“Pardon me, Lady Huntress, do you want to wipethatfirst?” He motions to my face.
“Fine.” I drag the cloth over my face. It is, admittedly, a relief to not have the strange greenish goop on my skin. It itches, rather than burning me as it does most people; perhaps I’ve grown mostly immune to it over the years. Burn or not, it’s gross.
“There’s a smear of—”
“I know.” I pivot and march toward the general direction of the house. “Buffoons. How did a creature get into this part of the city?” Louder, I call, “I will be reporting this oversight to Her Majesty.”
“Fleuriste.” The sergeant catches up and steps in my path. “There are more of them lately. We’ve lost four children to them, found their changelings in the street outside the houses. The past few weeks have been troubling. The queen already knows.”
“Then add more patrols, Nolan.”
“Done. We are stretched to our limit,” he says in a low voice. “Bind your side, Fleuriste. You’re bleeding.”
“It’ll heal.”
“If this keeps up ...” The sergeant lowers his voice to barely a whisper. “It might be good to have you in the city longer. Somethingis unsettling the faery creatures. There are more of them, and they’ve been of a bolder sort.”
I soften, maybe from hearing the worry in his voice, or maybe the battle energy is fading. “I will be here when I can, but the nexus of their entry into our world is Brimmond Wood. And we have what seems to be a monster unlike any other before. That’s my priority.”
“Ihaveasked for the Hunter,” Sergeant Nolan said. “No deaths that I can prove, so ... I cannot requisition your aid.”
I cannot handle two problems, but I have faith that my father will have the monster at home identified and managed soon, so I suggest to Nolan, “If there is a ball I cannot refuse—perhaps a celebration of the child’s safety—I can return to Regina Centrum for a while. I can speak to the Hunter, too. If there’s a rise and the creature at home ...”
“I will speak to the Chathams,” Nolan says quickly. “That’s their youngest one. They’ll be grateful to celebrate the Hunter.”
“Iam not the Hunter, Sergeant, but if necessary, they can know that an attending person is an emissary of the Hunter—simply notwhichnoble or officer or merchant. Or imply he may be there.”
He wasn’t going to be, though. Father would stay in Brimmond Wood, tracking this latest beast until he stopped it. Even a summons from the queen could not sway a Hunter on a trail, however thin.
Nolan nods. “Of course. I know not to reveal your identity to anyone. I will tell them the Hunter saved the child, but no names or saying that you are thenextHunter. I will suggest that they plan a celebration ball and invite all the nobles and merchants who were in the city to make vows.”
“Very good. And now, I must go do just that. Good morrow.”
“Good morrow, Fleuriste.” He bows and turns his back, allowing me the privacy to limp home.
I force myself to hide the limp as best I can. I’m barely healed from the blow to the head and the cut in my arm, but this cut is just another in a lifetime. Showing weakness is rarely an option. The green blood is not as bad as the red seeping through my dress, but I hope to hideboth. If the countess sees the state I’m in, the lecturing will be loud and sustained.
I could tell her I saved a child. That will help calm her upset if she catches me. As I walk home, I admit to myself that saving that one soul does little for my overwhelming sense of futility.Onechild. I saved one singular child. If I request it, the queen will send someone to chastise the faery court. The faeries will twist words to say it was another misunderstanding. By then, I’ll be in the country again, and they’ll likely have taken two more.
I sometimes feel as if I am being asked to stop the tides with my hand. I cannot solve every issue, rescue every stolen child, stop every monster. Myactualduty is hunting—with the intent ofkilling—the beasts. I am destined to be no more than a weapon the queen can wave around like a threat.
This afternoon, I will bow before my queen. I’ll wear a lovely gown and dance, and then I’ll offer a vow of loyalty to Queen Morag alongside other nobles and merchants. They all know that one of their number is the Hunter.
No one suspects a lady, though.
A lady ought to be looking for a spouse, making a home.
I am to be a weapon in a fine gown.
That is my fate. Even if I could be both, what sort of person would want a woman who is more at ease with violence than affection? What person would not mind my fate—or the likelihood of my death?
Not Isabeau with her protective mien.
Chapter 8
“Ankou [travels] the duchy in a cart, picking up souls. In the dead of night a creaking axle-tree can be heard passing down the silent lanes. It halts at a door; the summons has been given, a soul quits the doomed house, and the wagon of the Ankou passes on. The Ankou herself—for the dread death-spirit of Brittany is probably female—is usually represented as a skeleton.”
—Legends and Romances of Brittanyby Lewis Spence [1917]
