morris was staring at him. He held his gauntlet-capped nubs before his face — a face that
Kael likely wouldn’t have recognized, had it not been attached to Morris’s stocky body. His eyes had sunk so deeply into their pouches that he could barely see them. The mouth beneath his wiry beard hung slack.

“I know Baird’s told you,” he whispered, his croaky voice broken. “He started singing it the moment Lysander said my name.”

Kael felt as if he stared at Morris from the lip of cavern, as if the man he’d known was tumbling out of reach — as if he would soon be lost forever. And more than anything, Kael didn’t want that to happen.

He would rather hear a lie.

“It doesn’t matter what Baird said to me. If you tell me it isn’t true, I’ll believe you — or don’t say anything at all.” Kael took a step towards him, as if that might somehow keep the cavern from devouring his friend. “I’ll never ask. I don’t have to know.”

“It don’t work that way, lad.”

“No.” Kael took a step back. The cavern opened its jaws. “You didn’t.”

“I did,” Morris said quietly. “I did, lad … I wrote those letters.”

Chapter 39

Choices

Kael could think of only one thing to say: “How could you?”

Morris’s stocky arms sank lower as his shoulders fell. “I was a fool, simple as that. Crevan asked it of me —”

“And you wagged your tail and went along,” Kael said scornfully. “Baird was right to call you the Dog.”

“He was. They all were. When Crevan asked me to write those letters, I did just that. But I’m no traitor,” Morris said sharply, thrusting a nub at the middle of Kael’s chest. “That’s something you got to understand, lad.”

“Well, I’m having a difficult time believing it.”

“The Kingdom was in a bad state,” Morris insisted. “The whisperers all scattered
after the Falsewright’s death. The ones still loyal to Midlan had lost their faith in the crown, and the rebels thought they’d be rounded up and executed —”

“And they were.”

“— but Crevan said he wanted the whisperers to come back. He said it was for the Kingdom’s sake. He said the regions couldn’t survive without their aid, and that the only hope he’d ever have of convincing them is if I did a bit of whispering.” His shoulders rose and fell. “I thought they had a chance, lad. What would you have done if you thought your people had a chance of saving themselves? And what if you thought they might miss that chance out of fear?”

Kael said nothing. He didn’t know what he would’ve done, but he was certain he wouldn’t have lifted a finger to help Crevan.

“He was different in those days,” Morris said quietly, as if he could read the thoughts flickering behind Kael’s eyes. “Banagher did a bad thing, driving the whisperers off. Crevan stood for Midlan when most others fled. He and this sorry clump of outcasts got the nobles rallied and brought the Kingdom back together. They were heroes, lad.”

“Kyleigh could see it in him,” Kael said vehemently. “She knew Crevan was a liar — she attacked him for it.”

“Aye, up in the towers where it was only just the two of them. Nobody in the King’s court knew what Kyleigh was. They didn’t like her, they didn’t trust her. So when Crevan stumbled down the stairs with his face sliced open, who do you think they believed?”

“
You
knew what she was. You told me you knew.”

Morris looked away. “Aye … and so I had more reason than most not to trust her. Look, lad — being a … a … well, being what she is didn’t exactly help things. We only went along with her because of Setheran. But when we saw what she done to our new King, we thought she was the enemy. It was only after Crevan started to turn that we realized we’d made a mistake.

“He called me into the throne room the evening after Kyleigh fled, I’ll never forget it,” Morris said somberly. “Crevan begged me to write those letters. He said he wanted to bring the Kingdom back together. And after everything he’d done, I … well, I believed him.

“Once I’d sealed the last letter, Crevan turned on me. He made sure I couldn’t undo it,” Morris said, holding up his nubs. “He made sure I couldn’t stop him. Then he locked me in one of the tower rooms. He was going to make me watch, see — he was going to stand me up in front of all the whisperers, just before the sword came down, and he was going to make sure they knew it was
me
who’d sold them.

“By the time Setheran found me, it was too late. The letters had already been sent. I told him what I’d done, and he could’ve killed me then. But instead, he snuck me out. He handed me off to Matteo and told me to keep with the pirates. Then he gave me that wallet,” Morris thrust a nub at the throwing knives strapped around Kael’s arm, “and he said to me:
you make sure he gets these.
‘Course, I didn’t know who
he
was —”

“Wait a moment.” Kael had already marched several paces away when a thought struck him. “Setheran died fighting in the Whispering War. There was no way he could’ve found you
after
…”

He spun to Morris, who raised his bushy brows. “Died in the war? No. Where’d you hear a thing like that?”

He’d read it in the
Atlas
.

Something that was a mix between anger and shock burned across his face as the realization sank in. “How, then? How did he die?”

“You really want to know, lad?”

He wasn’t sure. After what he’d learned about Morris, perhaps it would’ve been best not to find out. But his curiosity won out over his worry.

Morris sighed when he nodded. “Setheran died in Midlan. He died right there alongside all the other whisperers —”

“But he knew about the trap!” The words burst from Kael’s lungs, furious and shocked. “Why in Kingdom’s name would he go if he knew? How could he have been so foolish?”

Morris was quiet for a long moment. “I wondered that, too. I couldn’t believe it when I heard. Haunted me for years, it did. And then one day, this little redheaded lad from the mountains showed up aboard our ship … and it all came together.”

Kael’s mouth went dry. He knew what Morris was going to say before he even spoke. The horrible, icy weight crushed across his back. It made his knees bend in shock … sagged his heart with anguish.

“His son was dead — leastways, that’s what Setheran told us. Said he’d died just days after birth. His whole village mourned him for weeks. I thought maybe he’d been so hurt by it that he’d gone to Midlan as a way of … ending things,” Morris croaked, his voice broken by his whisper. “But the moment I saw you, I knew what they’d done.”

“
They
?” Kael’s stomach was gone. It’d finally slipped out the bottom of his chest — leaving a ragged, gaping hole behind.

“Setheran and Amelia were well-known in the court,” Morris said quietly. “Crevan expected them to come to Midlan. If they hadn’t turned up, he would’ve known something was wrong. Had they run, he would’ve chased them. The only way they could give you a chance, the only hope they had of keeping you a secret … they had to make sure Crevan would never go looking for you. They had to let him think he’d won. Don’t you see, lad?”

Kael did. He saw it through such a fearsome, angry burst of light that he could hardly think to stand.

There was nothing left inside him … for he realized that not one thing he’d done was truly his. Every victory belonged to Setheran — payment for the blood he’d wasted. And if he’d ever done anything worth an ounce of good, deserving of the light, then it belonged to Amelia. It all belonged to her.

Kael was a ghost standing upon borrowed ground — one foot supported by the mounds of each grave. And he realized with an anguish that sank him to his knees that he would never be able to repay them. Nothing he ever said or did could possibly measure up to the gift they’d given him.

He would be forever in their debt.

Morris must not have been able to hear the shocked gasps of Kael’s heart, because he croaked on without pause: “I know what you’re thinking, lad. It’s easy to turn your nose up at a story once you’ve closed the book. You can shake your fists and call us fools — but when you’re stuck between the pages, you can’t see what’s coming. I’d give anything to go back there,” Morris whispered, his eyes imploring. “I’d give anything to change what I’d done. But time don’t turn back. It only goes forward. Now you know the truth … so do what you got to do. It’ll be what’s fair.”

He spread his arms to either side, leaving his chest exposed. But Kael shook his head. “I’m not going to kill you.”

His mouth fell open beneath his wiry beard. “But, I … it’s my fault, lad. If I hadn’t wrote those letters, they never would’ve had to —”

“It isn’t your fault,” Kael said sharply — sharp, because he knew the fault was his.

As he stared at the ground between them, he began to understand the weight of blood. It couldn’t settle every score. It couldn’t right every wrong. Blood, when spilled for a purpose, could be worth its weight in gold. But he’d never much cared for gold.

No, there were far greater treasures to be had … gifts that only life could give.

“You told me once that I shouldn’t regret things, and now I see why. Mistakes are just part of our stories, aren’t they? We can’t always choose which monsters will rise in our path, but we can choose to face them. Our choices carry us to our ends.” Kael looked up and met the old helmsman in his watery eyes. “Time will run out on both of us eventually, Morris. And when it does … well, I’d rather have you by my side than buried somewhere in the mountains.”

Relief washed out over his eyes. He slammed Kael into the middle of his chest, crushing him in a stocky-armed embrace. “And that’s right where I’ll be, lad. Aye — that’s right where I’ll be!”

The way Morris had him crushed forced Kael’s chin up at the stars. He was staring at the pale flesh of the moon, wondering how he was going to untangle himself, when a shadow crossed through the light.

He recognized the twisted silhouette of one of the Earl’s falcons. Its short wings beat furiously and its body bobbed up and down — dragged by the weight of the dark object hanging from its talons.

Kael quickly pulled away from Morris and pointed upwards. The old helmsman’s eyes widened. He waved a stocky arm, gesturing for Kael to follow. “Come on, lad. If we’re lucky, that little devil’ll lead us straight to where Titus is hiding.”

“Shouldn’t we go back and get the others?”

Morris shook his head. “No time. You said you’ve been wondering why the Earl’s gone quiet — this might be our only chance to find out. Pick up your feet,” he called as he lumbered up the slope. “You can’t let a fellow with no hands and too much belly get out ahead of you!”

*******

The falcon didn’t travel far. Kael had expected to jog half the night. But instead, it flapped hardly a mile up the slope before it came back down to earth.

There was a small stone cottage hidden against a rocky face of the mountain. It was only large enough for a handful of men. Kael figured it must’ve been home to one of the Earl’s scouting troops, or perhaps it was worse — perhaps the cottage was merely the head of a larger force. It was close enough to their camp that Titus’s men could’ve traveled there with ease.

The falcon landed clumsily. It hopped up and rammed its head against the cottage’s small wooden door. “Rest!” it screeched. “Tired — rest!”

Light streamed sleepily onto the frozen ground as the door’s latched window cracked open. Then the whole thing swung on its hinges and one of the Earl’s soldiers leaned out. “Have you got it?”

“Yes!”

“Good. There’ll be another bird coming by to pick it up in the morning.” The soldier bent to work on the object attached to the falcon’s claws. There was a muffled
click
and the clink of chains as the object came free.

“Sore!” the falcon screeched as it hopped inside. “Hungry!”

“Yeah, there’s vittles on the fire. Make sure you’re ready to take off at dawn,” the soldier grumbled as he straightened. “Someone’s got to keep an eye on those savages over the hill. They’ve been lurking around here for weeks, now. Makes me nervous. Don’t know why his Earlship doesn’t just sack them and be done with it …”

His grumbling went on as he ducked through the door, and Kael saw there was a small wooden box hanging from a length of chain in his right hand. He only caught a glimpse of it before the soldier disappeared into the cottage — shutting the door tight behind him.

“What do you suppose that is, lad?” Morris whispered.

Kael wasn’t sure. He was thinking about what the soldier had just said — about how he wished Titus would attack them and be done with it. If he’d known where they were camped, why
hadn’t
he attacked?

“He’s planning another trap,” Kael said as he studied the cottage. “And I’ll bet it has something to do with whatever’s inside that box.”

The soldier had said that another bird was coming to retrieve the box in the morning, and dawn was quickly approaching. They didn’t have time to return to camp. If he wanted to find out what Titus had planned, he knew he’d have to act quickly.

Morris kept an eye on the door while Kael circled around. The cottage backed up so close the rock wall behind it that Kael had to turn sideways just to edge through. There were no windows and no other doors. There was only one way in or out of the cottage — and Kael sealed it up.

He molded the door to the frame, molded the frame to the stone. He pressed on the hinges until they were little more than flattened strips of metal. He sealed the door’s window to its latching — just enough let it shift, but not enough to open. Then he crept back to Morris.

“I have a plan, but I’m going to need your help.”

He was met with a wide, gap-toothed grin. “You know I’ll do my bit, lad. Just point me to it.”

Once Morris was ready, Kael crept to the back of the cottage. The stone and mortar bent like clay beneath his hands. He dug until there was hardly a fingernail’s breadth of wall between himself and the inside of the cottage. Then he waited.

It wasn’t long before he heard the hollow
thud
of someone pounding on the door.