“Stop,” Dourin bit off. “These are southern forests. Have you forgotten what that means?”
Yes, he had forgotten. They’d seen no sign of the southern elves in days, no sign at all since the city. Venick had thought—foolishly,foolishly—that they had escaped. That the elves had given up the hunt.
His worry grew teeth and claws. It howled inside him.
“She is fine,” Dourin insisted, but his tone slipped, let some honesty leak through. “She knows better than to find trouble.” Which was a lie he could not have told in elvish. Dourin knew Ellina as well as Venick did. Better, even. It was all Ellina had done since they’d met: lie and stir up trouble. Venick couldn’t begin to guess where she had gone or what she planned now, but whatever it was, she would get herself killed. The certainty of it bedded down inside him, pushed his heart aside to make room.
“Was she armed when you saw her last?”
“Ellina does not need weapons to fight.” That was stone-Dourin. His lips were tight. His jaw was. His elven features were stark. Beautiful—all elves were—but harsh. He shot Venick a glance. He seemed to consider his next words for a long moment before, finally: “If sheisin trouble, what do you plan?”
“Same as before.” Pray for the best. Pray for luck.
That’s not a plan, Venick.
And what sort of plan was he supposed to have? Distract the southern elves again? Hope Ellina decided to actually use that sword of hers?
“Do you have a problem killing elves?” Venick asked. He got a flat silence in answer, which meant he’d caused offense. “No need for that. It was just a question.”
“It is against our laws.”
“I’ve heard.”
“We are not barbarians.”
“You are atwar.”
“War can be fought without death,” Dourin replied as if that were obvious. “Supply routes can be overtaken, pressure applied to southern territories, leaders captured and held prisoner.”
“And tortured.”
Dourin’s smile was jagged. “Torture can be very persuasive.”
Which might have started an argument between them—You said you weren’t barbarians—had this been another day. Venick swallowed instead and tried a different route. “Tell me about the southerners.”
“I though Ellina already had.”
He ignored that jab. “I want to hear it from you.”
“They are wild. They hold to our laws, but…loosely. Queen Rishiana does not rule the south. No one does. But the queen expects the southerners to obey her. I think they are weary of that. Their disobedience—this refusal to stop forced honor suicides—is an act of rebellion. They want to remind us we do not rule them.”
“And are they succeeding?”
“No.” But his answer came too quickly. “There has always been tension between the north and south, but ever since the death of the queen’s eldest daughter, those tensions have intensified. Some argue that our queenshouldrule the south. If she did, her daughter might still be alive.”
This surprised Venick. “The queen’s daughter died?”
Dourin momentarily disappeared behind a wide tree. He came out again on the other side, his white hair a beacon in the dark. “We do not know for certain. No one knows. She was traveling south on diplomatic business and the southerners were supposed to grant her safe passage, but she never returned. There has been no trace of her since, and that was eight years ago.” Dourin seemed to hesitate. “Her name was Miria. She was Ellina’s oldest sister.”
Venick did not immediately catch the meaning of Dourin’s words. They slid over him, slipped and slithered away. But Dourin’s gaze became hooded, lingering a moment too long, and Venick paused. Blinked. Heard the words and their meaning all at once. The world tilted, everything shifting as he was flooded with disbelief, and then—
Reeking gods.
“Ellina’s mother is thequeen?”
“She did not tell you?” Dourin flipped a hand. “Shame.”
But that made no sense. Ellina was a soldier. She could not be royalty and also be legion. Could she?
