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  Ember shook away her unwanted musings as the horses crested a hill and the keep came into sight. No matter what the mystery of her own shifting sensibilities, when she returned to the Guard’s quarters, she would no longer have the solace of time alone with her mentor. Her afternoon respite was about to end, leaving her to return to her duties. And to face Alistair.

  FIFTEEN

  EIRA AND CIAN WERE sparring when the messenger arrived, red-faced and breathless. Though he was bent over and panting, the sisters didn’t pause from their fight.

  With a move Eira should have known to anticipate, Cian feigned a misstep. Eira moved to strike as her sister seemed to stumble, but as Eira brought her sword down Cian suddenly crouched, springing up with a twist, landing behind Eira. Using the momentum of Eira’s swing to her advantage, Cian aimed a kick at Eira’s low back, sending her sister sprawling.

  “That trick works every time.” Cian offered Eira her hand.

  “One of these days you’ll actually fall,” Eira said, standing up with a groan. Sheathing her sword, she turned her attention to the messenger, who had finally caught his breath. “What news?”

  “Pardon me, Lady Eira.” The messenger bowed deeply. He was little more than a boy, bearing a grimy face and a nervous disposition. “But I’m not quite sure, as the message I was given . . . came from a source unknown to me.”

  “What do you mean?” Cian asked, sweeping her sword through the air in leisurely arcs.

  Eira didn’t blame her sister for giving the messenger only half of her attention. The boy was obviously new to his post, and she thought his strange words nothing more than a reflection of his inexperience.

  His face twisted with worry, the messenger reached into his coat pocket and withdrew a small bit of parchment.

  Eira took the paper, read it, and looked at him sharply. “Who gave this to you?”

  Catching the harshness of her sister’s question, Cian returned her sword to its scabbard. “What’s wrong?”

  “Who gave this to you?” Eira repeated, taking a menacing step toward the messenger.

  The boy put his hands up pleadingly. “Apologies, my lady. He was a stranger in a cloak. I didn’t see his face. I was riding in the forest and he appeared on the road, startling my horse. I nearly fell from the saddle.”

  He blushed at this admission but continued. “I thought at first he was a bandit intent on robbing me, but he held out this parchment and said, ‘Your masters are needed.’ He disappeared into the forest before I could question him.”

  “What does the note say?” Cian asked, seeing Eira’s furrowed brow.

  Wordlessly, Eira handed her sister the parchment. Three words had been scratched in ink onto the paper’s surface.

  Dorusduain is gone.

  “The village is gone?” Cian frowned. “How can that be?”

  “Did you investigate this claim?” Eira asked the messenger.

  He hung his head. “No, my lady. Pardon me, but I’m training to be a scribe, not a warrior. I was afraid to go.”

  Cian patted his shoulder. “No harm done, lad. You’d best leave this to the Guard, though I’d be surprised if it were more than a hoax. You did right in bringing this note to us; now go and find a meal.”

  The boy smiled gratefully and scurried off toward the manor.

  “Why would anyone jest about a village disappearing?” Eira asked Cian. “If that’s even what the note’s meaning is.”

  “I don’t know,” Cian answered. “But it must be false. Dorusduain is small, but villages don’t simply go missing. I suppose we should give this to Lukasz and he’ll send a scouting party.”

  Eira began to nod but then said, “Or we could go ourselves.”

  Cian laughed, but her sister remained stone-faced.

  “We should go,” Eira said slowly. “Now. We have no obligations for the rest of the day. Dorusduain isn’t far. We would be back not long after nightfall.”

  Shaking her head, Cian muttered, “This is work for the Guard.”

  “We still belong to the Guard,” Eira countered. “Serving in the Circle may draw us from the field, but it doesn’t mean we can’t return should we so choose.”

  When Cian fixed a dubious gaze on her, Eira said, “When was the last time we rode out together? Don’t you miss it?”

  “I miss time spent with you,” Cian answered. “I’d much rather hunt trolls than listen to Thomas discuss the state of the treasury.”

  Eira offered her a slight smile. Since they’d joined the Circle, their hours were increasingly spent on matters bureaucratic and political. Eira knew her sister well enough to be certain that Cian longed to be away from the keep and into a good fight as much as Eira did.

  Watching Cian’s resolve waver, Eira said, “If we tell Lukasz, it’s time wasted while a scouting party is formed. And if it is a hoax, that’s even more of a waste for the Guard. We can be on our way in a few minutes.”

  A smile twitched across Cian’s mouth. “It isn’t a very long way to Dorusduain, is it?”

  Without answering, Eira turned and walked quickly to the stables, knowing Cian would be right at her heels. They saddled their horses, two mares with coats like mist. Their horses were sisters too, foaled from the same mare: Geal for Eira and Liath for Cian. The sisters’ abrupt arrival in the stables earned a few curious glances from Ian the stable hand. He was respectful—or wary—enough to refrain from asking any questions.

  Soon enough they passed through Tearmunn’s gates and brought their horses to a gallop. The sisters didn’t bother with the main road. They’d spent enough years exploring Glen Shiel’s terrain to know the drovers’ paths and game trails that cut a journey’s time in half. Having been cooped in the stable as their riders were in the keep, the horses were eager to run.

  Giving Geal free rein, Eira mused that she and Cian should be tired of running after all these years. They’d been running since they were small girls. At first they ran from a town overcome by plague. A town filled with more dead than living, including their own dead parents. The sisters had continued running. They dashed from place to place, knowing that quick hands and quicker feet would win them a meal and spare them the lash or a dungeon. Through luck or fate, the one time Eira and Cian weren’t fast enough they’d been stealing loaves from the large open kitchens of a monastery. The rough handling of the burly, red-faced baker who’d dragged them before the monastery’s abbot didn’t prepare them for the priest’s sympathy or his kindness. Not seeing two thieves like the baker, the abbot saw Eira and Cian’s dirty faces and tattered clothing as an opportunity for charity. He fed the girls and offered hot water to rub months of grime from their skin and a bed to sleep in instead of the forest floor. The next day he changed their lives forever by sending them to serve Conatus.

  At Tearmunn the sisters still ran, but with a new purpose. Now they chased monsters—creatures more frightening than any they’d imagined when they’d been huddled together, cold and hungry, in the dark. But Conatus taught them to fight, not fear, the wicked things that lived in the dark. The sisters grew tall, grew strong, and grew ferocious.

  Eira sighed. A warrior’s reward after two decades of battle should not be a seat at a council table where one’s bones ached and muscles went weak as porridge. She recognized the honor of being called to the Circle and the rarity of a woman serving in the role, but the endless squabbling over expenses and ridiculous accommodations to keep Abbot Crichton happy had become nearly intolerable.

  Riding eastward, Eira thought she could feel the pressure of the low, swollen clouds weighing on her shoulders. She’d believed this unplanned scouting trip would free her mind of frustration. Instead resentment seeped through her veins. Her thoughts turned over and over on themselves as the day wore on.

  By the time Eira pulled up her horse, Geal, sullenness festered beneath her skin. She almost failed to hear Cian murmur, “Do you feel that?”

  Tucked into the foothills and blanketed by forest, the village of Dorusduai
n had always been quiet. But today the sisters came upon unnatural silence. No languid sounds of cows being milked or soft footfalls of villagers going about their day.

  Eira nodded at Cian.

  “Something’s wrong.” Cian nudged her mount forward. Geal’s and Liath’s ears were up, alert and flicking back and forth. As they passed beneath the cover of trees along the small path that led into the village, Liath squealed and reared.

  Keeping her seat, Cian reined in the mare and attempted to calm her. Geal pranced and snorted, her eyes rolling wildly so the whites showed.

  With soothing whispers, Eira carefully slid from Geal’s back. “We should leave them here.”

  “And if we need to run?” Cian asked as Liath shied.

  “Our feet will carry us back to the horses quickly enough,” Eira answered.

  They led the skittish horses to the edge of the forest, where the beasts became noticeably calmer. Eira tethered the mares to a fallen tree and the sisters returned to the path. As they moved beneath the forest canopy, Eira noticed that the silence wasn’t simply the absence of human noise. She couldn’t detect the song of a single bird or the buzz of an insect. The air was void of sound. The rasp of steel when Cian drew her sword was so deafening in contrast to the stillness around them it made Eira jump. Then she drew her sword as well.

  The gloom of the woods broke when they reached the meadow in which the village squatted. Though the sky remained overcast, the thatch-roofed stone huts could have been bathed in sunlight compared to the nets of shadow cast by the trees along the path. Despite the brightness of the open space, Eira shuddered.

  The village lay still. No chickens pecked the ground for seeds or insects. No children chased each other around the houses while their mothers patched worn clothes.

  Eira and Cian exchanged a glance before moving farther into the village.

  “We should check the houses,” Eira said. “I’ll go in while you keep watch.”

  Cian nodded.

  Ducking into the closest house, while Cian stood with her back to the open door, Eira crept forward. The hut was empty, but while she wouldn’t have described what she found as signs of a struggle, she did see what looked like disruption. A knife lay on the floor. The table near it held a loaf of bread only partly sliced. Embers from a cooking fire still glowed in the hearth.

  “Is anyone there?” Cian called to Eira.

  Eira emerged from the hut, shaking her head.

  “I’ll check the next house,” Cian said, already moving.

  They moved through the village methodically, searching every house for signs of people or what had happened but finding nothing. All that remained was evidence of a day in progress that had simply and suddenly stopped.

  “Where are they?” Eira kicked the dirt in frustration. There was no blood. No sign of a fight or smell of death lingering. And Eira knew well that death was a scent that hung in the air long after its occurrence.

  Cian turned a slow circle, surveying the houses they’d rifled through in vain. “The village is gone.”

  Eira nodded at her sister’s echo of the messenger’s words. “But what does that even mean?”

  “I don’t know.” Cian sheathed her sword. “But we won’t find out today.”

  “You want to leave?” Eira frowned. “But we haven’t learned anything.”

  Cian’s laugh was dry. “We learned it wasn’t a hoax.”

  “We should search the forest,” Eira argued. “Search for tracks.”

  “No.” Cian began to retrace their steps. “It’s time to return to Tearmunn. We’ve passed the point where we can do this alone.”

  Eira gritted her teeth, knowing Cian was right. But she wanted to stay. To delve further into this mystery of a silent village.

  “However the Circle decides to proceed, I’m not staying behind on the next mission,” Eira snapped.

  “I didn’t say you were.” Cian glanced over her shoulder and smiled mischievously at Eira. “And I didn’t say I’m willing to stay behind either.”

  With a laugh, Eira ran to catch her sister. When they reached the edge of the meadow, where the trees leaned over the path, Eira looked back at the silent huts, watching smoke that still slunk into the sky from fires abandoned . . . when?

  “The village is gone,” Eira whispered to herself, but Cian heard her sister.

  “We will find the cause of this,” Cian said. “Together.”

  Eira took Cian’s outstretched hand, clasping it tight. “Together.”

  SIXTEEN

  THOUGH AT FIRST she’d welcomed Barrow’s silence, as they rode into the keep, his stony expression unnerved Ember to the point that her blood felt like ice. Not once had Barrow looked at her nor had he spoken. When they reached the stables, he barked orders to the servants and they quickly assumed care of the steaming mounts.

  Without a word he strode away, leaving Ember with no choice but to chase after him. Barrow kept walking until they reached the practice field. She felt a spike of relief that it was empty. Ember wouldn’t have welcomed an audience for her first attempt at sparring, particularly when she’d be facing Barrow. She glanced at him, taking in his height, the massive blade strapped to his back, the broad set of his shoulders. She shivered but wasn’t entirely certain that fear was the cause for the gooseflesh on her skin.

  “Lora!”

  After so much silence, Barrow’s shout made Ember jump. He raised his hand in greeting as a figure garbed in a dark gray, hooded robe approached them. Ember’s chest caved a bit. She would have a witness to what was sure to be a humiliation. When the stranger reached them, slender hands pushed back the hood to reveal a face with delicate angles and a head of pale blond hair.

  “Ember, this is Lora.” Barrow nodded to the blond girl. “Should you ever need to practice sparring on your own, she can assist you. Rarely is she away from the field.”

  Lora smiled. “To be away would be to shirk my duty.”

  Ember was puzzling over Barrow’s words, for one surely couldn’t spar alone. Lora’s eyes were on her, so Ember forced herself to smile at the girl.

  “I doubt this match will offer much entertainment,” she said. “Barrow could probably beat me if he was blindfolded.”

  Lora laughed, but Barrow shook his head. “You won’t be fighting me.”

  Ember looked from him to the pale girl. “Am I fighting Lora?”

  “I’m not a fighter,” Lora told her. “Just a simple cleric.”

  “As if such a thing existed.” Barrow smiled at her and the back of Ember’s neck grew hot. When she spoke, a part of her knew it was only to interrupt their exchange.

  “If I’m not fighting you or her, then who is my opponent?”

  Barrow took a step back, making a deferring gesture to Lora. The slender girl bowed her head. Her palms rested against each other as if she were in prayer. Ember shifted on her feet. Was this part of their regular practice? Should she pray as well?

  She glanced at Barrow, who wasn’t praying. He was still watching Lora. The heat on Ember’s neck prickled onto her scalp. She forced her eyes off them and onto the damp ground.

  She drew a sharp breath and scampered backward.

  The earth at the cleric’s bare feet was bubbling.

  As Ember watched, the ground erupted. Earth stretched upward into a column taller than Lora. The mass of soil expanded and contracted, its shape changing as Lora maintained her contemplative pose. Limbs burst out of the block of earth. Arms and legs of mud snaked out of the lump. Hands with five fingers appeared. A neck. A head. But no face.

  Lora raised her head and opened her eyes. The mud creature stood before her as if awaiting her command.

  “That is your opponent,” Barrow said.

  Ember gazed at the strange form. “What is it?”

  “Simply a shape called forth from the earth to which I’ve temporarily lent part of my spirit,” Lora answered. “It has no name, for it is not a living thing. Not much more than a poppet for all intent
s and purposes.”

  When Ember turned to Barrow, he said, “I said you would face horrors because of your calling, but you will also witness many wonders. This is the first.”

  “And I am to fight it?” She looked at the mud man—if it could be called that. Its body was straight and lacked defining contours, giving no indication of sex.

  Lora lifted her hand and the creature moved, its steps slightly halting. “It will engage with you when I command it. It will also learn from you. As your skill progresses, so will its abilities increase.”

  “The earth creatures make fitting opponents when you first begin to fight, or later if you’re unable to find a sparring partner,” Barrow said.

  The cool steel of Silence and Sorrow whispered to Ember as she slid them free of their leather covers.

  “Let the blades speak to you,” Barrow murmured as Ember and the creature began to circle each other. “They were forged for you and you alone.”

  The weight of the weapons in her hands was reassuring. Grasping the leather-wrapped handles felt oddly natural. The perfect circle and interior half circle of the blades shone in in the daylight. Their gleam was subtle, reflecting the sublime quality of moonbeams. The thought sent prickles up her arms as if the energy contained within the blades had seeped into her skin and now traveled through her veins.

  She began to move tentatively, sweeping her arms back and forth to become accustomed to the wheels. With each motion the blades hummed through the air, singing their own silvery melody. The strange, alluring sound began to lead her body’s movements. As she flowed over the damp earth, Ember’s arms and legs took on the pattern of a dance that was both surprising and familiar. The mud creature mirrored her movements though it bore no weapons. Behind it, Ember noticed Lora and Barrow watching her, waiting.