Rebel's Cage (Book 4) (5 page)

‘But you’ll do it anyway?’

‘Sire, you don’t understand. I am not in a position to make such changes. Those laws are—’

‘Treason.’

Osbert slammed to a halt, guts churning, heart fluttering with fears too long encouraged.

‘Yes, Osbert, they are treason – for how can the Guilde continue to legislate against sorcery, to consider sorcery a great evil, to hold onto the sacred duty to eradicate all sorcery from the land, when your own King is in possession of such powers?’ Kenrick’s gaze narrowed. ‘Why, neither you nor your fellow Guildesmen have done anything to arrest me – so you already
know those laws are treasonous. If I am to marry, to produce an heir who might have these same powers, how would I appear to the rest of the world when I allow laws that could execute me to remain on your books?’

‘Of course, Sire,’ Osbert scrambled, but he was too late.

‘I want those laws reversed, Osbert. You will begin preparing the papers tonight. I shall be sending letters to Bishop Brome to ask of him the same in respect of Church law. Now I think it’s time I joined our honoured guest on the dance floor.’

Osbert rose to his feet as Kenrick left the table. A moment later and Godfrey was by his side. ‘What are you going to do?’

Blinking the fog from his mind, Osbert glanced at his sometime friend and much-needed ally. ‘What do you think I’m going to do? How can I defy him? He’d kill me and find a replacement to give him what he wants. Either way, those laws will change. I don’t have a choice and he knows it.’

‘You have other options,’ Godfrey murmured, his eyes full of meaning, begging Osbert to ask the questions, to make a choice, to
do
something more than simply survive, to find the courage to strike back.

‘No, Father, you’re the one with the options. I’m the one with the responsibility.’ Osbert’s voice came out as leaden as his heart felt. ‘But I wonder what you’d do in my place. I wonder how you would play it if in each hand you had an evil card and your choice only one or the other. If you will excuse me, I seem to have some work to do. Goodnight.’

No, courage had never been his greatest strength – but now was not the time for it to become a fatal weakness.

Damp leaves crackled softly beneath Finnlay’s foot as he regained his balance. Still crouched low, he peered through the dense undergrowth, keeping his breathing steady and quiet, his movements to a minimum. Pale shadows streaked the forest floor before him, cast by a moon buried behind fine
layers of cloud. His hands were cold, his boots dampened by layers of frost scattered about the ground. The rest of him was warm, heated by the chase.

He filled his chest with the evening chill, letting out the air against the curve of his elbow to hide puffs of steam which might give his position away. He absorbed the scents of the forest, individually and together, rolling them around in his head, identifying and discarding, picking carefully until he found the one he wanted.

Gentle sounds surrounded him, a subtle hum of forest life. Finnlay could have named each sound he heard, but it was all the more powerful – and infinitely more useful – to capture them as a whole, place the image of the forest within his Senses and let the intruder reveal himself against the familiar backdrop.

Shan Moss lived within him now each day, as it had done for the last eight years. This wide forest, almost bare in its autumn existence, had given him little joy and great heartache, seeds of sorrow and only one spark of hope. And now, after four days of tracking, he was nearing the end of his patience.

With one more casual sweep of his surroundings, Finnlay took a single step forward, listening with intent ears to the sounds he made, almost feeling the brush move to let him pass. Long tendrils of weeping pine glided across his face, a gentle caress, almost welcoming. There was still boy enough in him to smile at the fanciful thought.

Once more he came to a halt, concentrating. He waited.

He slipped the dagger from his boot, balanced the weapon and felt the hard horn handle, worn and well-used. Changing his weight from one foot to the other, he took in one more breath.

He sprang forward. In a moment he held his captive from behind with a blade to the throat, left hand twisting a sword from frozen fingers. With a dull thud it dropped to the ground and Finnlay breathed again, this time allowing the steam to fill the air around his prisoner’s ear. He felt no satisfaction, only despair.

‘Damn it, boy, what the hell do you think you’re doing?’

The body relaxed slightly, a half-stifled sigh providing some answer. ‘I’m sorry, Finnlay, I just didn’t …’

Finnlay pressed the blade closer, let the boy feel the cold steel sharp against his skin. ‘And what would you have done if it hadn’t been me?’

The body stiffened with shock. ‘I am sorry. I
was
trying, I just …’

With a grunt, Finnlay released him, putting the dagger away before picking up the sword. He tossed it to the boy with a casual gesture, denying himself the pleasure of acting on his anger and giving the boy a sound thrashing. ‘Come on!’

He didn’t look back as he began the long walk back to camp. He said nothing, but focused on the heavy footsteps trudging behind him, every now and then hastening to catch up.

If he left him out here on his own, perhaps then he might take this all a bit more seriously.

As though sensing his irritation, the boy spoke, his words punctuated by sharp breaths. ‘Well, it’s still early – can’t we try again?’

‘No.’

‘But …’

Finnlay came to a halt and spun around. ‘What’s the point in trying again tonight, eh? We’ve been at this all day. You must be getting bored with it. I know I am.’

He could barely see the face before him, the dark shadowed shape, but he didn’t need to. He knew the expression well enough. Hopeful, hurt that he’d done wrong, so very willing to make another attempt. ‘But it is early, I mean, if we try again, I promise I’ll do my best, really I will.’

‘To what end? So I can catch you within fifteen minutes again? The longest you’ve lasted today was our first attempt – and that’s only because I gave you a really big head start.’ Finnlay spread his arms wide in the only gesture of frustration he would allow himself. ‘Hell, Andrew, is this just some sort of game for you?’

‘No!’ Andrew looked horrified, blue eyes wide, mouth open in shock.

‘The drill is we go out and you try to evade capture for an hour. Just an hour. That’s all you have to do. Move silently through the forest without giving your position away for one tiny hour – and you still can’t manage more than a quarter of that, even after four days of these exercises.’

‘But you—’

‘What?’

Andrew shrugged, turning away. ‘Nothing.’

‘What?’

‘You’re a Seeker,’ Andrew mumbled.

Steeling himself, Finnlay stepped forward, deliberately towering over the boy. ‘I don’t need to be a Seeker to find you, Andrew. I could do it blindfolded with one leg missing, you make so much noise. You know I haven’t once tried Seeking you – but it wouldn’t matter if I had. How do you know the man who might some day be stalking you won’t also be a Seeker? How the hell would you get away from him?’

‘Nobody can evade a Seeker.’

‘Oh? An expert now, are we?’

Andrew said nothing. His stance was one of such complete dejection, Finnlay’s anger quickly began to fade.

‘Come on,’ he said quietly. ‘The others will be waiting. Supper should be ready by the time we get back. You must be hungry.’

A slight nod was all he got in reply at first, then another mumble. ‘I really am sorry, Finnlay.’

Such genuine remorse touched Finnlay deep inside, the way it always did. He felt the last of his frustration die away and with a sigh, he slung an arm around the boy’s shoulders, urging him back along the path. ‘I’m sorry, too. I don’t mean to get angry, but I know you can do better.’

‘What if I can’t?’

Finnlay looked at the young face gazing up at him bathed in flashes of moonlight. He looked so much like his mother, it was almost frightening – and yet, something in his eyes gave his father away.

‘What if I can’t, Finnlay?’ Andrew asked again. ‘The others
can all do this, can’t they? They can make their Senses work so they know when people are around them. What if I really don’t have that power?’

There was a low note of desperation in the boy’s voice and Finnlay felt suddenly guilty for pushing him so hard. If the boy’s powers hadn’t come through by now, after all that provocation, perhaps they weren’t going to.

But Jenn was
so
certain Andrew had abilities. And Martha said she could Sense them as well. So if they were in there, buried somewhere deep, why couldn’t Andrew push them up to the surface when he needed to?

‘I can’t be Salti if I don’t have any powers, can I?’

‘Are you worried about that? Honestly, it doesn’t matter. Plenty of Salti have children who don’t have powers. It happens all the time. It doesn’t mean you don’t belong.’

‘Everybody I know has them. You’ve been working with the others. Do they keep failing?’

‘Some of them, yes.’ Finnlay stopped and faced the boy squarely. ‘Look, I don’t want you to worry about this. Your mother’s abilities didn’t manifest until she was seventeen, and you’re still three years off that. The only reason we keep trying this is because of the time you spend at court, with Kenrick. And remember, these exercises aren’t just about you developing powers – they’re about you being aware with the normal senses everyone is born with. You can’t go stumbling around a forest, making that kind of noise, leaving a trail a blind man could see. We want you to be as well-armed as possible, for your own sake, that’s all. You’re doing well in everything else – your mother’s very proud of you, I know.’

A little smile lit Andrew’s face. ‘You must want to tear your hair out with me, sometimes.’

‘Well, yes, that’s true,’ Finnlay agreed, deadpan. ‘But you’re not the only one. At least half my students have the same effect on me – and I can honestly say that you are, by no means, my worst student.’

‘I’m not?’

‘No.’ Finnlay resumed walking, listening to Andrew walk behind, his step lighter now. ‘I think you should also know,’ he
added, giving the boy a little hope, ‘that I was the worst student of all.’

‘Really?’ Andrew’s voice suddenly held a note of excitement.

‘I drove everybody to distraction: parents, teachers and my brother.’

‘Duke Robert?’

In the darkness, Finnlay grinned. It never failed. Every time he brought up the general subject of his brother, he would get plagued with questions. He just had to be sure he didn’t do it within Jenn’s hearing. Finnlay wanted Andrew to grow up with some knowledge of his father. Jenn, on the other hand, wasn’t so sure that was a good idea – especially since neither Robert nor Andrew knew they were father and son.

‘Finnlay?’

‘Yes?’

‘After supper, would you tell us about the Battle again? I’m sure Mother won’t mind. It’s just that, being here, in the forest where it all happened, makes it seem more real. Does that make sense?’

A little too much sense. Finnlay agreed, ‘If the others are interested, then certainly. Now let’s get a move on. I can smell the cooking from here.’

*

Finnlay found the clearing almost by smell alone. Something tasty and rich was being cooked over an open fire and his stomach reacted with odd noises. Andrew left him almost immediately and went to join his friends. They were on the other side of the clearing, gathered around Arlie, who was obviously trying to teach them something. Finnlay watched them for a moment, then headed to where Jenn was sitting by a fire, an open book on her lap. These days, she did little else but work, and there were times when he wished she wouldn’t.

She looked up as he approached, a faint smile in blue eyes edged with a little tension. ‘How was he?’

Finnlay sank onto a log pulled close to the fire and carefully framed his reply. ‘About the same. What about you? How did the others go?’

Jenn frowned at his short response, then glanced across the
clearing, the dark blue eyes which were so like her son’s narrowed with distracted speculation. ‘They did well enough. Arlie’s had them working on lighting fires for the last hour or so – hence the mess. They did prepare dinner, and that certainly smells good.’

‘I noticed.’ Finnlay leaned back on his hands and surveyed the clearing and the activity going on. They’d brought eight Salti children with them on this trip, twice the usual number, because it was getting late in the year. The youngest, at thirteen, was his own daughter, Helen. The oldest was Liam, turning eighteen next spring. So far they’d behaved well, experimenting with woodcraft and testing some of the other lessons they’d learned in the Enclave.

It was perhaps too little for them – but for a community living in a kind of prison, it was certainly better than nothing.

Right now, Arlie Baldwyn was demonstrating another technique to light a fire from damp wood –
without
using his powers. That, more than anything else, was the focus of these trips, teaching the young Salti how to survive in the forest, how to avoid capture, how to track and trace both game and human quarry, all skills Finnlay had learned as part of his normal education at home at Dunlorn, essential skills these children would have to master if the day ever came when they could live safely outside their mountain home – even if that day appeared as far away as ever.

‘What’s wrong?’ Jenn’s voice was quiet and as Finnlay turned to face her, she raised her eyebrows, putting the book on her lap to one side.

‘Nothing,’ he said. ‘Just wondering how much use this is going to be in the long run. You know how bored they are at the Enclave.’ Along with a few other people he could have mentioned.

‘They’ve been fine while we’ve been away.’

‘Exactly. But we’re facing another long winter where any chance to get outside the Enclave will be limited at best. I can see more trouble brewing.’ The last two years had been a trial on his patience. Some days he spent most of his energies keeping track of the children under his tutelage, just trying to
keep them out of trouble. The truth was, he was tired of the responsibility, tired of training them for a life they were never likely to be able to lead.