The Dark Remains - Mark Anthony [3]
Durge’s perpetual frown deepened. “That is a perilous idea, my lady. The Mournish are a queer folk. They make no homes save the wagons they travel in, and it is said the music of their flutes can drive a man to wildness.”
Aryn groaned. That was hardly the response she had hoped for.
Lirith folded her arms over the bodice of her rust-colored gown and glanced at Durge. “She has it in her head to go down and see the wandering folk, even though Ivalaine has forbidden it.”
“She didn’t forbid it,” Aryn countered. “Not precisely, anyway. Ivalaine merely discouraged us from going. Besides, I’m weary of moping about this castle. I think we all are. It would do us good to get some fresh air.” She held her breath, looking from knight to witch.
Durge stroked his mustaches and gazed at Lirith. “I believe she means to go no matter what we say, my lady.”
Lirith sighed. “Aren’t chains an option?”
“A temptation, to be sure, but I fear not. It is best if you and I accompany her to see that she does not fall into trouble.”
If she had possessed two good hands instead of one, Aryn would have clapped. “Now that’s the sensible Durge I know.” She stepped forward and kissed his craggy cheek.
The knight blinked, his expression bewildered, and Lirith’s brow furrowed with displeasure. Aryn didn’t care if she had been too familiar. For the first time in days she felt her spirits lift. The others would see that she was right—this was exactly what they needed.
2.
Sunlight drenched the world like warm rain from the cobalt sky as baroness, countess, and knight passed through a colonnade of trees and stepped onto the village green.
It had been a simple feat to slip from the castle. Too simple for Lirith’s taste. Was it merely chance they had not come upon Lady Tressa or another member of the queen’s court on their way through Ar-tolor’s busy halls? Or had luck received some degree of assistance in the matter?
Lirith cast a glance at Aryn as they walked. She still didn’t know what the young woman had done over two months ago, when in secret they followed after Grace and Durge as the pair set off from Calavere. Tagging along had been a foolish plan, and Lirith had agreed to it only because she had been certain King Boreas’s knights would ride forth to retrieve them before they had gone a league from the castle. Only somehow Aryn had misdirected the king and his men. Lirith didn’t know how, but there was one thing of which she was certain: Aryn had used a spell of some kind to achieve their escape.
Yet despite Aryn’s rashness, Lirith was grateful—if not precisely glad—that she and Aryn had followed after the others. The road had been arduous, filled with fire and death, but there had been purpose to it. For if they had not stolen away from Calavere that day, there was so much Lirith would never have witnessed: Grace’s courage against the burning plague, Goodman Travis’s wisdom before the Necromancer, the girl Tira’s mysterious and wondrous transformation. And there was more she would never have known.…
I miss all your questions, Daynen.
A sigh escaped her lips, as it always did when she thought of the sightless boy who had given his life to save Tira at the bridge over the River Darkwine. For so many years she had prayed to Sia to grant her a child, and she had drunk an ocean of infusions and simples to quicken her womb. However, no amount of prayers or herbs would ever cause seed to grow in the soil of a salted field; she knew that now. But perhaps Sia had heard her pleas after all, for Daynen—however briefly she had known him—had seemed a son to her. She would never forget him.
“Come on, Lirith!” Aryn said, tugging on her arm.
Lirith let the young woman pull her across the grass while Durge trotted behind them, clad in a heavy gray tunic despite the brilliance of the late-summer afternoon. Already people from the town wandered uncertainly onto the green, as if fearful yet compelled