Idriel’s voice was quiet but insistent, reaching through exhaustion and satiation both. Zelen’s instinct was still to ignore it. The bed was soft. He felt less dead than he had on his return to the city, but he wasn’t ready to bound out and greet the day yet. Moreover, Branwyn was tucked neatly against his side, her breath light on his neck. If he was going to rise for any reason, it would be because of her, and in the more anatomical sense.
But a matter that sent Idriel in to wake him, especially when Zelen had company, was not trivial. Events of the last few days made it even more likely to be urgent. Zelen opened his eyes and grunted.
It wasn’t dawn yet. Idriel carried a candle rather than activating the magical lights, and the flame picked out shadows in his craggy, lined face. “Sir,” he said, seeing Zelen awake, “we’ve caught a boy breaking into the house.”
“Lgh.”
“He was armed, sir, if you can call it that, and seems to be seeking other children. I wondered if you wanted to speak with him before I summon the guards.”
“Oh gods,” said Zelen, managing actual words with considerable effort, “what’s happenednow? Yes, put him in the study and give him a hot drink and a tea cake. I’ll be in directly.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Why in the world,” Branwyn muttered as Idriel closed the door, “would you have one child here, much less a number?” She slid away to let Zelen get up.
“I’ve no idea. I helped look for that one earlier. Maybe the boy came to ask for my aid again? Or demand it, given how he arrived.”
“Or he suspects you, though I don’t know why he would.” Branwyn sat up, lithe in the moonlight, and swung her long legs over the side of the bed.
“You should stay here,” said Zelen, wrapping his robe around him. “Not that I wouldn’t be glad of your company, but it’d likely make the conversation more tricky, so there’s no reason you have to get up.”
“You never know,” she said. “Two sets of ears—three in this case—can pick up on details that one might miss. I won’t come in, but I’ll lurk outside and listen, unless you object.”
“Not at all.”
Only two of the servants were awake at that hour, which proved to be four after midnight: Idriel and the maid who’d collared the boy as he’d broken in through the kitchen. She clearly noticed Branwyn’s presence, and the fact that she was wearing Zelen’s robe, but showed neither surprise nor any other emotion. Their sleeping arrangements, Zelen reflected, were probably no secret, and other events had taken their place as the latest excitement.
He left both of them and Branwyn behind at the study door and slipped past it without letting the boy who sat on the couch see who was in the hall.
The boy was rigid, the tea and cake untouched before him. Zelen thought he was between eight and twelve, but poverty made that hard to tell, as did the boy’s too-large black clothing and the soot he’d smeared liberally on his face and neck. Either Idriel or the maid had scrubbed him as best they could before sending him into the study, but mortal power only went so far.
“You bastard!” He was on his feet as soon as he recognized Zelen, then running forward headfirst with tiny fists upraised. “You lying son of a whore, you—”
Zelen caught him by the shoulders, breaking the charge. The force as the boy struggled spoke of his desperation, but even his flailing arms couldn’t do much damage. “Easy now. I don’t doubt you’ve got a good reason for thinking I’m everything you claim, but I swear I haven’t knowingly hurt anybody. Tell me what’s wrong, and let’s see if we can’t sort it out.”
The flood of expletives cut off. The boy froze, staring at Zelen as tears of rage made cleaner lines down his cheeks. “Sort it out? Like you did before? With my brother, Jaron, and Cynric, and pretending to help us? Acting like you were a friend to our sort, like—” He choked off whatever he was going to say next and lunged for Zelen again. “Where’sTanya, you godsdamn liar?”
* * *
Branwyn didn’t know who the boy was talking about. Her mind immediately leapt to the child who’d found her in the alley, but she couldn’t trust her judgment on that. There were more than a few street urchins in the city. The disappearance of one might have nothing to do with another’s inclination to help strange wounded women.
She kept listening, not bothering to hide that fact. The valet had waved the maid back to her bed and was standing a discreet, or plausibly deniable, distance from the door. Branwyn had tried to wave him back in turn, but he’d simply shaken his head. Branwyn couldn’t blame him. Oath or not, she was an unknown quantity with a sword.
There was silence for a while, and Branwyn’s lesser gift enabled her to truly know that it was silence, not whispering.
Likely Tanya’s name took your boy by shock, said Yathana,and likely the child observed as much. Wasn’t what he was expecting. Children like that get good at reading people.
“I don’t know,” Zelen eventually said. “I had no idea she was gone until you spoke. I’ll take any oath you want on that, in front of any priest you want.”
“You… But…she…” The torrent of rage had turned into confusion and despair.
“Sit down, won’t you? Have a sip of that tea and a bite to eat.” Branwyn heard footsteps, then Zelen opened the door a crack. “Bran—Oh, Idriel, good. Get me clothes and a sword, would you? And rouse Jander and Lena. This might take a bit of force.”
“Right away, sir,” said the valet, glancing past him toward the boy, who was holding his mug like he wasn’t sure what to do with it. “Are you sure?”
“He wouldn’t do this on a prank,” Zelen said, “and if it turns out to be all a misunderstanding, I’d rather look foolish than otherwise. Thank you.”
He returned to the room.
