“People will die regardless.”
“Yes, but we don’t have to accept the things we might change. ‘Risks must be taken if we mean to get what we want,’ as Brennan Du once said to me.”
“No doubt hoping to impress you so you’d give him a kiss,” muttered Vai ungraciously.
“Not every man admires me just because you do.”
“That is exactly my point, Catherine. As long as clientage remains part of any legal code in Europa, as long as princes and mage Houses can bind entire villages into generations-long servitude, then how can things truly change? Camjiata is the only one with a legal code that will abolish clientage. There is no benefit to the princes and mage Houses to abolish clientage, because they prosper by it.”
The skin of frozen snow crunched satisfyingly beneath my boots as I smashed each step into the ground just as I planned to smash my foes. “Did Camjiata charm you like he charmed Bee? He’s not our friend.”
“Perhaps not, but he is our ally in the fight to abolish clientage. ”
“How can you say so? He shelters Drake. Who, may I remind you, wants to kill you, after you’ve witnessed me being humiliated!”
“I can crush James Drake.”
“Never let it be said that you lack confidence.”
His tone sharpened. “Do you doubt me, Catherine?”
I halted in the middle of the path. “Of course I don’t doubt you! But James Drake nearly burned me alive. The backlash of his magic didn’t pour harmlessly through me as it did through you. Even so, the worst thing was that he meant to kill you, if he could have. When I saw him again, I was so angry and scared that I kept insulting him until he lashed out at me. He would have done something dreadful if the general hadn’t stopped him. I don’t know how to stop myself from provoking him if we see him again.”
He grasped my arms. “That man will never hurt you, Catherine. Never.”
“That’s right, because I will kill him.”
He was silent for so long I thought he might be displeased by my bloodthirsty rejoinder. At length, with a frown, he spoke.
“I know you hate your sire, love, and I understand why you do. But don’t forget there is a part of him that gives you strength.”
“He’ll never truly let go of me,” I murmured, shuddering, for an unreasoning fear seized me. What if he could hear and see all I said even here in the mortal world? How could I ever escape, with his claws already in me?
“James Drake?”
“You’re the one James Drake can’t let go of. He doesn’t really care about me. I meant my sire will never let go of me, never stop hunting me…”
Perhaps the wind whispered. Alarm, like a dagger, pricked my neck. I pulled away from Vai to examine the woodland. Flakes of half-forgotten snow drifted among the slender trunks.
Vai drew cold steel and spun a breath of magic to waken my sword.
Sometimes the danger that stalks you stays hidden because it comes in plain sight.
A black wolf trotted down the path toward us, out of the south. When its uncannily golden eyes met mine, I knew it was some manner of kin. The wolf flicked a look over its shoulder and loped into the trees. A chittering bird fell silent. Tremors brushed the soles of my booted feet. A metallic jingle chimed.
“There’s someone coming,” I said. “Horses and men.”
Where the path dipped, curving to the right, nine men came into view. Four riders had spears braced in their stirrups, with bowcases slung from their saddles and primed with arrows. One carried a musket. Five men walked alongside lugging packs and traps. They wore sturdy winter clothing and fur hats. Some had the white skin of northern Celts, while others had mixed coloring. Seeing us, they halted in surprise.
Vai touched my arm. “Be ready to hit the ground. I will stun them all.”
The man with the musket gave a curt command. The horsemen dismounted, and all knelt submissively. The leader handed his musket to a comrade. With hands open and extended in supplication, he walked forward. He was an older man with a dusky, weathered face and a beard streaked with gray. Something in the shape of his blue eyes and the cut of his cheekbones struck me as familiar, although I had never seen him before.
Where I had grown up, young people showed respect to their elders by never looking them directly in the eye. Although we were younger than he was, the man kept his gaze lowered subserviently. Twenty paces from us he pulled off his hat to reveal a thick head of dark red hair, veined with white and pulled back into a braid. Ten paces from us he dropped to both knees.