Page 134 of The Duke and the Disciple

“We’ll drown, Calder. We can all make it to shore!”

“You’re not a Rhiagain. Our father will have all your heads if you don’t let go!”

“Tindahl?”

Rahn’s eyes rolled upward to look at the cloud-darkened sky from one side, the wood beams of the forge on the other. Vertigo crashed over him, his ears ringing so loud, there were no competing sounds. He was on the ground. Half in the structure, half out.

“He’s all right! We’re fine,” Pieter said. He shooed onlookers with his arms, and the guards drifted away, muttering in confusion. “Any reason you’re on your back?”

Rahn eyeballed the man’s hand with distrust but took it, worried he might fall again and draw even more notice. “Thank you,” he muttered, dusting himself off. When he blinked, he saw the White Sea again. The utter nothingness. “A dizzy spell is all.”

“Dizzy spell...” Pieter squinted in suspicion. “Some wine?”

“No need.” Rahn glanced at his hands to find them shaking. He shoved them under his cloak and turned his attention back to the blacksmith, who was completely unfazed by Rahn’s episode. The ringing in his ears droned on, a gentle buzz. “Time to leave?”

Pieter laced his hands over his torso with a pained look. “I came over to apologize to you. And... to offer my help.”

The man’s groundless nerve flared Rahn’s nerves back to life. “You and your help,” he retorted, turning to reach for his abandoned scabbard.

“I never intended to harm your work, Rahn, but to aid it.”

Rahn whipped the belt around him and fastened it in a rush. The beady, calculating eyes of Calder and Dacian stared him down, waiting for him to return. “And Revelry? Was thataiding?”

“Did you know the Barynovs had been communicating with Aesylt behind her brother’s back?”

Rahn coiled in anger, but it was directed more at himself, for indulging Pieter at all. “Your presumptions about Aesylt have done nothing good for her. Even the suggestion that they could get a letter to her without Drazhan finding out is madness.”

“I saw the letter. It was from the baron, Esker.” Pieter stepped closer, lowering his tone. “He appealed to her sensibility, offered a quiet end to the civil war if Aesylt surrendered herself to them. Presumably to marry one of his sons, though he didn’t say so specifically.That’swhat I was reading the day she attacked me.”

“Attacked you? You mean defended herself against an unwarranted assault on her person and property?” Rahn retorted. “Your delusions are almost impressive.”

“And she wasreallyupset I’d read it. More than was warranted, if she wasn’t taking the offer seriously. She definitely didn’t want her brother to know. Oryou,as I recall, since she failed to mention it when you asked her what was going on.”

Rahn turned his eyes back toward the blacksmith. He would know if they’d written to her, because she’d been with him almost exclusively since the problems had begun. But for it to be a lie was equally strange. And when Rahn weighed what he remembered of that day with Pieter’s explanation, her behavior made much more sense.

And rendered their final confrontation all the more crushing.

“I thought she was marrying you,” Rahn managed to say.

Pieter laughed. “We both know that was never going to happen. I wish my father had consulted with me, or I’d have saved him the breath and trouble. Curious howyoucounseled him into the idea though. A little counter to your own self-interest, isn’t it?”

“I didn’t—” Rahn drew a bracing breath. He’d already humored Pieter more than he should have.

“Drazhan doesn’t want to send a raven to Witchwood Cross and risk alerting them to our whereabouts, but I’ve suggested we send a faction there ahead of us instead. My gold is on her riding home to follow through on the letter’s offer, and I’d hate to be right... and too late to do anything about it.” Pieter whistled through his teeth.

“Then you don’t know Aesylt.” Eager to get his sword, to leave, Rahn lifted his scabbard from where it rested against the post.

“You never said what happened to her the night at Revelry.”

“What do youthinkhappened to her?” Rahn didn’t release his sword. Day turned to night, the ground to sea and storm. He blinked, recalibrating himself to the present. “Exactly what you intended. And now she’s gone, and the brute who put his hands on her neck is...” Never had he known the depth of regret he owned until that last debilitating conversation between himself and Aesylt. If he’d only?—

“I said I wanted to help, and I do. I’m going to tell you something that could have my family arrested.” Pieter checked to be sure they were alone. “We have our own collective of magi here in Wulfsgate. They aren’t registered with the Sepulchre, and no one knows about them beyond those who need to.” He reached into his cloak and withdrew a familiar nightgown. “I’ve already given this to our seeker. They’re meditating and will have a location soon. Wewillfind her. And when we do, I’m bringing our best healer, just in case.”

Rahn’s breath caught at the sight of the thin fabric. His hands clenched at the tactile memory of smoothing his hands along it... lifting it away from her skin. Oh, but what had he come to regret more, the intimacy or the betrayal of it? “Pray when we do that she’s unharmed and undisturbed, or no amount of penance will absolve either of us.”

“Time to move!” cried a loud, booming voice.

“I don’t expect penance would ever trifle with me, Scholar, but I hold no hope for her forgiveness either.” Pieter clapped a hand atop Rahn’s shoulder. “As for you... First you’ll have to forgive yourself.”

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