Page 137 of The BoneKeeper's Daughter

Truth, but a muddy truth.

“Just friends?” I ask, almost against my will. There’s nothing to be gained from the question. But for some reason I have to know.

“Yes,” she replies, almost absentmindedly, still looking at them, hesitant smile turning her lips up at the corners. “Just friends.”

Lie.

A BLADE AND A BODY

WREN

The blade pulsed when her blood hit it. Itpulsed, thrummed in my hand when it drank the one, two, three tiny crimson drops. The hum was almost audible, a confused sort of hunger that had me trembling. But there’s been no time to consider it, no time to think about it since, and it gets pushed aside, put in the steadily growing pile oflater, later, later.Later, where Tahrik’s memory is tucked away, where Silas’s face is hidden, where the sound of crushing rocks and screaming villagers is muffled. Where everything goes that threatens to overwhelm and consume me. Whenlaterfinally arrives, there will be a reckoning that will free or destroy me. But it’s not for this moment.

Last night ended too quickly, too suddenly. One second Rannoch and Kaden were there, smiling at me from across the fire, and I felt, for the first time in days, as though I could breathe again. The next they were being led away from me before I could even speak to them, before I could — I don’t know. I don’t know what I would have done. But I didn’t have a chance to doanything.Kylabet whistled sharply, there was a rustle from the trees, a man came out, and then they were gone.

“They’re safer away from you,” she said cryptically once they weretaken from the clearing. I didn’t respond, just kept my eyes fixed on the forest wall where the shadows had swallowed them, and she shrugged. “A caution, SoulBinder. No one will be happy you’re here.Noone. And any who are associated with you would be rotted grain from the same field, you understand? It will be hard enough for me to keep breath in your body; if you value their…friendship…I would not make it widely known.” Then, almost as an afterthought, added, “And that is the only kindness I will do you for free. Don’t expect more.”

I heard her, took her words to heart, but it didn’t ease the aching longing for their presence, for their familiarity and steadiness to help navigate the chaos of the past week. The emptiness was all encompassing — having them so close, yet unable to be with them — and coated my tongue with the bitter taste of first blooms in the Month of the Maiden. So I sat mute, staring at the fire, unmoving, for a long time, while Kylabet and her brother argued in terse tones. The normal liquid, musical sound of their language was spiked and curt, crackling back and forth until he made a sudden sharp, dismissive motion which silenced her instantly. She straightened immediately, snapped her heels together, and walked away without further discussion. And though Axton watched her, face troubled, he didn’t stop her. So when he turned to me and pointed at my sleeping roll without speaking, dark with anger, with frustration and confusion, I knew well enough to bite my tongue. He seemed surprised when I went to my bed with no protest, but I think even my silent obedience made him suspicious, because I could feel his heavy gaze on me until I finally drifted to sleep. I wanted to wake Lorcan, to rouse him for some kind of selfish comfort, but was too worried about when I’d next be able to anoint him, so I took what solace I could in the feel of him wound against my neck.

This morning started early, before the birds rose, before night had faded, before the fire had fully died. Kylabet appeared from nowhere, silent as an owl on the wing, leading a massive horse behind her. Axton was already up and about, tying up packs and loading his mount. They exchanged terse words, the conversation from the nightbefore clearly bleeding into this morning, then approached me together.

Axton sank to his heels by me, entire body tense. “Wake, Binder. It’s time to join the camp.” Kylabet made a small sound at the back of her throat at his words, and he held up a hand to stall further objections. “Enough,” he snapped. “We cannot continue at this pace, and I need to be in the main encampment. Binder, this is your mount for the time being.”

My brain was still sleep-addled, and I’d responded in stuttering surprise. “My…my mount?”

Rolling his eyes, he slowed his speech as though talking to a child. “Yes. Your horse. You can’t continue riding with me. You’ll be assigned a rotating guard. Every day one of my Riders will accompany you, but from this point on you will be responsible for yourself, your horse, your bedroll. Even the children in our land can manage those basics; we can’t expect less from you.”

Stiffening, I sat upright, curiously affronted. “I’ll manage,” I ground out, and tried not to smack him when he raised a disbelieving brow.

“We’ll see. Kylabet — yours to instruct, then pass her off and report.” With no further words, he turned and vaulted smoothly onto his horse, the movement startling an unintended gasp from me.

Kylabet studied me, then shook her head almost in disappointed acceptance, lips pursed. “You’re not going to survive this, Binder. That’s not a threat. It’s just an observation. Do what you can to make peace with it.”

“I’m more capable than you give me credit for, BloodLetter’s sister,” I snapped back, and she laughed.

“Perhaps. Perhaps. Up and mount. I will help with your supplies this first time, if only for brevity’s sake. But after this morning, it is up to you.” She’d motioned toward the massive beast; it had taken everything in me to walk to it without hesitation, to clamber onto it awkwardly as it shifted, snorting, beneath my graceless attempt to pull myself up from the stirrup to the saddle. Kylabet watched the entire time through an amused and knowing gaze.

“If you can’t even mount a horse by yourself, Binder, there’s no hope for you.”

“I can…mount…a…horse…” I huffed under my breath, and though it took longer than it should have, eventually I found myself on top of the surprisingly patient animal.

“You will have to move faster than that next time,” she smirked, then leapt on her own ride with enviable dexterity. “This quick. Or as close to. Walk on,” she chirped to her ready animal, who pulled at the bit, obviously eager to go. My own…well. After some encouragement in the form of firm heels to its side, and a brief struggle between its desire to eat the small bushes beside the road and my fairly weak attempts to pull its head from them, eventually it moved, muscles curling and uncurling in barely constrained power. The horse beneath me was as different from our village ponies as pure water from salt; something unexpected and wild seized my throat as we emerged from the forested area into an open field. The thought of leaning over the horse’s strong body and letting it gallop to the horizon, or further, filled me with strange longing.

An echo of it must have shown on my face, because Kylabet tilted her head when she looked at me, and for the first time a hint of approval crossed her sharp features. “You’re not totally without sense, I see, Binder. We have half of an hour, perhaps slightly more, until we’re with the main group. This is the length of time I have to give you enough information to keep you safe. Or at least, to keep my word that I tried.”

Nodding silently, I made every effort to focus on her while also doing my best not to fall off my mount and snap my neck.

“The BloodLetter is the Band Commander. You will not refer to him as anything other than BloodLetter, or your veins will be opened without question. You should have no reason to see him, unless he calls for you. Next are Flank Commanders. He has two. I am one of them. Once we reach the Band, you will not address me at all. The familiarity we have shown ceases immediately. There are things for the forest that are not for the field. Below Flanks are Riders. They are divided into two companies — those who are Blood Bound, and thenfollowing, those who are simply sworn. Any of these you may approach if you need something.” She hesitated, glanced back at me, and sighed. “If it comes to it, I would try to find a Blood Bound Rider before an Oath Rider. But I would also tryveryhard not to need anything.”

For the next few minutes, she’d rattled off a rainfall of facts about the encampment, ration expectations, where I would sleep, and, above all else, what not to do. The last list was longest, and included “don’t speak often, don’t stare at anyone, don’t draw attention to yourself, and try not to be a burden.”

“No one wants you here, Binder,” she said frankly. “You’re kind does not survive birth in our home. It’s only by the grace of blood that your throat hasn’t been slit from ear to ear in a pretty necklace, hmmm? But here you are, so we adapt.”

She’d sounded calm, almost unconcerned at the time, but as we approached a massive cloud of dust kicked up by a hundred horses or more, she’d grown silent, and now, though her body is still loose in her saddle, her jaw is tight. The languid, amused woman from the day before is disappearing with every step we take closer to the camp, replaced by the gleaming edge of an exposed blade, deadly and decisive. I don’t recognize the woman on the horse next to me anymore, and I wonder which is nearer to her true self, or if she’s just two equal sides of the same coin.

As we enter what seems to be the outskirts of the large band, the people nearest to us, all on foot, dart careful glances our way, first curious, then fearful, though surprisingly I can’t tell if it is me or Kylabet that has them shying away like skittish deer. Either way, they press back from us as unobtrusively as possible, trying to make their dropped eyes and stiff bodies seem natural. Most walk next to heavily laden pack horses, in between groaning, wooden wagons that look nothing like the Traders’. These are more utilitarian — long, open rectangles loaded with bags and what looks to be rolled hay or grass, pulled by massive, muscled horses with flowing manes and hooves that glint with iron on the bottoms.

Many of the people have a cloth pulled up over their mouths tokeep the grit from their faces, but the area around their eyes is coated with a thick layer of dirt, a testament to how long they’ve been trudging behind the storm kicked up by the riders in front of us. Their clothing is similarly covered in greyish-brown dust, as are the packs every single person has strapped to their backs. I don’t notice any weapons or belted blades, though perhaps those are easy to disguise. Theydoseem well fed, and not unhappy, just meticulously aware of Kylabet, or myself, and desperately desirous not to draw any attention to themselves.

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