Oliver didn’t glance toward him; kept walking, until he stepped over a picket, and paused to peer into the folded-back flaps of a tent. It was empty.
“Like I said: nothing. If this is a trap”—he did turn to Erik, then, though his neck felt heavy and creaky, and found that his concerned expression was verging toward a glare—“then it isn’t a magical one.”
Erik’s expression smoothed, his brows lifted, and then he nodded, turned away, and drew his sword. “Be watchful, men!” he called, voice echoing through the campsite. “Touch nothing suspicious! There might be traps!”
Ill-equipped to handle those, Oliver forged ahead, sword still sheathed, and made his way toward the center of camp, where Percy had been joined by his mate and son.
Tessa slid down from Alfie’s back and stood with a gloved hand resting on the female’s shoulder. With her other hand, she doffed her helmet, red hair sweat-plastered to her temples and neck, and surveyed their surroundings with a frown. “If they left, why didn’t they take their tents?”
Valgrind had his whole head, neck, and forequarters inside a tent, horns moving in sharp points beneath the canvas as he investigated, tail lashing back and forth like a curious cat’s.Náli stood at his flank, arms crossed, expression one of fond exasperation.
“They wanted to frighten us,” the Corpse Lord said, and when he turned his head toward them, he wiped his expression clean of everything save cold indifference. He caught and held Oliver’s gaze for a pointed second, and then his gaze wandered across the rest of the site. “Or at least confuse us. The more time we spend wondering what they’re doing, the more time they’re actually doing it.”
“Or,” Rune said, joining them, sword a naked, gleaming white bar that threatened to blind them all in the sunlight, “they caught wind of our approach and fled.” He propped his free hand on his hip and looked around with an air of satisfaction. The heat had sheened his face with sweat, but he was glowing, rather than melting. As a Northerner, he should have been puddling like candle wax, which was how Oliver felt.
There was much to be said of youth. Optimism case in point.
“Or they’re the ones who sent the drakes through the portal,” Náli countered, “and they’ve executed a tactical retreat.”
“Well, they’re gone, aren’t they? They didn’t want to face us.” Rune grinned and brandished his sword at an imaginary enemy.
Náli scoffed, and swatted at Valgrind’s flank. “Come out of there, you stupid beast.”
Valgrind backed clumsily out of the tent, kicking up a thick cloud of dust, and when his head was free, whirled, and licked a stripe up Náli’s neck and cheek. “Oh—gods, no,disgusting.”
Valgrind chirped happily.
Oliver turned slowly in place. He saw the felled tents, crumpled heaps of dirty canvas; saw Erik directing Magnus and Lars and the men who’d gathered to conduct a search, the sunlight painting the gray at Erik’s temples in unforgiving whiterivers; saw the rest of the Phalanx coming to an uncertain halt, half the men still mounted, wondering if this was to be a proper, feed bag and horse-watering stop, or only a brief pause.
When he next blinked, he failed to open his eyes, and felt a now-familiar urge to go toppling backward into the hallways of his mind—not merely hallways, he’d learned, but palaces; vistas; places whose farthest reaches he’d not begun to probe—and seek out answers at the source. He thought of the solarium. Thought of approaching Romanus and demanding an answer.Why is this camp abandoned? Why leave the tents? Are there traps ready to spring?
But what he longed most to ask wasWhat is this?He wanted to fish the necklace from his pocket and wave it in the emperor’s too-pale face and demand an answer.Why me? What do youwant?
He wouldn’t do that. Not here, not now…
Or so he told himself. But he was halfway to gone, the gray fog of the Between rising up behind his closed eyelids, when a soft touch landed on his elbow, and Tessa said, “Ollie?”
He started as though burned, and Tessa withdrew with a small, surprised gasp. She recovered quickly, though, fluttering hands reaching to smooth her hair, brows lowering and lips pressing together in a frown.
“Sorry,” he said. His heart was racing. “What did you say?”
Her frown deepened. “Ollie, are you well? You look–”
“You should scout ahead.”
By some miracle, Oliver refrained from leaping out of his skin a second time, but he thought that was only because he was already in a rabbit-pulsed lather. He affected nonchalance as he turned to Erik and said, “Hm?”
Sword held low along his thigh, Erik’s gaze tracked back and forth across the camp, taut now with kingly concern, ratherthan loverly worry. He spoke to Oliver without making eye contact. “The three of you should fly ahead and scout for enemy movement. This”—he gestured to the abandoned tents around them—“could be meant to lull us into a false sense of confidence. There’s hours of daylight left in which to make progress, but I don’t want us to ride into an ambush.”
“Agreed,” Oliver said, forcing a note of brightness into his voice. “We’ll lead the way. You’ll mind my horse?”
“Yes, of course. Be safe.” Erik spared him the briefest glance, and a nod, as though Oliver was no more than one of his soldiers, before he turned and strode back to the knot of men awaiting him.
~*~
By Oliver’s estimation, they flew some fifteen miles ahead of the Phalanx, and saw nothing save fields, fields, and more fields, quartered by low stone walls and narrow thickets of forest. Rather than the impenetrable canopy of the Inglewood, this forest was mostly comprised of low-growing hardwoods, the newly-budded branches offering glimpses of creeks, and hollows, and dreamy little glens, perfect for napping shepherds, playing children, or frolicking, lovestruck young people, but not dense enough to disguise a Selesee regimen.
Flying itself held none of its usual charm. The cold air was biting instead of bracing; the wind left his eyes streaming and sore; already tired from riding a horse, tense with a mounting anxiety he could neither will away nor justify to anyone else, and which only Náli, with his petulant, scornful side-eye glances knew about, Oliver found that he was aching all over by the time the light dimmed to pink-and-peach striations.
