Jules strikes out hard with her staff and Camden leaps. She had been crouched, waiting, to knock Emilia down and pin her to the grass.
“Oof!” Emilia says, and rolls faceup as Jules and the cougar look at her. For a moment, her jaw clenches and her face reddens even beneath her deep tan skin. Then she laughs. “All right.” She grasps Camden fondly by the fur and pats her ribs. “No need of a war gift when you have her.”
Emilia tosses Jules a light red cloak, like the ones the servants wear.
“Where are we going?” Jules asks. After a long afternoon of training, she is in no mood to go anywhere; she craves a hot bowl of stew and the softness of her pillow.
“There is a bard staying at the inn. Father told me she knows the song of Queen Aethiel, and I would hear it.”
“Can’t you go without us? I’m likely to fall asleep in my ale, and I don’t want to insult the bard.”
“No,” Emilia replies, “I can’t go without you. Camden will have to stay here, of course. Too many people not in our trust. We’ll bring her back a nice fat leg of lamb.”
Camden lifts her head from her paws but only long enough to yawn. A leg of lamb and a quiet room suit her just fine.
As Jules walks beside Emilia through the city, she pulls the hood of the cloak down to shadow her eyes. Nearly everyone they pass acknowledges Emilia somehow, with a nod or a lowered gaze. The whole city knows the oldest daughter of Vatros by the jut of her chin and the bounce in her stride. They revere her, almost like the people of Wolf Spring used to revere Jules before they knew about the curse. Now if she were to return, they would march her to Indrid Down with her hands tied behind her back.
When they arrive at the inn, there is already a crowd and the bard has already started. Emilia frowns slightly, but the long spoken songs are known to go far into the night, with listeners coming and going as they hear their favorite parts.
“This isn’t even the song of Aethiel,” Emilia says. “It is the arming verse for the song of Queen Philomene. And it goes on forever. I’ll get us some ale and food.”
Jules lets the hood slip back in the heat of the inn. No one is paying attention to her anyway. All eyes are on the bard, standing near the fireplace in a lovely tunic edged in gold thread. She is one of the youngest bards that Jules has seen, though she has not seen many. So few pass through Wolf Spring, tired perhaps of night after night of the song of Queen Bernadine and her wolf. This bard wears a light hood, not unlike the red one that Jules wears, and her voice is melodious even as she recites the arming passages: greaves and knives and leather to be buckled, on and on, dressing the long-dead war queen in her battle finery.
Jules finds an empty table along the rear wall and sits. By the time Emilia returns with two mugs, the bard has moved on to tell of the fierceness of the queen’s army.
“What is there to eat?” Jules asks.
“A leg of lamb, like I told you. And boiled greens. We will eat what we can and bring the rest back to the cat.” Emilia’s eyes dart around the inn and back to the bard. “She will never get to Aethiel at this rate. Perhaps we can bring her to the table when she stops for food and get a few lines then.”
“Or you can wait. She’ll be here for as many nights as people have coin to pay her. Besides, I don’t want her so close. Bards travel all over the island. She could recognize me.”
“Even if she did, she would not say anything. For a people who speak so much, bards have very tight tongues.”
“How do you know?”
Emilia raises her eyebrows.
“Well, I’ve never had to cut one out, for a start.”
The food arrives, a great platter of it, a whole roasted lamb leg on a bed of greens and roasted potatoes besides.
“Thanks, Benji,” Emilia says to the server, a yellow-haired lad who will run the inn one day.
“An entire leg for two,” Benji remarks. “I wouldn’t think such a small thing would have such a large appetite.”
Jules looks up and finds him smiling at her. She lowers her eyes quickly.
“Nothing small about my stomach,” she says.
“Well, I hope you enjoy. I’ll bring another jug of ale.”
“He is curious about you,” says Emilia.
Jules does not respond. She is bad company, pretending to listen to the bard and speaking only when she must. She supposes that she has been bad company since she came to Bastian City. But it is hard not to be, when every dish of food makes her think of Arsinoe and her famous appetite, and every boy with a crooked smile could be Joseph, for just one instant before she remembers that he is dead.
She forces herself to look back toward the bard and finds her staring directly at her, eyes fixed as her lips move over the words of the raid on the burned city. Jules stares right back, angry, though she cannot say why, and the woman turns her head just slightly so Jules can see the stark white streak running through her hair. The white strands have been gathered together into a braid that falls through the gold like an icicle.
Such white streaks are common marks amongst the seers.
“That is no mere bard,” Jules whispers. “Emilia, what are you up to?”
Emilia does not deny it. She does not even look guilty.
“The warriors and the oracles have always had a strong bond. It is how we knew to come to your aid during the Queens’ Duel. And now we would know what the Goddess has in store for you. What? Did you think we would just hide you here forever, like a prisoner?”
Jules watches as the bard bows to the crowd, taking a break for a meal and some wine. “You said I was welcome for as long as was needed,” she mutters.
The bard stops before their table.
“Emilia Vatros. It is good to see you.”
“And you, Mathilde. Please, sit. Take some ale with us and food. There’s plenty, as you can see.”
“You even know each other,” Jules says as Mathilde takes a seat. She is striking, up close. Not more than twenty years old perhaps, and the braid of white stands out so starkly against her bright blond waves that it is a wonder Jules did not notice it right off.
Emilia takes her knife from her belt and carves a thick slice of meat from the leg, piling it onto a plate along with the greens and potatoes. Benji arrives with a fresh jug of ale and a third cup.
“I would take some wine, also,” Mathilde says, and he nods before going to fetch it. “It is an honor to meet you, Juillenne Milone.”
“Is it?” Jules asks suspiciously.
“Yes. But why are you looking at me like you hate me? We have not yet spoken.”
“I don’t trust many these days. It’s been a bad year.” She looks at Emilia. “And she’s saying my name awfully loud.”
Emilia and Mathilde share a pacifying look. If only Camden were there to swat both of their faces.
“I am aware of the need for discretion,” Mathilde says. “Just as I am aware that your dislike of oracles stems from the prophecy surrounding your birth. That you were legion cursed. But that has turned out to be true, hasn’t it?”
“That I was cursed, yes. Though I’ve heard that the oracle also said that I should be drowned. That is not true.”
Mathilde raises her eyebrows and tilts her head as if to say, Maybe not. Or just not yet. “And is that all that you have heard?”
“What else is there?”
“We never knew the specifics of the portent. We see through another seer’s eyes only that murky curse.”
“You never knew her, then?” Emilia asks. “The oracle who threw the bones when Jules was born?”
“I was still a child when Jules was born. If I knew her in Sunpool, I do not remember. And nor would many, anymore. For that oracle never returned.”
“What is that supposed to mean?” Jules snaps.
“That your family covered the truth of you well.”
That they killed the oracle is what Mathilde means. But seer or not, she does not know for sure. It is only conjecture. Accusation. And Jules will not imagine Grandma Cait or Ellis or even Madrigal putting a rock to an old oracle’s head.