The moment Nix saw Rakon, a sharp pain rooted behind his eye and for a fleeting moment he had an overpowering impulse to charge the carriage, slay the eunuch and the driver, and flee with Rusilla and Merelda. The impulse was so strong that he actually took a step toward the carriage.
Of course, the thought and the step agitated the spellworm, sent vomit up his throat and caused his chest to ache. He groaned, staggered a step. Egil's hand closed on his bicep, steadied him.
'You all right?' Egil whispered.
Nix shook his head. 'No. They're trying to do something to me.'
'Who? The sisters?'
Nix nodded.
'Rakon,' Egil called, apparently intent on confronting the sorcerer about his sister.
'No!' Nix hissed. 'No, leave it. Leave it.'
Rakon looked at Egil, eyebrows raised, but Baras stepped between them.
'Did you hear that sound just now, my lord?' Baras asked.
Rakon looked up at the slit of dark sky visible between the cliff walls.
'The wind, maybe,' he said. 'Or an animal.'
For a moment, Baras said nothing, then, 'Probably we should camp soon, my lord. The light is soon to fail entirely. We should set up before that.'
'Find a spot of your choosing, Baras.'
'Very good, my lord.'
Once more Rakon disappeared into the carriage and they started moving. The caravan traveled only a short distance more, everyone wary and with weapons to hand, before Baras called a halt for the night. The shriek did not recur, though the tension lingered.
Even with only torchlight by which to see, the guards set up the campsite with impressive efficiency. In under a half-hour, they'd pitched six tents, kindled a fire, distributed dried meat and cheese from the supply wagon, put feedbags on the horses, and started a large pot of water for coffee. Egil and Nix had little to do but watch. Even Jyme was of more use than them.
They ate with the guards, Egil with his usual volume of gustatory noise, Nix nibbling and still trying to figure out what to do about the sisters. He began to doubt his thinking. He'd seen them, and they did not look capable of working witchery. Perhaps it was the Wastes that was making him feel so off?
But that thinking fled before the fact that he knew their names.
'What's in your mind?' Egil asked.
'The Hells if I know,' Nix said.
Rakon emerged from the carriage only once, to tell them to keep the fire low.
'My lord?' Baras asked.
'We don't want to be seen,' Rakon explained.
'By what?' Egil asked.
Rakon considered his answer a long time. 'By anything,' he said, and returned to the carriage.
Later, the eunuch emerged from the carriage to retrieve food for his master. Nix stood, hurried over, and tried to engage the plodding giant in conversation.
'How fare your master's sisters?' he asked. He wanted to see them again, to look them in the eyes, to see if they were the cause of his discomfiture. 'I can help you bear this food-'
The eunuch, arms laden with a wheel of cheese and two loaves of flatbread, responded with only a vacant stare so otherworldly that Nix, for once, found himself at a loss for words. He stepped aside so the giant wouldn't walk over him.
'He's a mute,' Baras called from around the crackling fire. 'And he'll welcome no help.'
Nix nodded, eyeing the eunuch as the man walked back toward the carriage. A scar made a pink line above the fold of skin on the back of the eunuch's neck, a scar too clean to have been caused by a weapon. Nix had heard of such scars before, though he could not quite remember where — something about magical chirurgy.
'There's something off in that eunuch,' Nix said, when he returned to Egil's side.
'Everything about this is off,' the priest answered, shoveling a chunk of cheese into his mouth. 'The people and the place. Still need to eat, though.'
'Aye,' Nix said, and did just that, though he found his eyes returning frequently to the carriage.
After the meal, Baras posted guards and set the watch schedule for the night. The men not on duty lingered around the low flames of the fire, saying little, watching smoke rise into the air. Egil shook his dice and Nix endured nausea to work at the spellworm. He needed to get himself free, now more than ever.
Everyone sat with weapons near to hand but the night got on peacefully.
Above them, the cloud cover broke, revealing a wedge of sky between the cliff walls of the cut. They could not see the skeletal trees standing watch on the cliff tops above, but the branches rattled in the wind like dry bones. As the hours passed, the darkness grew predatory. The wind howled above them, whistling dark promises.
'Heard lots of stories about you two,' one of the young guards said to Nix. 'Are they true?'
'Lies, all,' Nix said, stretching out his legs.
'Can't all be lies,' pressed the guard. 'Tell us about one of these adventures you been on.'
'Very well,' Nix said. 'Once, Egil and I were forced to travel the Demon Wastes with some guards of a doltish cast. One of these, a young whoreson who couldn't grow a respectable beard, insisted on hearing stories from me. I strangled him while he slept.'
Uncertain laughter from one guard, silence from the rest, a frown from Baras.
'Did I give away the ending?' Nix asked Egil.
'I believe you did, yes.'
'He was just asking, is all,' said another guard, perturbed. 'To pass the time. No need to be a prick.'
'No need?' Nix said. 'Really?'
'Nix,' Egil said, but Nix ignored him.
'We're not here for your entertainment, boy, and we're not friends. Egil and I are prisoners. You're our keepers. Do I not speak the plain truth?'
'It ain't like that,' one of the young guards protested.
Nix scoffed. 'Can we just get up and walk home, then? We're a long day out of Dur Follin. Can we return if we wish?'
Baras frowned in his beard, sipped his coffee. 'It isn't personal.'
'So you say,' Egil said.
'The lumps on my head feel personal,' Nix added.
Baras shrugged, scratched his beard. 'Have it as you will.' He topped his tin cup with more coffee from the pot. 'I offer no apologies. Duty is duty, and done is done.'
'Duty,' Nix said, shaking his head, and Baras said nothing.
'I think you've ruined the mood,' Egil said to Nix.
Nix waved a hand derisively. 'Bah. What mood?'
For a time, silence, then Jyme spoke, his tone incongruously light.
'It was for me,' he said.
'Was what?' Nix asked, leaning back, his hands behind his head, staring up at the clearing sky, the stars. Minnear would rise soon. He did not relish sitting in the dark of the Demon Wastes under the Mages' Moon.
'Personal,' Jyme said. 'It was personal for me.'
Nix smiled darkly. 'Of course it was. Egil personally knocked the sense from you. Wait…' He sat up and looked across the fire at Jyme. 'Did you mean that as a jest?'
Jyme was smiling, and Nix's frustration went out of him in a rush.
'Egil, is it possible that Jyme, Jyme, has a sense of humor?'
'Come now, no need for insults…' Jyme began.
'I've seen demons and devils,' Egil said. 'More than a man should. Even bloodied a few, so I know much is possible in this world. But this notion of Jyme having a sense of humor strikes me as preposterous.'
Chuckles around the fire, certain this time, and including Jyme.
'I was just pissed, see?' Jyme said, setting down his tin cup. 'You beat me down in front of my men. I didn't
