Piro longed to ask her mother's advice, but Cobalt was sure to have spies watching the queen. If he had remembered a little detail like Piro's love for her foenix, he won't have left any avenue open for her to reach her mother or father.
Even so, after she had eaten, she found her feet taking her to the mourning tower, where her mother was captive. The tower's courtyard was filled with animals, which the townsfolk had penned in hastily rigged shelters. Chickens and goats had settled for the night, making the area smell like a farm yard. And there, at the top of the steps to the tower's first floor, was one of the king's honour guard.
That reminded her of Sawtree. She knew of a window where she could look down into the stable courtyard. She'd go there next and see what she could do for the old guard.
The guard in front of her was one of the young ones loyal to Cobalt, lord protector of the castle. That role should have gone to Captain Temor…
That reminded her of Temor and his stand at the last gate. A sob caught in her throat.
Furious, she pressed the pads of her fingers into her eye sockets until she saw swirling patterns of rage. No point in crying. No point in feeling sorry for herself. Feel sorry for Sawtree instead. Maybe there was something she could do for him… sneak him food, since she had saved some from her last meal. Or, if she was really lucky, she might slip him a knife and he could free himself when he had the chance. How had Cobalt punished him, by crippling him? She hoped it wasn't something permanent.
One more grubby maid amongst so many, Piro made her way to the wing that overlooked the stable courtyard. It housed the castle hospice, packed now with injured townsfolk. Many had loved ones with them, nursing them, so there was a constant coming and going, with children crying and grown-ups bickering over space.
From a narrow window in the hospice she saw a man in the centre of the courtyard with his arms tied above his head, toes off the ground, head slumped. There was an ominous dark patch in the snowy ground under his feet. It was only as he slowly swung around that she saw the arrows in his chest. Stunned, she found it hard to credit what she saw.
It appeared as though, at Cobalt's orders, Sawtree's fellow men-at-arms had used him for target practice.
Impotent anger rose up in her, threatened to choke her, and hot tears ran down her cheeks as she left the hospice. Cobalt would pay for this.
Miserable fury raged through her as she wandered her home, recalling the many dreams where she had run down the corridors chased by wyverns, the Merofynian symbol. She should have heeded those dreams instead of trying to quell them with dreamless-sleep.
Halcyon must have been watching over Piro, for she found herself near the goddess's chantry with no memory of how she got there. She had slept under the nave last night. With the wardess dead there was only the healer to serve the temple and both Halcyon and Sylion's healers had been caring for her father. So the chantry would be empty of nuns.
As Piro had suspected it was empty of church officials, but thick with the scent of burning votive candles and full of desperate townspeople, praying to the goddess to bring them to safety. Piro entered, just one more desperate penitent. She ignored her royal family's private box and found a dark corner where she prayed, then dozed.
Not the cold, not the hard stone or the crowding, nothing could not stop her from falling into the deep sleep. Tomorrow was another day. Things would be better.
She had to believe this.
Fyn should have been asleep on the stone hearth in front of Lame Klimen's fire but he could not rest. Every time he closed his eyes, he saw himself fleeing down the abbey's stair while the others held off the Merofynians on the landing above.
He knew it was illogical to feel guilty about leaving the old masters and his fellow acolytes to die – without him, Lenny and the rest of the boys would have been trapped and killed. But this did not stop the sick rush of emotion.
It had been the kind of critical tactical decision the weapons master had been training him for all this time and he understood it, even if he didn't like it.
What really ate away at him was the knowledge that, if he hadn't frozen, the abbot might still be alive and able to rebuild the abbey.
Why had he seized up? He'd never failed in practice.
That was practice, this was nothing like the bouts with the weapons master.
Oakstand had taught that sometimes it was necessary to kill to save an innocent life. But when Fyn had imagined enemies they were faceless warriors with bad hearts, not ordinary men like his father's loyal men-at-arms, whose misfortune it was to serve the wrong king.
He rolled over and tried to think of something pleasant. At least Piro was safe in Rolenhold. But this didn't make him feel any better. He felt a niggle of worry every time he thought of her.
Feldspar jerked awake, alert and troubled, hand pressed to his heart.
'Bad dream?' Fyn asked, lifting on one elbow.
Feldspar inhaled sharply and sat up. 'Don't you feel it? My Affinity is itching like a -' His eyes widened and he glanced down to where his hand pressed to his heart. No, not to his heart. He pulled the Fate out from under his vest.
The seashell-shaped stone glowed fiercely, bright as a captured star. Fyn swallowed.
'It's beautiful,' Joff marvelled, as he, also, sat up. 'Perhaps the goddess herself has seen our plight and seeks to comfort us.'
Feldspar's hand closed over the stone, trapping the light so that only a deep orange seeped through the crevices between his fingers. Fyn wondered if it felt as hot as it appeared. As he watched, his friend's beatific expression faded and a sheen of sweat covered his skin. Feldspar's breath caught in a gasp and, when another breath failed to follow, Fyn grabbed the hand that held the Fate intending to prise it free, but…
…the instant he made contact with the Fate, a vision swamped him.
Cold leached into the very marrow of his bones. As good as dead, he lay wedged between bloodied corpses. Above him on the edge of a rocky ledge, torch-wielding men tossed another body over and it plummeted down, landing on top of him, burying him alive. His heart tried to climb out of his throat.
An imperative came to him.
Run. Leave the abbey. Flee for your lives. We are betrayed!
Fyn tried to run but his body wouldn't obey. His legs felt strangely stiff and disjointed. He recognised that terrifying dream sensation, where every movement takes incredible effort and happens too slowly. Yet he knew this wasn't a dream. It was a vision, and it was imperative he escape. It felt as if his heart would burst with the effort.
'Fyn!' Joff bellowed, as something snapped his head around, making one side of his face throb. Another blow sent him off his knees onto his back, knocking the air from his chest.
His sight cleared to discover Joff hovering over him, ready to deliver a third blow.
'Stop,' he croaked, lifting arms that ached from exertion, even though he had been sitting still.
Joff scrambled aside and turned to Feldspar. Fyn struggled to his knees to find his friend collapsed on the hearth stone, bleeding from his nose.
'You didn't have to hit him so hard, Joff,' Fyn protested, his voice a mere thread.
'I didn't hit him at all. His nose started to bleed when you touched the Fate.'
Fyn crawled over, touching Feldspar's forehead, feeling for the pulse in his throat, for signs of breathing. Good. He wasn't dead. 'Feldspar, can you hear me?'
His friend's eyes flickered open, fixing on Fyn.
'Have to escape!' Urgency warred with exhaustion.
'We've already escaped. We're safe. Remember?'
Feldspar frowned, then nodded and tried to sit up. Fyn went to help him but the Fate brushed his hand and he jerked back instinctively. Joff cast him a quick glance, then helped Feldspar, who hugged his knees, trembling.
'What did you two see?' Joff whispered. 'Was it the same thing?'
Fyn glanced to Feldspar who shivered, either unable or unwilling to speak.
'A mass grave filled with bodies,' Fyn whispered. 'Men with torches were throwing more bodies in on top of me… on top of Master Catillum, I mean.' He looked to Feldspar for confirmation.
'If you say so,' Feldspar muttered. 'All I felt was cold, a terrible cold. And the need to run.'
Joff turned to Fyn for an explanation.
'Sensation without sight,' Fyn guessed. That would have been even more terrifying. But he didn't say anything. Feldspar had always been the clever, nervy one, now his friend looked fragile.
Feldspar wiped blood from his lips and chin. 'If the Merofynians are throwing bodies into a mass grave, Master Catillum amongst them, the weapons master and all the warrior monks must be dead.'
Fyn nodded. 'So we know for certain that they were ambushed and the cream of Halcyon's warrior monks defeated. The Merofynians would have travelled with Power-workers just as we had our mystics. It's a wonder Master Catillum had any strength left to use the Fate.' Fyn imagined the mystics master injured, half-frozen with the use of only one arm. 'Poor Catillum, he wasn't dead when they threw him into the mass grave, but -'
'They couldn't have dug a trench,' Joff, the farmer's son, objected. 'The ground is still frozen. They must be throwing them into a ravine.'
'Whatever it was,' Fyn conceded, 'Master Catillum was being buried alive.'
'Probably the safest place for him,' Feldspar muttered. 'Lay low until they leave, then crawl out.'
Fyn nodded slowly. 'If he can get out with that withered arm.'
No one spoke for a while. A branch crumpled in the fire, revealing glowing coals. Fyn shivered, shaken by the vision, even if the experience had been secondhand.
'You must let him know we are safe,' Feldspar whispered and removed the Fate's chain, thrusting it towards Fyn.
Fyn shook his head, eyeing the seashell stone where a residual glow still lingered in its opalescent spirals. 'I'm not touching that thing.'
'You have to. You have an Affinity with the Fate. I don't. Take it.' Feldspar forced it into Fyn's hands. 'Since I joined the abbey, all I ever wanted was to train as a mystic. But I know my limits. When the Fate had me I felt like my head was going to burst. Any more and I think it would have.' He touched his nose, which was still bleeding sluggishly, then fixed on Fyn. 'You have to concentrate on Master Catillum to make contact, then send him a picture of us escaping from the caves and looking across to Sylion Abbey. He can guess from that where we'll be hiding. We need him.'
Fyn's stomach churned. He did not want to summon the Fate's powers again. But Master Catillum had risked exposing himself to the Merofynian army's Power-worker to contact them. He deserved to know the abbey's boys were safe. If the master could get to Sylion Abbey, Catillum could begin to rebuild Halcyon Abbey.
'What…' Joff began. 'What if you contact the wrong Power-worker? The nearest one must be with the Merofynians who took the abbey.'
Feldspar met Fyn's gaze, waiting for his response.
Fyn closed his eyes. Could he reach only Master Catillum? He shivered, remembering the cold, and the way the body plummeted towards him. It was so easy to imagine himself back in that moment. 'I think I can.'
Feldspar offered Fyn his hand. Another bead of blood seeped from his nostrils. 'Do you want my help?'
'No, I'll manage.'
Fyn closed his eyes, the better to concentrate. It was not hard to recall the body spiralling down towards him, the sense of entrapment…
All around him it was quiet, the quiet waiting of the dead. He was weighed down by the dead…
He was the mystics master.
Fyn recalled the fisher folk sheltering the boys. He visualised the distant cliffs with Sylion Abbey standing silhouetted against the sky.
A sense of relief washed over him and he realised it was Master Catillum's emotion. The sensation was so unnerving, he pulled back instinctively. The world dropped out from under his feet. He fell through nothing.
He was nothing… the gorge rose in his throat.
Suddenly he was in his body again, pitching forwards as he threw up all over his knees.
The horrible wracking spasms eventually passed and Fyn wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, supporting himself with a trembling arm.
'Here.' Joff offered Fyn a beaker of water from the bucket by the fire.
'Thanks.' Fyn could only croak.
'Fish stew,' Feldspar muttered. 'Smells just as bad the second time around. Think I'm -'
As he gagged, Fyn felt another spasm take him and, together, they staggered outside to throw up in the snowdrift by the door. They both heaved until they had nothing left to bring up.
Fyn sat back on his heels and picked up a handful of fresh snow to wipe his face. He laughed, even as tears stung his eyes.
'You're crazy,' Feldspar muttered, but he also grinned.
Fyn felt weak but oddly lighter and happier. They both sucked on fresh snow to rinse their mouths.
By the time they returned to the cottage, the old woman had lit a fish-oil lamp and was already cleaning up. She took one look at them and clicked her tongue on the roof of her mouth. 'Off with those clothes.'
Both Fyn and Feldspar protested but she couldn't hear them and, anyway, she wouldn't have taken no for an answer, so they stripped down. Joff didn't bother to hide his grin. Fyn removed his abbey leggings and the borrowed shirt with a sense of finality. Feldspar removed his robe. The old woman took the clothes off to wash and they were left in nothing but their breech cloths, huddled before the fire.
Lame Klimen fetched a patchwork quilt. It smelt just like him and was still warm from his body but they accepted it gratefully.
Under cover of the quilt Fyn undid the chain that held the Fate. 'I'm not going to Sylion Abbey. You keep this, Feldspar.'
Pale and shaken, his friend shook his head. 'No. You keep it, Fyn. I can't use it.'
Fyn gave an unsteady laugh. 'What makes you think I can?'
'If it's activated again while I'm wearing it I fear my brains will come pouring out my nose,' Feldspar said, his face naked of pretence.
Fyn shuddered.
Without warning, the woman pulled the quilt off their shoulders. Thrusting an armful of clothes at them, she said, 'Might be a bit big.'
Fyn and Feldspar unrolled the leggings and fisherman smocks. They dressed hastily, cold despite the thick walls of the cottage.
After tugging the smock over his shoulders, Feldspar pulled the acolyte plait free. 'At least Catillum knows we escaped. You did well, Fyn.'
But he couldn't shake the feeling that he had failed. If only he'd realised the original message from King Rolen was a fake. Then the abbot wouldn't have sent the fighting monks out and the abbey wouldn't have fallen. If only Fyn hadn't frozen, then the abbot would still be alive.
A wave of despair washed over him.
He could not change the past but he could influence the future. He must warn his father that the abbey had fallen. King Rolen would have to rethink his battle campaign.