dark, and the man’s voice was thick with sleep and drink.
Darraun took a deep breath, focused his mind, and changed.
Quickly. Hair long, height the same in case the tent’s occupant could make out his outline. Breasts, waist, hips-the face could wait a moment. The new form made certain parts of his clothing too tight, but in this case that was an advantage. Voice-soft, husky, seductive. “Haldren sent me to see if you need anything.” Pose-chest out, one hand on a cocked hip. “Sovereigns, is he trying to kill me?”
Darraun heard the man lie back on his furs. He changed his face-round and soft, with full lips and heavy- lidded eyes. It was a face he’d used many times, and it had proven its effectiveness. He started peeling off his clothes, glad he hadn’t been wearing his leather cuirass.
“No, no. Go away, girl.”
Darraun stepped out of his breeches. Haldren hadn’t shouted again, but Darraun knew that didn’t mean he’d abandoned the chase. Haldren was too smart and too angry to continue yelling. There was some commotion outside, a susurrus of voices trying to stay quiet.
“What’s going on out there?” the man on the ground murmured. “Is something burning?”
“Give me a blanket,” Darraun said. “I’ll go see.”
The man grunted. Darraun bent down and felt around for a blanket. He pulled one off the pile and wrapped it around himself, making a few adjustments to his body as he did so. His new identity complete, he stepped out of the tent.
“How much did he hear?” Vaskar asked.
“I have no idea,” Haldren said. “He certainly wasn’t there during the feast, and I made sure I was alone in the pavilion before I contacted you. But he could have come in at any point after that.”
“We spoke mostly of Gaven. Why should he care?”
“I don’t know.”
“Perhaps your success is not as certain as you believed,” Vaskar said.
“Nonsense. Everything is set in motion. Nothing can rob me of victory now.”
“Nothing? You’ve had a spy in your midst since you escaped from Dreadhold. How many other conversations has he heard? You told me yourself he had intelligence contacts. It’s possible the queen knows every detail of your plans.”
“Indeed.”
“Perhaps now you will reconsider my request.”
Haldren sighed. “Very well, Vaskar. We will choose a different field of battle. We’ll conform to your damned Prophecy.”
Getting away from Haldren had been easy enough. Finding a new suit of armor to fit a new body shape and blending in among the hundreds of camping soldiers was not too difficult. The real challenge would be getting out of a military camp located miles from civilization and surrounded by dragons.
The changeling who had been Darraun was getting comfortable in her new body, new identity, and new name-Private Caura Fannam, an enlisted soldier under the command of Major Rennic Arak. She wore her tawny hair pulled awkwardly into a tail down her back, a fashion popular with many female soldiers. A long shirt of leather studded with heavy steel rivets was standard issue for Aundair’s light infantry. She carried a short spear-not her favorite weapon, but easy enough to use: “Put the sharp end into the enemy,” she’d heard a training sergeant say once. In practice, she knew the hard part was pulling it back out in time to put it in the next enemy, which was why she preferred shorter weapons. But if all went well, she’d have no reason to use her spear as anything but a part of her disguise.
Even with dragons surrounding the camp, soldiers couldn’t abandon military protocols-sentries were posted at various spots around the edge of the camp and patrolling the perimeter, probably at least as much to make sure no one left as to intercept anyone coming in. Caura knew they’d be on heightened alert since Haldren had discovered Darraun spying on him. She smiled-how easy it was to think of Darraun as another person entirely.
“Where are you supposed to be, soldier?” A sentry’s voice rang out nearby, and Caura started. She’d thought she was well hidden in the shadow of a supply cache. She couldn’t see the sentry.
“Uh-I… I…” The voice was a young man’s, just on the other side of the supplies. The pieces of a plan started to come together in her mind. Jumping to a decision, she stepped out of her hiding place.
“I’m ready,” she announced. She looked expectantly at the other young soldier, hoping he would follow her lead. She spotted the sentry at the edge of her vision, but tried to act as if she hadn’t noticed him.
“What’s this?” the sentry demanded. “What are you two up to?”
Feigning surprise, Caura turned to face the sentry. She stood at attention and gave a salute. “Private Caura Fannam, sir.”
“Answer the question, Private, since your lover here seems to have lost his tongue.”
“Lover?” An instant of concentration brought a flush of color to her cheeks. “Oh, no, sir. We’re on our way to report for sentry duty, and I had to stop to, ah, use the latrine, sir. He was just waiting for me.” She saw a second sentry hanging back from the scene, ready to get help if a situation developed.
“What’s your name, soldier?” The sentry addressed the man beside her, who had fumbled his way to attention as well.
“P-p-p-”
“Do you have a problem with your tongue, Private?”
“Yes, sir, he does,” Caura interjected. “A terrible stutter. That’s why he’s not in Communications.”
That drew a harsh laugh from both sentries, and a blush she suspected was genuine from the other soldier. But it covered her new friend’s initial hesitation in responding to the sentry-one more step toward getting out of the camp alive.
“Private Jenns Solven, s-s-sir.” Jenns saluted. He seemed to be warming up.
“All right,” the sentry said, “get where you’re supposed to be. Don’t let me see you sneaking around like that again, Solven. And keep your eyes open tonight, the both of you. Word is a spy’s been discovered-pretty high up, too. So don’t go fooling around when you’re supposed to be on watch! The Lord General’s depending on you.”
“Yes, sir!” Caura and Jenns said in unison, saluting again. The sentry returned the salute and turned to rejoin his partner. She and Jenns stayed at attention until the two sentries were well on their way. She heard more laughter, then the sentries were gone. Jenns let out his breath and visibly sagged.
“Thank you,” he said. “I don’t know who you are or why you helped me, but I think you just saved my life.”
“Well, now it’s time for you to return the favor,” Caura said with a smile.
CHAPTER 28
Bluevine was exactly the kind of place that Phaine despised. A village small enough that everyone knew each other meant that strangers like him drew attention. The people loved to talk, they were never satisfied with terse answers, and they took umbrage at his habitual silence. On top of that, the weather stayed warm and bright. He vastly preferred the shadowy alleys, darkened skies, and comfortable anonymity of Khorvaire’s large cities.
The flip side, though, was that even a secret meeting like the one Haldren had held in Bluevine could hardly be kept secret in such a small town. The fugitive had admitted only a few people inside the room during the feast and had sworn them to silence, which of course meant that everyone in the village knew some version of what had happened inside. Getting information wasn’t difficult; just sorting out the truth from the wild speculation and rumors was problematic.
Almost everyone he interviewed claimed to know someone who knew someone who had been in the room, but few could name the source of their information, and those that were named denied that they’d been present. Several times, between interviews, he told Leina he wished he could just find a throat to slit and be done with Bluevine for good.
Through all the gossip and exaggeration, some hints of a consistent picture eventually began to emerge.
