Chapter 1
Aeldryc
Thebrightsunmademe wince as I stepped through the doors into the stable yard with a detachment of the Grey Guard. I’d sent word ahead to the grooms, and our three massive faebred warhorses stood in a line along the hitching post beside one far-too-gorgeous silver elven warmblood. They stomped their hooves as we approached, eager to get moving.
“Why is Bram in his leather barding?” I asked the groom, as he fell into step beside me, half jogging to keep up. “Is there news of danger?”
Thom shook his head. “Bram insisted. Said it was undignified to go without.”
I shot Thom a look. “I thought we agreed to stop pretending my horse talks.”
“If I recall, we agreed that intense eye contact, head bobs, snorts, and ear flicks can constitute a language.”
I tolerated Thom’s cheekiness for one reason: because Bram liked him. Finding a stablehand that my faebred didn’t try to bite was a victory, and I had a feeling Bram liked Thom specifically because of Thom’s horse language theory. As I approached, Bram shook his head, ears tilting toward me in question.
“There’s word of a disturbance,” I said, running my hand down his muzzle. “Nothing too thrilling, I hope.”
His nostrils flared and he butted me in the chest, huffing with a frustration that I felt all too well. Neither of us hoped the Great Peace would come to an end, but the general lack of violence in the kingdom had left us without purpose.
I slipped Bram one of the sugar cubes I kept in a pouch on my belt. Two-hundred-year-old faebred warhorses shouldn’t be addicted to sugar cubes, but it was his one vice, so I let him have it.
I mounted and turned Bram and kicked him into motion, trusting the three Grey Guard I’d selected for this mission to follow me. The ride out of Feravael was all thundering hooves and purpose. We moved in a loose formation through the palace gates and past the sprawl of the capital city, through stone buildings stacked tight along winding streets.
Feravael was beautiful in the way that old, powerful cities were: a chaotic assemblage of years of construction, one thing on topof another, with minimal advance planning, but a lot of pride. People in the streets parted for our warhorses, and I was sure they were curious. The Grey Guard didn’t ride for parades; our presence meant something was happening.
Beyond the city walls, the road south unwound through farmland, past the border of the capital, past villages where the architecture shifted from fae stonework to the simpler timber-and-thatch of the outer counties. The further we rode from the capital, the quieter the ride became, until even the road beneath us was packed earth and gravel and surrounded by rolling green hills.
“All right, let’s get the betting started,” Vaelith said, once we were out of earshot of any civilians. She was an air elemental who could call storms with a flick of her wrist, and summon bad jokes almost as fast. “I’m thinking boundary dispute.”
“You always bet boundary dispute.” My second-in-command, Thyren, should not have been betting.
“It’s our most common call. Waste of our talents, if you ask me,” Vaelith said, adjusting her sword belt. “What’s your wager?”
Thyren considered this for a long moment. “Clover growing in unusual patterns.”
Vaelith barked a laugh. “Oh, fuck off.”
“It’s a dark omen in Clovermere. In the past two months, I’ve been to two clover patches to investigate the presence of evil.”
“Was it evil?”
“No. Once, it was a rabbit with a creative eating pattern. The other time, a sleeping cow had flattened a circular area. Both were matters that could have easily been solved by the local magistrate.”
Vaelith whooped. “Holy hell, peace makes people paranoid. You in, Commander? Loser buys a round of drinks at the Silver Stag.”
I snorted. “It’s probably that band of highwaymen again. The magistrates don’t like to deal with them.”
“It’s a person,” Ilyndra said, interrupting our banter.
I glanced back. Ilyndra’s pale gold eyes were focused on something far down the road. There was a stillness in her that meant she was listening to the world in a way the rest of us couldn’t.
Vaelith narrowed her eyes at her wife. “Elves don’t get to participate in the bets. You know the rules. Your magic makes it too easy to win.” Vaelith, Thyren and I were fae, connecting to the earth’s elements. Ilyndra’s elven magic sensed the life that moved upon it. So if she said it was a person, it was a person.
“What kind of person would require the Grey Guard?” Thyren asked.
“A kind I’ve never felt before.” She paused. “Interesting.”
Vaelith perked up, standing in her stirrups to look down the road. “Dangerous interesting?”
