“I can imagine.”
Gerrod accompanied her toward the stair. She could hear the smile hidden behind his helmet. “Master Orquell came near to throttling his benefactor when he heard about the skull vanishing with Tylar.”
“We had no choice,” Kathryn mumbled, suddenly tired. It was a long climb back up to her hermitage.
With his usual acuity, Gerrod sensed her exhaustion and grew silent, offering her nothing more than his company as they climbed together. She appreciated it.
Still, as she wound her way up, her worries mounted with each step, stacked one atop the other. Eventually they toppled out. “What if he can’t find the rogues? Maybe it was a mistake…?”
“Hush. Such thoughts will only drive you into a state of inaction. We did what was necessary. If Tylar escaped the storm, word of our plight has spread. We must do our best to maintain here.”
“So we wait, hoping for rescue.” She shook her head. “I still wish there was something beyond our defenses we could bolster.”
“Keeping alive may prove fight enough from here. Our best offense was in breaking Tylar free to seek the rogues.”
Kathryn was reassured by his confidence in their decision, but little settled. Perhaps her dissatisfaction had more to do with being banished from the inner council of Tashijan. At least a small victory had been won this morning. With Delia admitted to the fieldroom, Kathryn would be kept better abreast of Argent’s plans and defenses.
At last, they reached the level of her hermitage. She would break her fast with Gerrod, then proceed with her day.
As she pushed into the hermitage, her maid Penni greeted her in her usual flustered manner. She had the hearth glowing with low flames. A small table had been spread with marbled breads, hard cheeses, and jams. Kathryn thanked the maid, then dismissed her. She knew that Gerrod preferred to keep his countenance hidden in his bronze armor unless alone with her.
Once Penni vanished down the back door, Kathryn turned to find Gerrod standing, almost shyly, only a few steps from the door.
“We won’t be disturbed,” she assured him and waved to the low table with the morning fare.
One arm slowly raised. His voice echoed hollowly out of his helmet. “Kathryn…”
Gerrod’s arm stiffened with a grinding creak. She stepped toward him.
“Can’t move…” he said, strained. “Mekanicals freezing up.”
She remembered when his armor had last grown sluggish. When he’d been exposed to the sapping of the storm, the Grace drained from his armor’s alchemies.
She heard a scratching behind her.
Twisting around, she drew her sword and pointed it toward the far drapes. The flames in the hearth damped to embers, then even the red coals dimmed. Cold spread across the room.
A long, skittering scrape sounded against the windows, dry branches on glass.
Gerrod groaned behind her, stiff in his armor. “Run…”
Laurelle wrinkled her nose. She found that Kytt carried a distinct odor about him. A musk, like a boy after a heavy run, only cleaner, with a slightly woody scent. She stood beside the young wyld tracker as he listened at the door. They were holed up in Brant’s room, listening for noises out in the hallway.
Kytt had taken to sleeping here, watching over the cubbies.
Barrin lolled beside the hearth, all but blocking the glow with his bulk. The two wolfkits wrestled across the breadth of his form, worming under legs, over haunches, growling and nipping at each other. They still used a pair of the giant’s boots as dens at night and had shredded one of Brant’s shirts as bedding.
They had seemed to settle well into the space.
But that was about to change.
Laurelle had come every morning and night for the past three days, slipping out of her halls and down to where the Oldenbrook retinue made their home. As the towers grew more crowded, this level was also shared by the four men from Akkabak Harbor, home of the Gray Traders. Freck-twist, the god of that realm, tolerated only men as his Hands. He had little regard for women in his realm, seeing them as little more than broodmares. His Hands also gleaned that same sentiment, as if burnt into them by his Grace.
She heard them pass by the door, grumbling under their breath. She heard Delia’s name, but she could make out little else. Then they were gone. Laurelle suspected Kytt heard every word as clear as if they were in the room.
“Is it safe?” Laurelle asked.
Kytt held up a hand. She noted that his fingernails were short, but filed to clawed points. In fact, Kytt seemed all sharp edges: tips of ears that poked slightly through his dark hair, the pointed squint of his eyes, even the hint of wolfish teeth when he allowed a shadow of a shy smile to form.
Then Laurelle heard it, too. The approach of two others. She was able to make out their words, spoken with little regard to who might hear, so confident in their positions that they did not bother to blunt their rudeness.
“I can’t believe the regent’s sellwench squirmed her way into my shadow,” Liannora hissed. “She’s certain to be favored by the warden, what with her being Fields’s daughter. I’ll be ignored.”
Her companion consoled her. “Who can ignore you? You shine brighter than the sun when you enter a room.”
“Oh, Sten, you can be so simple sometimes. I see how the warden watches her when that grubbing Hand isn’t looking. There’s no outshining family.” Liannora sniffed with disdain. “If only she stepped down or was made to step down…”
Sten’s voice lowered to a whisper, but by now they were passing the door to Brant’s room. “Missteps do happen. It is easy to trip on a stair. To break a leg…or even a neck.”
Liannora responded in equally low tones, but by then they had moved on down the hall. A bit of laughter carried back, then after another moment, silence.
Laurelle pulled her ear from the door. “Kytt, did you hear what that ice queen said? Were they merely speaking tall or were they serious?”
Kytt shook his head. “Even my ears are only so sharp. Her lips must have been at his ear.”
“I must find Delia.”
“What about the cubbies?” he asked.
She nodded. “We’ll move them first. Like we were planning. Then I’ll seek out Delia and warn her.”
Kytt strode toward the cubbies, sensing her urgency. “You take the boy. I’ll take the girl.”
Laurelle nodded. They had a pair of roughspun carryalls, meant to sling babies across a woman’s chest. They would each take one whelping. The plan was to abscond with the wolf cubbies and carry them up to Lorr’s abandoned rooms. Kytt had heard talk among the Oldenbrook guards that some harm was intended them, and as the wyld tracker was not of their realm, he had no real authority to stop them. The wolves remained the retinue’s property.
So the plan was to get them somewhere safe.
But thievery was beyond either of their skills. They didn’t know how anyone from Oldenbrook might respond, so they intended to make the move without any eyes about. The cubbies had escaped once already. It would be easy to explain away another disappearance.
Laurelle gathered up her carryall and lured the smaller of the two cubbies, the boy, notable for the extra white on the tips of his black ears, with a piece of dried mutton. She had the cubbie quickly bundled and contentedly chewing the salted meat. A low growling flowed as she slung the carryall over one shoulder and cradled the wolf across her chest.
Kytt had his cubbie, too. He held her back from the door, leaned his ear, listened for another couple of breaths, then nodded.
Barrin was already on his paws, ready to follow.
Kytt opened the door and led the way out. Laurelle followed. The bullhound padded after them.
The hallway was empty, except for one of the knights at the level’s landing. They moved quickly. A door opened behind them. Voices carried. Guards.
Ducking down, hidden by the bulk of the bullhound, Laurelle heard Sten, captain of the guard, call brusquely toward them. “Who goes there?”