The pair of guards at the manor doors were young—just old enough to enlist, to Amris’s practiced vision. They gawked at the horses and Amris even more obviously, and for longer than those at the village gates had done.
“Tell Hallis we’ll meet him in his office in a quarter hour,” Darya said to them. “Literally life or death, sad to say.”
The guards went pale—paler, in the case of the towheaded lad on the left. He swallowed and stepped forward, extending a hand. “And the…horses, ma’am?”
Darya shook her head. “That’s why the delay. We’ll take them ’round to the stables. Best nobody else try and touch them without armor.”
The boy retreated, trying and failing to conceal an expression of profound relief. He and his fellow didn’t give Amris much scrutiny after that. Compared to odd beasts and unexplained news, one stranger in armor wasn’t much excitement.
A small flagstone path took them around the side of the house. In the back, the stables stretched out in a long, low row of solidly constructed wood, with several paddocks occupying the space between the building and the dark line of trees where the forest resumed. A few horses sported in the larger one; the others were empty.
As Amris and Darya rounded the corner, a girl in rough clothing paused in the act of forking manure from a stall, goggled, then popped her head back into the building. No more than a minute later, a man stepped out of the door nearest to the main house and strode toward them. “Those arenotreplacements,” was the first thing he said, “whatever else they may be. Ironhide was a damned good horse.”
“I know,” Darya said, and ducked her head apologetically.
This, then, must be Isen, of whom Darya had spoken earlier. He was a tall, thin man in the same rough clothing as the stable hands, with close-cropped brown hair and apparently more than his fair share of problems, of which Sentinels and their unexpected finds were currently the largest. “What happened?”
“Tracked the cockatrice to ruins—no place for a horse.” As she spoke, Darya dismounted, and Amris followed her lead. “I left him on a loose tie outside, with water and plenty of grass nearby. While I was in the city, he got stolen.”
“By what?”
“I can’t tell you until I tell Hallis. I’m sorry.”
Isen blinked rapidly. “That bad?”
“Probably worse.”
The yard was silent save for the horses, who didn’t know enough to speculate or eavesdrop. Isen sucked in a breath, puffing out his cheeks, and then blew it out in a sigh. “I should have expected it. I’d just gotten a foal from Seafoam. What are these things?”
“Amris,” said Darya, with a slight smile and a gesture toward him, “and…twistedmounts, I guess is the best name for them at present. I wanted to get their gear off and give them water, whatever they are.”
“Good plan. I’ll do it.” Isen raised a hand before either Darya or Amris could object. “You don’t have to tell me they’re vicious. And I know a damn sight better than you do how to handle temperamental beasts. Give.”
He held out a hand imperiously. Almost by instinct, Amris put his reins into it. He fought the urge to salute.
Tired from the journey, the horse did no more than take a half-hearted bite at Isen’s hand, one which the stable master—Amris assumed—dodged easily, and countered with a light smack on the neck and the first of a sharp series of whistles.
“Come on,” said Darya. “He won’t know we’re alive until they’re dealt with, and we need to be in Hallis’s office by then.”
“I heard that,” said Isen, but he didn’t look away from the horses.
Amris started toward the path, but Darya caught him by the arm, then dropped her hand quickly. “Short cut,” she said, and gestured toward a door by the stables that Amris had overlooked—and no wonder, since it was far smaller and plainer than the double doors at the main entrance.
It also wasn’t guarded or, as Amris shortly discovered, even locked. Darya simply opened it and led him into a low hallway made of rough stone. Torches on the walls gave off dim light and much smoke, more akin to the bonfires of wartime than even the farm of his youth, where tallow candles and oil lamps had been fit for peasants.
Evenlightwas different.
Amris’s armor was heavy on his shoulders, and the hallway endless and featureless. Strictly speaking, there were doors, and smells and noise beyond them, but they were far away, perhaps not even real.
“All seems worse the closer it is to being over, doesn’t it?” Darya asked. “Don’t worry. We’ll get cleaned and fed before the world ends.”
* * *
The problem with Hallis’s office was that it was up two flights of stairs.
True, Darya had never complained about that, or even noticed it, on her previous visits to Oakford. True, she’d climbed higher in the ruins of Klaishil without minding the ache in her feet and the strain in her thighs. But when she’d been climbing around in the ruins, she hadn’t already been climbing around in the ruins—a concept that made sense to her weary mind—much less running, fighting, sleeping rough, and riding an oddly shaped horse-thing for three days.
Now that she was out of immediate physical danger, the supports were falling out from under her body. Danger was still out there, and she still had things to do, urgent things, but that didn’t matter. Bodies were stupid. Even willpower could only do so much with them.
