“How do these people stand it?” I asked.
Gael managed to look beautiful despite the sweat cascading down her face, or maybe because of it. “It’s quite interesting, actually. The weavers here have mastered the art of creating a material so light you’d scarcely know you were wearing it. It’s a guild secret. I’ve tried more than once to pry it out of them, but it’s closely guarded.” She shrugged. “Of course, we guard the secret to our waterproof wool just as closely.”
The mention of wool sent another wave of sweat cascading down my face.
“It’s not so bad once you get off the street,” Bolt said. “Most of the buildings are constructed with breezeways that capture and magnify even the slightest wind.”
I suffered in silence, taking regular pulls from my waterskin until we came within sight of a huge flat-topped hill holding a building that could have rivaled the entire tor.
Bolt’s expression turned even more sour than usual. “Behold the magnificence of the six-sided cathedral of the Merum.”
“You’re in an unusually foul humor,” I said, “even for you.”
“I don’t like coming here,” he replied, but he didn’t bother to elaborate.
“Why not?” I prodded.
He continued to stare over the top of his horse. “They know me here—at least they used to. Maybe the last of those have had the decency to die by now.”
I looked at Gael and Rory, but neither of them appeared to know anything more than I did.
Chapter 12
Toria Deel rode next to Fess as they journeyed north across the rich landscape of Aille. Wag followed just behind their horses, his nose in the wind, his gaze sharp enough to infer intelligence that no ordinary dog could own. The last of his kind on the northern continent. His littermate Modrie lived, but Willet had been forced to destroy her mind in Vaerwold.
She shook her head. So much had been lost, and there was still so much more that could be. That thought brought her back to Fess. Though she hadn’t spent as much time with the young urchin as Lady Bronwyn, she couldn’t help but notice the marked change in his personality since he’d been the unwilling recipient of both Balean’s physical gift and Bronwyn’s gift of domere.
The laughing carefree boy rarely seen without his smile had disappeared as if he’d never been. He rode at her side and might have been a ridiculous parody of the stoic vigilance of one their guards had he not been in earnest.
What had happened to him?
She considered the question. The most obvious answer might be true—that Fess’s part in the death of Balean had altered his view of the world, fracturing his image of himself in ways that couldn’t be reversed or restored. As tempting as that supposition was, she didn’t wholly believe it. During the festival of Bas-solas, Fess had helped defeat Laewan. Along with the other urchins, he’d temporarily accepted the physical gift of the Vigil guards and had used that deception to kill him.
Laewan, corrupted by Cesla and showing physical gifts he should never have possessed, had been cut down by countless dagger strikes from Fess and the other urchins they’d employed. Yet afterward, Fess had been the same as always. The urchins were accustomed to hardship and even death. In spite of that, Fess had shown a remarkable capacity for humor and even joy. What had changed?
Unbidden, a memory worked its way free of her control, the words of Pellin, praise Aer. Memories of Cesla held too much condemnation. “Never underestimate the power of a question, Toria Deel. Next to our gift, it will reveal more about a person than any other tool or stratagem, and it’s more honest.”
She mused, rocking back and forth with the steady gait of the horse beneath her. Questions were indeed powerful, if she knew the right ones to ask. She already knew what had happened to Fess, Bronwyn, and Balean on their journey to the Darkwater. Any query she posed would merely confirm the facts she’d gleaned from Fess when she’d delved him, and facts wouldn’t serve her. The knowledge lay deeper, but he wore his newfound reticence as readily as his former garrulousness.
“Fess?”
“Yes, Lady Deel?” He answered with her title, as he always did, but without breaking his survey of the landscape. She would have to find a query of sufficient importance to overcome his reluctance to speak.
“Tell me, what do you think of Ealdor’s instruction?”
His brows lowered, and his expression assumed a gravity that she prayed would never look natural. “From what vantage point do you wish me to consider the question?”
This aspect of him, the acuity of his intellect, had surprised her as well, but it explained why Lady Bronwyn had been drawn to him. When the former member of the Vigil had taken on Fess as apprentice, Toria had assumed it to be due to pity, like an old woman caring for a cat found on her doorstep. Bronwyn had seen more. Fess had a turn of mind that would make him a fine scholar, if he lived.
“All of them,” she answered.
He made one last check of the horizon before turning to her. “Assuming that what we think is true actually is true, Ealdor’s appearance is frightening. The Fayit is willing to surrender an immortal existence to warn us of the threat.”
A familiar misgiving, one that she’d felt at Ealdor’s appearance, returned. She chose, reluctantly, to voice it. Perhaps honesty on her part would be returned. “I find it difficult to trust him.”
“Ealdor?” Fess appeared surprised. “How so?”
She broke away from his gaze. “He reminds
