“Better that than to live as a coward and a traitor.”
She hugged him, pulling his sun-bronzed body close. How could he be so careless with his own life? “Don’t say such things! And please, let’s not fight. I just made love for the first time. This is not what I want to remember, you and I fighting afterward.”
He kissed her, stroking her cheek. “I don’t want to fight either. But you’re asking something of me that I can’t do.”
“Stay one more day,” she pleaded, “and I won’t turn you in. Will you meet me by the bridge tomorrow at noon?”
Janto hesitated a moment, then said, “Yes.”
He helped her lace up the corset. She put on her syrtos, rolled up the blanket, and gave him a good-night kiss. Then she headed back to the palace through the moonlit forest. His scent lingered on her body for a moment and then faded.
17
Janto waited impatiently for Rhianne at the bridge. She’d given him a critical piece of intelligence during their liaison last night, though not a welcome one. The Kjallans intended to murder the entire Mosari aristocracy.
Since then, he’d debated what to do with the information. Should the aristocracy evacuate Mosar? The aristocrats were, for the most part, also Mosar’s mages, and for them to leave in the middle of the war would spoil any chance Mosar had at winning. But there wasn’t much chance of that anyway.
After much thought, he’d decided the intelligence had to be passed along at his first opportunity. His father and mother, back on Mosar, would decide what to do with it.
Around noon, Rhianne trotted up on horseback, riding a white mare and leading a dapple gray gelding. She rode astride, not sidesaddle, and wore a shorter-than-usual syrtos, no loros at all, and braccae—Kjallan riding pants. He’d seen mounted soldiers wearing such pants, but never a woman.
“Can you ride?” she asked.
“Yes.” He glanced around to make sure no one was watching, then shrouded all of them, including the horses. “We’re invisible now. Did you not attract attention, bringing a second horse?”
She shrugged. “I used a lot of forgetting spells.” She offered him the reins to the dapple gray. “This is Flash. He’s big and—well, flashy. He picks up his feet when he trots, which means he’s kind of bouncy to ride. But he’s quiet and sensible, and if we don’t go too fast—”
“I’ll be fine. I’ve done a lot of riding.” Janto took the reins, put his foot in the stirrup, and swung up onto Flash. “Where are we going?”
“I want to show you something. It’s a surprise.” She turned the mare and sent her into a canter.
Janto gathered Flash’s reins and sent him after her, noting with pleasure how the animal arched his neck and moved up to the bit without being asked. They cantered in single file along a soft-dirt avenue. Passing through a pair of marble gates, they left the Imperial Palace grounds.
The road sloped downward as they traveled inland, away from the city and the harbor. Smoke rose from the chimneys of distant cottages. Farmland in the distant hills, dotted with pockets of trees, checkered the landscape in green and yellow.
Janto clucked to Flash, who responded with an instant burst of speed and surged alongside Rhianne’s mare. “How far?”
“Just ahead.” She pointed to a forest that lay cradled in the next valley. “Bow oaks. They’re in season.”
He’d heard of bow oaks, valuable trees for shipbuilding, much coveted on Mosar, where they did not grow. Bow oaks provided “compass timber”—wood with a natural curve used to form the rounded frame of a ship. Such trees were of great economic and military importance, but he wasn’t sure why Rhianne would want to show him a forest.
They veered onto a side road, downhill into the valley. One moment there were fields on either side of them, and the next moment there were trees. Big, fine trees, obviously cultivated. Each tree leaned over to one side or the other, its trunk forming a shallow arc.
The path dwindled away to nothing, and as the trees pressed closer around them, they slowed their horses to a walk. One of the trees had a symbol marked on it in red paint: a half circle crossed with a slash.
Janto pointed to the mark. “What does that mean?”
“That tree has been selected for harvest,” said Rhianne. “It’ll be chopped down and hauled to the shipyards at the end of the season.”
Spring seemed to have come late to the bow oaks; they were mostly just bare trunks and branches. Up in the canopy were large, ungainly white flowers and some curious growths—enormous fruits or seed pods, perhaps.
A gunshot went off behind him.
Janto drove his horse toward Rhianne to shield her from the unknown attacker. He looked around frantically but couldn’t see anyone. At least they were invisible. Rhianne seemed oddly unflustered.
Another gunshot went off.
“Where are they?” he cried. “Who are they firing at?”
“Nobody’s firing anything. It’s the trees,” said Rhianne.
“What do you mean it’s the trees?”
“Officially they’re called bow oaks, but sometimes we call them poppers. That sound is the trees popping.” Rhianne’s white mare stood calmly, as did Flash. Apparently the horses knew what was going on.
He looked up. “The trees are
“You see the lumps on the branches, way up there? They explode.”
“How?” Janto scanned the trees. He heard another gunshot sound behind him. He whipped his head around and caught the end of whatever had happened. A cloud of yellow powder rained down over several of the trees.
“Some sort of alchemical reaction. It’s how they reproduce. Why don’t we walk a bit and give the horses a rest?” Rhianne dismounted, pulled the reins over the white mare’s head, and set the ends on the ground. “You can leave Flash there; he ground ties.”
Janto pulled the reins over Flash’s head and tugged them downward to remind him to stay put. Flash flicked an ear back, insulted.
Rhianne unfastened a bundle from her mare’s saddle and carried it with her. Janto suspected it was another blanket. He walked at Rhianne’s side through the deep carpet of old, decaying leaves, staring at the branches overhead. He was rewarded when a popper finally exploded before his eyes. The strange lump broke open with a bang. It propelled a large yellow bullet shape into the trees, which broke into a stream of powder and rained down. “What do you mean it’s how they reproduce?”
“You know how with fruit trees, you need a hive of bees in the orchard to pollinate them? These trees don’t need bees. The explosion sends the pollen onto the flowers of other trees.”
“So it’s like . . . It’s like . . .” He chuckled. “It’s a bit vulgar, isn’t it?”
Her cheeks colored. “Janto, these are
“I know. But I don’t want any of that stuff to fall on me.”
“So what if it falls on you? It’s
“It’s just—I don’t know. Something about the way it’s delivered.” He grinned.
“Come on, don’t you think it’s interesting?”
“It’s very interesting,” said Janto.
“You told me about all the fascinating things you’ve seen on Mosar. I wanted to show you something on Kjall—something you hadn’t seen before. You’ve seen so many wonders, and I’ve seen so few.”
The anxious look on her face told him this was a bad time to tease her. She craved his approval, and if he didn’t grant it, he’d hurt her feelings. “It’s marvelous. I’ve never seen anything like it.”
“Really?” She smiled tentatively.
