“I won’t run away!”
“You’ll just go back and get yourself killed,” Leah muttered. “I should have known. Stupid men, why couldn’t we have kidnapped one of his sisters?”
“You wouldn’t want to meet my sisters,” the Prince said, shaking his head ruefully at the thought of Leah and Symanta in the same room.
“They can’t be worse than you!”
“Enough, both of you,” Tomaz said. A silence fell, as both Leah and the Prince turned away and pretended to be very interested in examining the trees surrounding the clearing.
“If you wish to go, then we cannot stop you.”
The Prince looked quickly at the big man. Tomaz was quite clearly disappointed by this turn of events, but just as clearly resigned to it. There was a deep sadness in his eyes, and the Prince looked away again, feeling as though he were betraying the man in some way.
“Yes, we can keep him! We did it once, we can do it again!” Leah cried.
“No, we cannot,eshendai,” Tomaz said. “We are being pursued by the Empire in force now. Things were different when we had a reasonable chance of passing through the Empire by stealth, but how can we tie up the Prince of Ravens and take him not only through the Pass of Roarke, but past the personal seat of the Prince of Oxen, who will have gotten the message days if not weeks ago that his brother is heading straight toward him? It’s common sense, and if you used your head, you’d know it better than I do. Calm yourself and consider the situation.”
For a long moment it looked as though Leah would just ignore Tomaz. But as the Prince watched, the anger seemed to drain out of her, and her face grew calm and still. Her hands continued to clench and unclench by her sides, but eventually those too relaxed, and the Prince breathed more easily.
“You’re right,” she said finally. “The benefits we could receive from his information do not outweigh the danger of not returning. The Elders need our report. We can’t take the risk of being caught by a border patrol.”
She turned to the Prince.
“We can’t let you go now,” she said, and he tensed, “but once we reach the road again near Roarke, we can part there.”
“How long?” the Prince asked.
“A few days at most,” she responded, her eyes now focused past him as if seeing something in her memory. “It’s far enough from Roarke that you won’t be detected by the Prince of Oxen’s forces, and it is close enough to the Pass that we can continue on without any added inconvenience.”
She caught his gaze.
“And then you can go get yourself killed in whatever way you want,” she said, the anger coming back to the surface. She turned away and began to pack her bedroll. The Prince looked over at Tomaz, but the big man had begun making his way to the river to fill the waterskins one last time before they left.
The three of them climbed onto their horses in silence soon after, the sun rising quickly in the sky, and set off toward Roarke.
The next few days passed in almost total silence. The Prince did not feel much like talking, so he kept silent unless a question was asked of him, and that was seldom enough as it appeared Leah and Tomaz were just as reluctant to speak. The Prince made a habit of reaching through the Talisman every night and every morning, searching for any sign of people following them, but time and again he found only the three of them in the middle of the giant forested mountain range.
The mountains began to become more noticeable as well, the ground dipping less and less often back toward sea level and instead continuing to climb. The Prince knew from lessons in geography that the Roarke mountain range was easily twice the size of the Elmists, and that passage straight over the top of them was next to impossible. He wondered how the Exiles were going to get around the Pass of Roarke.
None of my business now, he reminded himself firmly.
One night as they began to make camp while the sun was still in the sky, the Prince broached a subject that had been on his mind. Leah had disappeared into the trees, muttering something to Tomaz but not even acknowledging the Prince’s presence.
“Do you think we’re being followed?” the Prince asked Tomaz.
The big man looked up from starting a fire and raised an eyebrow at him. The Prince quickly continued.
“It’s not that I doubt your word,” the Prince said, “it’s just that it seems like we’re the only ones for miles. As a matter of fact, we are, I can tell you thatmuch for certain. I haven’t caught the slightest hint of the odd hunter or shepherd for days now.”
Tomaz looked at him thoughtfully for a moment, before letting out a long sigh. “I’ve been wondering that as well, truth be told. It’s something of a curiosity that we haven’t caught a hint of trouble sooner. I can only assume that they’re unsure exactly where we are.”
“We’re almost a week past Lake Chartain,” the Prince insisted, “and we haven’t caught any sign of anyone. Maybe we got away clean this time. It’s possible, don’t you—?”
The Prince cut off mid-sentence. Something, as if summoned by their conversation, was coming. He turned quickly, looking through the trees out over the side of the mountain. There appeared to be nothing there, only landscape folding out from beneath them and out toward the horizon. But the Prince was certain there was something. Why was he so sure there was something? It wasn’t a life. It was… what was it?
“Don’t I—?”
“Quiet,” the Prince said. He squinted as the wind picked up, blowing in his face. He reached out with his senses, using the Raven Talisman. He became more aware of the abundance of life around him, the mountain forest full of bright points of light—but they all bore the same hazy, undefined quality. No people, nothing nearby but animals. Farther away perhaps?
