He rose and embraced me, and after some quickly offered condolences, the caravan continued, General Draeger riding between me and the captain. Tension still ran high. I saw Sven eyeing the general and exchanging glances with the officer on his right. Keep an eye on him. Stay close. Be aware. All the hidden messages I had learned to read in Sven’s eyes from years under his tutelage.
As we neared the gates, the general rode ahead to direct his troops, and I turned to Sven.
“Here,” I said, reaching behind me into my pack, rustling blindly through the contents until I found what I needed. “Take this to Merrick at the chanterie first thing. Judging by Draeger’s greeting, I’m not going to get a chance to slip away for several days. It’s a little something I lifted. Don’t show it to anyone else, and don’t tell anyone else. Merrick will know what to do.”
Sven looked at me incredulously. “You stole this?”
“You of everyone, Sven, should know that kings don’t steal things. We simply make acquisitions. Isn’t that in your bag of royal maxims?”
Sven sighed and mumbled almost to himself. “Why do I feel that this acquisition is only going to bring trouble?”
It already has, I thought, and now I was hoping it might bring the opposite, some sort of peace. I wondered if, in the list of royal truths, a king was allowed hope.
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
Lessons were learned, miles covered, messages sent, days of rain endured, arguments settled, weapons mastered. Natiya was exhausted, as she should have been. I had promised her that this would be no holiday, and I made sure it wasn’t. At times she stared at me with loathing, and other times I held her while she choked back sobs. I taught her everything I knew and made sure everyone else did the same. She had as many bruises, knots, and blisters as I did. Her arms ached from throwing a knife. I made her use both until one arm’s aim was as good as the other’s—and then I prayed she’d never have to use any of her newly acquired skills.
Natiya made an uneasy peace with Kaden, because I told her she must if she was to ride with us. I saw how it needled Kaden. The small bit of tranquillity and acceptance he had found in the vagabond world was forever lost to him. At times, he seemed lost to everything, his eyes squeezing shut when he thought no one was looking as if trying to see where he fit in with a different kind of eye, but then he would speak about some part of Venda, a part that didn’t belong to the Council or the Komizar, and I saw the strength in his gaze again.
Dihara’s death came when we were two weeks out. I had just finished my remembrances when I saw her on the crest of a winter brown hill. She sat at her spinning wheel, the treadle clicking the air, tufts of fur and wool and flax turning, long tendrils swirling, lifting on the breeze. They became the dusky colors of sunset, pink, amethyst, and orange fanning out above me, a warm blush coloring the sky, brushing my cheek, whispering, Greater stories will have their way.
Then others gathered on the hill, watching her. Those I had seen before, their numbers growing each time they came. It began with my brother and Greta. Then a dozen clanspeople on either side. Effiera and the other seamstresses. A platoon of soldiers. Then Venda and Aster—Don’t tarry, Miz—the faces I had seen and the voices I had heard many times these past weeks. All of them little more than a rustle of air, a glint of lost sunlight, and a hush beating through my veins. A madness, a knowing, circling, repeating, a swath cutting deep into my heart.
It had to be someone. Why not you?
Voices that wouldn’t let me forget.
They are waiting.
A promise, a vow spilled from my lips in return.
No one else saw them. I didn’t have to ask. The routine sounds of making camp missed no beats. No heads ever turned. No steps faltered.
Ah, you again, Dihara said, turning to face me. The spinning wheel still whirred, the gifts swirled, the tendrils reached. Trust the strength within you, and teach her to do the same.
I looked over my shoulder at Natiya, just loosening her boots, ready to fall into her bedroll. I walked over and grabbed her hand. “We’re not done.”
“I’m tired,” she complained.
“Then go make camp elsewhere. Let the pachegos eat you right now.”
“There’s no such thing as pachegos.”
“When they’re chewing off your foot because you’re not prepared, you may think differently.”
* * *
I was surprised at how little Natiya understood the gift. How was that possible when she had lived with Dihara? But I remembered what Dihara had told me. There are some who are more open to the sharing than others.
“The knowing is a truth that you feel here and here,” I told Natiya. “It is connection. It is the world reaching out to you. It flashes behind your eyes, it curls in your belly, and sometimes it dances along your spine. The truths of the world wish to be known, but they won’t force themselves upon you the way lies will. They’ll court you, whisper to you, slip inside and warm your blood, and caress your neck until your flesh rises in bumps. That is the truth whispering to you. But you have to quiet your heart, Natiya. Listen. Trust the strength within you.”
After a few quiet moments, she yelled in frustration, “I don’t understand!”
I grabbed her by the wrist as she turned to storm off. “It is survival, Natiya! A whisper that could save you! Another kind of strength the gods have blessed us with. The truth you need doesn’t always come at the end of a sword!”
She glared at me. I could see in her eyes that, for now, sharp-edged steel was the only kind of power she sought. I felt something give within me. I could understand that kind of truth too.