Wrayth

Order, you know it is possible.” She fixed him with a sharp look of her own, “You loved Garil.”

The big man’s laughter stopped. “Yes, yes I did.”

What Sorcha didn’t share was the fact that she didn’t even know if she would still technically be called a Deacon. She’d left her partner behind, and was most likely considered dead. She still had her cloak and her Gauntlets, but that was about it.

She could feel the Bond with Merrick, a faint tugging on her conscience from the east, but he and the Mother Abbey seemed a long way off. She missed him and his sensible ways. Still, he was safer behind her than ahead where she was going. Ahead was a stronger tug on her. The Bond with Raed, leading her on like a lodestone.

As if in echo to her thoughts Aachon muttered, “Love seems a long way off in this world.” He was very melancholy for one with such a tough appearance, and Sorcha wondered if that was because of what he had seen in his travels.

The two of them slid down the gunwales, and sat on the deck in silence for a while, watching the sun flicker above them. It was beautiful and serene—at least for a moment.

“He’s not dead,” Sorcha eventually offered. “Whatever mess Raed has got himself into, I know he is not dead.”

“But war is stirring.” Aachon’s words on the heels of Lepzig’s made her shudder, but she did not offer comment. Even when he got to his feet and looked down at her. “Come what may, we will find the Prince and the rest will fall where it must.” With that he turned and left her.

It was another two days later that they finally saw Phia off the starboard side of the Autumn Eagle. They arrived just as evening was taking over from day and a full moon was beginning to rise. Even in the evening, it was a beautiful-looking town with tiled roofs, and the buildings stacked down toward a deep blue black lake. Aachon and the rest of Raed’s crew came up behind Sorcha. The first mate moved forward and joined her, looking toward the city.

“What do you know of Phia?” he asked, his hand clenching on the rigging.

Sorcha shrugged. “Not a thing. Merrick would have been the one to ask, and he would give you an encyclopedia’s worth of an answer.” She tried to sound offhand about it, but even saying his name gave her a pang. It hadn’t even been a year, but she had come to rely on him, and being separated from her partner felt unnatural. She’d lost him for a time in Orinthal, and she hated this even more.

Sorcha turned her face east, and even though she knew he couldn’t possibly hear her at this distance she tried. I’ll be back soon. Look after yourself.

Then she faced Aachon. “Now we find Raed, and for that I will need your help.” At the far end of the lake was a huge, strangely windowless fortress. She’d seen enough palaces of Princes that she could spot one immediately, however this one gave her a chill. It was typical of Raed that he would bring her to this sort of place. He really was the most awkward, dangerous man. Unfortunately he was also charming and good-hearted. Still, when she saw him again, she was going to certainly have words with him—among other things.

She cleared her throat, and focused her thoughts on what needed to be done. “I can tell he is in that direction, but I will need you to act as my Sensitive.” The words were almost choked out, because just one year earlier she would have never imagined saying such a thing. Her loathing for weirstones was legendary among the other Deacons, and she’d often complained to Merrick about the weak minds and foolishness of those that wielded them. How he would have laughed if he’d been standing on the deck of the Autumn Eagle right now.

The tall first mate inclined his head, gestured for the crew to stay back, and withdrew his weirstone from the bag hanging from his belt. Now that she understood Aachon’s training within the Order, Sorcha felt a little better about him handling it—but she was not going to tell him that.

Captain Lepzig strode up behind them. “What are your orders, Deacon?”

Sorcha took a breath. Now was the moment she wished she knew something of Phia, because there could be repercussions. “Take us in close to the fortress. I want to have a look at it.”

Lepzig didn’t question, he snapped a salute and returned to the bridge. As the Autumn Eagle turned into the wind and the engines began to spin the propellers, Sorcha opened her Center. She’d formed a Bond with Merrick and even Raed with ease, but she was not willing to do that with Aachon. Instead, she would use the weirstone to enhance her own nascent Sensitivity. It was dangerous and tricky, but there was nothing left but to do it.

With eyes half-lidded she whispered, “Open the stone.”

Holding it in the space between them, Aachon did so. Weirstone power was something Sorcha had never sampled before. She was not one of the Deacons who had ever worked with them, and it was so strange that she was knocked back, distracted for a moment. Whereas Merrick was warmth and gentleness, like smooth cream over her own sharp characteristics, this tasted almost medicinal. It contained not an ounce of human emotion or connection—which was the thing that made the Bond. She took another breath, unclenched her hands and reached out for the stone again.

Underneath the chill indifference of it was a well of power. Touching it, Sorcha realized why those who used them were so drawn to them; the power was clean like a river from a glacier. It was totally without the complications of a partner, but then it was also not as deep a well of strength either.

“Are you all right?” Aachon’s voice seemed like it was coming from a great distance, and it took some time for her to find her voice.

Her tongue seemed to be stuck to the roof of her mouth, but she managed to mumble, “Yes. Fine.”

“Then look for the Prince,” Aachon snapped in return. He’d probably forgotten about the first time he reached for a weirstone’s power.

Still, Sorcha managed to ignore his rudeness. She turned her Center away from the Autumn Eagle and toward the fortress of the Shin. To her altered Sight, it was like looking into a cube cut from the night itself. A window into nothingness. The only thing she could discern was the Bond disappearing into it.

The airship circled low over the fortress, so that she could pick out the glow of people standing on the parapets, but apart from that she could not see beyond the walls. She felt sick to her stomach just looking at it.

Aachon grabbed hold of her arm as it seemed she might topple. She shook him off. “I can’t see past the stone walls. It must have its own cantrip defenses. We’re going to have to get in somehow.”

She let go of the weirstone power and sagged back against the gunwales with a shudder. The rest of the crew shuffled their feet.

“What now Aachon?” one of them asked, but she could not focus on who it was who spoke. She was struggling to reel in her Center. Still, she did not like that they were asking the first mate and not her. Sadly Raed’s crew had completely forgotten anything like real discipline.

“Now”—Sorcha heard the dark tone in Aachon’s voice—“we go and get our captain back.”

Recovering herself a little, the Deacon smiled. It would be good to do that. Just as long as she could keep her feet, everything would be fine.

In the dark and silence Merrick woke. He had ceased to be able to tell what time of day it was. He couldn’t even be sure whether it was day or night beyond the stone walls. He thought of Zofiya and wondered if she was dead or alive.

He knew he should have been thinking about Sorcha and where she might be, or del Rue and what he was up to, but the Grand Duchess’ wide eyes and smile kept coming to him. It seemed impossible that she had been taken. Merrick had only ever known one person that was as ruthlessly efficient and competent as the Grand Duchess in his time, and that was his partner. Yet in one season he had seen his partner laid low with a mysterious illness and now Zofiya taken.

He sighed and rolled awkwardly onto his back. He was not a broad man, but even to him the bunk was incredibly narrow. They had not built the Silence Room for comfort.

The strangeness of the place was starting to get to him. For the longest time he thought he heard a voice repeating the word “Ratimana” over and over. What it meant was impossible to say. It was strange what the mind could conjure up when left to its own devices.

So he stared up into the blackness and thought dreary thoughts. It felt like from the first moment he’d