The wolf shifted away from him toward the bed's head with a growl.
"He has only just awakened, and you'll wear him out," Bitworth warned.
"Yes, yes," High-Tower intervened, and looked down at Nikolas. "Are you up to talking a little? The captain needs to know what you remember from that night."
Nikolas was still shaken by the loss of his companions. His brown eyes shifted so erratically that Rodian couldn't tell what the young man was looking at or for. Domin Bitworth gently waved High-Tower aside and stepped around the bed. He helped Nikolas take a sip of water from a mug.
"Anything might help," Rodian urged, feeling harsh for doing this so abruptly, but the sooner the better.
"Tall… big… so black," Nikolas whispered, and his haunted eyes looked only at Wynn. "A cowled robe… and a cloak that… moved… climbing the walls. It chased us into the alley… then Miriam started screaming… like Sherie."
"Sherie?" Wynn whispered.
Nikolas didn't seem to hear her. He trembled, staring blankly at nothing. Suddenly the frail apprentice cowered and pressed his hands over his ears, trying to block out a sound no one else could hear.
"Who is Sherie?" Rodian asked quietly.
Wynn shook her head slowly, still watching Nikolas in wary puzzlement. When Rodian looked to High-Tower, the domin shook his head as well. Bitworth knelt beside the bed.
"Nikolas," he whispered, "try to focus on the alley, nothing else."
The young man's eyes wandered. "I tried to keep her in front of me as we ran away, but it… he… was everywhere… in front… behind… everywhere in the forest."
Bitworth sighed. "He is slipping again. Some other memory keeps intruding."
Rodian only half understood. Ignoring mention of a forest, he kept his voice calm but firm.
"Nikolas, you weren't far from the scribe shop when I found you. When did you first notice the black-robed figure following you? Did it say anything?"
Nikolas blinked, awareness perhaps sharpening again. "We were walking, and it was just there in front of us, in the street… not moving, not a sound. We turned back, and it was there again, but closer. It reached for Miriam. Dâgmund jerked me back and shoved me into the alley… I ran… and heard Sherie scream."
Again, some other name in the place of Miriam's.
"It got so cold… between the trees," Nikolas whispered. "And the black… it grabbed Sherie, and she stopped screaming. Karl tried to reach her… but his father grabbed the folio. That hand… fingers all wrapped in black cloth… it went straight through her and closed on the folio."
Rodian exhaled in exhaustion. Unknown names kept bouncing around in Nikolas's head in place of Miriam and Dâgmund, along with someone's father cast as the black figure.
Bitworth rose and stepped to the bed's foot.
"I've heard pieces of this before," the healer whispered, "when Nikolas rambled in his sleep. It happens sometimes when the mind suffers a severe trauma. Some other overwhelming past event can become mixed with the more recent one. Until Nikolas regains his will and full awareness, he cannot separate the cause of one trauma from another of the past."
Rodian rubbed his forehead. The splinter of a headache felt like it would cleave his skull in half. Wynn looked at Nikolas in sympathy, with her hand on the wolf's head, and Rodian stepped back.
He needed information to catch a murderer—or murderers—and all he'd gotten was more senseless confusion. Sykion and High-Tower wouldn't face up to what was happening, or they tried to get around him in their own scheming. Bitworth's assessment of Nikolas was no help.
And now Wynn brought a wild animal into the guild, and no one seemed to object.
Rodian pulled his hand down his face. May the Blessed Trinity of Sentience preserve him, for he was standing in a madhouse.
He couldn't go to the royals with more nonsense, but when he looked down, Wynn was glaring at him. The anger in her face sparked his own resentment.
She couldn't possibly expect him to believe there was anything of note in Nikolas's rambling. High-Tower appeared just as uncomfortable with Nikolas's account as he was.
"Did Domin il'Sänke leave the guild at all that night?" Rodian asked.
High-Tower lifted his head, puzzlement disturbing his scowl, but Wynn cut in first.
"Why do you keep asking that?"
"Was he here the whole time?" Rodian demanded, ignoring her, and High-Tower hesitated. The pause was the only confirmation he needed, but the dwarf finally answered.
"Domin il'Sänke was handling a private task for me that night. It has nothing to do with what happened, but I can attest that he was engaged in guild business."
Rodian clenched his jaw—more evasions. He would get no rational help from these sages, even to save them from themselves. He started for the door but halted at another sharp rumble from the wolf.
Pawl a'Seatt stood in the hospice's doorway. Small Imaret peeked around his side, bearing an ink smudge on her brown cheek. Master a'Seatt's expression was flat and cool, but he was intently fixed upon either Wynn or Nikolas.
"Forgive us," the scribe master said. "Imaret wished to see how Nikolas fared."
The wolf's rumble shifted into an open growl, and Rodian glanced back.
Wynn reached for the animal. "Stop that," she said to it. "These are friends."
But the wolf remained tensely focused on the doorway, still growling.
Rodian followed its gaze back to Pawl a'Seatt, who now watched the wolf in turn.
High-Tower cocked his large head, and Bitworth's face filled with alarm. Even Wynn grew concerned. She raised a hand before the wolf's face, perhaps commanding it to stay. The animal held its place, its noise lowering to a rumble.
Pawl a'Seatt's brow wrinkled only slightly.
"What are you doing here?" Rodian asked bluntly. The shop's scribes had been laboring all day inside the guild, but masters didn't engage in the general work.
"I came to check on my staff," Pawl answered calmly. "And to see them safely home."
"I've already assigned men for that," Rodian replied.
"Forgive me, but your guards have not always been effective."
Rodian's throat tightened. He couldn't argue with that, though he failed to see how a scribe master could do better. Something else was wrong here. If a'Seatt overheard any of Nikolas's jumbled recollections, what had caught him so much that he'd stood silent in the doorway without announcing himself?
"Come, Imaret," Pawl a'Seatt said. "We must gather the others. Perhaps your friend will be better tomorrow."
Rodian almost stopped the scribe master, but he could think of nothing specific to ask. And would he receive an honest answer? Hardly. Truth had become as intangible as the black figure murdering sages for folios.
"That is enough for today," Bitworth said. "Everyone out. Nikolas needs rest."
High-Tower nodded agreement and gestured toward the door. Rodian shook his head in frustration and stepped out. But he had one other matter to address.
Wynn must have seen her coveted translations by now.
"Walk me out," he said as she stepped into the passage, and his tone implied that it wasn't a request.
"She's not had supper," High-Tower growled.
Rodian wasn't deceived by false concern. The domin simply wanted to keep Wynn away from him. He didn't care.
"I'll return directly," Wynn said, and then glanced back through the door at Bitworth. "Thank you for caring for Nikolas."
The wolf stalked out behind her, passing High-Tower with a quick snort. The dwarf rolled his eyes, grumbling under his breath as he stomped away. Rodian gestured down the hall as he stepped onward.