The Hallowed Hunt

judged him as blithely as Hallana had.

He added, 'Stay in; stay safe. Lock your inner doors as well. I presume whatever comforts this house may offer are yours for the asking.' He let his eye fall on the servant-warden, and she made a circumspect curtsey of acknowledgment. 'I don’t know what else Lord Hetwar may want of me tonight, so eat when you will. I’ll be back as soon as I can.'

He tucked the letter in his jerkin, bowed her a polite farewell, and made his way down the stairs. He wanted a bath, clean clothes, and a meal, in that order, but all such niceties would have to wait.

Leaving instructions with the porter for his servant, should Tesko arrive before he returned, Ingrey walked out into the town.

Familiar smells and sights subtly reassured him. He wound his way through the cobbled streets of Kingstown and across the half-buried creek, then climbed the steep steps up the near cliff of the temple side. Two switchbacks and a breathless ten minutes brought him to the stair-gate, winding crookedly under a tower and two houses, into the upper town. In the dark corner where the passage turned, a little shrine for the safety of the city stood, a few candles flickering in the dim drafts flanked by wilted garlands; reflexively, Ingrey made the fivefold sign in passing. He came out again into the early-evening light and turned right.

A few more minutes’ walk brought him to the main square before the temple. He strode under the pillared front portico and into the sacred precincts.

The central court was open to the air, and in its middle the holy fire burned quietly on its plinth. Through an archway into one of the five great stone domes surrounding it, Ingrey could see a ceremony beginning—a funeral, he realized, for he could glimpse a bier, surrounded by shuffling mourners, being set down before the Father’s altar. In a few days, Prince Boleso’s body, too, would pass through these rites here.

On the other side of the court, the acolyte-grooms were marshaling their sacred animals for the little miracle of the choosing. Each creature, led by its handler dressed in the color of his or her order, would be presented before the bier, and the divine would interpret by its actions which god had taken up the soul of the recent dead. This not only guided the prayers of the mourners, but also their more material offerings, to the altar and the order of the proper god. Ingrey would be more cynical about this, but that he had more than once seen results clearly unexpected to all parties involved.

A woman in Mother’s greens had a large green bird, which cawed nervously, perched upon her shoulder. A maiden in Daughter’s blue held a young hen with purple-blue feathers tightly under her arm. An immensely fluffy gray dog cowered close to the gray robes of an elderly groom of the Father’s Order. A young man in the reds and browns of the Son led a skittish chestnut colt, its coat brushed to a shimmering copper and its eyes rolling whitely. The animal snorted and sidled, yanking its groom almost off his feet, and in a moment, Ingrey saw why.

Pacing slowly after the others loomed the most enormous white ice bear Ingrey had ever seen. The thing was as tall as a pony, and as wide as two. Its narrow eyes were the color of frozen urine, and about as expressive. At the far end of a long, thick silver chain, its handler followed, dressed in the white robes of the Bastard’s Order. The young man bore an expression of suppressed terror, and his head swiveled a little frantically between his charge and a towering man who followed after, murmuring encouragement.

The man was nearly as arresting as the bear. He was broad-shouldered to match his height, with hair in a dense red horsetail down his back. Thick silver clamps held it in place, and thick silver bracelets clanked on his arms. Bright blue eyes held an expression of amiable bemusement which Ingrey was not sure whether to take as acuity or vacuity. His clothes—tunic, trousers, a swinging coat—were simple enough in cut, but colorfully dyed and decorated with elaborate embroidery. Big boots were stamped with silver designs, and the hilt of his long sword glittered with crudely cut gems. In the belt sheath at his back rested not a knife, but an ax, also elaborately inlaid, its blade gleaming razor-honed.

A brown-haired man in similar but less gaudy dress, a good head shorter than his fellow yet still tall, leaned against a pillar with his arms folded, watching the proceedings with a most dubious expression. Some of the grooms shot him looks of supplication, which he steadfastly ignored.

Ingrey tore his attention from this peculiar drama as he saw an older woman in the white-and-cream robes of the Bastard, the loops of a divine’s braid bouncing on her shoulder and her arms laden with folded cloth, scurry through the court, evidently intent upon some shortcut. Ingrey barely caught her sleeve as she sped past. She jerked to a halt and eyed him unfavorably.

'Excuse me, Learned. I carry a letter for one Learned Lewko, which I am charged to deliver into his hand.'

Her expression altered at once into something, if not more friendly, much more interested. She looked him up and down; indeed, he imagined he looked the part of a road-weary courier, just now.

'Come with me, then,' she said, and abruptly reversed direction. Though Ingrey’s legs were longer than hers, he had to stretch his stride to keep up.

She led him through a discreet side entry, down and up some steps, back outside behind the temple, and past the archdivine’s palace into the next street. Down one more narrow alley they came to a long stone building some two stories high, passed through a side door, and wended up more stairs. Ingrey began to be grateful he hadn’t just asked for directions. They passed a succession of well-lit rooms devoted to scriptoria, judging by the heads bent over tables and scratching of quills.

Coming to a closed door in the same row, she knocked, and a man’s calm voice bade, 'Enter.'

The door swung open on a narrower room, or perhaps that was an illusion created by the contents. Crammed shelves lined the chamber, and a pair of tables overflowed with books, papers, scrolls, and a great deal of more miscellaneous litter. A saddle sat propped on its pommel in one corner.

The man, sitting in a chair beyond one table near the window, looked up from the sheaf of papers he was reading and raised his brows. He, too, was dressed in Bastard’s whites, but the robes were slightly shabby and without any mark of rank upon them. He was middle-aged, spare, perhaps a little taller than Ingrey, clean-shaven, with sandy-gray hair trimmed short. Ingrey would have taken him for some important man’s clerk or secretary, except that the woman divine pressed her hand to her lips and bowed her head in a gesture of utmost respect before she spoke again.

'Learned, here is a man with a letter for you.' She glanced up at Ingrey. 'Your name, sir?'

'Ingrey kin Wolfcliff.'

No special reaction or recognition showed in her face, but the spare man’s brows notched a trifle higher. 'Thank you, Marda,' he said, polite dismissal clear in his tone. She touched her lips again and withdrew, shutting the door behind Ingrey.

'The Learned Hallana instructed me to deliver this letter to you,' said Ingrey, stepping to the table and handing it over.

Learned Lewko set down his sheaf of papers rather abruptly and sat up to take it. 'Hallana! Not ill news, I trust?'

'Not... that is, she was well when I last saw her.'

Lewko eyed the missive more warily. 'Is it complicated?'

Ingrey considered his answer. 'She did not show me the contents. But I expect so.'

Lewko sighed. 'As long as it’s not another ice bear. I don’t think she would gift me with an ice bear. I hope.'

Ingrey was briefly diverted. 'I saw an ice bear in the temple court, as I came in. It was, um, most impressive.'

'It is utterly horrifying, I think. The grooms were weeping. Bastard forfend, are they actually trying to use it in a funeral?'

'So it appeared.'

'We should have just told the prince thank you, and put it in a menagerie. Somewhere out in the country.'

'How did it come here?'

'By surprise. Also by boat.'

'How big was the boat?'

Lewko grinned at Ingrey’s tone, and looked suddenly younger thereby. 'I saw it yesterday, tied up at the wharf below Kingstown. Not nearly as big as one would think.' He ran a hand through his hair. 'The beast was a gift, or perhaps a bribe. Brought by this giant red hairy fellow from some island on the frozen