The dragon had brought him death, and the dragon would be destroyed by it. Only then will Flinn’s death and my life have meaning, she suddenly realized.
Jo stood and picked up Wyrmblight. The woman frowned. She was a squire of Penhaligon, owing obedience to Baroness Penhaligon. But that obedience would likely interfere with Jo’s desire to hunt Verdilith. Her thoughts turned grim. Your loyalty lies with Flinn, she mused, for it was he who helped you become a squire in the Order of the Three Suns. Without him, you would never have reached the castle. Or if you had, they would have laughed you back to the rat-infested streets of Specularum. Jo shuddered.
The squire touched the sigils one last time, then she turned and continued down the path. Her steps grew increasingly sure. “Have faith, have faith,” she chanted under her breath. She looked at the trees around her, noting how they burgeoned with buds, waiting to burst into green. But none of their vitality, their hope, seeped into Jo. She felt dead. Hurrying her step, she shoved her thoughts aside. “Have faith,” she said a little unsteadily as she touched the silver bark of a birch.
Just ahead, at the end of the trail, the midday sun streamed into a glade larger than the one Jo had left. She hesitated before entering the glade, suddenly unsure of how to greet her comrades. You’ve been beastly to them, Jo told herself, callously berating them for “failing” Flinn, ignoring their grief. They’ll understand, her logical half replied. They know I spoke out of anger and sorrow, not truth. Nodding once, Jo stepped into the glade and moved toward the encampment, keeping her eyes averted. If she didn’t look out into the glade, perhaps the memory of her first sight of it wouldn’t return. She quickened her pace, but the images were seared into her mind. She saw, once again, the terrible sight that had greeted her five days ago.
The crumpled, brutally savaged body of Flinn’s griffon lay at this end. All about the creature, a score or more of staves, wands, and rods lay half-buried in snow. The once-pristine whiteness was marred by blood and churned mud from the battle Flinn had waged with Verdilith.
Jo bit the inside of her cheek. She had to face these memories and drive them from her mind or she would surely go mad. Jo stopped walking and forced herself to look at the glade. Her eyes grew wide.
Sometime during the last few days, the sun’s rays had melted the snow. Gone was the white spattered with red. Dried tufts of grass and wildflowers lent a new, clean color to the glade. Jo blinked. Tans and yellows and browns and curtains of evergreen lay all about her as she knelt to take it all in. The trees had seemed so cold, so unfeeling the day they had witnessed Flinn’s death. Now, spring was coursing through them, and the trees had sprouted buds.
Jo drew a ragged breath. If I can only endure, like the trees endure, she thought, I’ll weather the winter of Flinn’s death. Tears flowed freely from her eyes. “I understand.” Jo slowly covered her face with her hands. The words have faith whispered once more through her mind.
A gentle touch on her shoulder made Jo look up. The concerned expression of Braddoc Briarblood’s good eye met hers, though his milky eye wandered blindly away. Beneath the blind eye Braddoc’s cheek twitched, puckering a deep hatchet scar that ran from his eyebrow to the cheekbone below, just short of the neatly plaited beard. Braddoc of the Cloven Eye had lost partial sight but not his life the day he had been attacked by an axe-wielding frost giant in the Altan Tepes Mountains. The dwarf’s lips compressed a little, and Jo wondered if the usually laconic mercenary was about to say something.
Instead, Braddoc held out a gnarled hand to Jo. Three purple-and-white blossoms glistened there. They were snow crocuses, the earliest flowers to bloom in the spring.
“Braddoc . . Jo whispered. She reached out and took the fragile blossoms; she sniffed them delicately, then looked at her friend. “For Flinn?”
Braddoc shook his head. “No, they’re for you, Johauna,” he said sharply. “Flinn won’t be needing these.” The dwarf took Jo’s arm and helped her rise. “Come, Karleah and Dayin are waiting. The time for mourning is past. It’s time to go.” Braddoc began walking toward the two canvas tents pitched at the other end of the glade. He stopped and eyed Jo quizzically when she didn’t follow.
“I’m not sure the time to mourn ever ends, Braddoc,” Jo said slowly. Her eyes slipped to the crocuses in her hand. “But you’re right—it is time to go.” She joined the dwarf, and together they crossed the ground leading to the camp.
Jo could see the smoke curl lazily away from the fire beneath the cook pot. Karleah Kunzay, an ancient, withered crone of a wizardess—and also a passable cook—was stirring something in the pot. Karleah ignored the approaching pair and busied herself about the fire. A sudden whiff of rabbit stew reached Jo’s nose, and she sniffed appreciatively. Only then did she realized she was hungry.
The ten-year-old boy sitting at the camp saw Jo and Braddoc approach, and he stood in quiet anticipation. Dayin Kine had once been a shy wildboy hiding in Flinn’s woods before Jo and Flinn offered him shelter. As Jo entered the camp, the boy brushed back his blond, shaggy hair and smiled tentatively. The smile was sweet in its innocence, and Jo couldn’t help smiling back. Dayin’s eyes were the color of the spring sky above, and they watched Jo intently.
The squire moved closer to the fire and saw that Karleah, too, was watching her with equal intensity. The creases around Karleah’s black, beady eyes had furrowed more than their usual wont. Her lips were pursed, and the ancient lines crisscrossing her face had sunk deeper over the last week. Why, Karleah’s worried! Jo thought in sudden surprise. About me? A wave of guilt washed over Jo, and she felt her face flush. Her dismay deepened when Braddoc left her to join Karleah and Dayin on the other side of the fire. The three of them looked at Jo silently.
“I—” Jo began, then coughed. Get a hold of yourself, she thought sternly. “The … pyre has finally burned out. Flinn is no more,” Jo finished.
Braddoc and Karleah glanced at each other. The old wizardess looked down at Dayin, then put her bony arm around her apprentice’s equally thin shoulder. Karleah nodded almost imperceptibly.
“Have you given any thought as to what to do next, Johauna?” Braddoc asked, his good eye looking up at Jo.
What to do next? thought Jo suddenly. Next? Why ask me? Jo turned away and placed Wyrmblight reverently on some nearby skins, buying a moment to think. Can it be, she thought, that they expect me to make the decision? She turned back to the others, and all three were looking steadily at her.
“I … hadn’t given it much thought,” Jo said truthfully, “but I know that the first thing I intend to do is find Verdilith.” Seeing their dubious faces, Jo added grimly, “The dragon must die. I won’t rest until Verdilith is dead.” Her gray eyes flashed.
“While you stood vigil over Flinn’s body,” Braddoc said after a discreet pause, “I followed the path Verdilith made through the woods. It wasn’t hard. He never once took to the sky—I think Flinn must have damaged his wings.” The dwarf grinned savagely.
Karleah began dishing up plates of steaming stew and bread and handing them to Dayin to pass out. Jo accepted one gratefully and took a place by the fire. She touched the sword lying behind her, and the words have faith seemed to echo through her.
As Braddoc opened his mouth to speak again, Karleah thrust a bowl into his hands and grunted, “Eat.” Snapping his mouth shut, he, too, sat by the fire. Dayin joined the dwarf and began eating his stew, using his bread as a ladle.
The fastidious dwarf shot him a censoring glance, then dug in with his spoon. A tiny drop of broth spattered Braddoc’s yellow jerkin and leather breeches. He frowned and wiped the spot away immediately. Jo smiled. He’s a strange fellow, she thought. So brusque and yet so persnickety about his appearance. Though his clothes were travel-stained, they were free of crusted mud, unlike Jo’s and her other companions’. The dwarf spent far more time at the stream washing his things than the rest did.