“What of Josiri? Taymor?”
“Josiri is with me. My brother is taken. He may already be dead.” Either way, he was beyond help. “Is Calenne here?”
“Yes, and ready to travel. I knew you’d come.”
“I have no choice. The Council…”
She fell silent as a girl appeared at the head of the staircase, her sapphire eyes alive with suspicion. Barely six years old, and she had the wit to know something was amiss. “Elda, what’s happening?”
“Your mother is here, Calenne,” said Elda. “You must go with her.”
“Are you coming?”
The first sorrow touched Elda’s brow. “No.”
Calenne descended the stairs, expression still heavy with distrust. Katya stooped to embrace her daughter. She hoped Calenne’s thin body stiffened at the cold and wet, and not revulsion for a woman she barely knew. From the first, Katya had thought it necessary to send Calenne away, to live shielded from the Council’s sight. So many years lost. All for nothing.
Katya released Calenne from her embrace and turned wearily to Elda. “Thank you. For everything.”
The other woman forced a wintery smile. “Take care of her.”
Katya caught a glint of something darker beneath the smile. It lingered in Elda’s eyes. A hardness. Another friendship soured by folly? Perhaps. It no longer mattered. “Until my last breath. Calenne?”
The girl flung her arms around Elda. She said nothing, but the tears on her cheeks told a tale all their own.
Elda pushed her gently away. “You must go, dear heart.”
A clarion sounded, its brash notes cleaving through the clamour of the storm. An icy hand closed around Katya’s heart. She’d run out of time.
Elda met her gaze. Urgency replaced sorrow. “Go! While you still can!”
Katya stooped and gathered Calenne. The girl’s chest shook with thin sobs, but she offered no resistance. With a last glance at Elda, Katya set out into the rain once more. The clarion sounded again as she reached Josiri. His eyes were more watchful than ever, his sword ready in his hands.
“They’re here,” he said.
Katya heaved Calenne up to sit in front of her brother. She looked like a doll beside him, every day of the decade that separated them on full display.
“Look after your sister. If we’re separated, ride hard for the border.”
His brow furrowed. “To the Hadari? Mother…”
“The Hadari will treat you better than the Council.” He still had so much to learn, and she no more time in which to teach him. “When enemies are your only recourse, choose the one with the least to gain. Promise me.”
She received a reluctant nod in reply.
Satisfied, Katya clambered into her saddle and spurred west along the broad cobbles of Highgate. They’d expect her to take refuge in Branghall Manor, or at least strip it of anything valuable ahead of the inevitable looting. But the western gateway might still be clear.
The first cry rang out as they rejoined the road. “She’s here!”
A blue-garbed wayfarer cantered through the crowd, rain scattering from leather pauldrons. Behind, another set a buccina to his lips. A brash rising triad hammered out through the rain and found answer in the streets beyond. The pursuit’s vanguard had reached Eskavord. Lightly armoured riders to harry and delay while heavy knights closed the distance. Katya drew her sword and wheeled her horse about. “Make for the west gate!”
Josiri hesitated, then lashed his horse to motion. “Yah!”
Katya caught one last glimpse of Calenne’s pale, dispassionate face. Then they were gone, and the horseman upon her.
The wayfarer was half her age, little more than a boy and eager for the glory that might earn a knight’s crest. Townsfolk scattered from his path. He goaded his horse to the gallop, sword held high in anticipation of the killing blow to come. He’d not yet learned that the first blow seldom mattered as much as the last.
Katya’s parry sent a shiver down her arm. The wayfarer’s blade scraped clear, the momentum of his charge already carrying him past. Then he was behind, hauling on the reins. The sword came about, the killing stroke aimed at Katya’s neck.
Her thrust took the younger man in the chest. Desperate strength drove the blade between his ribs. The hawk of the Tressian Council turned dark as the first blood stained the rider’s woollen tabard. Then he slipped from his saddle, sword clanging against cobbles. With one last, defiant glare at the buccinator, Katya turned her steed about, and galloped through the narrow streets after her children.