The Falcon in the Barn (Book 4 Forest at the Edge series) (79 page)

“
Since when?”

“
Since always, Colonel!”
Thorne snapped. “Some commanders refer to their second in command
as their ‘second minds’! And I’m advising you now, as I’m supposed
to, that you’re clinging to the old ways because you’re comfortable
with them. But the world is changing, Colonel. And we must change
with it, or be devoured by it. I agree that the Guarders may
return, but they’ll find a new way to make their presence known. We
must be prepared for different contingencies.”

That Perrin controlled of his fury for so
long truly impressed him. He wished Mahrree had been there to see
this. “Thorne, I read your proposal,” he said between his gritted
teeth. “I agree with you that when the Guarders return it’ll likely
be in a way none of us expect. However, your suggestion to train
soldiers in confronting citizens, patting them down for weapons,
and escorting them back to their homes for additional inspections
makes you sound more paranoid than I was at my very worst!”

“
Paranoid
?” hissed
Thorne. He was exceptionally brave today.

Perrin was beginning to be impressed and
astonished.

He really hated that.

“
Sir, paranoia is what
makes a great leader!” Thorne declared, leaning on the desk. “Never
fully trusting your subordinates, never fully believing your
enlisted men, and never fully having faith in those who
claim
to
love you
. One of the many things I’ve learned from
you is that a bit of cynicism is most healthy for the life of a
commander, Colonel!”

“
Well then,” Perrin said
with his own piercing glare, “you seem to have become
very
healthy
in the past few seasons, haven’t you? I can’t help but
wonder, why?”

“
I’m simply maturing, sir,”
Thorne said, standing up and straightening his jacket.

Perrin wondered if the captain had blinked at
all in the past five minutes.

“
The longer I serve, the
more I see, and the more I recognize how blinded people can be.
It’s my duty to remove those dark coverings that keep men like you
from seeing the truth!”

“
And what makes you so sure
you
know the truth, Captain?” Perrin challenged.

“
I know how to
see
,
sir. I have no claims of affection or emotion that cloud my
perceptions of the truth.”

“
Fascinating,” Perrin said.
“Several times you’ve mentioned love, affection and the like as if
those are bad things. As if you believe they—”

“
Destroy one’s ability to
see the truth, yes!” Thorne insisted.

“
My, my,” said Perrin,
slightly amused. “Not only have you become healthier, you’ve become
more obnoxious.”

Thorne stood taller. “Someday you’ll
understand, sir. You’ll see that I’m doing this for you. You
will
be impressed. And astonished. And then, you’ll wonder
what to do next. When that day comes, realize that I’m here to
guide you. I’m here
for you
, Colonel Shin.” He nodded once
and left the office.

Perrin let out a low whistle once he was sure
the captain wasn’t at the door listening.

“
Here for me? My, my,
Captain Thorne. Sounds like you have
plans
.”

He looked up at the ceiling again.

“
So I ask again, how much
longer?”

---

Thorne cracked his neck as he strode to the
stables. Soldiers parted for him to pass as they always did—the
sure sign of respect and fear. He reached into his jacket pocket
and pulled out the parchment message, wrapped several times and
sealed with the largest amount of wax he dared apply. He stopped in
front of the messenger’s horse just as the corporal was about to
mount it.

“
One more for the pack,
Corporal,” Thorne said crisply as he handed it to the
soldier.

The young man glanced at the addressee name
on the outside before he placed it in the pack.

“
No one asked you to read
the name, soldier!” Thorne snapped. “You get that pack to Idumea as
swiftly as you always do, and let nothing detain you.
Understood?”

The corporal saluted. “I’ve never let you
down, sir. All of your messages reach Idumea, sir.
All
of
them.”

Thorne stepped back to let the messenger
begin his long ride eighty miles to the south. He folded his arms
and scowled.

There had never been a message sent to the
Administrative Headquarters quite like
this
one.

Lannard had been most fruitful the past two
seasons, even bringing Thorne notes about what his teacher said.
Together they’d roll their eyes at her assertions, then Thorne
would take the notes and gingerly pocket them. Many copies had been
sent in the past three seasons, with messages of praise coming back
from Idumea.

And now the file was thick. Bulging, even.
Genev had requested one more update, and Thorne watched it ride
away: the final report of so many discussions and thinly veiled
debates that she allowed her students to carry out, bits here and
there that, like snowflakes, individually would have been nothing.
But all of it packed together created one massive, icy snowball,
dangerous and painful.

Now it was up to Administrator Genev to hurl
it.

---

Peto jogged over to Rector Yung’s house after
helping Deckett move hay for the cows, and found the old man
outside inspecting his herbs. He smiled when he saw Peto.

“
Did you hear the news?”
Peto called.

“
About?”

“
The expedition! It’s back
and headed to Idumea. My father saw them going by this
morning.”

“
Well!” Yung said, getting
to his feet. “That is something, isn’t it. News should be coming
soon, then, I suspect.”

“
And now I’ve finally
figured it out,” Peto announced.

Yung frowned. “Figured out what, son?”

“
The peach pits! The ones
you gave me last Harvest? You told my mother I’d know what to do
with them, and for the past five moons I’ve been trying to
understand what you meant.”

Yung looked truly lost. “What I meant?” He
leaned on a short shovel.

Peto was all energy. “You meant that
they
are my future, didn’t you? Not kickball, but maybe
growing trees? Apparently Tabbit Densal really liked trees so maybe
somewhere it’s in my blood, but I was thinking, an orchard? I don’t
know, that seems kind of dull, and I know that’s an immature
attitude, but then today it hit me: the ruins! They’re going to
need orchards there, aren’t they? And that’s what you meant by the
pits, right? To take them on an adventure to the ruins and plant an
orchard and find my future there!” Peto beamed at the rector who
still wore a puzzled expression.

After an awkward and silent moment, Yung
said, “Oh,
the peach pits
! The ones I dropped off at your
house when the pipers were replacing that burst pipe, right?”

Peto’s enthusiasm dimmed. “Well, yeah. You
told my mother, ‘Peto will know what to do with them.’”

Yung smiled apologetically. “I said that
because it was clear your mother had no idea as how to plant peach
pits. Peto, sometimes a peach pit is just a peach pit . . . a means
to getting more peaches, which you seem to love. I thought you’d
plant them around your house.”

“
That’s it?!”

Yung bobbled his head back and forth. “Well .
. . yes.”

Peto’s shoulders sagged. “So you don’t think
I should go to the ruins or anything to plant them?”

The old man shrugged. “Well, I don’t see any
harm if you want to, but it’s certainly not any of my
business—”

“
I don’t believe this!”
Peto threw his arms in the air and clomped around the garden. “For
moons I’ve been trying to understand the meaning of the peach pits,
and here you tell me they’re only for growing more peaches? For
crying out loud!” he exclaimed as he started for the road. “The
pits are only for getting more peaches—”

“
Unless
,” and once
again Yung’s quiet calm voice cut through Peto’s complaining and
pierced his heart, “unless the Creator wanted you to get something
more out of them.”

Peto spun around to face the rector who was
already busily hoeing around his basil. “What’s
that
supposed to mean?”

Yung shrugged again. “I suppose that would be
between you and the Creator.” He glanced up at Peto, nodded once,
and went into his home, leaving Peto gaped mouth and even more
confused.

---

Mahrree always thought of herself as a
patient woman. But during the next few days she began to wonder if
all people who thought themselves patient were really fooling
themselves as she was. The fact that there was no school to occupy
her mind didn’t help much.

The week did allow her, however, to work in
the Briters’ farm with a clear view of the message towers and the
fort. If anything interesting was going to happen, she had a front
row seat.

Then again, that front row seat was making
her a little bit crazy. Every time she heard hoof beats she’d look
up from whatever patch of dirt she was watering, or run from the
henhouse to see who was going to the fort. And considering how
often horses came and went, she was spending more time spying on
nobody interesting than she was helping the Briters.

Twice that week she noticed Lannard
exercising Thorne’s horse, with his unkempt hair flowing behind him
like a ragged flag. She had to smile at him. Lannard had done quite
well this year, and likely would be moved out of her ‘special’
class next season. His scores on the Mid-Year Department of
Instruction Exam—and Mahrree thought it funny that the first
letters of those words spelled out MY DIE, since many of the boys
complained how taking it “killed” them—were nearly the highest in
the school.

She’d noticed that he’d been taking thorough
notes, and Offra told her once that he overheard Thorne asking
Lannard for details about what they discussed in class.

Last week, after she received the form from
Idumea with the boys’ scores, Mahrree unexpectedly met Thorne at
the tower. Even though the scowling demeanor of the captain always
made her uncomfortable, she made a point of mentioning to him that
she was grateful for his interest in Lannard.

When she told him how his concern had made
Lannard a more attentive student over the past year, Thorne’s
features had contorted into such an odd smile that Mahrree thought
his entire face would rearrange itself.

All he said in response was, “I was most
fortunate to find him.”

His response solidified Mahrree’s evaluation
of Lemuel Thorne: most definitely peculiar.

Over the past couple of seasons she had
frequently noticed the captain, and got the impression that he was
watching
her. She would have chalked it up to paranoid
imagination, except that she usually never imagined those kinds of
things.

And usually Mahrree didn’t think of Thorne,
especially on days like today when her mind wandered all over the
place, and a little too late she remembered to turn off the spigot
that now flooded her buckets with frigid water.

“
I’m supposed to be
watering . . . seedlings?”

She spied Peto carrying another bale of hay
to the barn, and smiled that sometime in the past two seasons he’d
found his muscles. He’d never be as brawny as Perrin had become
baling hay, but the boy’s build was finally looking like a man’s.
He nodded over to Mahrree before he entered the barn.

So often Mahrree felt as if she knew only
half of her son. She was grateful he wasn’t as distant or unruly as
her students, but Peto didn’t share much with his family beyond his
humor and teasing.

Perrin said that was a
man thing
.
Especially a
son thing
. “Trust me, Mahrree. I rarely told my
mother anything at that age. And I turned out all right.”

“
Only because your father
sent you to the Densals when you were eighteen.”

“
That’s why we have Shem.
And Rector Yung. They can straighten him out for us if he gets too
obnoxious.”

Whenever Mahrree looked in Peto’s eyes there
seemed to be a great deal going on in them, yet none of it was
coming out. He spoke to her, but only in teasing, and he gave her
quick hugs when he was sure no one was looking.

Still, Mahrree worried that she was running
out of time. Some universities would begin in less than half a
year, and her son would be gone. So desperate was she with wanting
to hear something from Peto about his future that she had even told
him she could help try to convince Perrin to let him go to Idumea
if he wanted.

But he had shaken his head, kissed her on the
cheek, and said, “I just need to wait.”

She wished she knew what that meant, and
hoped he had someone nudging him the correct directions, as her
father had frequently nudged her. In so many ways Peto was like his
Grandfather Cephas. He was larger in build, thanks to Perrin, yet
his eyes and hair reminded Mahrree of a man she hadn’t seen since
she was fifteen.

But the rest of Peto was pure Perrin, from
his winks, to his laugh, to his features, to his voice, to his
forehead rubbing when he was frustrated. If her son was physically
the combination of her two favorite men, maybe the rest of him was
as well. She just needed to—as he reminded her—wait.

Mahrree really hated waiting.

It had now been four days since the
expedition returned to Idumea, Mahrree grumbled to herself as she
emptied the last bucket on what she hoped was a row Jaytsy had
already planted. Some news of any kind should have reached them by
now.