Fool’s Assassin

He bit his upper lip, worrying the information from his memory. “She was a girl, sir. That is, more girl than woman. Slight and slender. Her hair was blond and she wore it loose. Her clothing looked as if it had been of good quality but had seen hard use. It was a foreign style, the cape tapered in at the waist and then belling out, with sleeves belled as well. It was green and looked heavy but did not appear to be wool. There was fur on the edging of the hood, of a kind I do not know. I offered to take her cloak and hood but she did not wish to give them up to me. She wore loose trousers, perhaps of the same fabric, but black with white flowers figured on them. Her boots did not reach her knee and seemed thin and were laced tight to her calf.”

So much detail about her garments! “But what did she herself look like?”

“She was young. She looked white with cold and seemed grateful when I built up the fire for her and offered her hot tea. Her fingers were pale as ice against the mug when she took it from me …” His voice trailed away. He looked up at me suddenly. “She didn’t want to leave the study, sir. Or to give up her cloak. Should I have known she was frightened?”

Had Riddle truly thought he could make more of this man than a house steward? Tears stood in his brown eyes. “Revel, you did all that you should have done. If anyone is at fault, it is I. I should have gone to the study as soon as I heard there was a messenger. Please. Just keep watch here for a short time longer until I send someone to relieve you. Then you should go back to what you do best. Tend to our guests. Let no one suspect that anything is amiss.”

“I can do that, sir.” He spoke softly. Was the reproach in his dog’s eyes for me or himself? No time to wonder.

“Thank you, Revel,” I told him and left him with a clap on his shoulder. I moved swiftly down the corridor, already reaching for Nettle with my Skill-magic. The moment our thoughts touched, my daughter’s outrage blasted into my mind. Riddle told me. How dare anyone do this in our home! Is Mother safe?

She is. I’m on my way down. Revel is on watch on her door, but I’d like you or one of the boys to take his place.

Me. I’ll make my excuses and be right up. A heartbeat’s pause, then, fiercely, Find who did this!

I intend to.

I think she took satisfaction in my cold assurance.

I moved swiftly through the corridors of Withywoods, every sense alert. I was not surprised when I rounded a corner and found Riddle waiting for me. “Anything?” I asked him.

“Nettle’s gone up to her mother’s room.” He glanced past me. “You know that you were probably the target in some way.”

“Perhaps. Or the messenger herself, or the message she bore, or someone seeking to do injury to whoever sent the message by delaying or destroying it.”

We were moving swiftly together, trotting side by side like wolves on a trail.

I loved this.

The thought ambushed me and I almost stumbled. I loved this? Hunting someone who had attacked someone else in the sanctity of my own home? Why would I love that?

We always loved the hunt. An ancient echo of the wolf I had been and the wolf who was still with me. The hunt for meat is best, but any hunt is always the hunt, and one is never more alive than during the hunt.

“And I am alive.”

Riddle shot me a questioning glance, but instead of asking a question he gave me information. “Revel himself took the food and tea to the messenger. The two pages who were on the front door recall admitting her. She came on foot, and one says that she seemed to come from behind the stable rather than up the carriageway. No one else saw her, though of course the kitchen staff recall making up a tray for her. I haven’t had a chance to go out to the stables and see what they know there.”

I glanced down at myself. I was scarcely dressed to appear before our guests. “I’ll do that now,” I said. “Alert the boys.”

“Are you sure?”

“It’s their home, Riddle. And they are not really boys anymore. They’ve been talking of leaving for the last three months. In spring I think they’ll fly.”

“And you have no one else to trust. Tom, when this is over, we are going to talk again. You need a few house soldiers, a few men who can be brutes when the situation calls for it, but can open a door and serve wine to a guest as well.”