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It slithered off to join its companions, the pack moving in a wave down to the barges. He could follow them, possibly buy passage on the same barge. But it would be smarter to get the information himself, then somehow contrive to arrive ahead of them. His water magic would come in handy there. Besides, he couldn’t stand by and let that girl die, not if he could save her.
Abruptly, Gabriel could move, nearly lurching as whatever had held him back released. He ran down the steps to the pier, where poor Dary lay swallowed in a crowd. “Let me through,” he commanded, and the workers gave way obediently.
“She had some kind of fit, milord,” a woman told him. “Screamin’ and carryin’ on.”
Another woman had Dary’s head in her lap, dabbing at blood that leaked from the corners of the girl’s mouth, bright against her pale freckled skin. “I don’t know what’s wrong with her,” the seated woman told him anxiously, oblivious to the hunter a hand’s breadth from her face, choking her friend.
“Let me,” he said. He drew his silver dagger, one he’d bathed monthly in the light of the full moon, embedding it with enchantments to unravel the magical spells of other wizards. The hunter glanced at him, grinning in confident amusement—which turned to gaping shock when Gabriel drove the blade into its ochre eye.
The unnatural beast shivered, losing form as the enchantment that made it unraveled. It fell apart into a heap of quivering, mismatched flesh, smoke and ash wafting away. The woman holding Dary screamed at the sudden—to her—appearance of the mélange of hair, bones, and bloody tissue, and she scrambled away from it.
Gabriel crouched to take one of Dary’s hands between his. “All of you, go about your business,” he ordered the crowd, who quickly dispersed, muttering about evil magic. Whispering a restorative spell, he sent full-moon energy into Dary. He had no healing magic, but perhaps it would at least strengthen her.
The girl’s chest pumped with a sudden, ragged breath, and she choked out a gasp. Flinging herself to her side, Dary coughed up blood, heaving with the effort. Gabriel retained her hand, letting the moon magic restore her physiological balance.
At last, Dary squinted up at Gabriel. “Did ye send those things to punish me?”
“No,” he told Dary. “Those things are after my friend, also. If they reach her first, they’ll kill her.” They’d break Veronica’s spirit, without doubt, so Gabriel didn’t think that was overstating things. “Where did she go?”
“I don’t know who you mean,” Dary replied stubbornly.
“Veronica.”
“Never met anyone by that name.”
Gabriel set his teeth and tried the nickname she hadn’t trusted him with. “Nic.”
Dary let out a sigh, looking pained. “I kind of liked her.” She fixed him with a stare. “You’re herfriend, huh?”
“I’m trying to be,” he answered, hedging.
“Do you promise you have her best interests at heart?”
“Better than the things that attacked you,” he said, keeping it as honest as he could. Lady Veronica would disagree, or she wouldn’t have run.
Dary searched his face. “Were those things hunters?”
He hesitated, surprised that she’d identified the creatures, but Dary kept her expectant gaze fixed on his. He nodded.
“I’d been warned about hunters, but never seen ’em. I didn’t want to spill, but my immunity to compulsion didn’t do a thing. It’s like they just plucked the information out of my head.” She grimaced in remembered pain.
“Please, Dary. I have to get to her before the hunters do.”
“Tell Nic I’m sorry,” Dary said wearily. “Port Anatol. Wartson.”
Working at theinn wasn’t so bad. Missus Ryma, who ran the place, was a fair and generous boss. She hadn’t blinked when Nic’s rescuer—whose name she never did learn—dropped her off on the kitchen doorstep. Instead she sat Nic down, gave her water, then food, and even had one of the kitchen boys clean and dry Nic’s filthy boots.
And she never once asked Nic who she was or where she’d come from.
They quickly established that Nic had no experience cooking or serving food, but that she was familiar with the magical conveniences the locals bought from the incoming barges. Missus Ryma put Nic to bed, fed her a hearty breakfast in the morning, then put Nic to work on repairs.
Most of the people at Port Anatol had some conveniences that they’d gleaned from the incoming trade, but few knew how to maintain their expensive prizes. The fire elementals that powered the lanterns, for example, disliked the pervasive damp of the harbor city. Nic was able to coax the little spirits out of their sulks by drying them out and showing the lantern owners how to offer the creatures little treats like a tasty bit of fast-burning wood shavings to keep them happy.
Soon all the inn’s elemental lanterns were shining bright, and Nic had repaid Missus Ryma for the fresh clothes she’d given Nic, and to cover her room and board. With a growing stream of clients looking for repairs and advice, Nic had accumulated enough coin to buy passage on a coach going inland. The inland part was all that mattered to her. She had no criteria to pick a destination, other than to get as far away from the harbor—and anyone chasing after her—as possible.
Nothing had happened yet to justify her nerves, but she also couldn’t shake the tense foreboding, the persistent feeling thatsomethingwas breathing down her neck. It could be that she’d inherited some of the House Hanneil clairvoyance. Or it could behim, as she sometimes fancied she caught a glimmer of silver moonlight in the bright of day, or scented fresh water wafting over the pervasive brine.
She didn’t know how far she’d have to run to escape that sensation, but she was sure Port Anatol wasn’t far enough. Maman had warned her to listen to her instincts, so listen she would. Only two things kept her lingering. One was the conviction that Maman had intended for her to be met. If her contact had been delayed, then she wanted to allow some time for them to find her. And provide that comfortable living. The other was Missus Ryma.
