Elijah Winters's Arc

Chapter 3 of 4

Elijah pocketed the coin and looked north again. The road bent into shadow. Somewhere down it, Corwin Vaelric was buying salt with a dead clan's money and waiting for Elijah to come running. That was the trap. Move openly, and Gretel walked into the same night his wife had. He would not do that twice. He turned to Aldric, still leaning against the rune-carved tree. "You said you spoke for them. Where does Corwin sleep." "He doesn't sleep in one place," Aldric said. "He moves. The coins are breadcrumbs. He wants you on the road, alone, with the girl beside you." Gretel's small hand tightened in Elijah's coat. He looked down at her bare feet on the cold dirt. He thought of a door closing on a house he could not reach in time. "Then I don't take the road," Elijah said. He crouched to Gretel. "There's a place I know. Warm. Loud. A woman there feeds strays and asks no questions. You'll stay until I come back." Gretel shook her head hard. "You'll stay," Elijah said. "Or I go nowhere." Her jaw set. She nodded once. He took her through the trees on foot, off the road, until the woods opened on a low building with broad windows and warm light spilling out. The sign above the door showed a swirling dark and a pale figure. Auntie's Margaritas. He had used it before, decades back, when he needed a place that did not remember faces. Inside, the air smelled of salt and something burnt-sweet. Behind the bar, a shapeless dark thing coiled over the taps, its body a piece of night sky, two star-shaped eyes fixed on him. The void chef tilted toward him without a mouth to speak. "The girl needs a bed for three nights," Elijah said. He set four silver coins on the wood. The chef's stars dimmed. It nudged the coins back with the tip of its tail. "Not coins," Elijah said. He understood. He pulled the Vaelric coin from his pocket, then the witch's warning from his memory, and set neither down. Instead he unclasped the small iron ring from his own finger, centuries old, and laid it on the bar. The stars flared. The chef curled the ring away. Gretel climbed onto a stool. She did not cry. She watched him. "Three nights," Elijah said to her. "If I'm not back, the witch in the blue dress will come. Elizabeth. She'll know where to take you." He walked out before the girl's face could change his mind. At the treeline, Aldric waited. Elijah handed him the Vaelric coin. "Take this back to the road at Vale. Drop it where he'll find it. Let him think I came and turned around." Aldric's mouth pulled. "You're baiting the baiter." "I'm going in quiet," Elijah said. "Alone." He stepped off the road into the dark trees and was gone.