Loth stood on the deck of the Bird of Truth. His heart was leaden as he watched Inys draw closer.
Melancholy. That was the first word that came to mind when he beheld its dowly coast. It looked as if it had never seen the touch of the sun, or heard a joyful song. They were sailing toward Albatross Roost, the westernmost settlement in Inys, which had once been the heart of trade with Yscalin. If they rode hard, rested as little as possible, and met with no brigands, they might make it from here to Ascalon in a week.
Ead kept watch beside him. Already she looked a little less alive than she had in Lasia.
The Bird of Truth had sailed past Quarl Bay on its way to Inys. Anchored ships guarded it but, through a spyglass, they glimpsed the fledgling naval arm of the Draconic Army.
King Sigoso would soon be ready to invade. And Inys would need to be ready to repel him.
Ead had said nothing at the sight. Only turned an open hand toward the five ships at anchor—and fire, born of nothing, had roared up their masts. She had watched it devour them all with no expression, orange light flickering in her eyes.
Loth was shaken back to the present as a bitter gust of wind made him huddle deeper into his cloak.
“Inys.” His breath steamed white and thick. “I never thought to see it again.”
Ead laid a hand on his arm. “Meg never gave up on you,” she said. “Neither did Sabran.”
After a moment, he covered her hand with his.
A wall had stood between them at the start of their journey. Loth had been ill at ease around her, and Ead had left him to brood. Slowly, though, their old warmth had crept back. In their miserable cabin on the Bird of Truth, they had shared their stories of the past few months.
They had avoided any more conversation about religion. Likely they would never agree on the matter. For now, however, they had the same desire to see Virtudom survive.
Loth scratched at his chin with his free hand. He misliked his beard, but Ead had said they ought to disguise themselves when they reached Ascalon, since they were both barred from court.
“Would that I could have burned every one of those ships.” Ead folded her arms. “I must be cautious with my siden. It might be years before I taste of the tree again.”
“You burned five,” Loth said. “Five fewer for Sigoso.”
“You look less afraid of me now than you did then.”
The blossom ring glinted on her finger. He had seen other sisters of the Priory wearing one.
“All of us have shadows in us,” he said. “I accept yours.” He placed a hand over her ring. “And I hope you will also accept mine.”
With a tired smile, she threaded her fingers between his. “Gladly.”
The smell of fish and rotting seaweed soon rode on the wind. The Bird of Truth docked with some trouble in the harbor, and its tired passengers decanted on to the quay. Loth held out an arm to help Ead. She had sported a limp for only a few days, even though the arrow had gone clean through her thigh. Loth had seen knights-errant weep for lesser hurts.
Aralaq would leave the ship once everyone had departed. Ead would call for him when the time was right.
They walked down the jetty toward the houses. When Loth saw the sweet-bags swaying in their doorways, he stopped. Ead was looking at them, too.
“What do you suppose is in those?” she asked.
“Dried hawthorn flowers and berries. A tradition from long before the Foundation of Ascalon. To ward away any evil that might taint the house.” Loth wet his lips. “I have never seen them hanging in my lifetime.”
Clag stuck to their boots as they pressed on. Soon every dwelling they passed had a sweet-bag outside.
“You said these were ancient ways,” Ead mused. “What was the religion of Inys before the Six Virtues?”
“There was no official religion, but from what little the records tell us, the commons saw the hawthorn as a sacred tree.”
Ead withdrew into a brooding silence. They clambered over a drystone wall, on to the cobblestones of the main street.
The only stable in the settlement yielded two sickly horses. They rode side by side. Rain battered their backs as they passed half-frozen fields and sodden flocks of sheep. While they were still in the province of the Marshes, where brigands were rare, they made the decision to keep riding through the night. By dawn, Loth was saddle-sore, but awake.
Ahead of him, Ead held her horse at a canter. Her body seemed wrought with impatience.
Loth wondered if she was right. If Igrain Crest had been manipulating the Inysh court from behind the throne. Whittling Sabran down to her last nerve. Making her afraid to sleep in the dark. Taking a loved one for each of her sins. The thought stoked a fire in his belly. Sabran had always looked to Crest first during her minority, and trusted her.
He spurred his horse to catch up with Ead. They passed a village razed by fire, where a sanctuary coughed gouts of smoke. The poor fools had built their houses with thatched roofs.
“Wyrms,” Loth murmured.
Ead brushed at her wind-torn hair. “Doubtless the High Westerns are commanding their servants to intimidate Sabran. They must be waiting for their master before they attack in earnest. This time, the Nameless One will lead his armies himself.”
At sunfall, they came upon a dank little inn beside the River Catkin. By now Loth was so tired, he could scarce keep upright in the saddle. They stabled the horses and made their way into the hall, shivering and drenched to the bone.
Ead kept her hood up and went to see the innkeeper. Loth was tempted to stay in the hall by the crackling fire, but there was too great a risk that they would be recognized.
When Ead had secured a candle and a key, Loth took them and went upstairs. The room they were assigned was cramped and drafty, but it was better than the squalid cabin on the Bird of Truth.
Ead entered with their supper. Her brow was pinched.
“What is it?” Loth asked.
“I listened to some conversations downstairs. Sabran has not been seen since her public appearance with Lievelyn,” she said. “As far as the people know, she is still with child … but the dearth of news, coupled with the Draconic incursions, has left her subjects uneasy.”
“You said she was some way into her pregnancy when she miscarried. Were she still with child, she might have taken her chamber for the lying-in by now,” Loth pointed out. “A perfect excuse for her absence.”
“Yes. Perhaps she even colluded with it—but I do not think the traitors within the Dukes Spiritual intend to let her continue to rule.” Ead set down their supper and hung her cloak to dry over a chair. “Sabran foresaw this. She is in mortal danger, Loth.”
“She is still the living descendant of the Saint. The people will not rally behind any of the Dukes Spiritual while she lives.”
“Oh, I think they would. If they knew she cannot give them an heir, the commons would believe that Sabran is responsible for the coming of the Nameless One.” Ead sat at the table. “That scar on her belly, and what it represents, would strip her of legitimacy in many of their eyes.”
“She is still a Berethnet.”
“And the last of her line.”
The innkeeper had provided them with two bowls of gristly pottage and a hunk of stale bread. Loth forced down his share and chased it with the ale.
“I’m going to wash,” Ead said.
While she was gone, Loth lay down on his pallet and listened to the rain.
Igrain Crest was a tick on his thoughts. In his childhood, he had seen her as a comforting figure. Stern but kind, she had radiated a sense that everything would be well.
Yet he knew she had burdened Sabran in the four years of her minority. Even before that, when she was a young princess, Crest had hammered into her a need for temperance, for perfection, for devotion to duty. During those years, Sabran had not been permitted to speak with any children but Roslain and Loth, and Crest had always been near at hand, watching her. Though Prince Wilstan had been Protector of the Realm, he had been too deep in mourning to raise his daughter. Crest had taken charge of that.
And there had been one incident. Before the Queen Mother had died.
He recalled a freezing afternoon. Twelve-year-old Sabran on the edge of Chesten Forest, folding a snowball in her gloved hands, her cheeks pink. Both of them laughing until it hurt. After, they had clambered up one of the snow-clad oaks and huddled together on a knotted branch, much to the consternation of the Knights of the Body.
They had climbed almost to the top of that tree. So high they had been able to see into Briar House. And there had been Queen Rosarian in a window, visibly furious, a letter in her fist.
With her had been Igrain Crest, hands behind her back. Rosarian had stormed away. The only reason Loth remembered it so clearly was because Sabran had fallen from that tree a moment later.
It was some time before Ead returned, her hair damp from the river. She removed her boots and settled on the other pallet.
“Ead,” Loth said, “do you regret leaving the Priory?”