IT took two days after the bandit attack for Tris to find the opportunity to speak with Carina alone. He tried to arrange his tasks so that he could keep the healer's tent in sight, but she did not leave the tent by herself for an exasperating length of time.
When Tris finally saw his chance, Carina was heading toward her tent, coming from the far side of the caravan camp. It was the last day before they moved on, and the crews were already starting to break down tents and booths. Setup and teardown were the times when the most accidents occurred, and when Carina was the busiest. No surprise then, Tris thought, that she was difficult to find.
"I wanted to thank you for what you did," Tris said, catching up with her and touching the gash on his forehead that was well on its way to healing. Carina looked at him tiredly, and frowned slightly as if trying to place him.
"You're one of the hired guards, aren't you?" she asked. "You helped me get the patients out, when the building was on fire." Tris nodded. She looked at him a moment longer, as if trying to put something into words, then looked away.
"My friends call me Tris," he said. There was no hiding his Margolan accent, he knew, but at least the name was common. His mother, Queen Serae, had quickly gained the affection of the people of Margolan, making her name and the names of her children embarrassingly fashionable when he was a boy. No one, it seemed, fancied Eldra or Jared enough to use their names, and that had been one more thing Jared held against Tris and Kait. Now Tris was grateful that it was not remarkable that a laborer might share the same name with a prince.
The healer smiled tentatively. "You saved my life in that building. Thank you."
Tris dismissed the words, embarrassed. "I'd like to talk to you." He paused, then forged on. "I'd like to talk to you... about how you do what you do."
Carina stopped and met his eyes. "That's an unusual request from a swordsman," she said neutrally. "I don't bless swords or curse enemies, and I wouldn't show you how if I could."
"That isn't what I meant."
Carina looked at him closely, as if taking his measure. "What you did... in the fire... using magic to throw that beam... Have you ever done that before?"
"No," Tris replied uncomfortably. "But my granny was a hedge witch." Tris begged the forgiveness of Bava K'aa's spirit for the gross understatement. "I need to learn... to understand... how to control my power before I kill someone, and how to block out the spirits before they drive me mad."
"Come inside," Carina said, gesturing for him to join her in her tent. He'r voice was brusque with exhaustion but not unkind, and Tris imagined that she was often besieged by questions from the curious. She motioned him to be seated and nudged a small clay teapot closer to the fire in the center of the tent floor. "Why do you think I can help you?"
"I don't know where else to go," Tris said, forcing himself to meet her eyes. "When I was young, my grandmother taught me some of her magic—like lighting a fire without a spark. But now, it's like a floodgate opened," he said, his growing desperation clear in his voice. "Every time I dream, I remember something else she taught me. I can feel the magic, but when I touch it, I'm not sure whether I'm using it or it's using me." He paused. "Carina, when did you know that you could do what you do?"
Carina paused before answering. "I think at some level, I've always known," she said quietly. "But I didn't start to train for it until after—" S he stopped abruptly. "Until I was in my teens."
"But how did you know?" Tris pressed, and she looked at him for a moment before she spoke.
"I just... knew," she answered quietly. "I can't describe it. Maybe it's different for different people. I felt the power, but I didn't know what it was for, or how to make it do anything. Then once, when my favorite horse was hurt, I was caring for him and I was thinking about what it would take to heal him, and things happened." She smiled. "Scared me half to death."
"How did you know where to go, to learn more?"
Carina's face hardened and she looked away. "That wasn't a problem," she answered, her tone cold. "It was taken care of."
"I'm sorry," Tris said gently. "I didn't mean to pry."
Carina shook her head. "It's all right; It's just that, where I come from, people are superstitious. They don't like mages." She gave a sad smile. "In fact, they like them even less than they like twins."
So that was why such a talented healer and an expert swordsman traveled with an obscure caravan, Tris thought.
"Look, Tris, there isn't anything else I can tell you," she said, uncomfortable, as if she'd said too much.
"It's not that simple," Tris said, shaking his head stubbornly. "When the bandits attacked, right before I got hit, I saw the bandits die," he said, the words tumbling out, "I saw their spirits rise up out of their bodies," he confessed in a whisper. "I thought I was going mad. It happened everywhere I looked, until one of the raiders smashed me over the head," he said, ruefully touching his wound.
Carina frowned, and Tris sensed that she was suddenly taking him seriously. "You saw... the spirits rising out of the bodies?" she repeated slowly.
"If you can teach me nothing else, teach me how to block it out," he begged. "Surely, you have to know how to block out pain to do your duties. Otherwise, I am no help to my friends and little use to the caravan."
"Have you spoken of this to anyone else?"
"About the battlefield? No," he said, looking down. "The friends I travel with—they know I have some power, but they have no idea how little I can control it. I haven't said anything else. People would think me mad. I think the hedge witch suspects."
"Yes," Carina said thoughtfully, "Alyzza would suspect," she said. "She was court sorceress for a minor noble when her powers failed to save the noble's only child. The child's death nearly drove her mad and the court no longer wanted her. And so, she is here," Carina said, gesturing to the fair beyond the tent. "Like all of us, somewhere we never expected to be." She was silent again, and just when Tris began to fear she was going to turn him out, she spoke.
"I will help you as much as I can," she said slowly. "I will ask Alyzza to help as well. But you must be careful," she warned. "Say nothing about your magic to anyone else. You might attract more interest than you desire."
"Thank you," Tris said, as he got to his feet.
Carina smiled sadly. "Why don't you wait to thank me until I've helped you?" she said. "Come back after your sword practice, if you have the strength."
Thoughts full of a hundred questions, Tris slipped outside the tent. "Just remember, I saw her first," a voice came at Tris's elbow. Ban Soterius gave him a wry grin. "I'll give you credit for courage, Tris," he added, "considering Cam's size. I wouldn't want to face him to come courting."
Tris gave Soterius a dry look. "With the way you change companions, I'd be scared if I were you, too."
Soterius grinned. "Just my way of spreading sunshine," he replied, slapping Tris on the back. "No reason to overwhelm one and make all the rest miserable. You could take a few pages from my book, you know." He lowered his voice con-spiratorially. "And now that you don't have any official entanglements to worry about, you're free to choose for yourself, no one's business but your own," he added.
"Remind me of that if we make it to Dhasson in one piece," Tris replied. "Really, Ban. That's been the furthest thing from my mind."
"I know," Soterius replied. "That's the trouble with you. Too serious. The right woman could lighten you up." He smiled wickedly. "Of course, so could the wrong woman."
Tris gave him a good-natured punch on the arm as they walked toward the main camp area.
Before the supper fires were lit, they were pressed into service on a variety of jobs dismantling the camp, and when Tris finally grabbed a trencher of dinner and found a place near a fire, he dropped wearily onto his log seat.
Harrtuck had promised that life on the road would toughen him up, Tris thought, and rubbed a sore muscle ruefully. Since they joined the caravan, Tris discovered that muscles he did not know existed could ache enough to keep him awake at night—loading and unloading tents, equipment and merchandise, straining with guy-ropes to erect the large tents and sledgehammer the stakes that supported them. And then, after he was already bone weary, sword practice with Vahanian. Tris sipped the mug of ale and wolfed down the rest of his stew. All of this activity might be the making of a swordsman, but it was likely to be the death of a prince. Carroway joined him looking equally exhausted. "I'm going to be dead long before we reach Dhasson," the minstrel complained, digging into his food. "If it's not a full day of entertaining for the audiences, it's this bloody sword work at night." Carroway stretched and groaned. "Are you sure Vahanian's not secretly out to get us?"
"Ready for tonight's practice?" Vahanian asked, dropping down beside them with a steaming trencher of food. The mercenary grinned as Tris groaned his reply.
"That excited, huh? Must be doing a good job then."
"Couldn't you at least look tired?" Carroway complained as he finished his ale.
"What's the point?" Vahanian replied with his mouth full. "Doesn't make any less work."
"No, but it would give me a lot of satisfaction," Tris answered. "Where are we going next?"
"Further north," came a reply from Tris's other side. "And if you ask me, it's a mistake."
Tris turned to see Kaine, looking tired and dirty. "Nothing but trouble up north." Kaine swigged his ale. "'Course, seems to be a lot of that goin' around, if you take my meaning," he said, with a sidelong glance at Vahanian.
"I'm not sure I do," Tris answered carefully.
Kaine snorted. "Where have you been? Dhasson's at war. 'Course, now, they're not saying that, but war's what it is, all the same," he said, dropping his voice. "Some of the people coming through from that direction have some mighty strange tales. Mighty strange," he said, taking another draught.
"How strange is 'strange?'" Tris asked, leaning forward.
Kaine finished his ale and set his mug aside, then tilted his head to look at Tris. "How's unnatural things from out in the Blasted Lands for strange, huh?" he asked. "Word is that there've been some creatures sighted up near Dhasson that aren't the making of the Goddess, if you take my meaning," he said broadly. "'Twas a deserter through here that told some stories would stand your hair on end. Thought Dhasson's army was taking a beating and didn't fancy being eaten, or worse, so he lit off, or so he said," the tent rigger continued, wiping his mouth with his sleeve.
"The tribes' mages couldn't conjure things like that," Vahanian said thoughtfully and Tris turned. By the Lady's breath, Tris thought, he looks like he's taking this seriously!
"Don't know about the past, but they sure seem to now," Kaine replied. "And there were other stories. About day turning to night and lightning that wasn't the right color. About locusts coming up out of nowhere and disappearing just as fast. And about whole plains that were dry as a bone turning into mud right when the army went to cross them, and there weren't no rains for days, either," Kaine added. "Now if that's not magicked, what is it?"
"Certainly sounds like magic to me," Vahanian replied. He got up, headed for the barrel of ale, and scooped up another mugful.
"You're a cautious one," the tent rigger said to Tris as Vahanian walked away. "There're lots that don't hold with magic, but I've been around. I've seen strange things can't be explained no other way. Here's another piece of advice. Watch your back around that one," he said with a barely perceptible nod toward Vahanian, who was out of earshot at the ale barrel. "No count of the men he's killed or betrayed. The Eastmark army doesn't hang men lightly, but there's a death sentence on him. Betrayed a whole platoon, he did, at Chauvrenne."
"I'll certainly keep it in mind," Tris replied, as Vahanian walked back toward them. His thoughts lingered on the reports of magic far more than on Kaine's dark warnings about Vahanian's past. Certainly magic was no stranger to any of the Winter Kingdoms. And the grandson of Bava K'aa ought not to be surprised at arcane works, he thought, remembering the many times he saw his grandmother work spells at the palace. Some of them were workings of convenience, the sorts of things that any hedge witch might have done, like lighting a candle without a spark. But there were other times, Tris recalled, when as a young boy he hid in the shadows of his father's warroom, hoping to be overlooked so he could watch the exciting bustle of preparations for war. Then he saw some of Bava K'aa's true magic, as she scryed for the location of enemies or divined the weather or learned something of an enemy from captured belongings.
So it should not be unusual for magic to be at hand if Dhasson really were at war, he thought. Except that the kind of dark magic the tent rigger gossiped about was unusual. There were legends about a time when dark magic was as common as locusts, and the people of the Winter Kingdoms suffered for it. Then the Light mages banded together and fought the Mage Wars up in the sparsely populated far north.
That was many years ago, when Tris's grandmother was just a young woman. But anyone who ventured into the Blasted Lands did not doubt that strong magic had been loosed. There were creatures and plants that existed nowhere else, nightmare things that survived on the magic left in the area, magic which made it unsuitable for use by normal folk for long. For every story about monsters in the Blasted Lands there was at least one story of some fool who ventured in and never returned. The stories of lost treasures ensured a steady supply of fools, and kept the legends alive.
Dark magic like that was not supposed to still happen, Tris thought, watching the fire. After the Mage Wars, a secret society of the most powerful female witches formed, the Katae Canei. The Katae Canei combined their powers to suppress knowledge of the dark arts, to discover and root out any mage bold enough to try to learn them, and to destroy the runes and spellbooks of the dark masters. For a generation, they were successful. Bava K'aa was rumored to have been the chief of the Katae Canei Sisterhood.
Who had taken the mantle in the years since his grandmother's death, Tris did not know. The Sisterhood did not announce such things. Without a court mage, there was even less such information in Margolan. One thing was certain: if there were magicked creatures loose in the Northern Lands, someone was dabbling in the dark arts. And the return of the dark mages would be a disaster, unless someone could do something to stop it.
Just then, Soterius ambled up and dropped down beside Tris, warming his hands around a hot mug. "So what am I missing?"
Tris glanced from Kaine to where Vahanian stood and back. "Just talking about the trip north. Kaine here doesn't like the idea of crossing into Dhasson."
Carroway made a dismissive gesture. "Dhasson doesn't bother me. But the forest on the way to the border, that's another matter," he said, taking a long draught. "You know, the natives call it Ruune Videya, which means 'ghost trees," the minstrel said, warming to his subject.
"Stories say," he recounted, leaning forward, "that Jaq the Damned slaughtered peasants there two hundred years ago over a rebellion." He paused to sip his drink. "They say bodies are buried everywhere, which is why the forest grows so thickly," he added, glancing at Kaine and Tris. "They say that the spirits walk, restless from their unjust deaths, waiting to avenge themselves." He looked pointedly at Tris. "Not that I put much stock in ghost stories."
"Well, if you're too darn lazy to fight tonight, I say we turn in." Vahanian said as he walked back toward the group, draining his mug in one draught. Tris nodded and stood, ignoring Kaine's warning glance.
"If tomorrow's as long as today, I don't imagine there's enough time to rest before Winterstide," Tris replied. "Thanks for the stories," he said as he fell into step beside Vahanian.
"Keep them in mind," Kaine replied darkly. "All of them."
Tris and Vahanian walked halfway across the camp before either spoke. Finally, Tris broke the silence. "I get the feeling you two know each other from somewhere?"
Vahanian snorted. "You could say that. Kaine's a lying son of a whore and always has been. I met him a long time ago, right after he slipped the Nargi border with an angry captain at his heels. Seems Kaine helped himself to the captain's gold. I'm rather surprised he's still alive."
"He seemed a bit surprised to see you, too." "I hope so," the mercenary replied. Tris heard concern in his voice. "Because otherwise, someone sent him here, looking for me. While there are more than a few people with a reason to find me, only one has a recent grudge. In which case, Kaine's only looking for me because someone told him that I'm with you," Vahanian said, looking out over the dark horizon as if he expected to see more bandits, or worse.
"Good night, Jonmarc," Tris said as they reached their tents.
"Sleep lightly," the mercenary replied. "And keep your sword in reach."
Vahanian made it his business each night to check on his traveling party's mounts. They began the journey with better than average horses, and although most places hanged horse thieves, a surprising number of the beasts still managed to go missing. When the horses were accounted for, Vahanian headed back across the camp, shivering in the chill night air. He ducked into Linton's tent and squinted at the light. Several oil lamps set the large tent in a cheerful glow, and a brazier warmed the small space.
"You're looking good, Jonmarc," the caravan leader chuckled as he brought out a tray with a large decanter and two glasses. "Life on the road suits you."
"I'd have been dead a long time ago if it didn't," Vahanian replied, leaning back and propping up his boots on a trunk.
"Your 'contraband' are finally earning their keep," Linton continued, pouring the golden Margolian brandy and setting a glass in front of Vahanian. "Some day you'll have to tell me the full story. It's not like you to rescue the nobility."
Vahanian sipped his glass. "Times change," he said, staring at Linton and past him. "You'd be surprised."
"Probably not," Linton said, dropping heavily into his leather folding chair.
"Get to your point."
"My point, Jonmarc," Linton repeated, stopping long enough to take another sip of the brandy, "is that someone else has figured out as much."
"Who?"
Linton shrugged. "The names they gave, like their reasons, are fabricated, I'm sure. But earlier this evening, two men won a sizable amount at our gaming tables. Large enough to get the attention of the master gamer, and when he came to congratulate them on their winnings—and make sure they weren't cheating—they asked to see the caravan master.
"The gamesmaster brought them to me. They claimed to be rug merchants from the west and said they left their wares back at the inn where they were staying. They also said they'd just been through Margolan and what a pity it was that things weren't as they used to be."
"Do tell," Vahanian replied dryly, taking a long sip of his drink.
Linton leaned back, clomping his heavy boots up onto a sturdy trunk and finishing off his drink. "They went on to say that there was a new king in Margolan and that business wasn't good. New taxes. And there were rumors that not all of King Bricen's family were really dead," Linton said, watching Vahanian carefully.
Vahanian said nothing, but he took another drink of his brandy and met Linton's eyes steadily. "And?"
"And I got the feeling that my two visitors were probably going from one caravan to another, plus all the inns between Margolan and Dhasson, with the same story," Linton said.
"Why Dhasson?" Vahanian asked.
Linton shrugged. "It's well known that King Harrol was kin to Bricen. It's where I'd seek sanctuary if I were Martris Drayke," he added, staring pointedly at Vahanian. "I told them it was an interesting story," Linton continued. "And sent them on their way with a promise to look them up if we were ever in their province and needed rugs to trade."
"So why tell me about this," Vahanian asked, draining his glass.
"Because one of the men bore a striking resemblance to Vakkis," Linton replied, setting his drink aside. "All the way down to the knife crease you put in his cheek."
Now Linton had his full attention. Vahanian laid his empty goblet on Linton's counting table. "How sure are you?" he asked in a voice that could have etched glass.
"Very sure," Linton said. "My casino master tells me that the traveler was unusually skilled at contre dice and fond of Valiquestran whiskey and that he never, ever had his back to the door."
"That's Vakkis." Vahanian cursed. "Any hint that he was still looking for me?"
Linton shook his head. "He didn't mention anything. But he was dressed better than usual and either the bounty business has been good lately or he's on retainer to someone with a lot of money. He was spending Margolan gold."
"Damn."
"Jared Drayke may be a whore's son of a king," Linton said, leaning, forward, his voice dropping to a cautious rasp, "but he is a dangerous whore's son. And like as not, he has your number, Jonmarc."
"Where was Vakkis headed?"
Linton's tanned face creased in a grin. "Thought you'd ask. The Boar's Inn in Westerhaven—not far. Of course, since he told me that's where he'd be he won't be totally surprised if he gets company—"
"Only if he sees me coming," Vahanian replied, pushing to his feet.
"Jonmarc..."
"Don't worry, Maynard," Vahanian said as he grabbed his cloak. "I know we're a danger to the caravan. Let me take out Vakkis and we'll be gone in the morning."
"Would you sit down and stop thinking with your sword?" Linton snapped. "Did I say anything about leaving?" He spat loudly into a bronze cuspidor next to his counting table. "I haven't gotten to be a rich old trader by shivering every time a bounty hunter looks in my direction. Do you think you're the only one in my caravan who's got someone looking for him? If you can take Vakkis down, all the better. Why do you think I called you in tonight? And if you can't, we keep our eyes out. He doesn't have anything solid or we'd have been ridden down by King Jared's troops by now. Just warn the others to keep their heads down," the caravan master continued, pouring himself another drink.
A slow grin crept into the edges of Vahanian's mouth. "I knew you were a good man when you didn't water the ale, Maynard," he said.
"And I knew you were an honest mercenary when you paid for it," Linton shot back. "Now get Out of here. And good hunting."