ONE
Winters in Konschtat were cold. A damp, foggy, cold that burrowed marrow-deep into bones and made the thought of going outside again almost intolerable. Much better to curl up by the fire and dream of past days. But logs needed chopping. Animals needed feeding. And putting it off meant finishing in the half-dark, when it was better and safer to be back indoors. Elanie sighed, pushed back her stool, and picked up her sheepskin jacket.
" The fence up at Big Top needs checking," Caeris said.
Elanie nodded. " I know. I'll go up there with Diron tomorrow."
" He can mend a fence himself."
" Of course he can. But it's safer if we both go. I saw a couple of goblins up there last Darksday. This cold weather brings them in too close to the farm."
Kae tugged at the hem of her jacket. " I wants to see goblins, Auntie Ela."
" Well, now," she replied, picking him up and snuggling him. He was nearly four, but he still smelled of sweet, soft, baby smells. " Here's a thing, my lovely. Some goblins are not so bad but . . ."
Caeris snorted, but Elanie took notice. Despite being barely more than a toddler, Kae already displayed a tendency to run off and look for trouble whenever he got the chance. Too much like his aunt probably. She wanted to make sure he knew that going in search of monsters by himself wasn't a good idea.
" There's a goblin in Bastok, for example," she continued. " Whose name is Shinstix. He has a shop that sells wooden horses. Horses just about the right size for a young man of your great height to gallop around on."
" I AM big, aren't I, Auntie Ela?"
" Yes, you are," she said. " But the goblins that sneak up to High Top field won't care how big you are. They aren't nice goblins, not like Shinstix. The bigger you are, the better dinner they think you'll make. So I will give you a promise. If you're a good boy for the whole of winter – the whole of winter, mind – I'll take you to Bastok come spring and buy you a wooden horse from Shinstix."
Kae widened his eyes. " Really?"
" Yes."
" Winter is very long, though, isn't it?"
" It is," she agreed.
" I will try," he said, so seriously she had to fight not to smile.
" That means not going looking for any bad goblins in the meantime," she pointed out.
" I know. I'm not silly. But you would eat the bad goblins, Auntie Ela. They wouldn't eat you. You're a 'venturer, Diron says so. You would kick their bony . . ."
" Kae!" exclaimed his mother. " I'll wash your mouth out with soap, child."
" I didn't say it," he protested.
" Only because I interrupted you, you naughty rabbit."
" Peace," Elanie said. " And I'm not an adventurer any more, Kae. So let's stay away from the bad goblins. Okay?"
Elanie had given up what Caeris called her vagabond days several months ago. Her brother-in-law, Kae's father, had picked up some sickness at the spring fair in Selbina. Stubbornly he'd tried to shrug it off instead of seeking out a healer. By the time she heard of his illness and made it back to Bastok, he was beyond even her magic. All she could do was ease his pain with poppy juice and hold his hand as he passed. Caeris never blamed her for not getting there sooner, but she blamed herself. Out on the road it could be weeks before she heard any news from home. She didn't feel she could leave them again to fend for themselves; she'd always had a tendency to mother Caeris, and her sister clung to her quite desperately in the first weeks of widowhood.
Elanie wasn't sure when she made the decision to stay permanently. She wasn't even sure she ever did. She certainly didn't make a grand announcement, hang up her daggers, sell all her gear. She still had it in a small chest under the bed. But she acknowledged that she was unlikely ever to go adventuring again, unless Caeris remarried. Her sister didn't truly need her there anymore; she was more than capable of running the farm, and they'd hired trustworthy men to help. But whenever the subject came up, Caeris panicked and made her promise to stay.
Sometimes an old friend from the wandering days would pass through Bastok and fetch up at the farm; that always made Caeris particularly agitated. So when they asked Ela to go on a jaunt through Palborough Mines, or some such, she always laughed and said 'no chance!' Last she heard, they'd found some other white mage to replace her. She stayed out in the barn that night, chopping wood until her eyes wouldn't stay open any longer and her whole body ached. She was determined she wouldn't cry herself to sleep. Tears wouldn't change anything. They certainly wouldn't rewind the fight against Promathia – was that really so many months ago? – and miraculously bring Iggy back to life. She'd carried on after he died; they all did. But somehow her heart wasn't in it any more. It was as if Ignisrostrum had been the glue that bound them all together. Cerenth did his best to motivate them, but there'd been gaping cracks for a long time before she returned to the farm in Konschtat.
Elanie sighed, ruffled Kae's hair, and put him back down on the floor.
" Go and play with your sister, lovely," she said. " I have to go finish feeding the beasts."
He scowled. " But Mailin is boring. All she does is read."
" You could stand to spend more time at your books, young man," his mother told him.
Kae's scowl deepened. Elanie could tell he was searching through the other profanities he'd learned from Diron for something suitably scathing to say. She made a hasty exit before he found it: she didn't want to be the one called on to hold him still while Caeris made good her threat about the soap.
Fog enveloped her as soon as she stepped out of the door. It wasn't thick - she could still see across the yard – but it was cold and damp, and it made her hunch her shoulders and pull her sheepskin closer. Her footsteps sounded oddly muffled as she crossed the cobbles, as if she had wool for boots. There was no point calling for Diron, the sound wouldn't carry through the fog. Besides, he'd already be in the barn, putting up the feeds. She'd been longer than she intended in the kitchen. And no doubt Griggory was already chopping the wood they'd hauled yesterday, although she couldn't hear the swing of his axe. Starl would be in the tiny hut they used as a farm office, pouring over his accounts.
An outsider might think Starl won the game when they handed out jobs, especially at that time of year. He was inside, more or less, and he got to sit down all day. But Elanie had taken her turn at the books sometimes, and she knew that heaving dirty straw with a pitchfork was infinitely preferable to crouching in the cold, trying to make sense of the columns of figures. Starl had chilblains and headaches; whenever she went in there, he'd be blowing on his fingers to warm them up or stomping round to get some circulation back in his feet. That year they'd made a profit for the first time since Elanie's brother-in-law died, mainly thanks to Starl's forward planning. In the spring she planned to use some of it to build a proper chimney in the office so that he could have a fire.
Starl had an eye for her sister, Ela knew. Actually all three of them did, if only because Caeris came dowered with the farm. Elanie was the elder, but she'd foregone any claim on the property when she chose a vagabond life. Their father had married Caeris off to his farm manager after Ela left; Caeris hadn't been given much choice in the matter, but the match turned out a happy one, and she'd grieved honestly when her husband died.
As far as Ela could make out, remarrying never occurred to Caeris, despite the fact that she was an attractive woman still and young enough to bear more children. Her red-gold hair was long, and it had glints of fire in it where it caught the light. Her figure curved more than adequately in all the right places. Ela had seen Starl watching Caeris sometimes and reckoned he wanted the woman at least as much as he wanted the land. But Caeris was oblivious. Ela had dropped a few hints sometimes, when they lingered over supper, yet all she got back were puzzled eyes, as if Caeris had forgotten men had other purposes than merely keeping accounts and chopping wood.
For herself, Ela hadn't forgotten anything. But her life was much more ruled by convention now. Out on the roads, marriage was more or less unheard of. Men and women both took their pleasure where they wanted. There was plenty of bawdy gossip, but no one thought less of anyone because of it; loyalty, courage and the swing of the sword were what mattered out there. If a man – or woman – stood shoulder to shoulder with you and watched your back, it didn't matter how many whores they'd tumbled the night before. She missed those free and easy ways as much as she missed everything else, but she had no choice. If she didn't conform, the talk would taint Caeris and the children as much as it tainted her. If she'd been a man, she might have gotten away with it. As it was, on the nights her body burned, she had to grit her teeth and endure. Or ease herself, which helped momentarily, but left her lonely and sad for days afterwards.
Elanie sighed again and pushed open the barn door. Feeling sorry for herself accomplished nothing so she tried to avoid it.
By mid-afternoon they'd done with the animals and the log pile. Three of them were sweeping up the yard when Kae erupted out of the kitchen door, laughing. His sister, Mailin, four years older, came barrelling after him, her face red and cross.
Ela grabbed her nephew out of instinct. If there was trouble, he was generally the root and cause of it. He wriggled like a trapped bastore bream and squealed for her to let him go, but she kept hold.
" What have you done, imp?" she demanded.
Mailin puffed up to us. " He took my book, Auntie Ela."
Elanie removed the book from his grasp. He looked mutinous, but he didn't fight.
" Books are expensive, Kae," she said. " And it's mean to tease your sister."
" But she's so boring. All she does is read."
Ela couldn't deny that. Mailin spent her days, and a lot of her nights too, pouring over anything that had writing on it. Caeris often berated her daughter for the amount of candles she used. In contrast, Kae was only interested in something if it involved running, jumping and, preferably, hitting stuff with sticks. Sometimes Ela wished she could extract small bits of both and switch them over, making Mailin less bookish and Kae less wild.
" Okay," she said. " Listen to me, both of you. Item One. Kae, you promised me you'd try and be good for the whole of winter. Teasing your sister is not being good."
His bottom lip quivered. " But I did try."
" Then you must learn to try harder. Item Two. Mailin, spending all your time reading isn't good for you. You need fresh air and exercise."
Mailin looked down at her feet. " But it's so cold out here, Aunt Ela."
" I know, sweetie. So starting tomorrow you'll both come and help me on the farm for an hour. That will keep you warm. As for now, I'll keep the book. You can both go back inside and fetch your coats, and we'll take a short walk with Diron to check on the fences. You two can carry the torches for us."
" But . . ." Mailin said.
" No buts."
Elanie planned to walk down the path to the gates; even in the fog they were unlikely to run into trouble along the path. It was more to distract the children than anything else. She sent them back inside to fetch warmer gear. Kae ran happily, excited about the idea of a brief adventure. Mailin dragged her feet, but she did as she was told. They'd both returned, and Ela was checking buttons and gloves and scarves, when they all heard something that made them stop and turn towards the arch into the yard.
" Riders," Diron said.
Elanie gave Mailin a little push. " Back into the house. Take your brother. Kae, go. NOW." She raised her voice even higher. " Starl, Griggory, here. We have visitors."
She touched her fingers to the twin daggers she always wore. She never went anywhere without them, even now, although she'd only needed them a handful of times since she left the roads. She had no particular reason to suspect their unknown guests meant trouble, but it was better to be cautious. It was winter, and late in the day; only idiots or villains would come calling at this hour.
They clattered into the yard. Two of them. They rode black birds, well fed and sleek, with eastern saddles and harnesses. Ela heard Griggory behind her mutter something. He had his axe in hand. Diron leant on his pitchfork. She knew neither would hesitate to use the tools as weapons if necessary.
" Peace," she said, stepping forward. She'd pushed her sheepskin jacket back so that it wouldn't hamper her if she needed to draw the daggers. But she didn't think the men meant trouble, although she didn't recognise either of them. They had decent gear, and their birds looked expensive, not nags from a hire stable. No brigands or outlaws then.
" Peace," one of them replied. " We seek Coldlaw Farm." He spoke with a heavy accent, but she'd heard it often enough in the past to recognise it, and her heart beat a little faster. She relaxed her stance a touch. If she wasn't mistaken, they came with news, not trouble.
" Then you've found it," she said. " This is Coldlaw Farm. And you are far from home, gentlemen."
They both bowed, with that easy elvaan assurance Elanie hadn't seen in a while. Not many elvaan came to Bastok, and they certainly never ventured as far as the farm, except by accident. And, unless she was mistaken, this pair had travelled much further than the elvaan city of San D'Oria. They didn't wear any livery, but the first had spoken with an eastern accent. Ela would happily bet they'd travelled from Aht Urghan. But why? What business did they have at Coldlaw Farm?
" I feel certain you didn't come so far merely to admire the carvings on our gate posts," she said.
The first one smiled. They both wore swords, curved like scimitars, but the rest of their gear was plain and anonymous. Whatever they were, they travelled in some secrecy. The curved swords made her think, a touch hysterically, that they must be Immortals, members of the elite Imperial Guard. But what business would two Immortals have on a small farm in Konschtat Highlands? And besides, they weren't veiled; as far as she knew, the Immortals never removed their veils. But her heartbeat had speeded up again despite herself. Just the sight of them was enough to make her remember the woman she had been, once upon a time.
" We seek Elanie Byrne," the first said.
Diron stopped leaning on his pitchfork.
" You've found her," he said. " What's your business?"
The stranger looked at Ela. " Elanie Byrne?"
" Yes," she managed to say, past the constriction in her throat.
The man reached down to his belt, and both Griggory and Diron hefted up axe and pitchfork. He glanced at them but didn't falter, pulling a letter from the pouch at his waist. He held it out, looking at Ela. Diron looked at Ela too, and she nodded. Griggory stepped forward and took the letter, passing it over. When she took it, she discovered her fingers were trembling. She wasn't sure if it was fear or excitement. The clamor of her old life sounded so loud in her ears she could barely think straight.
Like the messengers, the seal on the letter was anonymous. No clues there. She took a deep breath and broke it open.
Inside there was a single sheet.
Five words written on it.
" Come," it said. " I need you. Aphmau."
Elanie lowered the page, hoping no one noticed how much her hand shook.
" Who gave you this?" she asked.
The man looked at her. " The one who wrote it. There is a token with it, Lady. So you know there is no trick."
She held out her other hand, and he dropped a small coin into it. She didn't even need to look at it to know what it was, but she checked anyway. It had once been part of a necklace, an Ephramadian talisman, but someone had removed the chain. All that remained was the token, a round metal carving like a coin, bearing the worn symbol of an armoured rider on a horse.
Elanie closed her eyes and took a deep breath. If her current life swirled and span any faster around her feet, it would shatter into pieces, and she'd fall into the void beneath. More than that, she ached to fall. Voices from her past called to her like sirens.
The name Aphmau was common enough throughout the Empire. It meant Little Flower, or so she'd heard, and it was the pet name for countless girl children. If this message had fallen into other hands by mistake, there was no reason for anyone to suspect its true origin. Even the token was just an old, meaningless carving to most people. The ghosts of the Ephramadians carried hundreds of them. The writer had gone to a lot of trouble to ensure that the message came in secret and meant nothing, except to its proper recipient.
Elanie.
She shook her head. What in Altana's name was Nashmeira up to now?
Yes, Aphmau was a common name in the Empire. But there was one Aphmau Elanie knew well. And this particular Aphmau viewed the Ephramadians and their artifacts with a very potent reverence. Most people knew her by a different name. And they had a tendency to fall to the ground as she passed, in case they sullied her by looking on her face. Nashmeira. Empress of Aht Urghan. Who had loved and lost an ancient Ephramadian ghost in the battle to protect her Empire.
Elanie could think of only a few reasons for Nashmeira to have need of her, a secret need at that, and none of them were good. Most of them involved Luzaf, Nashmeira's ghostly lost love. If Ela ignored the message . . . ah, by Odin's nine hells, no way could she ignore the message. Nashmeira was brave and good and a fine empress. And she was ten years wiser than she'd been when they first met. But Ela knew none of those things would stop the Empress haring off on some idiotic quest, especially if it had something to do with Luzaf.
She looked at the messenger. " The answer is yes."
He bowed, and a small smile broke his quiet calm. " Thank you, Lady."
" I'll need a little time though. A few days."
" I understand."
" Travel safe," she told him.
They turned their birds and rode back out of the yard. Ela looked at Starl, and Griggory, and Diron, and she tried to smile. What on earth did she think she was doing? Caeris would go crazy. And Ela couldn't even give her a proper explanation. Until she knew what Nashmeira was up to, the less people who knew about her involvement in this the better.
The only ones she dared trust were the ones who'd fought beside her to save Nashmeira ten years ago. She just had to hope that they'd forgiven her by now for walking out on them to become a farmer.
