through the thin stone corridors that laced the stones of Bellin. The darkness was broken by candles at each turning; enough light to see where they were going, if not the individual steps that would get there. But walking slowly fit Marcus’s needs at the moment.
“You knew about this?” Marcus said.
“I knew the girl was traveling in disguise.”
“You never mentioned it.”
“I didn’t think it was odd. In my experience, people take on roles and put them off again quite often. Consider my own position with the caravan.”
Marcus took a long, slow breath.
“All right,” he said. “I’ll have to take this to the ’van master. We can’t stay here.”
“No offense meant, Captain, but why not? It seems to me that the caravan’s mission remains what it was before. Now that we know the situation, perhaps we could help the girl maintain her illusion. We could hide her cargo until spring, and carry on as if nothing were different.”
“Doesn’t work that way.”
“What doesn’t work that way, Captain?” Master Kit asked. Marcus paused at a sharp turn. The single candle gave the carved lines of the wall the aspect of life and awareness. In the dim light, the actor’s face was dull gold and blackness.
“ World doesn’t work that way,” Marcus said. “You never have that much money without blood coming out of it. Eventually one of us would get greedy. And even if we didn’t, there’s someone looking for that cart.”
“But how would they find it, if they didn’t also know to look for us?” Master Kit asked. Marcus noted that the man hadn’t argued against the dangers of greed and betrayal.
“At a guess? They’d hear stories about a ’van being guarded by the hero of Gradis and Wodford. And with a cunning man who can turn aside arrows and command the power of the trees.”
The chagrin on the actor’s face told Marcus that his point was clear.
“This isn’t what I hired you on for,” Marcus said, “but I need you to stay with me.”
Master Kit pursed his lips, hesitated for a long moment, then turned and walked farther into the darkness between candles, heading toward the ’van master’s lodging. Marcus followed him. For almost a minute, their footsteps were the only sounds.
“What are your plans?” Master Kit said, his voice cautious. Marcus nodded to himself. At least it hadn’t been no.
“Go south,” Marcus said. “West is snowbound, east is back toward whoever follows us. North is the Dry Wastes in winter. We let it be known we’re taking the goods to Maccia or Gilea, trying to sell at the markets there instead of wait for Carse. Move off east, then cut south.”
“I don’t know of any roads going south until-”
“Not roads. We have to get off the dragon’s roads and take farm tracks and local paths down to the Inner Sea. There’s a pass along the coast hardly ever freezes. Put us into Birancour in four weeks if it stays cold. Five, if it thaws enough to get muddy. They don’t take well to armed bands crossing the border, so anyone following us might be turned back. Another week and we’re in Porte Oliva. It’s a big enough city to disappear into for the winter. Or if the roads are decent, we can push on for Northcoast and Carse.”
“It seems like the long way around,” Master Kit said. The hallway opened out into a wider chamber where several passages came together and an oil lamp hung from a worked iron bracket, and Master Kit stopped in the light, turning to face him. The man’s face was gentle and sober. “I wonder whether you’ve considered the other option?”
“Don’t see there is one.”
“We could all visit the cart, fill our pockets and purses, and vanish like the dew. Anything left, we could put in a warehouse as someone else’s problem.”
“That might be the wise thing,” Marcus said. “But it’s not the job. We keep the ’van safe until it gets where it’s going.”
Marcus could see the skepticism in the actor’s long face, and the grim amusement. It was, Marcus knew, the moment that would decide all the rest. If the actor refused, there weren’t many options left.
Master Kit shrugged.
“Then I suppose we should tell the ’van master that his plans have changed.”
The caravan left just before midday under low, grey skies. Marcus rode fore. His head still ached from a night of dreams as familiar as they were vicious. Blood and fire. The dying screams of a woman and a child who were both twelve years’ dust now. The smell of burning hair. It had been years since he’d woken calling for his wife and daughter. For Alys and Merian. He’d hoped the nightmares had passed forever, but clearly they had returned, at least for the time.
He’d lived through them before. He could again.
The ’van master sat at his side, their white-plumed breaths falling in and out of time. Crows watched them from snow-caked trees, shifting their wings like old men. The snow was wet, but not more than a foot thick on the road. It would be worse once they turned off the dragon’s roads.
“Can’t believe we’re doing this,” the ’van master said for the hundredth time. “They didn’t even tell me.”
“They didn’t think of you as a smuggler,” Marcus said.
“Thought of me as a dupe.”
“Me too,” Marcus said. And then to the Timzinae’s outraged look, “No, they also thought I was a dupe. Not that I also thought you were.”
The ’van master sank into a bitter silence. The cliffs of Bellin faded behind them. It promised to be a miserable winter. When they stopped for the night, putting up tents in the fast-fading twilight, Marcus walked through the camp with Yardem at his side. Conversations paused when they came near. Smiles grew false and unconvincing. Resentment soaked the caravan like oil on a wick. He’d have to be sure nothing happened to light it. It was no worse than he’d expected. When he came to his own tent, she was waiting for him.
Tag the Carter was gone, vanished from the world as if he’d never been. The actors had helped her wash the worst of the dye from her hair, and without the lichenous whiskers her face seemed almost unnaturally clean. Youth and her Cinnae blood conspired to make her coltish, but a few years would change her into a woman.
“Captain Wester,” she said, then swallowed nervously. “I didn’t get to say how much I appreciate this.”
“It’s what I do,” Marcus said.
“All the same, it’s more than I could have asked, and… Thank you.”
“You aren’t safe yet,” Marcus said, more sharply than he’d meant. “Save your gratitude until you are.”
The girl flushed, her cheeks like rose petals on snow. She half bowed, turned, and walked away, footsteps crunching in the snow. Marcus watched her go, shook his head, and spat. Yardem, still at his side, cleared his throat.
“This girl’s not my daughter,” Marcus said.
“She’s not, sir.”
“She doesn’t deserve my protection more than any other man or woman in this ’van.”
“She doesn’t, sir.”
Marcus squinted up into the clouds.
“I’m in trouble here,” he said.
“Yes, sir,” Yardem said. “You are.”
Dawson
The King’s Hunt pressed through the thick-falling snow, the calling of the hounds made fainter and eerie by the grey. Dawson Kalliam leaned in toward his horse’s steaming neck, feeling the great animal launch itself into the air. He saw the icy ditch as a blur beneath them, and then it was gone, and the impact of their landing gave way again to the wind-swift chase. Behind him, half a dozen voices rose, but not the king’s. Dawson ignored them. To his left, a grey horse with red leather hunter’s barding loomed out of the snow. Feldin Maas. Others rode close behind, nothing more than snow-drowned shadows. Dawson leaned closer to his mount, digging heels into its
