She nodded. He donned his cloak, and she hadn’t yet removed hers. They headed out in the cold to the mess hall.

“You won’t like this one. I’ve clearly been doing too good of a job. I’ve drawn the notice of the Dark Master himself, it seems. They are stepping up the challenge.”

“Is this because of Dekana?” he asked.

“I don’t know. The Mistress wouldn’t say much, but I suspect her death had to do with something else. The Mistress insisted it was not related to my task, but, well, who knows how much we can trust that.” She would not mention it to him, but she knew the Mistress would shed no tears if she ended up as dead as Dekana. How could the Masters even hope for her to succeed on this mission? A chill ran through her as another idea occurred to her. Was it possible they had no need for her to succeed? Perhaps it was all just some kind of trap, a way to be rid of her. Simply a way to anger the Akarians. But why? She shoved those thoughts aside. It didn’t matter. She would succeed and return to her life. Their motives were irrelevant.

“And what is this new task of yours?”

She couldn’t meet his eyes. “A kidnapping.”

His eyebrows shot up. “Well, then! You have been doing too good a job!”

“Not that I can choose to do anything else.”

“Indeed.”

“Steal too many trinkets, and they think you can steal a man.”

“Or they don’t think very well,” his father said, grinning through a slight twist of pain in his shoulder brand.

“Well, I won’t dispute that,” she said, feeling a burn in hers as well. Sometimes the pain felt nearly good when you were hurting alongside a comrade in rebellion. “To make matters worse, the man they want me to kidnap is a prince.”

“Of course! Why start small?”

She laughed. “I have a good plan, Father. I think I can do it, actually. I’m ready. I have everything packed to leave in the morning.”

“So soon?”

“Please. Promise me you won’t worry.”

“Ah, meesha, you know I would never lie to you, so I can’t promise that.”

“Well, then promise you will pray for me and try not to think too hard about it.”

“Aye, that I will. Now, let’s eat, and you can tell me the details of your devious plans, or I can tell you of the evil schemes the Fat Master has me executing in the bulb gardens for the spring.”

3

The Balcony of the Sky Kings

The first day’s ride was more than she could have hoped for. Sorin had been right, although she hated to admit it. An entire day spent alone on the road was surprisingly uplifting, and the landscape was awe-inspiring, whether it was the rolling cornfields of Kavanar or the colorful autumn forests that awaited her in Akaria. The first night, she slept in a small, quiet inn just inside the Akarian border. She marked it on the map as a place to return to. It was the sort of town where people went about their own business and didn’t want to be bothered—perfect for her purposes.

The second night she spent in a larger town with cobblestoned streets and two-story shops and inns. In the market she checked the price of horses—nearly the same as in Kavanar, thank goodness.

She and Kres rode into the third day in a driving rain, and her cloak could not keep out the bone-shivering wind and spray. By dinnertime, she was soaked through and hadn’t looked at the maps the entire day. Though she risked missing something, it was so wet that she didn’t want to take them out and ruin them after the days and days it had taken her to study the originals and make careful copies for herself. Then, using Sorin’s farseeing, the two of them had followed the roads from the sky, checking the accuracy of the maps and updating them along the way. At this point, she knew them by heart anyway.

Where was an air mage when you needed one to quell this damn rain? Or even an inn? She hadn’t seen civilization in several hours.

Go ahead and find some dinner, she told Kres, and he ambled away to find something to munch. She set about making some sort of temporary shelter. She needed to rest, eat, and examine the maps to see if she’d taken a wrong turn, and tying her oiled tarp to a tree trunk and a nearby branch would have to do. She settled another thick burlap from her pack over a pile of damp, dead leaves. Under her makeshift refuge, at least there was a break from the pattering of the rain on her head. Hell, how could summer be over so quickly?

She swigged some water from her skin and wished again she had the fiery powers that Sorin had. He could remedy this situation so easily—spark them a fire, make them a blanket of thick air above, push the rain itself away if he wished. But what could she do as a creature mage? Sometimes she loved it the most, and other times, she cursed herself for her foolish, impractical magic. What could she do against the cold—grow fur, grow a tree for shelter? If an inn didn’t turn up, she might just have to try it. It was one thing to use magic to start a lovely fire, it was quite another to have to turn yourself into a bear. Actual shelter would be better.

She took some rations from her pack—soft bread and vegetables that wouldn’t last the whole journey, a little smoked meat. Tired, she let her head fall back against the tree and looked out at the mountains.

On this ride, admiring the mountains had been her favorite pastime so far. As she’d ridden north, they had grown grander and grander to her left. At Mage Hall, they weren’t very visible, just small peaks in the distance, but the road she followed veered closer and closer to the mountains. She couldn’t help but feel her heart leap a little at their majesty. The mountains were dressed in rich reds and fiery oranges at their base, leading up to towering pines, bare stone, and snow-capped peaks. To the north she could see the mountains where Estun lay nestled—strong, snowy, and grand.

Sorin was right, it was a lovely land. Not boring and flat and a dull green-yellow, like Kavanar. Broad rivers ran with an elegant blue darkness, and the plants had a variety to them that made her feel excited and alive, with so many different and diverse energies swirling around her.

Enough resting. Her shoulder twitched at her—continue, continue, let’s move on… She unbuttoned and unfolded her pack, careful to not let any water inside, and took out her maps.

Kres munched on some grass nearby. Not all the birds had flown south yet, and some sang sweetly. The light wasn’t very good under the tarp, and it took some experimentation to actually see the map without endangering it.