‘Nona!’ Kettle tried to sit up and fell back with a gasp. ‘This is serious. You have to go. The Noi-Guin will call others.’
Nona shrugged again. ‘I’ll kill them if they come.’ She paused, thinking over Kettle’s words. ‘How would your wounded assassin call for help?’
‘They’re shadow-workers. She could reach out to another, if they had the bond.’
‘How far?’
‘It depends. A mile? Ten? Most shadow-workers could send a simple call for help a fair distance.’
‘So call her.’
‘Who?’
Nona levelled a narrow stare at Kettle. ‘Sister Apple.’
‘But Arabella—’
‘The Noi-Guin want me, not her. And they’ll track me from here if I run. So we need someone here to stop that happening. And if Ara needs protecting – well, I’m the Shield aren’t I? I passed the ordeal. You didn’t.’
‘But—’
‘Call her!’ Nona shouted it.
‘I don’t want her to see me die!’ Kettle shouted it back.
Nona sat back, stunned. ‘You … you’re not going to die.’ The words came rough from a dry throat. ‘It’s just a small knife.’
‘It had venom on it, Nona. It’s eating at me. I can feel it in my bones.’
‘Wait!’ Nona fumbled in her habit, her fingers clumsy with grief. ‘I’ve got the black cure!’ She brought the vial out.
‘Little Nona.’ Kettle’s old smile returned. ‘Where in the world—’
‘I made it.’ Nona twisted the cap. ‘You’ve got to drink it!’
Kettle gave a weak grin. ‘I’d rather drink ditchwater. You should throw that away. It’s dangerous stuff even when not made by novices.’
‘But—’
‘I’m a Sister of Discretion, Nona. I’ve already taken the black cure. I took it when I first saw her. It’s why I’m still alive. But it’s not enough.’
‘Sister Apple would know. She could do something. She’s the Poisoner! She could—’
‘They still call her that?’ The ghost of a smile now, a weak thing.
‘Call her!’
‘No.’
‘Call her, or I swear by the Ancestor I’ll track and kill this Noi-Guin. And then I’ll find the Tetragode and start killing the rest of them until there are none left.’
‘Nona!’
Nona shrugged. ‘I’m going. I saw her blood trail. It went west towards the river.’ She got up.
‘I believe you’re serious.’ Kettle looked surprised, though Nona could see no reason for it.
‘I swear that I will do what I say.’ Nona sprang away, starting back along the path that she had broken through the undergrowth.
‘Nona!’
Nona turned. All around Kettle the shadows gathered, a dark mist bleeding through the wind.
‘Can you reach her?’
Kettle sat with her head back against the bark, her face white as death, a tear running from the corner of her eye. ‘I can always reach her. A thousand miles wouldn’t matter.’ She raised an arm, unsteady, and beneath it a shadow blacker than the night stretched out, reaching for infinity, as if the sun had fallen behind her. ‘It’s done. She knows I need her. She knows the direction.’
‘You swear it?’
‘I swear it.’
‘By the Ancestor?’
‘By the Ancestor.’ The faintest echo of that grin. ‘And by the Hope, and the Missing Gods who echo in the tunnels, and by the gods too small for names who dance in buttercups and fall with the rain. Now go. For the love of all that’s holy, go. You wear me out, Nona. And I’ve got to concentrate on being alive. It would break her heart to get here and find me dead.’ She drew a shallow breath. ‘They’re both in that direction. If you take it until you find some sort of trail there’s a good chance you’ll find Ara and the others on it. Try to travel with Ara and Zole. Tarkax may be able to protect you if the Noi-Guin track you from here.’ Another shallow breath, snatched in over her pain. ‘Go! Now!’
Nona came forward. She set her canteen in Kettle’s lap and kissed her icy forehead. Then she ran.
41
Clera found Nona before Nona found Ara. She came hurrying along a forest track in the late afternoon, chased by a dark squall.
‘Nona! Hold up!’
Nona turned on the path, relieved, feeling the sweat on her forehead start to freeze as she faced the wind.
‘You were racing!’ Clera came puffing to a halt. ‘My excuse was trying to catch up to you. What’s yours?’
‘The same.’ Nona grinned. ‘Are the others safe? I’ve been imagining awful things.’
‘Don’t know. You’re the first I’ve seen.’ Clera bent over, hands on her thighs, catching her breath. ‘I got very lost for a while back there so I’m pretty sure everyone’s ahead of us … Ancestor bleed me! Where in the hells did you get that?’ She straightened, staring at the naked blade in Nona’s hand, a shortsword of Durnish blue-steel, as long as a man’s arm from elbow to fingertips.
‘I took it off a raider.’ Nona frowned. ‘Do you think the others are safe?’
Clera puffed through her lips. ‘Don’t know. We need to find Ara though, and the rest of them … Raider? One of the ones that chased us?’ She glanced back along the track and scanned the trees more slowly. ‘They’re going to want that sword back …’
‘No,’ Nona said. ‘They’re not. Come on.’ She set off at a jog.
‘Wait up!’ Clera hurried to catch up. ‘Are they after you?’
‘Someone might be. And we need to find the others.’
‘Someone?’ Suspicion crossed Clera’s face. She looked nervous. ‘You’re not making a lot of sense …’
‘Save your breath for running.’ Nona led off as the wind started to build.
The edge of the squall caught them before they’d covered fifty yards, whipping the screw-pines into a frenzy, howling between the trunks, seizing icicles as long as Nona’s blade and shying them across the track.
‘You … you killed the person who had that sword … didn’t you?’ Clera ducked beneath a broken length of icicle, hunska-swift.
‘They’re not alive any more.’
The wind took whatever answer Clera had to that and for the next ten minutes they ran in a maelstrom of ice, wind, and flying branches, dodging what they could, relying on the thickness of their coats and hoods to take the brunt of any impacts they failed to avoid.
An hour later they were crunching their way through frozen puddles on a lane between beleaguered potato fields. The hedgerows bore scattered stands of hoare-apple, the dark red fruit glistening with frost.
‘Where is she? Typical Ara. She’s going to have me running all the way to the Kring.’ Clera pulled level again.
‘You’re very keen to find Ara,’ Nona said, eyeing her friend. ‘I didn’t think you liked her.’
‘Well I do.’ Clera snatched a breath. ‘And you should throw that sword away. It’s weighing you down, and you’re hardly going to use it. We haven’t moved past knife-work yet!’
‘I should throw this sword away?’ Nona slowed.
‘It must weigh a ton.’
Nona came to a halt. She held the sword up between them. ‘I should throw it away?’ She met Clera’s dark gaze. ‘I don’t need it?’
Clera looked away, her eyes on the track ahead. ‘… Nona …’
Nona let the sword fall. It fell point first and stuck in the ground between them. ‘Come on then.’ And she ran on.
‘Hey! Novices!’ The cry came from behind them.
Nona and Clera stumbled to a halt and turned. A moment later Nona had Ara in her arms. The Jotsis heir, eyes bright, face reddened by the wind, returned the hug grinning. ‘Who are you and where have you hidden Nona?’ Ara squeezed her and stood back. ‘Since when are you a hugger?’
‘I’m your Shield. You have to hold your Shield tight.’ Nona glanced around at Ara’s cold camp. Just the windbreak and a log to sit on. ‘We have to find Zole next.’
‘What the hell for?’ Clera looked suddenly fierce.
‘Zole?’ Ara’s smile fell away. ‘She’s Tarkax’s responsibility. We need to find Jula and Ruli!’
‘Zole,’ Nona confirmed. ‘Because Sister Apple isn’t looking after you any more and we need Tarkax in case anyone makes a move on you. Also, the countryside is thick with Durnish raiders. I saw another party two miles back. That’s the third I’ve seen.’
‘Sister Apple wasn’t looking after me in the first place!’ Ara glanced around as if the Poisoner might be standing behind a tree. ‘Was she?’