Violette Malan - The Sleeping God

“Who else knows?” Parno said, tapping the side of his face next to his eyes when she looked at him with raised brows.

“You’re the only one I’ve told.” Dhulyn answered the question he’d really asked. She’d only told Parno himself when they talked of Partnering-not fair to him otherwise. And she’d only been able to tell him because she had Seen the manner of his death. Knowing the one thing that she must never tell him had left her free to tell him everything else.

At first he’d been delighted, thinking they’d soon be the richest Mercenaries in the Brotherhood. They’d know which jobs would be successful, and which would end in disaster, who would pay up promptly and honestly, and who try to cheat. He’d soon learned that she couldn’t use her Mark to answer specific questions, and when it did work, it wasn’t reliable and steady like the Finders or Menders he’d known, but so chancy and sporadic as to be more liability than asset.

“ ’Course it wasn’t dangerous then, for others to know.”

“No,” she said. “Just no one’s business. I tell you I’m safe enough.” She thought for a moment. “Dorian knows, I believe. Though he’s said nothing.”

“You’ll be safe with any of the Brotherhood, I should think, let alone the man who Schooled you.”

Dhulyn nodded. For Mercenaries, the Brotherhood was their religion.

Parno leaned back on his cot and stretched out his legs in front of him, as far as the limited floor space would allow. “Linkon says the last rumors out of Gotterang before the Snow Moon closed the passes fit what the Finders told us. The New Believers are pressing the Tarkin for measures against the Marked, and he’ll either have to give in, or refuse outright and take the consequences.” Parno looked up from beneath his golden brows. “And, apparently, there will be consequences.”

Dhulyn turned over on her side again, this time propping herself on one elbow. The slanted ceiling-their room was under the eaves of the inn-prevented her from sitting up. “I’ve read of such things in the past, but if I hadn’t seen and heard it for myself, I’d find it hard to believe that people could be turned against the Marked.”

Parno nodded. “People can be persuaded to hate and fear what they don’t understand-even something useful and homey like a Mender or a Finder.” He shrugged. “Healers, though, that would take some persuasion.”

“There’s not so many Healers, however, even the books mention that. Though more than Seers, that’s certain.”

“I can remember talk of such things when I was a child,” Parno said. “The Market Dance at the Harvest Fair, they’d get someone to stand in the center to be the Seer, usually whichever young maid had been chosen Lady Harvest.”

“One of your sisters?” Dhulyn asked with a smile.

“When they could bully enough people into it,” Parno admitted, laughing. “Certainly no one ever expected a real Seer to show up.”

Dhulyn rolled over onto her back again. There had been a fair amount written over the years about the Marked, but what she had never yet found in any book or scroll was mention of her tribe. Her height and coloring marked her for an Outlander, but she’d met only one man who had seen her and instantly known which Outlander tribe she came from. How Dorian the Black Traveler knew of the Espadryn, Dhulyn never learned. All she knew was that he had taken her from the hold of the slave ship, put salve on her cut face, spoken to her in her own tongue, saying “come with me, and learn to kill whoever hurts you.” And she had gone with him, and learned. And somehow she had never asked whether Dorian also knew about the women of her people.

“If you’ll be all right,” Parno said, getting to his feet. “I have an… appointment.” Dhulyn saw for the first time that he was wearing his finest clothes, which at this moment meant his cleanest.

“And what are you using for money?” She looked up, and their eyes met.

“I need none,” he said. Now she could see his smile as well as hear it in his voice. “This one loves me.” He gave her a courtly bow.

“Your wenching will kill you one day,” she muttered.

Parno’s face drained of color and he clamped his jaw tight.

“Just an expression,” she said quickly, hauling herself up on her elbow again. Still pale, he continued to look at her, eyes narrowed, likely calculating whether she might be annoyed enough about the valerian to tell him the one thing she had promised never to tell. She held out her hand to him.

“Never, my soul,” she said.

He touched the tips of her fingers with his own, brushed the back of her scarred knuckles lightly with his lips. “In Battle,” he said. He gave her a more pronounced bow, and was gone before she could answer.

“Or in Death,” she said to the empty room.

Ah well, she thought, settling back into the warmth of the bed. He’d believed her; all to the good since she’d told him the truth. If only she could keep her temper. Her thoughts began to float with her return to sleep.

Never wanted to have the blooded Visions, she thought sleepily, and less so now . Unless perhaps something was going to show her why Parno so badly wanted to return to the land of his birth.

“Are you the one they call Dhulyn the Scholar?” A plump, compact, no-nonsense woman of middle years stood at their table, prosperously but not fashionably dressed in a good wool overtunic with expensively dyed yellow trim. This matron was accompanied by a young girl, dressed not quite so well. Even this early in the evening both women managed to look out of place in the public taproom of an inn. Though it was likely the men of their household would not.

“I am.” Dhulyn looked up from the loose pages in her hands and smiled her wolf’s smile, the scar, normally too small to be seen in itself, pulling her lip up into a snarl. Parno did not trouble to hide his own grin as he watched the woman, already starting to seat herself on the stool across the table, unconsciously check her movement for a long minute before slowly setting herself down. She then looked Dhulyn Wolfshead sharply up and down, to show she had not been frightened.

Parno knew what the townswoman saw-knew what he had seen when he first noticed Dhulyn across a field of armored forms fighting and limp bodies fallen. A woman much taller than the average, hawk-faced, pale skin lightly damaged by the northern sun, beaded thongs tying back long hair the dark color of old blood. The hair had been permanently removed over each ear and the skin tattooed blue and green in her Mercenary badge. Tonight she was not in battle leathers, but dressed in loose wool trousers dyed a dark blue and gathered at the ankle above leather slippers. A tight vest made from scraps of silks and wool, and bits of leather, quilted together with ribbon and laces, left her arms bare as if she did not feel the cold. Armed, but not obviously, and not for war.

The woman would see an Outlander Mercenary. Nothing more.

“Hmph,” the townswoman nodded. “The landlord here has put out that you’re looking for work.” She looked pointedly around the tavern room. The place was almost empty. Linkon Grey was preparing for his late night by taking a nap, leaving his daughter Nikola in charge. It was early yet for drinking, though the supper hour was not so far off. The place smelled faintly of spilled ale, and not so faintly of the fish oil they used in the lamps. The townswoman’s eye rested longest on a table of young persons near the staircase, too friendly to be anything but professionals waiting for trade.

“Strange place to find a scholar,” she finally said.

“I’m a Mercenary, townswoman. Not a shopgirl.”