Page 68 of Heir

Aiz’s neck prickled. Elias knew Bisker was a slum. She’d chosen it on purpose. Aiz could never convince anyone that she was a noble. But Bisker was obscure enough—according to Dolbra, anyway—that Aiz didn’t think anyone in the Tribal Lands would know it.

Least of all a man who could break her in half with one fist if she looked at his wife or child the wrong way.

“Tregan was a gift,” Aiz said. “From someone with greater means than I.”

Aiz’s chest tightened at the thought of Cero. The cloister. She could not fail because of one man’s suspicion. Mother Div had said something about Ruhyan.The key to her trust. He sees what others do not.Aiz looked up at the boy.

Ruhyan grinned impishly, reminding Aiz of Hani. Aiz couldn’t help smiling back.

“That’s my horse there.” She pointed to where Tregan was staked. “Treg doesn’t get spooked by anything, even little children who are part wolf.”

“Half wolf,” the boy said, but a shy grin bloomed on his face. “Can I ride her?”

“Certainly,” Aiz said. “If your parents have no objection. She’d be happy carrying a lighter load. And she’s faster than your brother’s horse. Fast as the wind.”

Ruhyan sighed longingly. “I want to go fast as the wind.”

“Pffft.” A voice came from beyond the fire. The boy who emerged was younger than Aiz and broodingly handsome, with Laia’s dark gold eyes. “No horse is faster than Lili.”

“Tregan is.” Aiz focused only on Ruhyan. She winked at the child. “Trust me.”

Ruhyan gazed at her for a few seconds, but it felt like longer.I want to know where Mother Div is.She let that truth rise to the surface of her mind.I want to help my people.

“I trust you,” he finally said, his grin a flash of light in the darkness. “So can I race her?”

Something shifted in the camp with those words. Laia relaxed. Elias glanced up at his boy, smiling.

“In the morning, love.” Elias stood, and Ruhyan swung down with awhoop. “I’ll judge the race myself, and whoever loses folds laundry for a week. Now—where are your sisters?”

“Zuriya’s with the Fakira—” Ruhyan said.Those who tend to the dead, Aiz recalled. “And Karinna is beating up that boy from Tribe Aish she hates so much. I told her not to, he’s bigger than her, but you know Kari.”

Laia looked stricken and slipped into Sadhese. “Pires?”

“Don’t worry,” Ruhyan said. “She’s fine—”

“I’m not worried abouther, Ruh,” Laia said. “Elias—”

“I’ll handle it,” he said, stretching languidly before Laia glared at him.

“You don’t seem to be in a hurry?”

He shrugged. “If my daughter sees fit to teach a smart-mouthed Aish boy a lesson, who am I to interfere?”

“Jaldi!” Laia said in exasperation, and her husband laughed, dropping down for a lingering kiss.

Their sons exchanged a glance, making identical faces of disgust before following their father into the night. The other Tribespeople fell into conversation with each other.

“My daughter Karinna,” Laia said. “She’s fourteen. Second-born, after Sufiyan. And she has more of a temper than the rest of the family combined.”

More of a temper, perhaps, Aiz thought.But her father is more deadly.

“Ruhyan—Ruh—reminds me of a girl I knew back home,” Aiz said. “Hani. She loves the wind too.”

Laia tilted her head. Her expression was mild, but there was steel in the set of her jaw. “My family is protective,” Laia said. “But I do not think you are here to kill me.”

“I’m not,” Aiz said, and she recalled what Dolbra had told her. “You are a history-keeper and storyteller for your Tribe. A story hunter. I imagine that means that you’ve told stories others don’t wish told. And that makes them angry.”

Laia looked at her in surprise. “Yes,” she said. “You understand the role of a Kehanni well.”

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