“Hello? Luc?”
Padding outside, he stopped in astonishment when he came across a pair of boots by the door. They were exactly his size andlooked sturdy, if slightly worn. He put them on, wondering where they’d come from. Maybe the Arcanist had stolen them. Maybe they had belonged to his last “apprentice,” before Luc turned the poor fool into Cryptic bait.
Still. A boot was a boot, and if he left them sitting there, Supper would come along and eat them.
Outside, Rolan got his first look at just where he was. The Arcanist’s house was bigger than it looked from the inside, with a tall, steeply pointed roof, a crooked chimney, and several outbuildings scattered about. The land to the west and north was rolling green grassland with sheep and goats milling around, doing sheep and goat things. To the east and south, the woods loomed like storm clouds, and he couldn’t stare at their shadowy depths for long without feeling ill.
The city was depressingly distant, the walls rising so far to the west that when Rolan lifted his hand, he could obscure it entirely.
It would be a long walk back.
All that connected him to home was a thin dirt trail through the grass. That was the way he’d go. He’d follow that path to the city. Maybe he’d even meet Anaya and Evaine on their way out to Sylvet. Maybe he’d just leave Crisanth behind and go withthem.
Hearing a sudden splash, Rolan turned to see the Arcanist standing over a large wooden trough. He was pouring a bucket of water into it. When he noticed Rolan watching, Luc gave the boy a grim nod. He took a bar of soap from his pocket.
Rolan got a queasy feeling.
He eyed the path to the city.
Before he could work up the nerve to run, Luc walked over tohim. He was wearing dark trousers held up by suspenders, and the sleeves of his rough linen shirt were rolled to his ample biceps. Rolan could not help but stare at the tattoos that swirled over his arms. They were monstrous, literally. Cryptics curled and clashed and roared on the Arcanist’s skin in vivid, horrible detail. When his muscles flexed, they seem to come alive, the ink flowing in malevolent lines. And was it his imagination, or did the tattoosglowfaintly?
“What’s the water for?” asked Rolan, dreading the answer.
“You,” grunted Luc.
“I ain’t taking no bath!”
“Youaren’ttaking a bath,” corrected Luc. “Except youare, because you stink to the skies. When’s the last time you washed?”
“Last month,” lied Rolan. In fact, he couldn’t properly recall the last bath he’d had. There was no tub in his pa’s hideout, and he couldn’t go bathe in the river that ran through Crisanth. The last time he’d tried, the gang of older kids who patrolled the banks had tied him up and dangled him upside down from the bridge. When they’d dropped him in, he’d nearly drowned. Anaya had to drag him out. Perhaps that counted as his last real bath, then. Which meant it had been… over two years.
He gave Luc a wobbly smile. “I’m perfectly clean. I’m practicallyshiny. It’s Supper you’re smelling.” Leaning toward Luc, he added, “And let’s be honest… probablyyourself.”
The Arcanist moved so quickly that he had an arm around Rolan before the boy could even blink. One minute he was standing innocently in the grass, and the next he was pinned under Luc’s arm like a sack of grain.
“Put me down!” yelled Rolan. He beat his fists on the only partof Luc he could reach—his rib cage. But the man didn’t even flinch. It was as effective as a squirrel punching an oak tree. “Put me—not there!”
When Luc did drop him, it was headfirst into the wooden tub, pausing only long enough to yank off Rolan’s new boots. Rolan twisted and spluttered, splashed and cursed, as Luc dumped another bucket of freezing water right over Rolan’s head. Then he chucked a brick of soap into the tub before retreating to a safe distance where even the most violent of Rolan’s splashes couldn’t reach him.
“If you want lunch,” said Luc, arms folded over his chest, “scrub.”
“You got my clothes all wet!” Rolan complained.
“They need it as much as you do.”
Puffing out an annoyed breath, Rolan picked up the soap and glared directly at Luc as he raked it over his hair. Luc waited long enough to be sure Rolan would follow through, then disappeared into the barn behind the house, giving Rolan privacy.
“Stupid Arcanist,” muttered Rolan as he peeled himself out of his soaked clothes and tossed them to the grass. “Stupid bath.”
Then Supper wandered near, ignored Rolan’s threats, and made off with his pants. Rolan sighed, knowing he’d likely never see those pants again. Pity. They were his only pair.
“Stupid goat,” he grumbled.
The water wasn’t as cold as it had seemed at first. The Arcanist must have heated it somehow. Rolan finished washing then sat for a while, watching the clouds roll overhead and the goats butt heads in the grass. A lazy feeling stole over him. When was the last time he’d been cleanandhad a full belly? Not that he’d ever give Luc the satisfaction of knowing he might actually beenjoyingthe bath.
He was fully submerged in the warm, sudsy water, with just his nose above and still dry, when he glimpsed something out of the corner of his eye—a flash of steel.
A dagger!
