The Disappearance of Winter's Daughter (Riyria Chronicles #4)

He saw it then. A shiny key was dangling from a hook just to the side of the door. Why he hadn’t seen it before he had no idea, except he wouldn’t have expected Mercator to act in such a rational way. After the missing knife, he had assumed she wouldn’t be sensible about the key. By the time he snatched it off the hook, Villar’s blood was up. He was ready for murder. Still, the idea of actually strangling the noble bitch, of touching her, was awful. Then he remembered the metal poles. Better to beat her to death. I can do that!

Returning to the pot and its stand, he saw a blade in the bottom of the empty container—a small one, not much bigger than a paring knife. Mercator had left it where she used it the most. With a grin, Villar took it. Holding the little knife in one hand and the key in the other, he returned to the locked door. He was so enraged his hand shook, and he had a hard time putting the key in the lock. He was forced to put the knife under his arm as he used two hands to steady the key.

Watch it not work.

He turned and felt the tumblers engage. The bolt slid free.

Ha! Finally, something went right!

Pulling the door back, he spotted the duchess. The lazy bitch was still asleep on the floor. She had one of Mercator’s blankets over her such that only her head was visible, and only the top of that. He could see the chain looping from the wall to the collar, which was lost below her long sandy locks of hair. That had been Mercator’s idea. She needed to be able to feed the cow, and that meant opening the door. Without a chain on the big woman, she’d be able to overpower Mercator the moment she popped the lock. Chained up by the neck, she was helpless.

He took a step into the room, then stopped.

Something wasn’t right—a lot of things in fact.

The figure underneath the blanket was too small. He could see her hair peeking out from where her head should be, from where the chain led, only there was no bulge, no head—just hair. For an instant, he thought all the days of starving had magically shrunk her to the size of a skinny dwarf, but that wasn’t possible.

A kick revealed all: One blanket was laid over straw and another bunched up to look like a body. There was a pile of cut hair, and the collar—the empty collar.

He turned and caught sight of her bolting out the door. She had waited just to its side when he entered. Out she went, trying to slam the door closed behind her—trying to lock him in! The old bovine was no match for a mir. Villar kicked the door wide, throwing her flat on her back.

She screamed, thrusting her hands out to ward him off.

“Time to die, you fat cow!”





Chapter Twenty-Six

Haggling





“Explain something to me, Royce,” Hadrian said as the two struggled up the slope. “Why did Maribor create picker bushes?”

“Did he?” Royce asked, fighting through a thicket of fallen deadwood, high grass, and a wicked snarl of the thorny bush Hadrian was taking issue with. “Thought he was just the god of men, not flora.”

“Oh, you might be right. Bet Evelyn would know.”

“With any luck, she’s long gone. I don’t think we’re going to find this place.” Royce paused to wipe his face with his sleeve.

That was when Hadrian knew it was hot. He, of course, was soaked with sweat. His shirt stuck unpleasantly to the center of his back. Worse, the material of his pants clung to his thighs, making it hard to move. Royce rarely perspired, but that day his hood was back, his forehead slick and shiny, his hair sticking. Two days before, it had felt like it might snow, but now summer appeared to have leapfrogged spring. Trudging uphill across sodden grass and through brambles as formidable as castle walls didn’t help.

“I get the strong feeling we’re wasting our time,” Royce said, waving a hand before his face to clear away the mini-storm-cloud of tiny black bugs. He turned and looked behind them to where the city of Rochelle spread out below. “It wouldn’t be this far out, would it?”

Hadrian shrugged. “We’re coming into a forest now.” He nodded at the staggered line of pine and spruce that grew just up the slope. The trees were gathered in small groups as if chatting about their neighbors, but farther on, they marshaled en masse, forming a dense forest that covered the base of a coastal mountain. “Was there a forest on the map? Do you remember?”

Royce shook his head. “No, but these trees are, what, thirty, forty years old? Probably been cut for firewood for generations. That map goes back hundreds of years. No telling what this place might have looked like then. The only positive thing is that it does make sense for Villar to be out here. The seclusion is ideal. I can’t imagine too many people coming up this way if they didn’t have to.”

Hadrian took advantage of Royce’s pause, and plopped down in the grass. At least the puddles left by the previous days of rain were cool. He scooped up a handful and wetted the back of his neck. Then he lay back and stared up at the blue sky and white clouds. “Beautiful day. Doesn’t seem right.”

“What doesn’t?” Royce asked, scanning the way ahead and not looking pleased.

“That such awful things should happen on such nice days.”

“You’d rather be up here in the rain?”

“I was thinking more about the people down there. You saw them this morning, all dressed up in their finest clothes. Been a long, dark winter. They just want a little happiness. And on the first good day in months what happens? It’s not fair.”

Royce gave Hadrian a puzzled look. “That’s so odd.”

“What?”

“Here we are, fighting brambles and slick, muddy slopes while trying to find a madman before he massacres hundreds, and your thoughts are focused on how unfair it is for the people having a grand time at a festival?”

“Why is that odd?”

“Why wouldn’t you think about us struggling in this heat against these thorny vines while breathing in these tiny black flies? Isn’t that unfair? Why can’t we be eating pork and dancing with ladies on such a fine day?”

Hadrian chuckled.

“What? Why is that funny?”

“It isn’t. It’s just I have this image in my head of you dancing. Can’t get past it.”

Royce frowned. “I’m just saying it’s strange that you feel sorry for them rather than us.”

“Well, I do feel sorry for you, if that makes it better.”

Royce clapped his hands together before his face, trying to kill some of the swarm that plagued him. “Why?”

“Because you can’t understand why it is I would feel sorry for them. Makes me think your world is very small.”

“Oh,” Royce said, sounding disappointed. “I thought you were going to say something else.”

“Really, what?”

Royce made a pfft sound, spitting as if the flies had invaded his mouth. He stepped back from the brambles, waving his hands before his face as he retreated. “Miserable little horrors. Why do they do that? Fly right into our mouth, eyes, and nose. It makes no sense. They can’t like it; I certainly don’t. There’s no benefit to be had, and yet into my mouth they go.”

“What was it you thought I was going to say?”

“Oh.” Royce washed a hand over his face. “I thought you might be on the verge of apologizing for volunteering to be a martyr last night.”

“Apologize? Are you kidding? I saved us.”

“Is that how you see it?”

“Is there another way?”

“You put me in a very unpleasant position.”

Hadrian sat up to face him. “Oh, I’m sorry. Were you the one tied up all night while a dwarf played with a knife, reminding you about his intention to slit your throat? ’Cuz I thought that was me.”

Royce was struggling, trying to extract something from his tongue with two fingers, a fly no doubt. He got something, peered at it in disgust, and gave it a flick. “You’re supposed to be learning from me. You can’t do that if you don’t listen.”

“Learn from you?” Hadrian said. “I think you’ve got that backward, pal. Arcadius teamed us up so I could teach you.”

Royce, who had moved on to cleaning his eyes, paused. “Did you just call me pal?”

“Yeah. It means friend—literally brother.”

“I know what it means.”

“So it’s just your hearing that’s going? If you want to talk about odd, that would certainly qualify. You have the most disturbingly acute ears of anyone I’ve ever met. Seriously, I don’t know how you sleep at night. The crickets must drive you insane.”