Page 13 of The Summer Pass

Vanu beckoned him in, and Barda stood at attention, looking at his mother as though he expected her to leave.

“Ma, this is scout business,” he hissed finally.

“Oh, I see.” She suppressed a smile. “I am on my way out. Tell me what you decide, my lord.”

Vanu nodded. “What did you find out?” he asked Barda, not waiting until Gurti was gone. Indeed, she lingered by the tent opening.

“It’s two women and a man—a mother and daughter and a servant of theirs or a hired guard, I think. Even the guard looks pretty harmless. They’re following us because they think we’re holding the girl’s betrothed hostage.”

“Good information. How’d you get it?”

“I, uh, I asked them,” Barda admitted uncomfortably. “There wasn’t much of anywhere to hide to spy on them, so I had to just … sort of ride up to them.”

Vanu’s mind flitted wistfully for a moment to imagining how Lill would have gone about it. Crawling through the tall grass probably, creeping up under cover of darkness and lying in wait until morning to overhear their conversation.

“I don’t suppose they’re looking for Halza,” said Gurti from the doorway.

Barda glared at her. “Ma—what?”

“The girl’s betrothed. Might it not be Halza?”

“Heart of the Blue Heaven,” Vanu muttered. And Barda had probably chased them away. “Have they gone?”

“Uh, no. I told them that they should, because we don’t have any prisoners, and I said we’re riding under the banner of the Lion of the Summer Pass—they said they knew that … I mean, I tried to get them to leave.” Barda shrugged. “They seem really determined.”

The morning after he left Umtúshta, Lill was up before dawn, moving quietly through the woods outside the village of Radush. He found the spot he was looking for easily enough. He’d wondered, the last time he was here, whether he should mark it in some way. But it wasn’t as if he would be gone long, he’d thought. Either he was never coming back, or he’d return in a few weeks. And he had been right. He had been in Umtúshta less than a month.

He knelt and used one of his knives to dig into the dirt, as he’d done before. In a few moments he uncovered the bundle he had buried and unwrapped it to reveal coiled ropes of pearls and agate beads, gold bracelets, rings with delicately incised stones, and a gold and enamel medallion on a long chain.

It was the wedding jewellery that Davanu Shawa had provided for Lill when he sent him to marry Vanu. At the time, Lill had thought the man was a fool to trust him with all this. Of course he was going to steal it; it would be imprudent not to. Now, looking down at this tangle of valuables in the thin predawn light of the forest, Lill thought about Lord Davanu picking out jewels for his dear friend’s bride, and the idea of converting them to coins he could trade for food and lodging appealed less than it had three weeks ago. Vanu had never even seen these, but maybe if he had, one of them would have some meaning for him, something that would have reminded him of Davanu. To sell them would feel like giving up another little piece of Lill’s tenuous connection to Vanu.

Lill sighed. He was going to have to get used to this feeling; it would be the baseline of his life from now on. He picked out the string of agate beads and looped it around his neck.

Chapter 5

The Tawa Valley

In the end, Lill unstrung the pearls, traded four of them for a horse and converted two more into a bag of copper and silver coins to pay for food and lodging. He thought it best to stay in hostels where he could, though he would have preferred to sleep outside. He found he didn’t like talking to people, couldn’t make the right responses or marshal his face into the appropriate expressions. He felt like an animal pretending to be human and not doing a very good job.

But he had a project—a mission of sorts, even if it was one he had given himself. And it involved talking to people, so he could not afford to avoid them altogether.

He set off down the Torakand road, stopping at likely habitations and hostels to ask if anyone had seen a young man ride by who looked like him. For the first day, riding from Radush to the first of the official way-stations on the Torakand road, he thought he was on the right track. People remembered a well-dressed young man of Lill’s age and general appearance. Some even remarked that they could have mistaken Lill for the other traveller, and one asked Lill why he’d shaved off his moustache. “You look like a girl without it,” he added.

Had the other young man—yes, he was a different person—been travelling away from Radush or towards it when they saw him? Most either couldn’t recall or thought he’d been heading to Radush, but they couldn’t swear he hadn’t come past this way again afterward, going the other direction. Some thought he had. Then Lill arrived at the way-station and found the hostel where Arsha had stayed on his way to the Spring Pass. Here at last someone had detailed information: the young man matching Lill’s description had come here two days ago, travelling north from Torakand, and he had not been back since. The landlord was sure of this; Arsha had borrowed some horse tack and had not come back to return it. The landlord had already made inquiries. Lill digested that information as he ate in the hostel dining room. He would have to turn back in the morning.

Vanu agreed to let the girls go with Gurti. Susami was in favour of it, and though Atari didn’t really want to leave her father, she wanted to be separated from Susami even less. Mikhi was firm in her refusal when Susami suggested she come too, and Vanu agreed with her that she was needed here as his interpreter. Susami didn’t press the point. He knew she wasn’t really afraid for their safety. She just didn’t want them to get in the way. That had been her reason for wanting to marry Halza.

Halza had to be dealt with. Vanu sent for him, and the lowlander presented himself, looking both nervous and hopeful. The hopefulness irritated Vanu extremely. He told Mikhi to stay and interpret, though he would have sent her out and done Halza the favour of having this conversation aloud in privacy, if he hadn’t been annoyed.

“Do you know a young woman from Radush named Auxshna?” He spelled out the name for Mikhi, and she made a meal of pronouncing it, so it was several seconds before Halza understood.

“Auxshna,” he repeated, the colour draining from his cheeks. “I—I know her.”

“You’re betrothed to her,” Vanu signed.

Mikhi gaped at him, then swung an accusing glare at Halza.

“You’re betrothed to her?”