When she left the cramped litle room she had shared with the cook and came downstairs, the others were already in the kitchen, huddled round the fire drinking taillin and speaking in subdued voices. Hebba, who was bustling around trying to get breakfast, kept dissolving into tears at the thought of leaving her beloved home. On that score, however, Vannor had been very firm. If the Magefolk should ever find out that she had harbored the fugitives, her life would instantly be forfeit. Whether she liked it or not, he was determined to have her safe.
When he saw his daughter, Vannor’s eyebrows went up in surprise. “By the gods, lass—I never would have recognized you!” He pulled her roughly into a hug. “Do you know,” he said softly, for her ears alone, “when you and your sister were born, I was young and daft enough in those days to wish for a son. Well, I want to tell you now that you’re far braver and more clever, and more precious to me, than any son could be. I couldn’t be prouder of you.”
Zanna held his words in her heart, and they helped boost her courage when, for the first time in three weeks, she stepped over Hebba’s threshold and into the perilous and hostile streets. Suddenly she felt utterly naked—and it wasn’t just the unaccustomed clothing. She felt as though her very thoughts must be transparent to the eyes of every passerby. Then Tarnal winked at her. “You’re a lad, remember—just keep thinking of that. And a very convincing one you are, too—though I like you much better as a girl.”
Zanna grinned back at him, and concentrated on her role as they threaded their way down through the city streets. She was a lad, she told herself firmly—and she was out with her… her brother, she supposed Tarnal would be. They were helping their granny get safely to the market… Solicitously, she took Hebba’s heavy basket, and hooked her hand through the old cook’s arm. Beneath her cloak Hebba was trembling, and Zanna was suddenly very glad of the shawl that draped the woman’s head, concealing her face in shadow. They had made her wear it to hide her eyes, which had been red from weeping at the thought of leaving her home—though the gods only knew, grieving widows were a common enough sight in the streets of Nexis after the hardships of the unnatual winter. Nonetheless, Vannor’s daughter realized that her dad had been wise to insist on Hebba wearing the shawl. Not only did it conceal her bloodshot eyes, but it also would hide the look of terror that was doubtless on her face at this very minute.
Zanna was so lost in her thoughts that at first she didn’t hear the tramp of booted feet until Tarnal’s elbow poked her sharply in the ribs. “Soldiers!” he hissed at her. “Act normal. Remember, the lad has nothing to fear.”
She was glad of the timely warning—it gave her time to compose her features into what she hoped was an expression of amiable stupidity. Zanna gaped at the patrol in admiration as they marched past, wishing, as would any lad her age, that he could be a soldier, and wear a shiny sword.
By the time they were safely past, she wished that she was wearing skirts, so that she could let her knees knock, as they were trying to do, without anyone seeing. Tarnal gave her a heartening grin. “Well done,” he whispered. “They didn’t suspect a thing!”
They passed two more patrols before they reached the waterside, and by that time Zanna, elated with the success of her disguise, was very, very glad indeed that she had not let vanity prevent her from cutting her hair. But when they reached the fulling mill and Tarnal lifted the grating to let them descend into the noisome, dripping, slime-coated drains, her elation vanished abruptly at the thought of descending into the sewers again. The memory of that last nightmare journey, dragging her wounded dad through the cramped and stinking tunnels, was still too recent. In coping with Hebba’s fears and hesitations, however, she forgot her own. Somehow, between them, she and Tarnal managed to get the rotund old cook down into the tunnel—with Hebba weeping, wailing and protesting every inch of the way until Zanna wanted to slap her.
Then, all too quickly, it was time for the young Nightrunner to leave them. Zanna walked with him as far as the dim light that filtered through the grating would reach, and when it was time for him to leave her, Zanna’s fears for him returned to her in an overwhelming rush. Impulsively, she flung her arms around him and hugged him hard. “You be careful,” she told him fiercely.
Tarnal grinned and hugged her back. “Don’t worry, I will. I’ll see you tonight.” Then he was gone, leaving a kiss upon her brow. Absently touching the place on her forehead where she could still feel the imprint of his lips, Zanna watched his light until it disappeared around the next bend in the tunnel, then went back with reluctant, dragging steps to comfort Hebba.
Taking thankful gulps of blessed fresh air, Tarnal emerged at last from the outlet of the drain, a short distance downstream from tie great barred arch of the river gate in Miathan’s newly constructed city wall. He slithered as quickly as he could down the steep bank of the river’s edge and vanished into the dappled shadow beneath the willows that dipped into the water. From there he made his way swiftly downriver, pausing only long enough to wash the slime from his boots.
Though he was worried about his companions, especially Zanna, and grimly aware of the dangers that awaited him, Tarnal felt an unaccountable lightness of heart to be free of the city at last: to be free of the grime and smoke and crowds, to see the sunlit sparkle of the water, to hear the sound of birdsong, and the cheerful lapping song of the river. It might not be the open sea, which he’d been missing so badly he even dreamed about it, but at least it was moving water—and that was something!
Tarnal crept on cautiously, not allowing the pleasures of the open air to distract him from his task. Once he was round the first bend of the river, and safely out of sight of the guarded gate, he slipped out of his clothes and boots, and stuffed them, together with his sword, into a bag of oiled canvas that he had made at Hebba’s house. Twisting the neck of the sack tightly, he tied a piece of thin rope around it and, holding the free ends firmly between his teeth, waded carefully into the river, testing the bottom and the current as he went. The water was icy cold against his shrinking skin, the current tugged at him strongly, and the heavy bag dragged at his aching jaws and threatened constantly to pull him down. Tarnal, however, had lived all his life beside the sea and was a powerful swimmer, well accustomed to cold water. He swam across the river on a slanting course, letting the current help him rather than fighting it, and reached the tree-lined southern bank without mishap. Hauling himself out of the water with the help of a low-hanging bough, the Nightrunner scrambled up the steep slope until he found a sheltered, level spot. Pulling his clothes, only slightly damp, from the canvas bag, he dressed again and buckled on his sword. After a few minutes to rest his aching limbs, he got to his feet once more and headed downriver toward the outlying dwellings of the merchants.
So far, everything had gone according to plan, but as the hours went by and the sun dipped past noon, Tarnal became more and more disheartened. The first boathouse he encountered was open to the river but proved to be empty. When Tarnal peered cautiously over the low stone wall that bordered the grounds of the second mansion, he saw a gardener working close by the boathouse, trimming the ornamental hedges in a desultory fashion. From the scant progress the idler had already made, he looked as if he’d be mere all day. Ducking down behind the wall and keeping low, the Nightrunner sneaked past the man and continued what seemed to be turning into an endless trek—especially when the third boathouse—which he’d climbed an almost unscalable wall to reach and then spent a nerve-racking hour trying to break into—proved also to be empty.
Keeping well within the cover of the trees that thronged the waterside, Tarnal made his way downriver, trying to ignore his sinking heart and his growling belly, until he caught a glimpse, through the bushes at the top of the bank, of a high brick wall mounted with iron spikes, which guarded the last of the outlying mansions from his thieving kind. Despite his weariness and hunger, the Nightrunner grinned. He would see about that. Such elaborate precautions were a good omen—they usually indicated that there was something within worth stealing. He ran along the bank, skirting the wall until, as he had expected, it turned in his path, down toward the river itself, where it gave way to high black iron railings that guarded shallow steps down to a little wooden jetty, on the far side of which was an ostentatiously constructed boathouse—built, no doubt, of the same stone as the house and with scrolled iron water gates to match the railing.