Page 40 of Silverbow (The Godsung Saga #1)

twenty-one

Oryn

O ryn had planned to slip quietly from Windcross Wells at dawn.

Now, if they saw the dawn without half of Windcross Wells burning, he would consider that a great personal accomplishment, just as he considered leaving Cedric Norvallen in one piece a great personal accomplishment.

The man’s inability to keep quiet aside, he hadn’t liked how he looked at her or how her heart had done that little skip.

At least mention of her father had thrown cold water on that.

He didn’t begrudge the girl her love for her father, but if Innesh and Trout Run were any indication, this night would not go well. Unlike Innesh and Trout Run, Windcross Wells had a wielder’s outpost and a full garrison of crimson coats, not to mention the High Lord who wanted her found.

So Oryn slipped out back to wait.

Enya Ryerson, vexing as she was, was predictable.

The door at the back of the inn banged open, spilling lamp light into the dark stable yard.

For a moment, it haloed her in gold, illuminating the bow slung over her back.

She looked like a goddess of the hunt. Oryn shook that thought from his head as the door shut and it winked out.

She scrambled down the stairs, muttering that strange list under her breath.

He let her get halfway across the yard before he called out from where he leaned in the shadows. “Going somewhere? ”

She wheeled, belt knife in hand. He blew out a stream of pipe smoke, wondering if giving that back had been wise.

“You smoke?” It was an odd question, but she was stalling, eyes darting around the stable yard in search of a way out.

He chuckled darkly. “You hardly know me at all Ansel .”

“It’s hard to get to know stone,” she said coolly.

“Perhaps,” he answered, glad she could not see the smile that played faintly across his lips. “I am a gargoyle after all.”

“And you know me so much better?” She bristled.

He considered. He’d learned much about her on the road, but now did not seem like the time to point out her every quirk, just the ones that posed immediate danger.

“Well enough to know you’d come this way.

Though I find the little regard you have for your own life rather curious.

Are you planning to storm the outpost? Alone? ”

She huffed and tossed her braid over her shoulder.

He extended the pipe toward her. “Care to join me?”

“No, I do not care to join you!” She snapped.

“You know, you’re the first like you that we’ve ever seen. A pity to get yourself killed before you do whatever it is the gods have planned for you.”

“I’m not interested in being a means to someone’s end,” she hissed.

“Really? Because that is all that you will be if he gets a hold of you. They call him the puppet master, you know.“ She swallowed audibly. “Do you think the gods gave you that gift just to throw it away?”

“I don’t put much stock in the gods,” she spluttered.

Oryn sighed. “You should. They favor you. And they are none too pleased with you running straight into a trap.”

“You speak to the gods now? The ones who abandoned us?”

Oryn blinked. “Abandoned us? Is that what they teach you mortals?”

She scowled at him. “I am not going to stand here and debate theology with you while my father is being tortured .”

“He is bait, Ansel.”

“I don’t care.”

“You should.”

“Do you expect me to sit here and do nothing?”

“Am I doing nothing?”

“It sure looks like it,” she hissed .

Oryn chuckled. “I am waiting.”

“For what ?”

“For Bade. If there’s a way to get him out, he’ll find it.”

“And if there’s not?” Her voice cracked, revealing delicate fractures in the anger she wore like a shield, making him wonder how much of it was a mask.

“Colm’s gone to bed,” he said simply. “He’s trying to find him in the dream.”

“And then what?”

Oryn tapped the contents of the pipe onto the ground and tucked it away in his cloak. He strode across the yard to tower over her. “You’ve only ever had two choices, Ansel. You can ride east like a reasonable person, or I will drag you like the bounty you are.”

***

Oryn watched her alternate between pacing the length of her room and sitting on the edge of the bed, endlessly fidgeting with that little carving. Neither Bade nor Colm had appeared to give their reports in the hours since he’d stopped her in the yard.

“What is the list you keep muttering?” He finally asked.

She shot him a glare and went back to her pacing, silent now except for the usual hum that filled his ears. He heard their footsteps long before she did, so he wasn’t surprised when his companions filed into her room. Enya sank onto the end of the bed, eyes wide, hands finally stilling.

“Well?” She demanded as soon as the door clicked shut. “Did you see him?”

“He’s alive.”

For now. Oryn heard the words Bade left unspoken.

“We have to get him out,” she said.

“There’s no getting him out,” Bade answered flatly.

He delivered his findings in the same unfeeling tone he used for everything.

“He’s being kept with the king’s gold in the store rooms below the soldier’s outpost. Aside from the dozen men on watch since someone started setting outposts on fire, Ralenet travels with three dozen of his personal guard.

They only bring him up once a day for his public flogging and he goes straight back down. ”

“What does that mean?” Enya asked desperately.

“It means,” Oryn sighed. “There’s no getting him out.”

She hurled her belt knife so hard it buried itself in the wall. Oryn blinked at the quivering length of steel. Giving it back definitely hadn’t been wise.

“Nice throw,” Aiden murmured.

“I am not leaving without him.”

Colm cleared his throat. “I spoke to him in the dream, Ansel. He wanted me to tell you he knew the risk when he committed his crime, and he made his peace with it.”

The girl gaped at him. “His crime? What crime, exactly?”

“The High Lord’s accused him of tax evasion,” Colm answered levelly.

“That’s…that’s ridiculous,” Enya spluttered. “He paid the tax collectors every year. And that doesn’t sound like him at all.”

Colm sighed. “He was dreaming of Greenridge. The place where you camp with the herd in the summer.” Her brow furrowed as objection shifted to uncertainty.

“He also told me to tell you that Liam said you running off to turn yourself in was the dumbest thing he’s seen since Oslee Amcot tried to wrestle that porcupine.

” A faint smile tugged at the corners of Colm’s mouth.

The strangled sound that escaped her seemed to teeter between a hiccup and a sob. The mention of the stablemaster’s son seemed to wield some kind of leverage Colm’s word alone could not. Or perhaps this porcupine business led credibility to his word.

“They do not want you caught,” Colm said gently.

“Did he tell you what Ralenet’s interest in her is?” Oryn asked.

Colm shook his head.

“I overheard one of Norvallen’s men say it was an old grudge. Something about Renley Ryerson being a Queen’s Guard,” Aiden offered.

All eyes turned toward the girl.

“Did you know that?” Oryn demanded.

She pinched the bridge of her nose between her thumb and forefinger. “I am the most ignorant woman in Estryia, remember? ”

Enya

“What exactly do you propose? Even if we got him out, we’re stuck in the middle of Windcross Wells surrounded by a battalion of wielders and a wall twenty feet thick.”

Enya scrubbed her hands over her face. She had to find a way to get to him, no matter what the demi-elves said. “You said you could bring walls down.”

Oryn ground his teeth. “We could, and then we’d run our horses to death trying to reach Tuminzar before we could be intercepted. There’s no wielding out of this. Not with the outpost here.”

“What about Cedric’s men?” She asked desperately.

“Still too few and even if he’s taken with you, we can’t trust that one of his number won’t be tempted by ten thousand gold marks. They could buy Norvallen House for that.”

She chewed her lip. “What about outside of the city? When they move him again?”

Bade picked at his fingernails. “By all accounts, the Master of Coin is hunkering down for an extended stay.”

“So?” She asked, hating the way her voice cracked. “He can’t stay forever. We can wait him out.”

“Every word you speak, every man who looks at you, is a risk,” Oryn sighed. With each point and counter-point, her chest seemed to constrict tighter and tighter.

“So what? We let him die?” Enya clutched the horse head carving, the only anchor she could find in the sea of swirling rage and grief.

“Him or you, Ansel.”

“You don’t know that!” She snapped. “I can look after myself. I can’t just leave him here. He’s my father .”

“Enya,” Colm said gently.

Out. I need to get out.

Colm seemed to realize it first, and he threw the window open before Enya could cross the room that seemed to grow smaller by the second.

Oryn propped open the door that adjoined his room.

Her throat tightened, and she couldn’t stop the tears that pricked at the back of her eyes.

She strained to hold them in, but the pressure built. The walls kept coming closer.

“Enya- ”

“Get out,” she gasped.

She squeezed her eyes shut and waited for the boots to fade, willing herself not to cry in front of the immortal warriors. The door to Oryn’s room closed softly. Behind her eyelids, she could see her father in the drawing room of Ryerson House, reminding her to breathe.

She had to breathe. She had to think. She had to find a way.

Enya moved to the window for air. She leaned against the frame and looked down into the narrow alley.

She had to get out of this inn and to the outpost. At least see it for herself.

Her fingers curled around the windowsill, brushing against the vines that climbed the wall.

They were thick and rope-like. Enya trailed her fingers along them, staring at the drop.

There was no getting down the hall, but the window…