“Pagans in the west.” said Gildmane, gazing over the yard, sipping cinnamon wine. “It’s easy to forget they’re still out there, especially when Paul won’t pay them any damned attention. And these Vaufnar accusations, we’ll never see an end to them.” He paced to the corner of his desk where he’d left the flagon. It was still steaming, and Jael could taste the spice of it in the air—warm, soothing. He offered her a cup which she declined, then he filled one for her anyway. She sipped on it while he replenished his own and asked her, “So you’re glad that Blackheart’s dead? What’s happened to my timid, little kitten? She’s turned into a Lioness.”
“She has,” replied Leonhardt, hiding her flushing cheeks behind whatever letter was in her hand. “That was…that was the first time I’d ever seen someone die like that.”
“Not like the stories, is it? But you did well for your first time.” He paused and drank a deep gulp of wine. Jael did the same. “I think you’re ready for a real task now that you’ve tasted some blood. I’m putting you with Corvin tomorrow. I hate to do it to the old bishop, but I want the Cross to investigate these accusations.
Knight Paladin Brandon Corvin. The thought of working under him gave Jael chills. He was never callous to her, though neither was he ever kind. The man was a Tsaazaari half-blood; dark with long, jet hair and beard; and piercing, tawny eyes like those of a hawk. Even at a distance, when he looked upon her, she felt like an arrow loosed from his bow might strike her dead at any moment. “You aren’t coming?” she asked.
“Unfortunately not. I’ve got far too much scribbling to do. It’ll just be you, Corvin, and Ogdon.” Jael’s heart sank, and Trey couldn’t stop from laughing at her miserable face. “I’m not cutting you a break, am I? Speaking of which, are you done with the missives?”
She sifted through what was left on the desk. There were two, one sealed with a yellow lion signet, the other with dingy candle wax. She cracked the lion-seal. It was a letter of acceptance of an exceptional offer signed at the bottom by Sir Brandr Harpe, Aestas First Lance. Brandon was being invited back to take the Cross’s oaths.
Leonhardt gushed, “It’s from Sir Brandr. He says he accepts—Trey, why didn’t you tell me?”
“I didn’t know he’d stayed for the Fair until after our incident with Harold. It’s unprecedented, letting him in like this, but he would have been admitted to begin with if Whitehand wasn’t looking for a puppet.” Gildmane drained the bottom of his cup and returned to the window, his gaze locked on the Temple Rock. “They’re fools, Jael, to think they can keep me from taking what I want.” He turned to her again. “What’s the last one?”
She broke the dingy seal and unrolled an equally meager parchment. The writing was rough to read and heavy handed. She skimmed to the bottom, and there, found a pair of signatures. It was a letter addressed to her, signed by Ricard and by Zach. Jael snatched the parchment to her chest without reading another word, guilt-ridden, as if the captain could read her mind if she were to know what they wrote—as if Zach would know that she’d forgotten him in the depths of her heart.
“It’s for me,” she answered after a breath pressing the letter to her chest, “from my father, is all. But I think it’s time I get to sleep. I have a duties to prepare for tomorrow.”
But Jael hardly slept at all that night. She lay abed, turning back and forth between reading the letter and burning it to forget her past and her girlish promises. She couldn’t do it, so by breakfast she sat at the paladins’ table with the parchment tucked against her breast, protected by linen and maille and surcoat. Ogdon was there as well, seated next to Corvin whose face betrayed nothing as Trey gave them their briefing.
The three of them were to ride to the Dim, a strip of land on the fringe of the Sky District named for the constant shadow cast by Ward Aureus. There, they would question the accuser, Dante, as well as Bishop Vaufnar of the Compassionate’s Cathedral. No action was to be taken, and they were to return with whatever information they could collect.
Ogdon grimaced at the mention of the Dim and again as they rode for their first destination. Whitewashed stone complexes changed before their eyes into dilapidated hovels of wattle and daub. Here, the paved streets gave way to ancient cobbles long since crumbled into gravel and dust. So too had the people decayed. They were putrid and toothless, dressed in nothing more than linen sacks, begging on street corners. Sylvertre, could not bare to look at them. He leaned in his saddle and whispered to Jael to be careful in this section of the city, that the derelicts were dangerous. “I’ve heard stories,” he said, “that the plebeians eat their own babes in the winter, and that they’re so desperate for money that they’ll kidnap noble ladies and sell them to Tsaazaari traders in the harbor.” Leonhardt rolled her eyes. He was no better than a child—in his speech, his appearance, his persistence—grinning with pink cheeks and a pointy, naked chin. “There’s no need for you to worry, though. I’ve watched you in the yard, and Father has written saying your sword play is the rave among the gentry. Is it true that you lopped that pig’s head off? He deserved it. Those western oafs don’t know anything about how to treat a lady.”
“I didn’t lop off anything,” she replied.
Corvin’s horse ambled to a stop. “Ogdon,” he said.
The squires reined in, and Sylvertre reported, “Yes, Sir?”
“Shut up.”
Jael had to bite her tongue to keep from laughing, watching Ogdon’s body sag like a sack in his saddle. It was almost enough
