Palimpsest

They are drawn from the provinces young, before names settle, and trained in houses that keep no register. They are not soldiers, and they are not assassins, though the work has the shape of both. They are sent where the Ledger cannot be seen to act, and they walk in the world as merchants, travelers, and damsels in distress who met by chance on a difficult road.

They are recalled only when the work is done, or the agent is. To know one before the work is finished is, in nearly every case, the last knowing of one's life.

— Ledger field instruction, unsigned, recovered from the rooms of an officer after his death

Chapter 29 Invisible Pain

When she opened her eyes the last two heavy logs were smoldering low. The last thing she remembered was the sky between the trees turning slowly orange, then deep crimson, before the dark began to swallow everything. Now, when she lifted her head, the dark was being pierced by shafts of pale light — though not yet enough to warm the air. Holding the old, bloodstained clothes she had thrown over herself as a blanket, she pushed herself upright where she lay, trying to get closer to the fire. The pain in her ribs would not let her move far.

Sleeping the whole night against a tree on hard ground would account for some of the discomfort, but the ache had begun before that. Kaelin had begun to feel it in her body even as they were still setting up camp and lighting the fire. She had thought it would pass once she rested, but now there was a new ache in her left arm as well. She had been on the move without rest for the past few days; perhaps she had hurt herself somewhere along the way without noticing. Still, the pains kept rising, one after another, and showed no sign of easing. And yet her mind had not been this quiet in a long time. Most mornings she fought sleep, wrestling with bad dreams and the kind of thoughts that wore her down before she could close her eyes. To get to sleep at all, she would need at least half a bottle of wine and two or three twists of tobacco. But last night, beyond the walls of her own home and the cushions of her own couch, here in this hollow of the forest, she had slept so well. She could not remember the last time her sleep had been this deep, this unbroken.

When she finally pushed herself up enough to sit closer to the fire, she saw Darian and Vaelra across from her, sleeping back-to-back. Both of them were curled in against the cold, drawn closer to one another in their sleep. Vaelra had been ready to drop the moment they made camp. She had neither rested nor eaten since they had taken her out of that dark cell. Once the fire was lit they had divided the food from the Mistress's bundle into two days' rations, and each of them had quietly cut a piece from their own portion and added it to Vaelra's. Tivver had given her the rum at the bottom of his flask without touching a drop. It hadn't taken long after that for her to fall asleep where she sat. While she slept, Darian had spent what little energy he had left trying to heal her. The rest, Kaelin couldn't quite remember.

Just beside them, Tivver was sleeping in the most absurd position imaginable, almost upside-down against a tree. That he could still manage to snore in such a posture was less strange than it was admirable, and Kaelin smiled faintly to herself. On her other side Ravah was leaning against a tree of her own, sleeping with one of her batons clutched tight against her chest. So this is what it looks like to sleep ready for war, Kaelin thought. In front of her sat the water-skins and flasks that had run dry the night before, all of them now full to the lip. Ravah must have walked down to the river either in the night or before dawn and filled them. Kaelin looked at her again. It was impossible not to admire her.

At last she lifted her head and looked around. When her eyes found what she was looking for, she was, for some reason, not surprised. A little way off, sitting on a low rise of stone, Veylith was — of course — awake. She was carefully wiping down her weapons with a cloth. Her hat and coat hung from the branches of a tree a short distance away, set up like a scarecrow. Kaelin watched her for a while without quite knowing why. Then she pulled the old garment back around her shoulders, rose slowly, and started toward her, careful to make as little sound as possible.

"Are you any better?" Veylith said suddenly, when Kaelin was still a few paces off. That she had heard her coming was understandable enough — but how had she known who it was, Kaelin wondered before answering.

"It was one of the deepest sleeps I've had in a long time," she said as she came closer.

"Glad to hear it. You winced a few times in your sleep, like something hurt."

"Huh. I don't remember dreaming, either, but —" She paused. "Were you watching me last night while I slept?"

Veylith stopped wiping the weapon for a noticeable beat, then resumed and answered. "Ravah, Tivver and I took watches in turn. We checked on everyone now and then, of course."

Kaelin came up beside her, well aware that she had not really answered the question. She sat on the stone next to her. Veylith did not look at her and went on with her work.

"Are your coat and hat wet?" Kaelin asked, gesturing toward the distant tree. She wasn't really curious; the question simply came out.

"It's bait," Veylith said. "That's the most exposed spot around here. It can be seen from a lot of angles. If anyone is following us —"

"They'd go there first, and we'd see them first," Kaelin finished for her. Then, almost to herself: "Clever." She turned back to Veylith. The woman seemed to be wearing nothing but a thin shirt.

"The others will be up soon. Eat something. Once it's properly light, we'll move on," Veylith said, sensing she was being watched.

"And you?"

"I've already eaten," Veylith said, but Kaelin didn't find that very convincing. She didn't say anything about it, though.

In the end she rose from the stone and lifted the old garment from her shoulders. She draped it carefully over Veylith's shoulders and laid a hand on her back. "I think you can come and sit by the fire," she said, then turned and walked back toward the camp.

When she got there and crouched down beside the fire to warm up, the others were still asleep. As she held her cold hands out toward the heat and leaned forward, a sudden pain bloomed in her ribs and she drew in a sharp breath. She pressed her hand against the spot and waited for it to pass.

"That pain doesn't look right at all," said Darian quietly from where he lay. He was still leaning against Vaelra, his eyes still closed.

"Did I wake you?" Kaelin asked, almost as if she hadn't heard him. She didn't know what else to say, since there was nothing to see.

Darian didn't answer. He opened his eyes and gave her a long look. Then, slowly, without waking Vaelra, he eased her back against the tree and got to his feet. He pulled the cover up over her, walked around the fire, and crouched down beside Kaelin. He held his hands out to the heat. For a while neither of them said anything; they only sat by the fire, warming themselves. At last Kaelin understood that he was waiting, patiently, for her to come back to the matter of the pain.

"It started last night, actually, but it wasn't really serious until now," she said at last, still looking into the fire, almost whispering. She didn't want the others to hear, especially with all of them either wounded or worn through.

"Could you have hurt yourself somewhere when we were running, without realizing?" Darian whispered back.

"I don't know. Maybe. But there's nothing to see."

"Let me look," he said, and shifted closer. Kaelin hesitated for a moment, then began to undo the buttons of her shirt from the bottom. She opened it as far as her stomach and the lower half of her chest. Darian first looked carefully, then, like a healer, began pressing gently with two fingers in different places. After a few tries he pressed in one spot and Kaelin drew in her breath sharply and pulled away on reflex.

"Right there," she said, not bothering to hide it. Then she leaned back toward him. This time Darian moved his hand more gently across that part of her side. Kaelin's face was clenched, her whole body tense. He drew his hand away, looked carefully at the spot a moment longer, then turned back to her.

"Where else?"

"The top of my arm started aching this morning, too," she said, pointing to the upper part of her left arm.

Darian rolled the sleeve up and did the same there. The reaction was milder, but much the same. He let her arm down again and started rebuttoning her shirt himself. Kaelin felt no embarrassment — and yet, for an instant, it was a strangely interesting feeling — having a man dress her instead of undress her. When Darian had closed her shirt and straightened her clothes, he laid a hand on her stomach and closed his eyes. He looked as though he were trying or waiting for something, but nothing came. At last he drew his hand back and looked at her, thoughtful.

"There's no wound, no bruising," he said after a moment. "I thought there might be a contusion or some internal bleeding I couldn't see, but there isn't. Everything looks completely normal — healthy, even." He stretched his hands toward the fire to warm them. "I tried to use my power to see whether I could heal you, but —"

"There was nothing to heal," Kaelin finished for him. She accepted the pain and settled in beside him, closer to the fire. "I suppose I'll just have to wait for it to pass," she said in a slightly brighter tone. Darian could see exactly what she was doing, but knowing it gave him nothing to say.

"We should probably warm something up and put some tea on before the others wake," she said, turning to him. Her expression had shifted entirely. "Veylith said we'd be moving on soon. There isn't much food, but bread —" Just then a dead rabbit dropped onto the ground beside her. Kaelin flinched and pulled back against Darian on reflex; when she finally lifted her head she saw that Veylith had thrown it.

"For breakfast," Veylith said, with something half-surprised, half-apologetic in her face.

"You — when — how —" Kaelin stammered, still half-startled, half-still afraid. But Veylith only gave her a faint, smiling glance and walked off. Darian reached past her, took the rabbit, and laid it down in front of him. From his pocket he drew a small but heavy knife and tested the edge against his thumb. Without looking at Kaelin, who was watching him with a strange expression, he said, "Maybe you handle the bread and the tea," and began to skin the animal. Kaelin swallowed a small flush of revulsion, looked at the half-skinned creature, and without a word slowly got to her feet and stepped away.

…

"Now this is what I call a good way to start the day," Tivver bellowed, trying to fit the whole rabbit leg into his mouth. Beside him, Ravah was biting into warm bread and watching him with one of the most withering expressions she could manage.

"Eat properly, you animal," Vaelra muttered, jabbing him in the ribs from the other side. "And who said you could have that whole leg to yourself?"

Tivver tried to say something through a mouthful of food, and almost no one understood a word of it. But Vaelra caught it well enough. "What do you mean, 'I'm worn out, I need to build my strength back up'?" she shouted. "Hand it over, you greedy gnome!" — and lunged for the piece of meat in his other hand.

Kaelin and Darian were taking a strange pleasure in seeing them this way. Beyond just watching Vaelra come back to herself, these short stretches of normality were doing all of them good. Even Ravah, though she tried not to show it, was enjoying their bickering. Veylith felt something like the same, but one of her eyes was always on the distance. Kaelin could feel that she was much better, but she was also aware of how exhausting it must be to live always braced for the next thing. Vaelra had said she wasn't sleeping much; whether that was choice or duty was hard to say.

"Anything moving on the horizon, boss? Anyone tracking us?" Ravah asked, breaking into Kaelin's thoughts.

"It's quiet for now," Veylith answered. "The city is in no condition to send anyone after us right now. What I'm worried about isn't behind us. It's what might be ahead."

"How long until we reach the village?" Darian put in.

"Off the roads it'll take longer, but we'll be there before dark," Veylith said, throwing a piece of meat into her mouth and looking out toward the distance. "We absolutely have to find horses there, or it won't take us ten days to reach Nirali — it'll take three weeks."

"A bed for the night wouldn't be the worst thing, either," Tivver chimed in. "And a little ale."

"Those coins from the pockets of the clothes the Mistress gave us are going to do a lot of work for us. But I don't think forty-odd lorins is going to stretch to everything, darling," Vaelra said, still trying to reach for the food in front of him. Kaelin would never forget the moment, the night before, when they had each changed out of their old clothes — coins stuffed into every pocket, more than a few of them. Without the Mistress we would have had nowhere to go and no coins in our pockets, she thought.

"We'll have to spend carefully. The road is long," Veylith said, in a serious tone.

"Or we'll help ourselves a little along the way," Tivver said in the same tone, throwing her a brief glance.

"We'll see," was all Veylith said, returning the look in kind. Then she went back to scanning the horizon. Kaelin didn't know exactly what that meant, but she had a few ideas. None of them involved finding honest work.

For a while no one spoke; everyone went back to their food. Veylith was the first to leave the fire, and began to make ready. She straightened her clothes, settled her weapons in their places, tightened her boots and her belt, and tucked a few small knives into different hiding-places about her person. When she was nearly done she turned to the others. "Come on, we need to move now," she called. Ravah was already getting ready. Darian and Kaelin had only just risen. The remark was really aimed at Tivver and Vaelra, who were still sitting and enjoying themselves. Aware of this, the two of them got up without protest and began to gather their things in a hurry.

Almost everyone had something to carry, so there was packing to be done — but Kaelin had only her small satchel and the dagger at her belt. While the others were gathering, she made her way over to Veylith. By the stone where they had sat that morning, Veylith was folding the cloth she had spread out to dry.

"The rabbit really hit the spot. Even if I never figured out when you caught it," Kaelin said as she came up. Veylith gave a faint smile but didn't answer. Kaelin didn't say anything else, but she didn't move away, either. She watched Veylith check the cartridges in her belt and the spare magazines in her pocket. Veylith had understood that Kaelin wanted to say or ask something, and was waiting patiently for her to be ready.

"I saw you fight, and — when you were out there, you were so good," Kaelin began at last. She didn't know how to put it, and was aware she was making strange sentences. "So, what I wanted to ask is —" and as she was still fumbling for the words, Veylith cut her off with a sharp "Shit." An arm went around Kaelin and pulled her in behind her, and Veylith stared at a point in the distance.

"We've got company," she called toward the camp. Kaelin looked, alarmed, in the direction Veylith was looking. Far to the south, a mounted figure sat still on the horizon. It held there for several seconds, then turned its horse and disappeared behind the line of the land.

"A scout," said Ravah, already at her elbow without Kaelin having heard her come up.

"They've started sending eyes out everywhere already, then," Veylith answered, still gripping Kaelin's arm and keeping her behind her. Then she turned to Ravah. "Get the others together — we need to move faster." Ravah nodded and headed back to the camp in long strides. Veylith let go of Kaelin's arm and turned to her. "Don't go wandering off on your own. And on the road, don't ever fall to the back." Kaelin nodded almost reflexively, without saying anything. Then she watched Veylith walk over to the distant tree and pull on her long coat and her hat.

By the time the others had gathered behind Kaelin, Ravah was throwing dirt over the fire, smothering it. At last, with Ravah on one side and Veylith on the other, they were ready to move. Veylith looked them all over, said nothing, and started east. The others fell in behind her.

◈◈◈

The rider drove his horse at full pace into the camp and reined in a few paces short of the fire still burning at its center, and swung down out of the saddle. Without slowing his breath he made for a small tent on the far side of the fire. At its entrance stood a tall, heavily built man with long black hair and a long black beard. The rider stopped before him, eyes going to the tent flap and holding there. The man waited for a beat.

"Report."

The rider drew his eyes back and bowed his head in salute. "All six were there. They'd made camp for the night. But just a short while ago they moved out again, heading east."

"Huh," the man said, smiling. "Good," he murmured to himself. Then: "Take some more provisions with you," and he gestured toward the packs beside the fire. "Then keep them in sight." Still breathing hard, the rider nodded a salute. His eyes went once more to the tent flap before he turned for the fire.

The man stroked his beard and looked up at the rising sun. Then he drew a deep breath and stepped inside the tent.

Pale morning light came in through the seams of the canvas. She lay naked on her side beneath the open furs, one arm folded under her head and the other along her body, her hair loose across the pillow. The man stood a moment looking at her. Then he crossed and sat at the edge of the furs, and waited.