A little more disconcerting were the astonished and angry faces of the two guards looking out at him. By the light of the braziers on the pillars’ inner tops, both men wore leather armor with riveted steel plates under gray tabards and cloaks. Chane could not make out the emblem on the tabards, but neither man wore a helmet beneath his cloak’s hood. Both began whispering to each other until ...
“Stay where you are!” one called out.
Chane could not be certain in looking through the gate’s iron slats, but the second guard might have reached for a sword at his hip.
“Turn back and leave ... now!” the first guard shouted.
Chane considered doing so, there and then, but Wynn’s hand closed on his forearm. Wynn had faced much in the past few years and would not be intimidated by a pair of guards—admirable but sometimes unwise.
“We have an invitation,” she called out.
Then one of the keep’s far double doors opened.
A tall figure emerged and stepped down the stone stairs to the dirt yard. Chane could not make out a face, but by the heavy folds of a full-length skirt below a long wool tunic and cloak, he could see that it must be a woman. As she came toward the gate, he realized why her face had been difficult to see in the night. She had dark skin—darker than anyone he had ever met, with brown-black, tightly curling hair all the way to her shoulders.
Taking in her large eyes over a flared nose and very full lips only slightly lighter than her skin, he wondered who she was. She was dressed like neither a servant nor a noble.
The dark-skinned woman paused halfway to the gates as both guards looked back. One guard left his post to go and meet her, saying something so low that Chane could not catch it. After looking out through the gates for an instant longer, the woman turned and vanished back into the keep. The guard who had gone to her went running off toward what appeared to be a barrack on the courtyard’s north side.
Chane was about to advise that they leave.
From out of the barrack came a short, muscular man with a nearly shaved head. He was dressed like the two guards—except that his hood was thrown back. The way the messenger guard followed two paces behind suggested that the short one had authority over the others.
“What is this about?” he barked before he even reached the gate.
“Nothing, sir,” the first guard answered, straightening stiffly. “We’re just turning a wagon away.”
As the short man—apparently in command—neared the gates, he peered out through the lattice, and his eyes roamed over all in the wagon.
“Captain Holland,” came a voice behind Chane, and he turned halfway on the wagon’s bench, as did Wynn.
Nikolas stood behind Wynn and between Osha and Shade in the wagon’s bed.
“It’s me,” Nikolas continued, pulling back the hood of his cloak. “My father sent for me.”
The short one squinted and then frowned. “Master Nikolas?”
“Yes, please let us in. We have come a long way.”
Chane heard a tremor in the young sage’s voice, but perhaps Nikolas’s speaking up might disarm the tension here.
“I’m sorry,” the captain said, polite but firm. “There’s been plague in the villages, and I have standing orders not to let anyone through.”
“Plague?” Wynn repeated. “We saw no signs of plague.”
Indeed, what Chane had seen in passing through two villages was strange but not indicative of disease.
The captain’s eyes narrowed as he fixed on Wynn, and a scowl rose again on his face. “Turn the wagon around and leave. I have my orders.”
“Captain Holland! Open those gates ... now!”
At this new voice shouting from somewhere in the courtyard, the captain turned about, as did the two other guards. All three stiffened to attention as a small young woman walked brusquely toward the gate.
She was pale, though beautiful, with a narrow jaw, a heart-shaped mouth, and a high brow of perfect skin. A mass of shiny, straight blue-black hair fell over the shoulders of a velvet gown of dark emerald green. She wore no cloak and gave no regard to the rain. Behind her followed the much taller dark-skinned woman.
“My lady?” said the captain, with his back to Chane.
The small woman stopped and looked through the gate from about five paces off. Her eyes locked on someone other than Chane, and the harshness of her gaze faltered for a blink.
“Open the gates,” she repeated. “Master Columsarn has asked to see his son, and I doubt this small group stopped in either of the villages.”
Her dark eyes shifted focus, possibly to Wynn, and then slightly upward as she studied Chane.
He felt Wynn’s hand touch his arm.
“Duchess Sherie Beáumie ... the duke’s sister,” she whispered.
Chane glanced at Wynn and wondered how she knew this, but she kept her eyes forward.
The woman—the duchess—approached the gate as the captain quickly stepped aside. But when the captain turned to follow her, he appeared worried and took a hesitant glance back toward the keep. The darker-skinned woman stopped three paces behind all the others.
Duchess Beáumie continued looking at Chane on the wagon’s bench. “Did you stop at either village along the road or speak to anyone?”
“No,” he answered.
If she found his near-voiceless rasp odd, she did not show it as she turned her head toward the captain. “As you see, they came in contact with no one.”
Chane, born into a minor barony with a mother fragile and weak in both body and mind, had met but a few noblewomen who gave orders as if they never expected to be questioned.
The captain nodded instantly to his duchess and then to his men, though he still looked troubled. One guard swung the rotating gate bar, and both men pushed the gate’s halves outward.
Chane flicked the reins, and the horses passed through as the duchess and her companion stepped aside. The guards closed the gate immediately once the wagon entered the courtyard.
“Everyone out,” Chane whispered, setting the brake as he reached back for his packs.
Wynn reached for her own pack and pulled her sheathed sun-crystal staff from beneath the bench before she hopped down. Osha and Nikolas gathered their belongings and got out the back as Shade leaped over the side to join Wynn.
In the cold, wet night, and under the red glare of the gate’s brazier, Nikolas appeared almost ill as he rounded the wagon’s back. Chane caught the duchess’s eyes on the young sage.
There might not have been hatred in her stare, but Chane recognized pain and resentment when he saw it.
“You came,” she said simply, looking away.
Nikolas said nothing, and the young woman glanced over the rest of the group while appearing to regain her composure. Her perfect brow wrinkled slightly at the sight of Osha and the overly large black wolf standing beside Wynn.
She addressed Nikolas again. “Your father and I did not expect an entourage.”
Her haughty tone appeared to catch Wynn off guard. Wynn might not be intimidated by a pair of guards, but she had little experience with arrogant nobles.
Chane understood them only too well—as he had been one of them. Drawing himself to full height, he stepped in next to Wynn.
“The guild sent this sage with some texts for Master Columsarn,” he returned with equal disregard for the duchess’s position. “Two sages could not travel such a distance without protection.” He lightly brushed back his cloak’s folds, exposing his longsword on one hip and his shorter sword on the other. Osha’s longbow was also in clear view.
“Please,” Chane said, “take us inside before one of them catches an illness in this rain.”