Chapter 22 - We're already here.
The Archiater walked down the corridor of the royal castle towards the chambers of the rescued girl, Aris, where two guards stood at the door.
One of them saw the Archiater coming and pulled the door open, letting him into a room filled with morning light, where Aris sat on top of the blanket with Queen Edith settled beside her on the edge of the bed.
Sir Aurey kept a little way off, leaning against the wall with his arms crossed over his chest.
"My Queen," the Archiater greeted her.
Edith straightened, looking closely into his face.
"What is it?"
"I have just been in Sir William's room and… I found the remedies and tinctures I left yesterday untouched… The bed is made and the room is empty."
Edith's brows drew together and she rose from the bed, her head dipping for a moment, then turned to Aurey.
"Aurey. Find Alistair, and the man who was supposed to be watching William."
Aurey took the order with a short nod, and a dark aura wrapped itself around him, a deep violet cast along its edges.
The shadow under his feet came to life, reached upwards, closed over him from every side, and Aurey dissolved into it in an instant, leaving an empty space at the wall.
The Archiater had not moved from the door, and Edith walked past him out into the corridor, making for William's room. She went in alone and stopped in the middle of the room, running her eyes over it and finding everything exactly as the Archiater had described it.
From there she went down to the outer courtyard, where Aurey and Alistair Sterling were already waiting for her, while behind them a group of knights headed for the gates at a quick pace, their gear clattering.
Edith stopped in front of Alistair, looking into his eyes without a word.
"Last night I sent a knight named Gunard to follow William, but now we cannot find either of them. Men have already been sent out to search."
Edith's jaw clenched, drawing a hard line under the skin over her cheekbone, while the rest of her face did not change.
She did not answer and went past Sterling and Aurey towards the gates, while both knights followed her.
In the far corner of the courtyard, Rowan Hart looked out from behind an archway, in a plain tunic and dark trousers instead of armour. He moved his eyes from the departing queen to the knights at the gates and back, warily trying to work out what was happening.
Hart caught a passing knight by the cloak, and the man turned at once.
"Hey. What's going on?" Hart asked.
"I don't really understand it myself. But they say two of ours have gone missing, and one of them is the survivor from the hunt."
The moment Hart let go of the cloak, the knight carried on deeper into the courtyard without looking back, while Hart watched him go and then turned his head towards the gates where the queen had gone out.
The morning market of the lower city spread along a wide cobbled street in rows of awnings and stalls, and from them came the smell of fresh bread, fish and hot oil.
The voices of the traders, the creak of carts, the chink of coins on the counters ran together into an unbroken hum that swallowed everything around it, while Elara, Bernard and Leo moved through the crush.
Elara walked in front, reading one passing face after another and slowing every few steps to ask strangers the same question.
Her voice stayed calm, but with each new question the words came out faster and each sentence ended higher than the last.
She described Aren carefully, hoping that at least one detail would snag the right witness, but for the most part the passers-by shook their heads, some shrugged vaguely, and others went past without even slowing down.
Bernard held half a step behind Elara, running his eyes over the whole street, the shadows in the side lanes, every corner where a man who had walked off alone at night might have ended up.
Every so often he asked his own short question of a trader behind a stall, or of a passer-by standing still.
Leo, meanwhile, kept up alongside Bernard, turning his head after every face they passed.
Two knights came out of a side lane, split up in the crowd and went from one passer-by to the next with short questions, moving straight on each time.
One of them noticed Bernard, changed direction and came towards him at a brisk walk.
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"Have you seen a knight today or yesterday evening, green cloak with no crest, a dent in the side of his helm?"
Bernard shook his head without changing his expression, and the second knight, coming up behind the first, stepped forward with another question.
"What about a man, ordinary clothes most likely, short brown hair, stubble, a scar at the temple?"
Bernard went still for a fraction of a second, Elara after him, and the two of them exchanged a look.
"Y-yes," Elara said.
"He was at the Merry Ploughman yesterday…and he talked to us."
Both knights leaned in, cutting the gap to Elara.
"Where did he go afterwards? Was he alone? What did he say to you?"
Without waiting for an answer, Bernard shifted sideways, putting his body between Elara and the first knight.
"Where he went, we don't know. He only told us who he was and listened to our stories."
The knight studied Bernard's face in silence for a few seconds, until quick footfalls sounded behind them and a third knight came darting out of the side lane, calling to the first two.
"Dorn, Avillar! We've found something!"
Both knights turned round, and the third, catching his breath, went on.
"People in the southern quarter say they saw Sir William. He attacked three men. And they say he was looking for a black-haired lad who fought at the tournament."
Elara, Leo and Bernard exchanged a look, the same worry and fear on all three faces.
The knights set off towards the southern quarter, and Bernard and the others went after them.
The southern quarter met them with a clamouring crowd closed in a ring round the middle of the street.
The knights forced a way through while Bernard, Elara and Leo squeezed after them, until the open space at the centre of the ring came into view ahead.
Edith stood there straight and unmoving, Alistair and Aurey to either side of her.
In front of them were four men, one holding a broken wrist against his chest, a second wincing with a palm pressed to his stomach, a third shifting from foot to foot, while the fourth stood apart with his shoulders down and his eyes turned away.
The one with the broken wrist spoke, addressing Edith, though his eyes kept breaking away to the knights.
"I'm telling you, he just walked up and started badgering us about who this lad with the tattoos is and where to find him. How were we supposed to know? And straight away he came at us with his fists!"
"He actually started with his boot…" the second muttered, still holding his stomach.
"Who gives a shit!" the first barked, not taking his eyes off the knights in front of him.
The fourth man shook his head slowly, then turned to Edith.
"In any case, I told him where to look for this lad, just to put a stop to the whole bloody mess," he said.
"And where was it you sent him?" Edith asked.
"To the Merry Ploughman. Me and the lads usually see him there, with a girl, a boy and a fair-haired man."
The two knights, Dorn and Avillar, came out into the centre of the ring and bowed to the queen.
"My Queen! I can confirm this man's words. According to witnesses, Sir William was indeed at the Merry Ploughman and spoke with them."
Sterling turned to the knight and cut him off with a short question.
"With them — who's them?"
"Well…a girl…a boy…a bloke…" Dorn said.
Sterling turned to Edith, who was watching the knights with a face that gave nothing away and said nothing for several moments.
"Take me to these people."
The moment the knight nodded and the queen moved off, a firm voice came out of the crowd, clearly audible over the din.
"We're already here."
The whole crowd turned at once and looked at Bernard standing among them, with Elara behind him, holding Leo in front of her with both arms.
Meanwhile, among the giant trees of the Great Forest, Aren and Grant walked on, looking about them constantly, treading on soft ground covered by years of leaf litter and moss.
Lizards ran along the roots, going still at every rustle and scattering again at once, and in a rotted trunk nearby a broad black snake slid away into a split in the bark.
Aren looked around, his eyes lingering a moment on the wells of shadow between the trees.
"I thought the Great Forest would be more alive…"
Grant went on looking straight ahead without turning his head.
"Two Cortexes weren't enough for you?"
Aren broke off, walked a few paces in silence, and then said it anyway.
"I mean…we've been walking about an hour now…and we still haven't come across a single big animal."
Grant stopped, set his hands on his belt, lowered his head towards the ground and stood without moving.
"Yes. We wondered about that too. During the Sacred Hunt."
Aren stopped as well, his eyes fixed on Grant's back, and the knight went on talking without once turning round.
"How do you think I managed to get the two of us in and past the forest watch unnoticed?"
Aren said nothing, running his eyes through the thick shadow among the trees.
"Because the free fighters and adventurers who took part in the Sacred Hunt found a secret way through the western grove, so they could slip into the Great Forest and scout out where the magical beasts live. So that during the hunt they wouldn't waste time searching and could go straight for bigger prey," Grant added.
Then he laughed drily.
"Crafty bastards…"
Aren listened in silence, watching the knight's back again.
"So there it is, Aren. We knights serve with honour. With valour. And we never do anything of the kind. We go out on the hunt by the covenants of our forebears and we carry pride in our hearts. When we came into the Great Forest, we knew and accepted that it would take us more than a day to find prey on our own. But…"
Grant moved slowly off to the side without taking his hands from his belt or lifting his eyes from the ground, turning over in his memory every step of that journey.
"In three days…we found not a damned thing. Not one magical beast, not even an ordinary one. We got as far as the trees with steel plates driven into the bark. That meant the inner bounds, where the more powerful creatures live…the dwelling of the gods… And you'd think, well, no luck. But even then…I felt something was wrong. The forest was silent. It was so quiet that I couldn't shake the feeling that something was off. That feeling grew stronger still when I ran into a whole party of adventurers, which is strange in itself, since we were supposed to be working alone…and…they hadn't found anything either."
Aren walked behind him, listening and looking around all the while at the same silent giant forest.
"They combed the whole western side, but all the usual haunts of the white-stone boars, the Cortexes and the rest…were empty. The creatures had run off somewhere, and nobody could work out what to do next."
Grant turned his whole body towards him and looked him straight in the face.
"So, Aren, if you feel that something is wrong…then you're not just feeling it. This whole business with the hunt…with you…with this…"
Grant's hand went up to his own temple and began to shake, and his voice broke into a rasp.
"Damned voice in my head…" he added, then breathed out, his shoulders coming slowly down, turned away and walked on.
"Let's just go. No beasts means no beasts. All the better for us. We'll reach the Great Tree faster," Grant finished.
"And what about the thing that attacked you on the outer bounds?" Aren asked.
Grant stopped dead, not taking the next step, and the pause began to stretch, filling with nothing but the sound of the far-off treetops and the soft creak of wood somewhere high above.
"Pray…that we don't meet it…"
A wave of cold went over Aren's skin, running down his spine from the back of his head.
"What was there…was death," William Grant added.
He turned his head slowly over his shoulder.
"If I tell you to run…run. And don't look back…Understand me?"
Aren swallowed, and a drop of sweat slid slowly down his temple, after which he gave a short nod.
Grant turned and carried on in the same direction, making his way towards the Great Tree, while far off in the depths of the forest something enormous, which had felt their presence, turned slowly towards them.