The smell worsened as they passed through the gate into the bailey. Corwin blinked the sting of smoke out of his eyes and breathed through his mouth, trying not to focus on the stench of burned flesh. Stormdancer snorted in protest, nostrils flaring. Bodies littered the bailey, scattered here and there like desecrated statues. It was impossible to count their numbers. Several of them had burned together, loved ones clinging to each other through the end. Corwin couldn’t understand why so many were caught in the fire. With so much stone in the house’s structure, surely there would’ve been ways to escape before the fire spread. Then the explanation came to him—it must have been more wilder magic.
Corwin and Dal headed to the right, with the rest of the Tormane guards following behind them, while Prewitt’s men swept the left. Dal stared down at the bodies as they passed, but Corwin kept his gaze up and forward, paying as much attention to Stormdancer’s ears as he did to everything else. If there was danger ahead, Storm would give him early warning. The warhorse was uneasy, his neck arched and back tense, each step punctuated by a snort.
They rounded the first corner only to find the destruction continued on. More bodies were scattered about, charred to unrecognizable husks. In the distance, what remained of the postern gate hung open, three-quarters of it blown away. The attackers must have surrounded the house.
Hearing a noise beyond the gate, Corwin tightened his grip on his sword and steered Storm toward it. Once on the other side, he spotted a bonfire burning ahead. A man knelt beside the fire, but the moment he spotted them, he leaped up and bolted.
“Stop!” Corwin dug his heels into Storm’s sides and reined him after the stranger, who disappeared down a narrow path through the woods. Giving pursuit, Corwin swept his gaze through the trees on the lookout for other enemies. His knees brushed tree trunks and bushes, branches scraping through his hair like grasping fingers. Still, Stormdancer made ground on the man easily. They were almost upon him when the path opened up into a clearing.
Reaching the man, Corwin leaned over in the saddle and grabbed the back of his tunic. Corwin kicked his feet free of the stirrups and tackled the stranger to the ground. Storm halted at once, as he’d been trained to do. Corwin quickly stood and pointed his sword down at the man lying facedown in the grass.
“Roll over slowly and look at me.”
The man obeyed, shifting awkwardly onto his back. Corwin held the sword steady, his gaze unmoving even as Dal and the others arrived. Out of the corner of his eye, Corwin watched Dal fetch Stormdancer for him, securing the horse’s reins.
“Who are you?” Corwin said.
The stranger shook his head, which was as bald as Governor Prewitt’s. Pockmarks and dirt spotted his face while blood and char covered his tunic. His right sleeve had been torn away at the elbow, exposing a muscled forearm rimmed with a blue tattoo.
Corwin brought the sword closer to the man’s throat. “I won’t ask again: Who are you and what are you doing here?”
In answer, the man opened his mouth, but only a garbled sound came out, a red pit where his tongue should’ve been.
“What in the three hells is going on?” Dal said, joining Corwin.
Corwin stepped back, giving the man room to stand. “Get up.”
The man did so, limbs trembling. Corwin frowned, surprised by the depth of his fear. Surely he knew that if Corwin was going to kill him, he would’ve done it already.
“Watch out, Corwin!” Dal shouted, making a grab for the man, who had reached into his pocket for a weapon. His hand came out empty save for a puff of smoke. For a second, Corwin thought the stranger was summoning fire, but then he saw it was magic of a different kind entirely. Just what, he didn’t know, but he stumbled back from it in fear.
The smoke transformed into two long black tendrils like snakes. They slid into the man’s mouth, disappearing down his throat. He began to scream as black lines spread over his face and down his arms, following the flow of his veins. Those veins swelled until they burst, breaking through the skin with blood blackened to tar. The man’s screams abruptly ended, and he fell to the ground in a messy pile.
Covering his mouth, Corwin turned away from the sight. Around him, the others gasped and shuddered, several of them gagging. At least one man vomited.
Governor Prewitt and the rest finally arrived. “What happened?” Prewitt said. He dismounted, feet striking the grass with an audible thud, and handed his horse’s reins to one of the guards before approaching the body. Corwin relayed the story while around him the guards made warding gestures.
After several seconds of examination, Prewitt announced, “This man was from Andreas.”
Taking a steadying breath, Corwin forced his gaze onto the body. “How do you know?”
“This tattoo.” Prewitt indicated the blue ink wrapped around the man’s forearm, barely visible on the ruined skin. “It’s a miner’s mark. All who work in the mines in Andreas receive one. The ink glows in the dark, making their bodies easy to find if there’s an accident or they lose their way.”
Across from them, Dal wrinkled his nose. “That’s rather unpleasant.” He picked up the magestone whistle around his neck and blew it. No sound came out, at least none that the men could hear, but somewhere overhead, Lir let out a cry in answer to the silent summons.
“But what sort of magic was that smoke?” Corwin said. “I’ve never seen something like that. I thought wilders could only manipulate the elements . . . fire, earth, air, and water.”
“And sometimes spirit,” Prewitt said. “That’s what the oldest tales say.”
“No wilder born with spirit has been seen for centuries.” Dal stretched out his arm to catch Lir as she landed.
“Quite right, Lord Thorne,” said Prewitt with a bob of his head. “They haven’t been seen.”
Corwin considered the implication. It was true that wilders lived in hiding. The eradication of their kind was one of the Mage League’s primary purposes, one they’d grown even more successful at these last three years since the inception of the Inquisition and the formation of the gold order. Before it, wilders were condemned only once they’d been discovered performing wild magic. Now, the League actively searched them out. Every city and freeholding in Rime was bound by royal decree to allow the gold robes to examine their citizens, regardless of age. Could it be that there were those with spirit abilities who had simply managed to avoid being caught all this time? Corwin didn’t know. But with magic like he’d just seen, he supposed anything was possible. He knew a dozen men or more who would give their right hands to possess such a weapon.
“Lord governor,” one of the guards shouted, bursting into the clearing to join them. “The fire that man was tending had a nightdrake corpse in it.”
Corwin, Prewitt, and Dal followed the guard back to the fire. Corwin fixed his eyes on the charred pieces. The guard was right—there was a drake corpse among the debris. Still, he couldn’t make sense of it. Drakes couldn’t have done this. So why were there corpses here? Nightdrakes scavenged their dead. Why burn them? It was like trying to solve a puzzle with misshaped pieces.
“What would you have us do, your highness?” Governor Prewitt asked.
Corwin didn’t answer at first, uncomfortable with the question and the responsibility that fell to him. “I suppose we should take the miner’s body back to Farhold and have the magists examine it. They might know more about the magic that killed him. And we need to complete a thorough search of the house and grounds.”
Prewitt nodded. “Will you be prolonging your stay in Farhold then?”
Corwin considered the question, his unruly thoughts turning to Kate once more. If he did stay, it was possible he might run into her again. He could even orchestrate the meeting, if he dared.
But only heartache lay down that path.
“No,” Corwin said. “I will not prolong my stay. If the man was from Andreas, then that’s all the more reason for me to keep on with the tour.” That and the fact that Lord Nevan of Andreas is one of my father’s biggest detractors, he thought but didn’t say. “I was scheduled to head there next,” he added. “I’ll be leaving tomorrow.”
“Beg pardon, your highness,” replied Prewitt, “but given that this attack might have been an act against the high king, surely someone from your party should stay to learn what the magists have to say.”