Blackstone (Book 2) Read online

  They went directly to Darrens’ study, where they found the man dressed more informally than usual, in nothing but trousers and short sleeves, his feet propped up on his desk. He looked tired even at first glance, and Siobhan’s heart sank. A tired man was not known to possess much patience.

  He looked up at the tentative knock on the open door, then waved them in and to the chairs arrayed in front of his desk. “Siobhan, Fei, come in. I hope you’re coming to talk to me about something different this time.”

  She concealed a wince. “I’m sorry. I’m not.”

  Darrens blew out an aggravated breath.

  “Hear us out,” she pleaded, both hands raised up in a staying motion. “You know that Fei is from Saoleord?”

  “Yes, and?”

  Fei smoothly picked up the thread of the conversation. “You know that my people are the only ones that retain records from before the governments fell?”

  His eyes flew to Fei’s face, his wandering attention now firmly fixed. In deliberate motions, he took his feet off the desk and leaned forward, hands braced against the desk. “I did not. How much do your people know?”

  “It is why they fled so high up in the mountains,” Fei explained simply. “They wanted to remove themselves far from the conflicts of the world to preserve all of the history and knowledge they could. The legend says that when they fled, they were only allowed to bring as much in the way of personal things and tools as they could carry on their backs. The wagons and horses were for scrolls, books, and records.”

  Siobhan’s lips parted in astonishment. Eight years she had known this man, and she’d just learned more about his people in the past five minutes than in all of those years combined.

  “Now that is very interesting,” Darrens allowed, “But I’m not sure why you’re telling me this.”

  “Before I left home, I was training under a master historian. I was to take his place when I reached of age.” Fei gave a slight shrug of the shoulders. “The lifestyle of a historian did not suit me, so I left. But before I did, I learned much of the history of the world. Guildmaster Darrens, I have seen the pattern before in the records of history, many times. When a country or people are pushed to the brink, they always react in the same way: war.”

  Darrens scrubbed two hands roughly through his hair, making it stand on end in every direction. “I understand what you’re saying to me, and I allow that if anyone would know, it’d probably be you. But what do you two want me to do about it?”

  “Please intervene, find a way to ease the monopoly so that Orin isn’t on the verge of financial collapse,” Siobhan pleaded. “Markl said he’d talk to his father himself if you felt like you needed his help in negotiating.”

  “We can’t ease it, it means not having the money to repair the bridges,” he argued, using the same words he had in the last three arguments they had about this.

  “It means a delay in repairing the bridges, not something insurmountable,” Siobhan argued, also repeating her words. Frustrated this was going the same way as previous times, she threw up her hands. “If you can’t do something about the trade monopoly, then find a way to make an economic boost for Orin! Create a demand for a product, or something. If someone doesn’t do something, then we face war.”

  “War,” Darrens scoffed. “Orin would first have to finance a war, which they don’t have the funds to do. And where would you get together enough men to make up an army? We haven’t had war in two hundred years, at least—”

  “Two hundred and thirty nine years, to be precise,” Fei interjected calmly.

  Darrens gave him a nod of thanks and kept going, “—so no one living even knows how to command an army or what to do with one if they had it! Siobhan, I realize you’re worried, I grant you that there’s good reason for it, but I don’t think it’ll come to war. Orin’s not in a position to do anything.”

  Her words simply weren’t going through. Desperate, she turned to Fei for help.

  The look in Fei’s dark eyes was glum, as if he realized the argument was already lost and they were speaking to deaf ears. Still, he tried. “A starving wolf will attack, whether he thinks he can win or not.”

  “And you think Orin is that starving wolf right now?”

  Fei inclined his head.

  “I grant you they will try to do something.” Darrens tried to smile, but his patience was all but gone at this point. “But they don’t have the resources or reserves to pull together anything that will do significant damage. I’m sorry, but I don’t see a reason to really worry.”

  And that was the heart of the problem. Siobhan sank back into her chair, resigned that she would not be able to convince Darrens of the severity of the situation until something drastic happened. “Then, if it’s alright with you, I want to go into Saoleord.”

  He cocked his head at her. “For what purpose?”

  “These people are experts, they remember things long forgotten by the rest of the world,” she explained. “Maybe they can see a solution to the problem that we can’t.”

  Darrens clearly didn’t see the point of going, but was willing to send her on her way if it meant a break from repeating the same argument. “Go, then. How long will you be gone?”

  “Two, perhaps three weeks?” she offered uncertainly. “Grae doesn’t have a path built going that direction. Or coming back. It’ll cost us a little time to build it.”

  “We can survive without you for three weeks,” he claimed confidently. “If it will make you feel better, and you think it will help, then go.”

  Relieved to at least get this much compromise, she gave him a strained smile. “Then we’ll go.”

  ӜӜӜ

  Siobhan was completely incapable of letting anyone pack themselves.

  Wolf had watched this pattern for years. She always said “Pack up, people!” and acted as if she wasn’t going to help in the slightest, but before they had even half their bags filled, she’d pop her head into people’s rooms and ask if they’d packed this or that. This time was worse than usual, and Wolf had an idea of why. Part of it was because of their destination—she didn’t want to be caught shorthanded on the way to Saoleord. But part of it was because Rune had very limited experience packing at all.

  Beirly and Conli both dragged her out of Rune’s room several times, telling her she needed to pack herself, but every time Wolf passed the stairs, he could hear her voice floating down from the third story.

  Shaking his head, he went down to the main floor and spied Sylvie sitting at the table with Markl, their heads bent together. Those two were becoming nigh inseparable, like Denney and Conli, although for entirely different reasons. He and Beirly had a bet going on when the two would officially get together. All the signs were there, although something seemed to be holding them back.

  Waving his hand, he caught the brunette’s attention. “Sylvie, go pack for Siobhan. She’s so worried about Rune I think she forgot to pack herself.”

  Sylvie smirked at him. “Already have.”

  He blew out a breath. “Smart woman. Funny, I don’t remember her being this bad with me.”

  Beirly, passing by, offered, “You never looked at her like a mother either.”

  True. He still didn’t. How anyone could look at Siobhan and not see a woman was beyond his ken. “Is that the difference?”

  “Mostly.” Scratching at his beard, Beirly amended this, “I think. So, we all packed? All bags in the cart?”

  He got a chorus of assents.

  “Good, good. I wonder who will take us to Stott tomorrow? Grae or Rune?”

  Wolf shrugged, not concerned either way. Ever since Rune had passed his test two days ago, he’d been looking for excuses to take people by path. Likely he’d do it again tomorrow. The newness of it would wear off eventually.

  Although come to think of it, Grae still acted like that sometimes….

  Markl turned and looked up toward the rafters. “Fei, is there anything we need to know about your people? How to greet
them, anything that we shouldn’t say or do?”

  “Yes,” his voice floated down from above. Wolf couldn’t see him, but could more or less pinpoint his location from Fei’s voice. “But I’ll tell you as we’re crossing the bridge over into Orin. It’s best to say it all at once.”

  “Alright.” Even though he agreed, Markl looked slightly disappointed by this delay. Wolf had never seen a man that loved learning as much as their resident scholar.

  He’d had no idea what to think of a ‘scholar’ at first. But after six months of being in Markl’s company, he’d come to respect the man. Not just for his skill with that crescent spear of his, but also for his knowledge. More than once, Markl’s ability with languages and his understanding of cultures had saved the guild a pretty penny and kept them out of potential danger.

  Conli stuck his head out of his clinic in the back and called, “Wolf? A moment.”

  Having a good idea why he was being summoned, Wolf let out a soft sigh before turning and walking to the back of the Hall. Conli stepped into the room to give Wolf enough space to enter, then half-closed the door behind him.

  As usual, the place was neat as a pin, even the floor clean enough to eat off of. Conli was fanatical in that, something about dirt causing infections. Teasing the man about it would set off a rant that could last hours. As Wolf sat on the simple wooden bed against the back wall, he noticed that half of the usual jars, herb packets, and medicine bottles that usually lined the shelves over Conli’s desk were missing. He was taking that much along? The leather satchel containing his surgical tools was also missing from the desk, likely already packed into the small black emergency bag.

  With deft hands, Conli undid the metal hand on Wolf’s right arm and rolled the sleeve up, revealing the bandage underneath it all. “I told you,” he said mildly, “to leave the hand off for a while, give this time to heal properly.”

  “I feel naked without it on,” Wolf grumbled, half under his breath.

  “I swear some days, I don’t know which weapon you prefer: your hand or your sword.” Shaking his head, he unwound the bandage, examining the long gash on the skin with clinical eyes. “It’s healing well enough in spite of everything. If you left the hand off for three days, it’d scab over completely and you wouldn’t need to worry about infection setting in.”

  “You want me to leave it off while we head for Saoleord?” Wolf objected.

  Conli’s brows furrowed slightly. “No, I suppose that is a bad idea. I’ll keep a careful eye on it and hope for the best.” Reaching behind him, he lifted a bottle off the table and started dabbing it on the wound, making it sting something fierce. For such a shallow wound, it was putting up quite the fuss.

  “This will be Rune’s first real trip with us,” Conli mentioned idly.

  Wolf considered this for a moment before nodding thoughtfully. “It might be, at that. All our other escorting jobs didn’t last us more than a day. Huh. I wonder how he’ll do sleeping outdoors?” As far as Wolf could tell, the boy had been city bound his entire life and had limited experience being in the woods.

  “You and Fei might want to take him aside, teach him some basic survival skills,” Conli advised. “Just in case. Once we pass Stott and cross the bridge into Orin, we’ll have little in the way of civilization. If he gets lost out there, or separated from us, he won’t have a clue on what to do.”

  True enough. The connecting bridge from Stott to Orin’s shores took barely five hours to cross. And that was with a heavily laden wagon. A man on horseback could cover it in about three. On Orin’s side, there was Channel Pass—barely more than a trading town. Beyond that, Wingate, but after that city there wasn’t anything but grassland and forest. In fact, there weren’t many towns in Orin altogether, until you either went much further west or all the way up north. It left a lot of unclaimed territory for a man to get lost in. Rune was an expert inside of a city and could survive well there. Put him in nature’s territory, and he wouldn’t have a clue.

  After six months of being around him, Wolf had developed a certain fondness for the boy and wouldn’t care to lose him through stupidity. “I’ll teach him,” he promised Conli.

  “Good. I figured Siobhan hasn’t thought of this—yet—but when it does occur to her, she’ll want someone to broaden his education.”

  True enough. Wolf reached for his hand, intending to put it back on, when an odd expression on Conli’s face made him pause. “What?”

  “Wolf,” the physician’s tone was slightly uneasy, “Do you think that Rune has a, well, crush on Denney?”

  He blinked. Then blinked again. “What?”

  “It’s just, I’ve noticed that whenever Rune isn’t studying, or working, that he spends most of his time with Denney. Or watching Denney. And I see that smirk on your face, and I don’t find this funny.”

  Really? Wolf found this fatherly concern outright hilarious. What, Conli didn’t want his precious niece together with an assassin? Well, mayhap the worry was somewhat justified. Rune had made great strides with them, granted, but he still found killing people a perfectly acceptable way to solve problems. He slapped Conli on the shoulder in a supportive gesture. “Relax, man. I don’t think it’s what you’re fearing.”

  “Then what is it?” Conli demanded.

  “Denney’s had a bit of hero worship for our boy ever since he protected her in Iron Dragain. He’s never had someone look at him like that before. He’s drawn to her because of it, is all.” Although if those two did decide to be together, Wolf thought it’d be for the good. Denney was a beautiful woman that had a severe prejudice hanging over her head. She needed a strong fighter as her life partner.

  Frustrated, Conli growled, “Denney’s a little sweet on the boy, too.”

  Oh-ho. That was the real problem, right there. Wolf had to bite the inside of his cheek to stop himself from laughing outright.

  “Don’t you dare laugh,” Conli warned him, pointing an outraged finger at him.

  Wolf spread a hand in a peacemaking manner. “Conli, it could be worse.”

  “Oh, do tell,” he snapped in irritation.

  “Think about it. She could fall for some weak accountant that can’t protect her. At least when she’s with Rune, you know no fool will be able to lay a hand on her. Our boy might not know the proper way to court a woman, but he’s got the fine details of protecting them down pat.”

  Not wanting to admit this, Conli gave a wordless growl.

  “And ’sides, I doubt romance has crossed Rune’s mind.” There were simply too many other basics that the boy was still learning. Friendship, brotherhood, family, affection, loyalty, love, kindness…Rune had learned many things since joining up with them but he didn’t understand all of it. Feeling such emotions were still raw and new to him, and there were days he struggled with it. He wasn’t ready to dance with a woman just yet.

  Blowing out a breath, Conli leaned against the edge of the desk, shoulders slumped. “I suppose I’ll worry about it when or if it happens. Just because the interest is there, doesn’t mean that anything will develop. Markl and Sylvie are a clear example of that.”

  “Truly.” Wolf really wanted to know what the holdup was. If this kept going on, he’d lose that bet with Beirly. Maybe he should find some way to nudge them along….

  “Wind and stars, Wolf, will you leave that hand off tonight?” Conli demanded in exasperation. “You don’t need it on. Give yourself a few hours at the very least to heal up some.”

  Wolf clutched his iron hand and protested, “But—!”

  “If Tran tries anything, I promise to clobber him for you. Just wait until tomorrow morning to put the hand back on.”

  Well, likely he wouldn’t be in trouble without the hand as long as he stayed in the Hall. It was almost evening anyway; he could afford to wait until the morning to put it on. “Fine,” he sighed.

  ӜӜӜ

  They did, of course, have an already pre-built path made to take them directly to Stott. Not much of
a distance was between Goldschmidt and Stott anyway, as there was nothing but a few villages between the two cities, and it was a short jump by path. Rune, smug about his new license, was the one that took them.

  If it was a matter of going west, toward either Wingate, Coravine, or Blenkhorn, then they had paths to take them there as well. But of course, none of the guild except Fei had gone to Saoleord before, so they had no path that would take them there. Once they crossed into Orin, they’d need to camp outside of Channel Pass’s walls and build a path going north.

  Once they were off the path, they took an outer highway in order to bypass Stott, and made a beeline for the bridge. Wolf eyed the town as they passed it. From here, it didn’t seem much had changed in the eight months since he’d been here. The road was bustling with traffic, coming and going, with everything from couriers to tradesman passing them. Wolf walked at the back of the group to keep a general eye on his people, making sure he didn’t lose anyone in this crowd.

  They arrived at the bridge without trouble and started the crossing immediately, as there was no need to time it perfectly with it being such a short distance. Rune, perched on top of the cart with the girls, turned to Siobhan and asked, “Why ain’t we staying in Channel Pass as we build the path? I didn’t get that straight last night.”

  “Tran and Wolf are both blacklisted from that town,” she explained without rancor.

  Rune shot him an amused smirk. “Why ain’t I surprised. Alright, wolf-dog, what did ya do?”

  “It’s not my fault this time,” Wolf denied with an unconcerned shrug.

  “It really isn’t,” Siobhan agreed, backing him up. “You see, about five years ago we came through Channel Pass on the way back from an escort. We just happened to arrive at the same inn as the slavers that had sold Wolf to me years before. They recognized him—he’s probably the only Wynngaardian with a missing hand they’d ever seen before—and put up a ruckus, saying he couldn’t be a guild member because he was a slave. I, of course, jumped into thick of it and started arguing with them. It got heated, then one of their men tried to force Wolf to take his hand off, and it went from bad to ugly. Tran came downstairs to see what all the yelling was about, saw someone attacking us, and leaped into the middle of things before I could try to calm anyone down. The next thing I know, the whole main room is in shambles, the slavers are missing more than a few teeth in their heads, and the guards arrived on scene demanding an explanation. Once I showed them that I had proof of Wolf’s purchase, and he didn’t belong to the slavers, they were willing to let us go. But they’re not willing to let us back into the city.”