Chapter 211

I arrived in the demesne to find Ashlara sitting on a stone and sobbing.

Not crying. Not quietly wiping tears away.

Sobbing.

Her shoulders shook violently. Her entire body had folded in on itself, curled into a tight ball. Her face was buried in the hollow between her knees and chest as though she could somehow make herself smaller.

Disappear.

Her bow lay shattered nearby. Arrows littered the ground. A tree had been ripped from the earth and tossed aside.

I ignored all of it.

I crossed the distance between us, knelt beside her, and pulled her into my arms.

She crashed into me. Her arms wrapped around me so tightly it hurt. She clung to me as though I might vanish if she loosened her grip for even a moment. Her sobs grew worse.

I tightened my embrace and gently rocked her back and forth.

“It's okay,” I whispered. I wasn't even sure what I meant by it.

Nothing about this was okay. I'd never seen her like this. In all the years I'd known Ashlara, I'd never seen grief hit her this hard. I'd seen her cry. I'd seen her mourn. I'd seen her angry.

But I'd never seen her broken.

Tears streamed down her face. Mucus ran from her nose. Every few breaths she choked on a sob she couldn't suppress.

Ashlara was a mountain. The toughest person I knew. The woman who stood her ground against monsters, armies, and gods.

Whatever had happened, it had shaken something fundamental inside her.

I gave her time.

When it became clear she wasn't ready to talk, I reached out through the silver threads connecting me to the others and gave a little tug.

Not enough to alarm them. Just enough to let them know I needed them.

Mirri. Serah. Elise.

I wanted to call Iolite too, but she was still following Annora. The investigation couldn't stop.

Elise arrived first.

Her gaze swept over the scene. The broken bow. The uprooted tree. Ashlara in my arms.

She hesitated.

I could practically see her trying to determine the correct response.

Then, apparently deciding there wasn't one, she walked over and awkwardly wrapped her arms around Ashlara from behind.

The warrior jumped slightly, then relaxed.

Mirri arrived next. She took one look at Ashlara and didn't bother asking questions. She simply joined the embrace.

A few moments later Serah stepped into the demesne. Unlike Elise, she didn't hesitate. She simply moved forward with the confidence and certainty that seemed to define her and wrapped her arms around all of us.

The four of us sat there holding Ashlara while she cried.

No one pushed. No one demanded answers. No one told her to calm down.

We simply stayed.

Eventually her breathing slowed enough that she trusted herself to speak. Even then the words came in fragments. Broken pieces.

She told us about the hunt. About Aurelion. About Nyssira. About the argument. Then she told us about Chamberlin.

The more she spoke, the deeper my frown became. The angrier I grew. It wasn't my anger. I had no right to it.

Ashlara had been hurt. This was her wound. Her betrayal. Her grief.

That didn't stop me from wanting to beat the living shit out of the Oathbound King.

She didn't need me to defend her. She'd already punched him in the face.

Honestly, I was more than a little proud of that. Not many people could say they'd decked a god and lived to tell the story.

But that didn't stop the rage. It didn't stop the instinct to protect.

Because the more she spoke, the more obvious it became that Aurelion had manipulated her from the beginning.

He'd found a lonely, angry girl. Earned her trust. Become the father she needed. Then shaped her into whatever weapon he wanted. And when he was done, he'd left. Burned down the house they'd built together. Vanished without a word.

While she searched. While she worried. While she grieved.

And somehow he couldn't understand why she was angry. Couldn't understand why she'd loved him. Couldn't understand why abandoning her hurt.

To him she had been a project. A tool. A means to an end.

To her he had been family.

I couldn't imagine that kind of betrayal. Couldn't imagine learning that one of the most important people in my life had viewed our relationship so differently. That the love had only gone one way. That the person I'd trusted had never really seen me at all.

My teeth ground together hard enough that my jaw ached. Part of me wanted to hunt Aurelion down immediately. Part of me wanted to show him exactly what happened when someone hurt my family. But none of that would help Ashlara.

So I did the only thing I could.

I stayed. I held her. I let her rage. I let her cry. I let her grieve. I let her mourn a man who had never truly existed. And, more importantly, I let her know she wasn't alone. That we were still here. That we weren't going anywhere. That she could still trust. Still love. Still belong.

This would leave scars - the kind that never fully vanished. But scars healed. Eventually.

Ashlara was strong. Strong enough to survive this. And this time she wouldn't have to survive it by herself.

* * *

The woman named Annora didn't flee.

She walked away from Seth, certainly, but she didn't run. She didn't look over her shoulder. She didn't suddenly change her plans or disappear into an alley.

She simply continued her day.

She visited two merchants, browsing wares without buying anything. She stopped at a bakery and purchased a loaf of bread and a sweet pastry, eating the latter as she wandered through the city. She spent several minutes speaking with a cloth seller about fabrics and prices.

Normal things. Ordinary things. The sort of things people did when they had nothing to hide.

By late afternoon she arrived at an inn near the city gate - the sort frequented by merchants, caravan guards, teamsters, and travelers who cared more about clean sheets than luxury.

The innkeeper greeted her by name.

She rented a room and disappeared upstairs.

I waited.

She napped. Sorted through her belongings. Did absolutely nothing interesting.

At dusk she changed clothes. The blue dress disappeared. So did the gloves and polished shoes. In their place came comfortable riding breeches, a loose blouse, and muted colors that drew little attention.

After sunset she headed downstairs and slipped out through a side door toward the stables.

A stable hand already had a horse saddled and waiting.

She mounted and rode out of Kingsward.

Following her was easy. Unlike Seth, I didn't need roads. I didn't need a horse. I didn't even need to move. I flowed through the Earthpulse beneath her, gliding through stone and packed dirt like a fish swimming through water.

Three hours later she arrived at a roadside inn.

She tied off her horse, entered, ordered tea from a serving girl, and sat alone near the corner of the common room. Then she waited.

Half an hour later a caravan rolled into the yard.

One of the wagon masters entered. He scanned the room once, spotted Annora, and crossed to her table.

“He asked about secondary placements,” she said without preamble.

“Specific case?” the man asked.

“No.”

“Concerned?”

“Yes.”

“Compromised?”

She took a sip of tea. “Likely.”

“Who?”

“Grimm.”

“Certain?”

She shook her head. “No.”

“Fenwick?”

“Unlikely.”

The wagon master stood and left.

That was it. No papers. No coded phrases. No secret handshakes. No dramatic cloak-and-dagger nonsense. Just six questions and six answers.

I followed him.

The caravan got back on the road and continued through the darkness. Near midnight they reached a broad river, large ferries waited at the crossing. The wagons rolled aboard. People followed. Lanterns swayed in the night.

I stopped.

Sneaking onto the ferry wasn't impossible, but it wasn't easy either. Not with sailors still working the decks. Not with lantern light reflecting off the water. Not with dozens of eyes constantly moving.

I didn't know how deep the river was. I didn't know if I could remain beneath the boat and still hear anything.

And if another exchange happened onboard, crossing ahead of them meant I might miss it entirely. Worse, I might end up waiting on the wrong shore while the information traveled somewhere else entirely.

I watched the ferry pull away. Lantern light dwindled. Voices faded. Eventually there was nothing left but darkness and the slow sound of water. I remained there for several minutes. Thinking. Frustrated.

The Covenant wasn't a secret society meeting in candlelit basements. It wasn't villains exchanging coded messages in dark alleys. It was farmers. Merchants. Teamsters. Clerks.

People moving information from one ordinary person to another until it eventually reached somewhere important.

No single person seemed to know enough to matter. No single conversation revealed anything significant.

And that made them far more difficult to unravel.

Eventually I admitted defeat. For tonight, at least.

I stepped back to the demesne to report my failure.

* * *

Tansy snuck out again.

I followed her.

Vel asked me to, but honestly I probably would've done it anyway. I was curious about this Anura guy.

Tansy really seemed to like him.

And he was a God-King.

We weren't supposed to trust God-Kings. Something about wanting to rule everyone with metal hands.

I wasn't entirely convinced. Metal hands sounded impractical. They'd probably be heavy. And unless you figured out how to make the fingers move, holding things would be difficult.

On the other hand, you could probably punch through a wall. Or block a sword. Which sounded pretty cool.

I was still undecided on the whole metal hand issue. I'd need more data.

Anyway.

I'd followed Tansy for hours. It was incredibly boring.

She stepped to a village and waited. Then she followed a human who talked to another human who talked to another human who eventually led her to an old farmhouse.

Then Tansy killed everyone inside.

That part wasn't boring. She burst through the door with her swords out. Then there was shooting. And screaming. And more shooting. And more screaming. The screaming stopped first.

Tansy seemed disappointed by that.

Afterward she searched the bodies, gathered up papers and guns, and finally started heading back out.

Something moved in the darkness. A god. He'd been suppressing his Faith - the same way I did. Which explained why I hadn't noticed him.

But now that he'd decided to reveal himself, Faith rolled off him in waves.

He stayed just beyond the reach of the lantern hanging outside the farmhouse. Watching. Waiting.

He was big. I mean, not Nim big. Nobody was Nim big. But he was still really big. The kind of big where you start wondering if you should climb a tree before he notices you're there.

Which was stupid because he had wings.

Huge wings. Not fancy angel wings. Not butterfly wings. Not mysterious ‘look at me, I'm mysterious’ wings. Real wings. The kind eagles had. The kind that made climbing a tree seem like a bad idea.

Which felt unfair. If somebody gets to be huge, they shouldn't also get wings. There should be rules about these things.

Anyway.

He looked like he ate wolves. Not because he was mean. Just because if someone told me he'd eaten a wolf once, I'd believe it immediately. Maybe two wolves. At the same time. Without cooking them.

His face was weird. Not ugly. Just… weird. Like somebody made a man and accidentally added too much murder.

His eyes flashed in the lantern light as they moved. They moved constantly. Not his head - just his eyes. He looked at everything. Trees. Tracks. Birds. Tansy. More tracks. The house. The bodies. Probably a squirrel three miles away.

I got the feeling he knew where every rabbit in the forest was at all times.

He needed a haircut. Done by someone who wasn’t him. Because he clearly wasn’t good at doing it himself. That or his barber was blind. Maybe both. I wasn’t sure.

And there were bones in it. Actual bones. Tiny little teeth. Claws. Tiny bits of dead animals. He looked like he’d lost a fight with a taxidermy shop.

His clothes weren't much better. Have you ever met somebody who owns a shirt but doesn’t know how it works? That.

There was leather. Fur. A bunch of knives. Not a normal amount of knives. A collection. So many knives he didn’t have enough pockets for all of them so he started stabbing them directly into his clothes.

Which seemed unsafe. What if he tripped? What if somebody hugged him? What if he sneezed? It felt like a lot of opportunities to get stabbed.

I did that once.

Not the tripping part. The knife part. I stabbed a bunch of stuff through my vest because I didn't feel like carrying it.

Mirri got really mad. She made growly noises and made me new clothes. Looking back, she was probably worried about the hugging. Or the sneezing.

“Back to your favored prey, I see,” he said.

Tansy jumped. Then immediately pretended she hadn't.

His gaze lingered on her for a moment before sweeping across the farmhouse, the blood, the tracks, the bodies. Then back to her. To the blood on her hands. The blood on her clothes.

“You hunted them well.” He sounded pleased. Not because they were dead. Because she'd found them.

Tansy's cheeks turned pink. Which was weird.

Anura circled the farmhouse slowly. “Twelve?”

“Fourteen.”

A smile tugged at the corner of his mouth. “You found the cellar.”

“Yeah.”

“Good.”

Good? Was this a test?

He crouched beside a blood trail. Ran his fingers through it, then tasted it. “One escaped.”

Tansy nodded. “Briefly.”

“You followed.”

“Yeah.”

“He doubled back.”

“Twice.”

His smile widened. “You anticipated it. Interesting.”

Interesting? I thought this was supposed to be flirting. I thought he was all ‘Tansy you're so beautiful.’ ‘Tansy let's kiss.’ ‘Tansy let's mate.’ ‘Tansy smooch, smack, kiss, kiss, barf.’

But it wasn't. Not even a little.

I'd seen Seth flirt. And Mirri flirt back. Ashlara pretended not to flirt while totally flirting. Serah somehow flirted while discussing trade agreements. I'd seen Iolite turn red every time Seth looked in her direction.

This wasn't any of those. This was like watching oatmeal flirt with a finger. The finger turned red when you stuck it in because it got burnt. The oatmeal was just… oatmeal. Not sexy. Not charming. No raisins. No nuts. No chunks of chicken. Just boring old oatmeal.

“Did you come alone?” Anura asked.

Tansy brightened immediately. “Yeah.”

“Unfortunate.”

The brightness vanished, like somebody had informed her there was no more teriyaki chicken. “Oh.”

Anura didn't seem to notice. “I'm curious how the others would've handled it.”

“The others?”

“The rest of your pack.”

Did he want to mate with everyone? Even Nim?

I mean, Seth somehow managed five women, but that felt excessive.

Anura stared at the farmhouse. Thoughtful. “I imagine the tall one would've waited out front.”

Nim.

“The winged one would've found the records before the attack.”

Thae.

“The hungry one would've blocked the rear exit.”

Moss.

“The first one would've caught the runner.”

Vel.

“The obnoxious one would've started a fire.”

Rude. Very rude.

Then he looked back at Tansy. “And you hunted.”

She smiled. A small smile. A shy smile. The kind people got when they liked somebody. “Would you like to hunt together sometime?” She tried to sound casual and failed completely. It sounded rehearsed. Like she'd practiced saying it in front of a mirror.

“Of course.”

Her face lit up.

“I'd love to see your pack in action.”

The smile froze. Just a little. Not enough that he'd notice. But enough that I did.

“Most predators compete,” he continued. “You share territory. Share kills. Work together.”

“We're family.” Her voice sounded smaller than before.

Anura fell silent. Like she'd said something important. Something he was still trying to understand. After several moments he nodded. “I'd like to observe that.”

Observe.

Not join. Not hunt. Observe.

That was when something started bothering me.

He wasn't looking at Tansy the way Seth looked at Mirri. Or the way Mirri looked at Seth. Or the way literally anyone looked at someone they wanted to kiss.

He looked at her the same way Elise looked at a weird magical bug she'd just discovered. Like she was interesting. Like she was useful. Like she was part of something he wanted to understand.

He turned away. “Until next time.” His wings spread and he launched into the night sky.

Tansy watched him disappear. Then stood there smiling like an idiot.

I stared at her. Then stared at the empty sky. Then back at her.