'Empaths,' Sir Topher said, his eyes still on the novice as she busied herself plucking a pheasant. 'It's the empaths who are sensing something.'
'I thought they were all put to death.'
'No, only those who belonged to the Forest Dwellers. There seem to have been others with the gift, especially among the Flatlanders and the Monts. I believe it's why Saro of the Monts keeps his people well hidden.'
Sir Topher walked over to where the girl was sitting. Feathers were stuck to her fingers and parts of her shift.
'Pick a language,' Finnikin said stiffly. 'She seems to know a few.'
The novice stood, her eyes moving from Finnikin to Sir Topher. 'I only know the language of my parents and Belegonian,' she said quietly in Belegonian. 'And I can speak a little Sarnak.'
Sir Topher's breath caught. 'Is there anything else you need to tell us, Evanjalin?'
She shook her head, and her bottom lip began to quiver.
'There's no need to be afraid,' Sir Topher continued gently. 'Where did you hear about Charyn's plan for Belegonia?'
She leaned close, whispering into his ear, 'Balthazar.'
Finnikin saw confusion on Sir Topher's face.
'Please don't be angry, Sir Topher,' she said. 'Please take me to the Monts. They will know what to do, I promise you. On my life, I promise you.'
'And you believe them to be in Sorel?'
She hesitated for a moment and then nodded.
The thief was cackling with laughter. 'Crying,' he mimicked. 'So sad. Want someone to cut my froat open and feed it to the dogs.'
The girl did not respond, and after a moment Sir Topher walked away. 'Come, Finnikin. Practice.'
But Finnikin stayed. 'Why is it that you choose silence, Evanjalin?' he said. 'Something to hide?'
Her eyes met his. 'Why speak when I can respond to your whistle like a dog?'
He gave a humorless laugh. There was nothing simple about this one.
'And anyway, I was so enjoying the discussions about fragile Lady Zarah.'
He and Sir Topher had discussed Lord Tascan's daughter in Osterian. Finnikin's eyes narrowed as he tried to bite back his anger. What they didn't know about this girl could fill the
'Is that jealousy I hear in your voice?' he asked.
'Jealousy? Of a vacuous member of the nobility who trills like a bird, according to Sir Topher?'
'Your voice could do with a bit more of a trill,' he said.
'Really? Because yours could do with a bit more refinement. For someone who's supposed to be the future king's First Man, you sound like a fishmonger.'
'First,' he seethed, 'I belong to the future King's Guard and second, my father was the son of a fishmonger, so I would choose my insults more carefully if I were you.'
'Finnikin! Practice,' Sir Topher called out again.
Evanjalin returned to the task with the pheasant as if Finnikin were no longer there.
'You have a very dark heart,' he accused.
'It's good of you to recognize, Finnikin,' she said without looking up. 'There's hope for you yet.'
Chapter 6
The road to Sorel from Belegonia ran through ancient caverns said to be the dwelling place of the darkest gods in the land. Travelers preferred the ocean route between the two kingdoms despite the piracy on the open seas, and Finnikin could understand why. The journey through the caverns took most of the day. He was forced to stoop for the entire time and felt hounded by the carvings of grotesque forms, half-human, half-animal, on the walls around them. Yellow painted eyes tracked him, while outstretched clawlike fingers traced an icy line along his arm whenever he brushed against the jagged rock.
There was little reprieve when they reached the capital. Sorel was a kingdom of stone and rubble, its terrain as unrelenting as Sendecane. The dryness in the air caused them to choke each time they tried to speak, and rough pieces of stone cut into Finnikin's thin leather boots. He could not help but notice the bloodied feet of the novice, and he cursed her for whatever it was that drove her on. Lately she had taken the lead, though when he thought back, he realized that she had done so since Sendecane.
Sorel had a darkness to its core, much like Charyn. But if Charyn was a knife that could slice its victim with quick and deadly precision, justice in Sorel was a blunt blade that dug and tunneled into the flesh, leaving its victim to die a long and painful death. Sorel had been Lumatere's only competitor in the export of ore from its mines and had reveled in the catastrophe of the unspeakable, tripling export fees and bleeding the surrounding kingdoms dry. The king used the mines as a prison, and it was rumored that some inmates had not seen light of day for as long as Finnikin had been alive. Worse still were the stories of the slave children, forced to work in the mines during the day and locked up underground at night. For once Finnikin was grateful that he and Sir Topher and the thief were fair in coloring and even more grateful that the novice's hair was shorn.
'Keep your head down,' he warned her at the heavily guarded border town. 'They distrust those with dark eyes, and this is one place we do not want attention drawn to us.'
Finnikin passed through safely; not even the quiver of arrows he wore on his back and the bow that hung from his side drew the attention of the guards. But the novice did. They grabbed her by the coarse cloth of her shift, almost choking her. Finnikin lunged toward them, but she held out her hand to stop him. He watched as one soldier forced her to her knees, checking behind her ears for any marks of the phlux, which the people of Sorel believed the exiles of Lumatere carried in their bodies and spread across the land.
The soldier showed no emotion. Unlike in Sarnak, there was no hatred caused by hunger and poverty. There was nothing but a sense of superiority taught from an early age and a strong aversion to foreigners. When the same soldier forced Evanjalin's mouth open and shoved his fingers inside, Finnikin's fury returned and he made a grab for Trevanion's sword, only to be pinned back by Sir Topher.
'You will make things worse!' his mentor hissed in his ear. 'You're putting her life at risk.'
The thief of Sarnak snickered with glee.
In the village, Evanjalin was sick at his feet. Finnikin suspected it came from the memory of the soldier's filthy fingers inside her mouth. Without thinking, he held her up and wiped her face with the hem of his shirt. Their eyes met, and he saw a bleakness there that made him choke. Suddenly he wanted the power to wipe such hopelessness away. That moment in front of the guards, he had allowed emotion to cloud his reason. Yet he felt no regret. He understood, with a clarity that confused him, that if anyone dared touch her again, his sword would not stay in its scabbard.
She pulled away and gestured to an inn at the edge of the main square. 'I want to wash my face,' she mumbled, walking toward it.
He went to follow, but Sir Topher's voice stopped him. 'Finnikin. Give her a moment.'
Later, they set up camp at the base of an escarpment. While Sir Topher dozed and the thief from Sarnak swore from his shackles, Evanjalin began to climb the rock face.
'Stay here,' Finnikin ordered, but if he had learned anything about the novice, it was that she did as she pleased, and so he found himself climbing after her. Though cursing her inwardly, he could not help marveling at her fearlessness and the ease with which she ascended the rock in her bare feet.
When he reached the top, she was standing on a narrow ledge of granite that protruded over the camp below. But it was the view to the west that took his breath away, a last glimpse of Belegonia in the evening light.
'It's beautiful,' she said, speaking in their mother tongue.
He stood silently, struggling with the pleasure he felt as she spoke their language.
'Say something,' she said as the sun began to disappear and the air chilled. 'Tell me what you're
