"I have a thought…" Wendee Jay said softly. Then she paused.
There was a hesitancy to Wendee's manner that surprised Elise a bit. The other woman had proven herself chatty, quite a comfortable person to be around and, if not a substitute for Ninette, an adept replacement. Then Elise realized that Wendee wasn't sure just where they—Sir Jared and herself in particular, she suspected—drew the line at servants putting themselves forth.
Firekeeper might have a title, but she dismissed it except as another name to which she would reluctantly answer from time to time. Derian might be a king's counselor, but he was a carter's son without title and his noble connections were patronage, not family.
This matter, however, had been raised by Elise—the future Baroness Archer—and clearly Wendee was uncertain if her advice would be welcome.
"What is it, Wendee?" Elise asked, trying to project warmth and reassurance into her tone. "Don't hold back. I may have studied New Kelvin, but my knowledge is limited. You are the only one of us who has done more than cross to a border town."
Wendee seemed even more uncomfortable.
"Actually," she said, "what I had to say wasn't about New Kelvin, not really. It relates, but it's something else."
"Go on," Elise prompted, wishing Ninette were along. Ninette could have privately assured Wendee that Elise wasn't a snob, but for Elise to do it herself would sound like just the thing a perfect snob
would
say.
I'll just have to prove to Wendee by my actions that I don't think less of her because she doesn't hold a title.
"Well," Wendee said, "is it important that Lady Melina not know we're looking for her? I mean, I understand why you didn't want her to know at first—when you weren't certain your suspicions were justified—but now… It's like Lady Firekeeper says, you
know
."
Elise mulled over this, nodding her head so that Wendee would not take her silence as rejection.
"That's a very interesting thought," she said. "I hadn't seen things that way."
Derian frowned. "But what do we do if Lady Melina gets the wind up and runs?"
"We chase!" Firekeeper said fiercely, jumping lightly as if she might bolt across the fallow fields that very moment, like a dog after a hare. "Winged folk should be watching Lady Melina and the treasures. They see, we run, we catch her!"
Derian grinned. "I bet you would and then the New Kelvinese would chop you into little, tiny pieces. Still, I like what Wendee's saying. It should make Lady Melina easier to find if we're not hiding ourselves, and if she does bolt…"
He shrugged.
"We chase," Firekeeper repeated firmly.
"So how are we going to find Lady Melina?" Elise asked again. "Even if we don't need to hide, it's not going to be easy. I suppose we could set up a residence and start entertaining on a lavish scale, but I don't have the resources for that. My father, you may recall, doesn't even know I'm here."
Instantly, Elise wished she hadn't reminded them, but no one commented. Derian did nod a bit resignedly, but even he didn't protest. Maybe since Elise had acted as a translator the night before, his reluctance to have her along had begun to ease.
True, Wendee possessed a fair command of New Kelvinese, enough to get by, but her vocabulary was frequently archaic and often she lacked the words for common terms like "chamber pot" or "spoon." Elise supposed these didn't come into use very often in high drama.
"There's a way we could sort of entertain," Wendee offered, "without needing more funds than we've brought with us."
Elise grinned. "Good! I was dreading writing my father."
Wendee relaxed. "We make ourselves a part of local society—a fairly visible part. People should come to us, then."
"Getting to be part of the local culture won't be easy," Derian commented dubiously. "As we've seen, the New Kelvinese don't exactly embrace foreigners."
"Actually…" Wendee paused thoughtfully. "I thought that Doc might hold the solution to all our problems."
"Me?" Doc started. Elise noticed that he managed to look astonished, pleased, and worried all at once. "How could I?"
"Go into practice," Wendee said, "as a healer."
"But New Kelvinese herb lore is respected in every land!" Doc protested. "Some of my best drugs come from here. How could I compete?"
"You have the healing talent," Wendee replied, "and that would make you special in any land."
"They must have their own doctors with the talent," Doc said, not protesting, just stating a point.
"They may or may not," Wendee said with a shrug. "The point is, the talent makes you useful beyond the average apothecary. In any case, I'm not so certain that the talents are common in New Kelvin. Did you ever see
The Tragic Romance of Tiliata and Mermetio
?"
"I'm afraid I missed that one," Doc admitted. Elise liked how the faint trace of a grin visible beneath his beard made his face light up. "It sounds like quite a show."
"Oh, it is," Wendee enthused. "I played Tiliata in a production some years ago. The play deals with a romance between two lovers…"
"It would," Doc teased, "by definition."
Elise felt a flash of envy. Doc never teased her—but then he might have known Wendee for years.
Wendee frowned at the knight. "This is serious."
"Sorry."
"Tiliata is a maiden, a member of the Sodality of Herbalists. Mermetio—the youth she loves—is a rising member of the Choir of Songweavers. They fall in love—an innocent enough passion—but soon after his voice begins to change."
Doc and Derian exchanged sidelong glances, which Wendee valiantly ignored. Her voice took on a certain melodramatic tone as she related the story.
"Desperate to help Mermetio maintain his place—for if his voice broke dangerously he would be forced to find a new sodality, and the pair's hoped-for marriage would be long delayed—Tiliata makes Mermetio a potion. Unfortunately, she is a mere apprentice and doesn't realize that the same concoction that will stabilize his voice will also geld him. Mermetio loses interest in her and she—facing not only her lover's abandonment but the wrath of her superiors—poisons herself."
"And your point?" Doc prompted.
Wendee glared at him.
"My point is that if they had doctors with the healing talent Tiliata could have paid one to cure him. That isn't even mentioned as an option. There are dozens of incidents like that in modern New Kelvinese drama—people maimed or mortally wounded—and never once is a person with the healing talent summoned. That only happens in traditional drama—stories set in the days before the Burning Death—what they call the plague."
Doc nodded, sketching a gracious bow in the air above his saddle's pommel.
"You have a point, Goody Wendee. I apologize for my doubts. Very well. Let's seek out the local equivalent of the Street of Apothecaries and Healers."
He frowned then. "I wonder if I need a guild membership to practice?"
"I don't know," Wendee admitted. "We can look into that when we get there. I guess if you can't be licensed, we'll just have to do without."
Doc didn't look happy about this aspect of the plan, but Elise didn't let such a minor wrinkle keep her from being charmed.
"We'll rent a few rooms," she said confidently, "ground-floor ones if we can find them. I'm certain that if Lady Melina is in town someone will tell us—people always tell foreigners about other foreigners."
She spoke with assurance, having witnessed similar exchanges in Bright Bay and even at home in Hawk Haven. People were always asking where you were from and then asking if you knew someone else from the same place.
Suddenly, the days that must pass before they reached Dragon's Breath seemed an eternity. She longed to thump Cream Delight with her heels and go racing along the roads until they reached the city of sorcery.
Firekeeper seemed to sense her burst of enthusiasm.
"I wish we could fly," she said 'wistfully, "like Elation." The wolf-woman pointed above to where the golden-eyed peregrine shifted lazily on the air.
"So do I," Elise said softly, as if they were sharing a great secret. "So do I!"
T
he man who had greeted Baron Endbrook outside Smuggler's Light proved to be Longsight Scrounger, one of the leading figures in the pirate organization. Nor had it been complete chance that he had been waiting to meet the baron. Lookouts had spotted Waln almost as soon as he entered the swamp; reports of his progress had been passed along to the lighthouse.
"We might even have pulled you out if you'd blundered into a boghole," Longsight said. "Then again we might not have."
He grinned at his own joke, showing a jagged front tooth, broken some said when he bit another pirate's arm to the bone during a brawl.
Longsight had taken Waln into the lighthouse and encouraged him to bathe and dine. It was only after Waln had suddenly nodded up from a guilty drowse following an excellent meal of fish poached in white wine that he thought to wonder whether the door to his room was locked.
The baron decided not to bother checking. He'd walked into the pirates' lair freely. It was up to them to decide whether he was their guest or their prisoner. For now he needed rest more than freedom, and sleep was not denied him.
Waln's dreams were full of storm-tossed seas through which he piloted a ship crewed by skeletons. Eventually the ship was wrecked against rocks the crystal blue of Lady Melina's eyes.
He swam to shore, where he spent an eternity slogging through swamps in a thick fug of summer heat. He struggled on endlessly, pushing through vines that wrapped around his limbs, twisted around his throat.
Several times he nearly strangled, but always the pressure relented just before his heart burst from lack of air.
When Waln awoke, clear light was shining in through the narrow window in his room. A girl with hair the color of fire or fine brandy was seated at his bedside reading a book. Seeing he was awake, she put down the book and dashed away—presumably to fetch some adult. Only when she was gone did Waln realize that the girl had been Citrine Shield.
He slept again before anyone returned to speak with him. When he awoke, the light had dimmed and a man waited nearby. Waln could not recall seeing him before, but judging from how the man reached over and took his wrist to test his pulse Waln thought he must be some sort of healer.
"Fess Bones," the other said by way of introduction. "Here, drink some of this—it's just water."
Waln did as he was told, realizing he felt wrung-out, so weak that he could hardly get his fingers to close around the handle of the heavy pottery mug. Fess Bones helped him, wiping the water that dribbled down Waln's chin as neatly as a mother might.
"You've been sick these past two days," Fess reported. "Fever rose the very night you arrived. You slept the night through and all the day following. Woke once this morning—we thought you were with us—but the fever dragged you down again. It's evening now. How do you feel?"
"Thirsty," Waln croaked. "Weak."
"You can have more water in bit. Let your stomach learn to swallow what you just drank. I'll see if the kitchen has any broth and tell Longsight you're awake and likely to live."
Fess was back some indeterminate time later with a container of warm fish stock.
"Longsight says you're to rest. He'll talk with you come morning."
Waln wanted to disagree. His task was too important. He needed to get news to Queen Valora, but when he tried to speak his throat would not obey him. He let Fess Bones spoon fish stock into him, drank more water, drifted back to sleep.
When Waln awoke once again, darkness had fallen. Someone else sat vigil with him, just visible in the flickering candlelight—a weathered old crone with a scar through her right eyebrow and the top of her left ear missing. She gave him water and broth, helped him use the pot, then settled back in her chair to nap.
Waln himself was at last wide awake. In some ways he felt more alert than he had since meeting with Lady Melina at the post-house, his mind clear, his thoughts cogent. He wondered if his family had missed his letters or had simply believed that some vagary of winter shipping had delayed them, wondered how he could get a message to Queen Valora, wondered how she would take the news of Lady Melina's betrayal.
The queen was certain to be angry—furious. A sudden realization chilled Waln as if the fever was returning. What if Queen Valora took her anger out on him?
Somehow the thought had never occurred to him. He'd fled toward her, trusting the queen to avenge the wrongs done to him and, through him, to her. Why had he never seen that Queen Valora would most likely strike out at the nearest person holding part of the blame?
Lying on his back in the dark room, listening to the rasping snores of the old pirate woman in the chair beside his bed, Baron Endbrook frantically reworked his plans.
Before, in some vague fashion he had thought to take ship for the Isles, to let Queen Valora assume responsibility for the entire mess. Now Waln realized that if he hoped to return home with some shreds of his reputation intact, he must act at once. Fortunately, the very secret nature of his embassy for her made it unlikely that Queen Valora would inquire after him too publicly lest embarrassing information come to light.
He had time. The thought comforted him. He had time, time to put pressure on Lady Melina, to regain the artifacts, to make his own deal with the New Kelvinese to activate the artifacts or—better—to simply get off this cursed mainland. Queen Valora could find another ambassador.
After he had the artifacts back, then Waln could tell Queen Valora the truth. If nothing had been lost but a little time, surely she would be willing to accept that the heirlooms' secrets had not been unlocked—especially when she realized how close she had come to losing them entirely.
All through the long hours of darkness Baron Endbrook lay awake. When dawn filtered pale and chill through the narrow window the crone ceased her snoring. She moved flaccid lips over bare gums and smiled pinkly at him.