The Knight and the Moth (The Stonewater Kingdom, #1)(9)

“Night,” said the gargoyle.

“I can see that. Are the others abed?”

“Indeed.” He grimaced. “The knighthood, too.”

I coughed. “The king is still here?”

“The abbess offered him the dormitory. Perhaps she pitied him. And what a useless thing pity is, for a guest is always a kind of trespasser. Why, just while you were lazing here in the sacristy, I caught a few errant knights lurking around the spring. Don’t worry—I set them right.” He tutted, then reached for a linen cloth and crudely patted the bile from my mouth. “Feeling better?”

Everything hurt. The muscles in my brow, my jaw, my stomach—sick from ingesting the spring water. There was no mark upon me for the injuries I’d incurred in the dream. But the pain from a broken collarbone, from wrung-out muscles, was still a ghost in my body.

“I’m thirsty,” I rasped.

The gargoyle glanced at the floor, desecrated with my vomit. “I would escort you to your cottage, but it appears I have swabbing to do.”

I rose onto wobbling legs. “Sorry for the mess.”

He stuck up his nose and didn’t bid me good night.

Outside, the air was chill. Not saccharine and putrid like rotting flowers, but fresh, its effect purifying. The tor boasted no trees—just gravel and stone and grass speckled with gowan flowers. Above, the moon was a pale fingernail in the sky, disinterested in lighting my way. It didn’t matter. Even with a damp shroud around my eyes and no lantern, I found the path through the grounds that led to the stone outbuildings that rested in the ever-present shadow of Aisling Cathedral.

There were six buildings besides the cathedral upon the tor. The largest was a two-level dormitory with attached stables that were often empty, but now smelled of manure from the knights’ horses. The second-largest building was an ivy-laden cottage where the abbess lived. Directly behind it was the dining commons, and then two more cottages. One for the gargoyles, who didn’t eat or drink but did enjoy sleep, and one for the Diviners.

The last building was a tiny stone cottage that sat far on the south side of the tor, where the wind was loudest. No one ever went there. The cottage had no windows, just an ancient iron door. A sad excuse for architecture, and utterly abandoned for it.

My walk through the grounds was quiet. I wound my way past the stables, the dormitory. All the windows were dark. Either the knighthood were somber for their king’s ill portents or they were abed. But then I rounded the abbess’s cottage, coming into view of the dining commons—

I blinked. The common windows were bright. And a knight, armed to the teeth, was stationed at its door, looking straight at me as I came from the darkness.

“Oi!”

I skidded to a standstill.

The knight, bearing a sword on her belt and a lethal-looking axe in her left hand, marched toward me, squinting against her torch. “Who’s that?”

My voice was a croak. “Six.”

“Who?”

“Six.”

The knight kept coming, aglow in the yellow torchlight. She had ornate bronze and gold and silver rings in her dark, cropped hair. A sharp nose. Lines between her brows and around her narrowed gaze that made me certain she was older than I was. Her green eyes had charcoal drawn around them; they widened as she looked me over. “Bloody pith, Diviner.” She lowered her torch. “You look like a ghost in that—that—”

I followed her gaze down to my Divining robes. The white silk, still wet, left no part of my body to the imagination. “I’m on my way to my room,” I said, clipped.

“At this hour?”

“I’ve been dreaming. Or have you forgotten the Divination?”

The knight stared. Not in the awestruck way strangers who came to Aisling often did, but more meticulous. “I haven’t forgotten. But everyone has gone to bed. Your Diviners and abbess included.”

“The gargoyle let me rest in the cathedral.”

She perked a brow. “You need rest after dreaming?”

“I doubt a simple soldier would understand the complexities of Divining.”

The knight’s brow rose. For a splintered second, I felt shamed, talking down to her like that. But then my good sense kicked in. She was, after all, a knight, serving a king whom the Omens clearly did not favor. No remorse was due. “I am thirsty,” I said.

“Well.” She tapped her boot over dirt. “It would be this simple soldier’s honor to walk you back to your dwelling.”

I nodded at the building behind her. “The kitchen is just inside. I’ll get water here.”

“I’ll bring you some.”

“Thoughtful.” I pivoted around her. “But unnecessary.”

“Wait, Diviner.” She reached for my arm. “Wait—”

I wrenched open the door to the dining commons.

Bent over, boots unlaced, another knight sat upon a long wooden table. He wasn’t wearing armor. Or chain mail. Or a tunic. He wasn’t wearing anything at all above the haphazard lacings that kept up his trousers.

He turned at the sound of the door, dark eyes skittering to a halt over me. Firelight caught along the three gold bands in his right ear.

The knight from the road.

He was smoking something, a small, smoldering twig that smelled sharp, like nettles. Just like when we’d locked gazes earlier, me on the wall, him upon his horse—