Relief tumbled down Fie’s spine. She wrung out her shirt’s hem. “Something like that.”
“Help me fill these, will you?” Wretch tossed a water skin to her.
Hangdog looked from her to Fie, then stomped back toward the camp.
Wretch didn’t speak until his footfalls faded. “He corners you again, you call for me, all right?”
“I can handle him on my own,” Fie mumbled, surprised when her eyes burned. The anger had boiled down to mortified spite. “I just… All I did was play a damn game.”
Wretch dropped the water skins on the bank and waded out to Fie, shaking her gray-streaked head. “Aye, all you did was play a game. And with a pretty boy. And if it were fair, that’s all there’d be to it.”
Wretch wasn’t much for sentiment, but she gripped Fie’s shoulder anyhow. “I would have left you to handle Hangdog. We all know you could trounce him twice with your eyes shut. But when he followed you? The only reason that pretty boy didn’t come haring after was because I beat him to it. And we both know where that road would have led.”
Fie did. And she hated it. All this mess over a stupid game.
“We’re two more days off Cheparok. Then you’re clear of all this nonsense, and we’ll have a Covenant oath to cash out and no more fretting over Oleander rides. That’s a mighty thing, Fie.”
“Aye,” Fie said softly. Two days and it would all be over.
“They’ll come up with a fancy name for you,” Wretch teased. “Tell stories for centuries. Fie Oath-cutter. Fie the Cunning. Fie, the Crow Who Feared No Crown.”
“I’ll settle for Fie, Who Never Saw an Oleander Again.” Fie rubbed her eyes.
There was less jest than truth when Wretch said, “So would we all.”
That night passed, and two more, without Fie looking at Hangdog or the lordlings if she didn’t have to. Instead she huddled in the wagon, practicing her toothcraft as the road turned from sand to rocky clay, and bristling pines shifted to copses of stout palms. Each field they passed seemed lusher than the last, a distant thin ribbon of green broadening into the Fan River, which gave the region its name. That ribbon pointed straight to a hard, jagged line against the coin-bright sea: Cheparok.
And that river marked their way, flashing coy as Fie fought to strike harmony with pair after pair of teeth. As Cheparok neared, Pa looked over his shoulder less, but a telltale creak of the wagon seat still gave him away each time. At least the Pigeon witch-tooth had kept any plague beacons at bay until after they’d passed.
By the time they drew within half a league of the city’s western gates, Fie’s shirt clung horribly to her skin, half from the choking air and half from the murderous sun overhead. Cheparok’s towering walls didn’t even have the decency to cast a long enough noontime shadow to offer respite.
Pa whistled a stop and guided the oxen to the side of the road, then twisted in his seat to face her and the prince. Tavin climbed up into the wagon bed a moment later, prompting a disgruntled mew from Barf as she peered out from behind a sack of rice. The other Crows gathered round.
“Hold up a moment.” Pa cast his gaze about and waited until a band of Owl sojourn-scholars had passed down the flatway. “All right, here’s the pinch: they’ll have Vulture witches at the gate.”
“Why?” Prince Jasimir frowned.
“Checking for witches, mostly unregistered ones from the countryside. That’d be no trouble, but…”
“They’ll spot me for a Hawk witch,” Tavin finished. “One who’s supposed to be dead. So how do we get past?”
“Can’t hide you in the wagon. Odds are we’ll be searched.” Pa continued even as Prince Jasimir tilted his head at that. “We burned our only Sparrow witch-tooth on the Oleanders. We can sneak you through with two plain Sparrow teeth… but the Vultures will pick up on any spell I’m casting when they test my witch-sign. So that leaves Fie.”
Fie’s stomach dropped. “What?”
When, not if.
“It’s time.” Pa held out a fistful of Sparrow teeth. “How’s that practice?”
CHAPTER EIGHT
WHEN
“Step in the footprints.”
“What?” the prince whispered to Fie’s left.
“Don’t make new footprints. Step in Hangdog’s prints. Or Swain’s.”
