“I can tell from the impassioned defense.” There wasn’t a hint of mockery in the elf’s reply, though it was clear she hadn’t missed Fern’s use of past tense.
The rattkin sighed and stared bleakly ahead at Bucket’s patient progress. In the wake of her outburst, the emptiness that had gotten her into this fix returned, like cold, black water refilling a pool from an underground stream. “You know, I already bared my soul a few days ago, and that’s how I ended up in this mess. You’ve been doing the same job for nearly a thousand years. Didyoualways feel good about it?”
“Nothing feels good all the time,” replied Astryx.
Which wasn’t exactly an answer.
“Only a day stands between us and Bycross, and then you can head back to where you belong,” continued the elf. “To what’s important.”
And that was definitely the end of the conversation.
8
With Bycross less than a day away, Fern abandoned revising her letters to Viv in favor of working them out aloud. She was nearly out of parchment anyway. Zyll was a willing—or at least captive—audience. Whether she was fascinated or confused by the whole affair was beyond Fern’s ability to determine.
The hazferou sat between them, clucking and cocking its head in every direction. It had reclaimed its space on the buckboard, but no blood had as yet been shed, and she decided not to tempt fate by trying to alter this state of affairs.
Astryx didn’t comment on the one-sided conversation between goblin and rattkin, no matter how much the bookseller swore during the recitation. Still, Fern got the impression she was listening with half an ear.
Ha,she thought, with grim amusement.
“Maybe I should spend more time thinking about how to make it up to her?” said Fern, chin in paw. She arched a brow at Zyll. “Who wants to listen to somebody flog themselves, right? I’m here because I made a mistake.Everybodymakes mistakes. So, focusing on minimizing the damage is what a responsible adult would do, yeah?”
Zyll stared back, neither nodding nor shaking her head. Or blinking.
The goblin slid her bound hands into a maroon pocket, withdrawing a spoon. It didn’t look particularly clean. She slowly licked it, and then inserted the end into her mouth and closed her lips over it, sucking deliberately and never breaking eye contact.
“Um. Anyway.” Fern cleared her throat, looking upward and appealing to an invisible Viv. “Look, I panicked. Everything was just too much, and I got maudlin and tipsy, then fell asleep in a wagon and woke up a day outside of town. Pretty fucking—I mean, pretty ridiculous, right? I’m sorry it took me so long to make my way back, but you wouldn’tbelievewho I . . . okay, no, that’s too much to start with.”
Zyll hiked both brows up, still sucking on the spoon.
The cart jostled its way through an arcing turn, and Fern grabbed the edge of the buckboard with both paws while the hazferou fluffed and squawked in annoyance. They’d begun a slow descent toward Bycross, and the cart track noodled its way between humps of green hillside. Somewhere a brook gurgled, and three or four tendrils of smoke spiraled skyward in the distance.
Fern tried again, gesturing beseechingly. “I just want to fix this. So. Howarethings? Er. Whatever happened, whatever fell apart or cost you or made your life hells, I want to do something about it. I know I probably don’t feel trustworthy to you right now, but I swear, it’llneverhappen again.”
She stared down from Viv’s lofty perspective at the humble rattkin before her. Coincidentally, this view coincided with one of Bucket’s hindquarters. Deepening her voice, and already shaking her head, she replied, “‘Fern, do you think I’m an idiot? You knew whose wagon that was. You knew what you were doing. You left everyone here to clean up your mess, and take care of your pet, and you know what? Wedidall that, and it turns out we don’t need you for this, and apparently, you didn’t need us, either, so—’ Oh, gods, this is fucking ridiculous.” She sagged and put her face in her paws.
Astryx’s voice distracted her from her pity soliloquy. “If you want my advice, you’re making this very complicated,” she called, turning around to jog backward, which was honestly pretty impressive. “Simple is better. The guilty dog barks loudest.”
“The what?”
“The quick cut is best. In and out before anyone can feel it.”
“I want to apologize, not stab her. Have you spent a thousand years collecting these weird sayings?”
Astryx shrugged. “It seems a waste to agonize over something you’ve already run away from.”
“I’m notagonizing,I’mplanning. Those are two different things, I . . . Hang on a minute.”
The elf must have seen something in Fern’s expression that troubled her. “What?”
Fern raised a claw and pointed down the road. “I think somebody is waiting for us.”
“Why would you think that?” Astryx replied suspiciously, already turning to face forward again.
Then her hand was at the pommel of her sword before Fern could even blink.
He stood before a wooden footbridge that crossed the slow-moving stream Fern had heard in the distance. The hills heaped up sharply on either side, casting shadows nearly to the bridge. The cool breath of the brook carried the smell of grass and dew to Fern’s nose.
