reeking of pine. The crude painting above the door showed that it was normally home to the men of gold pack, Panthers Hunt. Although daylight shone through the roof in places and there were no shutters to keep rain from blowing in the window slits, it was certainly roomy enough, and Fabia would not be staying long. That was another problem-time was desperately short. She must have a serious talk with Horth, and Orlad, and Benard… and just about everybody else.
The rest of the clothes she had bought had not been delivered yet, but her brother was waiting for her-her youngest brother, the dangerous one-accompanied by six gangly boys armed with cudgels. They wore peasant garb and unsightly hemp collars that must signify something to Werists.
Orlad bore a satisfied air. He was a seasoner. In the last two days two sons of Hrag had died by his hand, more or less. War was easy, wasn’t it? He had added a new scar, a jagged line, still red, from the corner of his mouth almost to his ear, as if a claw had ripped his face open.
“You can go,” he told Namberson and Snerfrik, and they vanished along the trail while still telling their lord that he was kind. He indicated the newcomers and rattled off some names.
“Probationers,” he told Horth. “They will look after you.”
The boys were regarding Fabia with interest, as if Florengian women were rarities thereabouts. She could see nothing in them to interest her.
“Are you sure?” she asked.
Her brother shrugged. “You want to hear what I’ve promised to do to these maggots if you get molested, or insulted, or even annoyed?”
“No.”
“I warned them that I always carry out my threats. Didn’t I, maggots?”
They chorused nervously that their lord was kind.
“I must talk with you,” Fabia told him. “Come in here.”
She marched into the barracks, and continued along the narrow walkway that ran the full length of the building, between two raised platforms of packed earth. A thick litter of blankets and other personal gear on them suggested that Panther Hunt’s gold pack had left town in a hurry, no doubt right after Dantio’s letter had brought the news that Saltaja was entering the trap.
She turned. Orlad had chosen to sit down just inside the door, and Horth was perched on the edge of the platform opposite. Angrily she stalked back to them.
“I don’t want those boys eavesdropping!” She remained standing.
Orlad shrugged. “You think they haven’t noticed the windows?”
“Will they listen?”
“Certainly. Will it matter?”
That would depend on what was said. “You are going to Celebre?”
He nodded.
“When?”
“Soon as Arbanerik gives permission. Nils has sent him my request. Tomorrow if we can.” Orlad was very sure of himself now. Yesterday’s outlaw had become today’s warrior leader. He killed sons of Hrag. He was on firstname terms with huntleaders. He needed practice smiling, but he could smirk.
“You don’t speak the language!”
“I can learn it faster than you can become a man.”
She scowled. “You think you can be doge?”
“Certainly. Benard isn’t going, he says. Dantio can never produce an heir, and that’s one of a ruler’s duties.”
“I’m coming with you!”
Orlad smiled for the first time. It was not much of a smile, and it was directed at Horth, sharing amusement at Fabia’s performance. “Dantio insists Celebre has never had a female doge. They’re hardly likely to want one at a time like this.”
“But Stralg may,” she said.
His eyes narrowed. “After you have sold us to him, you mean-me and Dantio?”
“Of course not! But I am coming with you.”
Orlad rose to his feet, surprisingly tall at close quarters. Her eyes were not much higher than his brass collar.
“It’s no journey for a woman.”
“I crossed as a babe in arms.”
“You don’t understand the dangers, kitten.”
“Of course I do!” In fact she knew the Ice better than he did. She had seen a vision of her infant self almost dying there. She must not lose her temper.
“Do you?” He put a knuckle under her chin and raised it so they were eye-to-eye. “Only twice has Nardalborg sent out a caravan this late in the season, and neither one arrived. There’s death and frostbite out there, also rock boar and catbears. At the Edge there’s no air, no water. You can’t sleep, can’t breathe, your skin cracks. Rivers of dust will swallow you whole.”
“You know all this personally, I suppose?”
“Yes I do.” Nothing fazed him now. “I worked on the bridge at Fist’s Leap. Also, when we get to Florengia, if we ever do, we will have to avoid Stralg loyalists guarding the far end. The Mutineer and his men will have their own ideas about who’s going to run Celebre after Father. We may find when we get there that the city does not even exist any more. Are you still sure you want to risk your pretty little neck?”
Ignorant, arrogant boy! Saltaja was out there, bloated with evil and a much worse danger than any he had mentioned.
“Yes!” she shouted. Remembering the probationers, she dropped her voice to a whisper. “You need me!”
“Of course we do.” Orlad pulled her to him and kissed her, full on the mouth. It was definitely not a brotherly kiss, and yet somehow it did not ring true.
She struggled free, still angry at his mockery. “That means you give your permission, my lord?”
“It means we both need you and want you, tigress! We’re going to discuss it with the huntleader in the Panthers’ mess at sunset.” He headed for the door.
“My lord!” Horth said softly.
Orlad stopped, turned. “Master Merchant?”
“You know Nardalborg Pass, you say?”
“The first part of it. Not the Edge itself.”
The Ucrist smiled diffidently. “I know both passes, but only by hearsay. Nardalborg Pass is well signposted. Varakats is not. You have no hope of finding it without a guide, no hope at all. Anyone will tell you that. Have you spoken with the Pathfinders?”
Orlad shook his head. “No, but I will, right away. Thank you.”
The door banged and he was gone.
Fabia slumped down on the edge of the platform beside Horth. “This is awful, just awful! The family has been reunited just one day and already it’s splitting up-Ingeld and Benard going back to Kosord, Orlad and Dantio rushing off into the war. And I must go with them, even if it’s just to say farewell to my dying father, who deserted me, although that means deserting you, who have always been my father.”
Horth patted her hand diffidently. “Orlad and Dantio will not be rushing off anywhere, my dear.”
“What? How can you say that?”
“Because that man I was speaking to while you were buying your new gown was Pathfinder Hermesk. I have known him for years.”
She knew what that subtle little smile meant and her heart dropped. Here was a complication she had not foreseen. She should know better than to underestimate Horth Wigson.
“I confess I don’t know what pathfinders do. A guild?”
“No, no. The Pathfinders are a cult of holy Hrada. Hermesk is head of the local lodge. You could say he is the light of Hrada on High Timber, but that seems a little pretentious.”
Hrada was goddess of useful skills and crafts, like pottery and writing, but those were regulated by guilds.
