Chapter 170: All Of You

James waited almost twenty seconds before he asked again, which was impressive.

"What did it say?"

I kept the note folded in my hand. "Words."

"I gathered that."

"Then we’re making progress."

He leaned closer, and I moved the note away. James looked offended. "I’m not going to steal it."

"You considered it."

"I did not."

Daphne looked at him, and James sighed. "Briefly."

The carriage started moving again. Renn had spoken to the two riders, checked whatever identification they carried, and then sent one of them back toward Merrow’s estate while the other joined the rear escort. Nobody had attacked us, and nothing had exploded. For once, stopping had only produced a letter. I should have appreciated that more. Instead, I opened the note again.

I have the thirteen. Get to Halden. All of you, this time.

The words hadn’t changed.

Elizabeth had stopped holding out her hand, which was good. She was still looking at me, which was less good.

Sophie glanced between us. "Miarielle is the beastkin representative?"

"Apparently."

"The one Saera was waiting for?"

"One of them."

"The woman from when you were twelve?"

I looked at her, and Sophie lifted both hands. "The magistrate asked loudly."

That was fair.

James leaned back. "Who is she?"

"Mia."

"I know that part."

"Then why ask?"

"Alash."

I considered pretending to sleep, but four people were watching me, and Daphne was the one not looking directly at me, which somehow counted most. I sighed.

"Miarielle Veyra. Lyssairia’s mother."

Elizabeth’s expression shifted slightly. "The woman who gave you the token?"

"Her daughter gave me the token."

"So Lyssairia is..."

"She leads the Cat faction."

"And Miarielle?"

I looked out of the window. Fields went past, with nothing suspicious in them, which was how I preferred fields. "Important."

James waited. "That’s all?"

"For now."

"You’re terrible at explaining people."

"People are complicated."

"You explained Renn as tired."

"Accurately."

Sophie smiled. Elizabeth didn’t. Her eyes went to the folded note.

"What does ’all of you’ mean?"

She hadn’t asked to see it again, which meant she had read enough of it upside down before I folded it. Princesses were dangerous.

"Exactly what it says."

"Alash."

"I know."

The carriage lurched over a rut, and Dream Haven absorbed most of it. I unfolded the note one more time and handed it to Elizabeth. James made a wounded sound.

"You wouldn’t show me."

"Correct."

"Why her?"

"She stopped asking."

"That’s backwards."

"It worked."

Elizabeth read the line. Sophie leaned in, and James immediately moved to her other side to read it too. Daphne stayed where she was. She probably didn’t need to read it twice. Elizabeth handed the note back.

"All of you, this time."

"Yes."

Sophie was quiet. James wasn’t. "What happened last time?"

Nobody told him to stop, which probably meant I had to answer. I rested my head against Dream Haven.

"Three beastkin escorted me back to human territory. Cat, deer and rabbit. Three different factions chose them."

Nyra, watching every tree as though it had personally offended her. Caelum, ridiculously tall, ducking under branches that would have cleared anyone else. Vessa’s ears. For a moment the carriage wasn’t a carriage. Then it was again.

"All three of them died getting me home," I said.

Nobody spoke, which helped. I looked out of the window.

"They got me close enough. My father came for me after that."

Sophie lowered her eyes. James’s hands had gone still. Elizabeth looked at the note in my hand.

"So Mia isn’t telling you to survive this time," she said. "She’s telling you not to arrive alone."

I looked at her. "Something like that."

James leaned back. "That’s why you wouldn’t show us."

"No."

"No?"

"I didn’t show you because you’re nosy."

His face changed, and Sophie laughed before she could stop herself, and the pressure in the carriage loosened, a little.

Daphne finally looked at me. "Three."

"Yes."

"You remember them."

It wasn’t a question. "Yes."

She nodded once, and said nothing else. I appreciated her, quietly.

***

The northwest road was worse than the western one, which I took personally. The carriage tilted around stones and shallow ditches, and one stretch that Renn’s riders insisted still counted as a road despite all the evidence. It was also the road the Crown used to supply Halden, which meant fewer inns and more soldiers, and Renn meant to cover in two long days what the original route had spread across a string of comfortable stops. Nobody asked me how I felt about that.

We stopped twice the first morning, both times at Crown checkpoints, and neither involved violence. I was beginning to distrust the pattern. The closer we came to Halden, the more soldiers there were: small patrols at first, then mounted companies, then supply wagons rolling west with Crown markings painted down their sides. The treaty had turned half the border into a moving warehouse of food, canvas, weapons, medicine and paper, especially paper. Apparently governments could wage peace with as much logistics as war. Possibly more. War only required convincing people to kill each other. Peace involved seating arrangements.

***

At midday, Sorel checked all of us. James said his chest didn’t hurt, too quickly, and got told so. Daphne said her head was fine and stared at Sorel until Sorel believed her; I liked Daphne’s medical strategy, though it would never have worked for me. When Sorel put a hand flat against my chest and told me to breathe, it barely hurt.

"Better," she said.

"Excellent. Barrier?"

"Tomorrow, if it stays this good."

I considered arguing. Then I remembered what staying in bed had achieved. Growth was terrible. "Fine."

Sorel looked suspicious. "You agreed."

"Yes."

"That’s why I’m suspicious."

***

We ate without leaving the carriage. Renn now considered roadside meals an unnecessary security risk, and I agreed, because it meant nobody made me stand up. The food was cold. Every victory has its limits. Sophie had fruit. James had somehow acquired twice as much bread as everyone else. Elizabeth was reading the route card Renn had given her. Daphne was asleep, really asleep, her head resting against the carriage wall and moving slightly whenever a wheel found a bad patch.

I watched her for a second, and then stopped. The System said nothing.

I was still deciding what Daphne’s bond meant. Not mechanically. Mechanically it meant almost nothing useful: no Healing Bond, no recovery, no progress on the Path, no cooldown. But the Main Quest counted it. Three of four.

I looked at Elizabeth’s route card. Not at Elizabeth: at the route card. There was a difference.

For years I had needed to bond with four people I didn’t know. That had been simple while they were documents: names, profiles, potential, titles. Then they had become people. James was still annoying. Sophie was still dangerously cheerful. Daphne had become someone who could say two words and make me stand in front of a Tiger who was trying to break my Barrier. Elizabeth was...

I stopped. That was enough thinking for one meal.

[Agreed.]

’Nobody asked you.’

[You were approaching unnecessary reflection.]

’That’s rude.’

[Accurate.]

I ate more cold bread. The System was getting too comfortable.

***

We spent that night at a Crown post with stone walls and very thin mattresses, and I slept anyway, because I am a professional.

The landscape changed on the second day. There were fewer farms and more stone. The hills rose higher, grey-green in the afternoon light, and the road widened until two supply wagons could pass without one of them ending up in a ditch. Crown watchtowers stood along the ridges, some old and some new, and some repaired so many times that the original tower had probably given up.

I knew this region. Not every road or every hill, but its shape: the way trees thinned near the patrol routes, the way every bridge had enough stone around it to become a defensive position, the way villages sat further back from the main road than villages did further east. Border country. People here expected strangers. They just didn’t trust them.

I shifted against Dream Haven, and Sophie noticed. "You know where we are."

"A little."

"Your face changed."

"My face is the same."

James looked over. "It did change."

I disliked traveling with observant people. Elizabeth lowered the route sheet.

"How far are we from where you crossed?"

"I don’t know exactly."

That was true. On the way back we hadn’t followed roads. We had followed forests, caves, dry riverbeds, anything that made meeting soldiers less likely.

"Close?" said Sophie.

"Close enough."

Nobody pushed, which was new. I appreciated it too much to mention it.

***

We saw Fort Halden late in the afternoon. James saw it first. "There."

Everyone moved to the windows. I stayed where I was, and then curiosity won, which was embarrassing.

Fort Halden sat where two ridges narrowed toward the west. It was larger than I remembered, or I had been smaller; probably both. Grey walls climbed out of the ridge itself, built in layers rather than squares, with three separate gates and towers set into the higher ground. The Crown’s banner flew above the central keep, and below it hung more flags, some of which I recognized and most of which I didn’t. Temporary camps filled the fields to the east and south of the walls: rows of tents, supply wagons, horses, soldiers, officials. There were far too many people. I regretted coming immediately.

Sophie pressed closer to the glass. "That’s a fort?"

"What did you expect?" said James.

"Something smaller."

"So did I," I said.

Elizabeth looked at me. "You’ve been here?"

"Near it."

"Not inside?"

"No."

The last time I had been this far west, reaching a human fort had been the entire point. Going inside it hadn’t mattered. Safety had been on the far side of the next patrol, and then the next, and then my father. I touched the note in my pocket. All of you, this time. Annoying woman.

"The signing is the day after tomorrow," said Elizabeth, to nobody in particular, and folded the route card away.

***

We didn’t go straight in. First there was a checkpoint, and then another checkpoint, and then paperwork, and then more paperwork confirming that the first paperwork had been correct.

James leaned against the carriage. "Peace is terrible."

Elizabeth didn’t look up from what she was signing. "You’ve been here four minutes."

"Exactly."

A Crown officer read from his list. "Princess Elizabeth Aurelius."

"Yes."

"Lord James Vellaroux."

"Unfortunately," I said.

James looked at me. The officer looked confused. Elizabeth closed her eyes.

"Yes," said James.

"Lady Sophie Trohan."

Sophie raised a hand.

"Lady Daphne Spinster."

Daphne nodded.

"Lord Alash Vortex."

I stayed seated against Dream Haven. The officer waited.

"He’s alive," said Sorel.

"I can see that."

"Then why are you waiting?"

Renn turned slowly to look at me, and I sighed. "Yes."

The officer made a mark. I had successfully entered international diplomacy.

***

The third gate was different. Human soldiers stood on our side of it, and beastkin stood on the other: only six of them. Two were Cat, and one was Deer. One was a broad man with curved horns I didn’t recognize, and there were two more whose factions I couldn’t place. Nobody had a weapon drawn. Everyone had a weapon. That was a different thing.

The carriage went quiet. James looked through the window openly. Sophie tried not to. Daphne didn’t bother pretending. Elizabeth had gone very still, in the way she did when she was making sure every part of her looked like a princess.

I watched the nearest of the Cats. He was older than Lyssairia had been, with golden eyes, and I didn’t know him. He looked into our carriage, and his gaze passed over Elizabeth, James, Sophie and Daphne, and stopped on me. I waited. His ears moved once. Then he turned and said something to the woman beside him, and she looked too. Wonderful.

"I think they know you," James whispered.

"Quiet."

"You didn’t deny it."

"I also didn’t throw you out of the carriage."

"That isn’t..."

"James," said Elizabeth, and he stopped.

One of the Cats walked over to Renn, and they spoke for less than a minute. Then both of them looked at our carriage, and Renn came over.

"Vortex."

"No."

"I haven’t asked you anything."

"I know how this works."

"Someone from the beastkin delegation wants to confirm you’re here."

"Why?"

"They requested you."

They had. I had temporarily forgotten. "Now?"

Renn looked at the forty people waiting to process us through the gate. "No. Apparently they’re capable of waiting until we’re inside."

"Good."

He turned away. "Who?" I asked.

Renn looked back. "I wasn’t given a name."

***

Inside, Halden was worse. There were people everywhere. The fort had been built for soldiers, and someone had filled it with diplomats, and the result was unnatural. Uniforms passed formal robes. Crown clerks carried boxes of documents through courtyards where soldiers were drilling. Beastkin banners hung from buildings that had almost certainly been designed to keep beastkin out. Nobody commented on that. I noticed.

Several courtyards had been divided with ropes and painted markers: the human delegation, the beastkin delegation, the Foreign Office, Zenith, the Crown military, medical, supply. There was even one marked for the chroniclers. I turned away from that immediately.

"No," I said.

Sophie followed my eyes. "They haven’t done anything."

"They might."

Elizabeth looked amused. "You’re a duke’s son attending a historic treaty signing after uncovering trafficked beastkin under a Crown lord’s estate."

I looked at her. "Why would you say that out loud?"

"To prepare you."

"You’ve made it worse."

"Good."

I had trusted her once. A mistake.

***

Our rooms were in the eastern officers’ residence, which apparently meant stairs, a great many of them. I objected, and nobody cared. Renn posted two Academy guards in the corridor and disappeared with Elizabeth and Sorel to report our arrival. James wanted to go with them, Renn told him no, and James complained for three flights. Sophie went to find food. Daphne went to her room. I made it to mine, let Dream Haven expand across the bed, and lay down. Victory.

There were voices outside, doors, boots, someone arguing about delegation credentials. None of it involved me, which was excellent. I closed my eyes, and three knocks came almost at once. I stared at the ceiling.

"No."

Another knock.

"I’ve reached my limit."

"Alash."

Not Sorel, and not Renn: Elizabeth. I considered whether princesses could legally be ignored, and the door opened, so apparently the law was irrelevant. Elizabeth stepped in. She was still in her travel clothes, but someone had already handed her a folder. I suspected folders bred near government buildings.

"You didn’t lock it," she said.

"I had hope."

"You shouldn’t. Someone is asking for you."

"I’ve been here seven minutes."

"Nine."

"That’s worse. Who?"

"The beastkin delegation."

"That isn’t a person."

"They refused to give the guard a name."

"Then I refuse to stand up."

Elizabeth looked at Dream Haven, and then at me. "I told them you’d say that."

I closed my eyes again. She didn’t leave. I opened one.

"What?"

"They said to tell you they know you’re awake."

I sat up. Elizabeth’s expression was far too neutral.

"Their exact words?"

"Yes. And: ’He was always bad at pretending.’"

I stared at her. That wasn’t Mia. Mia rarely wasted words explaining things everyone already knew. Someone else did.

I stood up, and Elizabeth’s eyebrows rose. "You didn’t even complain."

"Don’t make it significant."

"It already is."

I picked up Dream Haven. "Where?"