Chapter Thirty-Two: After Passing Four Snow Markers

 

By the time Sanji returned, Kyosti, Anglorae, and John had taken refuge inside a kind farmer’s wagon. They listened to his griping about the sleet ruining his crop until Anglorae, who was peering through the slits in the wagon, called out Sanji’s name. She shook Kyosti’s arm. “She’s back!”

“Who’s with her?” Kyosti asked, his heart squeezing.

“No one,” Anglorae answered, sounding less certain. “She’s alone.”

Sanji clambered into the cart with a huff, shivering violently. After paying her respects to the farmer, she turned to her companions. “I’ve made contact with your friend, Kayla,” she murmured to Kyosti. “She gave me an inn to meet her at. What is going on, Kyosti? I thought we were taking Anglorae to the queen?”

“We decided that once you were back, John and you would take Anglorae to the queen,” Kyosti told her quietly, hoping the farmer wasn’t listening too closely. “I’ll go to this inn. Kayla was my contact in the House of Wizards, I have to report Anglorae’s return to her now.”

“Report to her?” Sanji said doubtfully. “They don’t have a liaison in the court?”

“Northerners,” Anglorae scoffed. “The court and the House don’t get along well. The House is probably afraid the queen will turn me against them if she gets her hands on me first, so they made a separate deal with Kyosti.”

“You’re---double-crossing the queen?” Sanji asked, her voice both impressed and aghast.

Kyosti glanced nervously in the farmer’s direction. “Let’s get out of here.”

The wind was blowing something fierce as they dragged themselves out, a constant deluge of sleet slapping into their bodies. Sanji groaned and pulled Kyosti and Anglorae very close. “I really hate this place,” she confided as they slipped and slid across the bridge. John, on Anglorae’s other side, made noises of agreement.

Kyosti and Anglorae, who were quite enjoying themselves, laughed until the wind carried the laughter away.

There were only a few brave souls on the bridge, and the journey into the city was quick. Even the city guards gave them little trouble: Kyosti showed them his credentials and they let them all in without comment.

The palace--and the inn where Kayla was waiting--was high on a hill. They almost slid almost all the way to the bottom several times climbing the street, and near the top they were panting and out of breath from the exertion.

“What do those statues mean?” Anglorae panted, pointing.

Kyosti of course couldn’t see what she was pointing at, but considering how close they were to the palace, he thought he might know. “Oh, you mean the statues of Arrellya, the hero of Bell-Zar? Yes, she’s a big thing around here. Those statues represent a few of her exploits: the defense against the GEZER, the marshland fight, the fight and flight of the HitherBlissery, defeat of Grindon Hair-Eater, her marriage to the King of Lir...”

“Grindon...Hair-Eater?” Sanji repeated incredulously.

Anglorae, however, went ominously silent.

Eventually they reached the road the inn was on. “Pass only five snow markers and the inn will be on your left,” Sanji told him, fussily fixing his cloak and scarf. “Oh, are you sure---” She stopped. “Well. Be safe, I---”

She stopped again, then leaned forward to kiss him on both his eyelids, which was the only part of his skin exposed. “I don’t know why you leave your eyes out,” she muttered to him. “It’s so useless.”

He laughed and hugged her. He turned down the street, and the other three turned to go to the palace.

“Wait!” Anglorae cried, turning back and grabbing Kyosti’s arm.

He shook her off roughly. “Your place is at the palace,” he told her, but she grabbed him again.

“I don’t know if I can survive this place,” she whispered to him, barely loud enough over the wind. “A place where they celebrate the defeat of old GEZER? The injustices against the Leopard Queen? How do you stand it?”

“I’ve just kept silent,” he told her. “I’m just one person, and I’m not worth much. So I have just done nothing.”

“And I’m expected to do nothing too,” Anglorae said bitterly. “Keep my head down.”

“That’s how you survive,” Kyosti said. “What else can you do?”

Her hand tightened on his arm for a moment. “I can think of a few things I would rather do than survive.”

Sanji called Anglorae’s name behind her.

Kyosti’s heart sank. “If you don’t survive, you’ll be playing right into their hands.”

Anglorae took her hand away. “I’m tired of being someone else’s pawn.”

She turned and walked away, the noise of her stumbling footsteps quickly swallowed up in the wailing wind and snow.

Kyosti followed Sanji’s directions and went four snow markers down from the main road, then turned left. Before he entered the inn, he took a moment to enjoy the wind. With his eyes in total darkness, he could almost imagine he was standing in a winter snowstorm in the south, where the Infinite Spyglass never dared to show his eye. Perhaps he was bundled with Mother and Father on either side, his family singing along with the song of the wind. Maybe penguins were passing through their camp, a monstrous herd of waddling creatures with their beaks ducked low against the wind. Maybe a leopard seal raised her head and roared into the night, and the world trembled.

Ridiculous. It was much colder in the south. He couldn’t even properly pretend.

Kyosti pushed open the door to the inn. Before he had taken one step inside, he was grabbed from the sides, his arms forced up painfully and his pack ripped from his back.

“Search him.” Kayla’s cold voice rang out from nearby. Two soldiers forced Kyosti facefirst onto the floor and removed his weapons and searched his body while another one rifled through his pack.

It wasn’t until they had stripped him almost to his drawers and emptied out everything in his pack that the soldiers admitted defeat. “There’s no knife here.”

“What have you done with the knife, Romalidan?” This time the voice was silky and smooth. Kyosti twitched in surprise. Galeon was here too? Tricky. “Kayla was so sure you didn’t give it to the Seers.”

“Impossible,” Kayla sneered. “Besides, Sanji had it from John that Kyosti had the knife less than a week ago. If he put it down somewhere, it’s not far.”

She stepped closer, her footsteps distinct on the stone floor. “And I’m sure I can get him to talk.”

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Photo by Aditya Vyas on Unsplash