Rebecka Evertrue's Arc

Chapter 32 of 66

Rebecka set her boot in the stirrup and heard the second horse. It came up the track from the south, easy and unhurried. Not a raider's pace. A courier's. She dropped back off the mare and pressed her hand to the animal's nose. Aiyana had already gone still by the cabin's corner, half-shadow, half-woman. Rebecka moved to the rear of the cabin and looked through the small back window. A man swung down at the front step. Young. Leather satchel across his chest. He whistled a short pattern at the door and waited. When no answer came, he tried again. Then he tried the latch. He stepped inside. Rebecka came around the front. He was already at the table, reading the burned patch where the letters had been. He turned when the door creaked. His hand went to the satchel, not the knife at his belt. That told her everything. He was carrying, not fighting. He was the next link in the chain, riding to collect what she had just burned, and he would ride back south the moment he understood the cabin was cold. "Stay," she said. He bolted for the side window. She drew and loosed. The arrow took him in the thigh and pinned him to the wall. He screamed once and clawed at the shaft. She crossed the room and put her knee on his chest and her knife under his jaw. "Who waits for the letter," she said. He spat at her. His other hand was already inside the satchel, and she saw the shape of a small clay figure through the leather. A signal doll. Break it and the woman south would know. Rebecka cut the strap. The satchel dropped. She kicked it across the floor to Aiyana, who had come in behind her. "Hold it flat," Rebecka said. "Don't let him touch it." The boy thrashed. Rebecka pressed the knife until he stopped. "Name," she said. "The woman. South of the coast road. Where." He shook his head. She saw the choice in his face before he made it. His hand shot up for the arrow shaft in his own leg, meaning to snap it, meaning to bleed out before he could talk. She caught his wrist. Then she looked at Aiyana. Aiyana nodded once. Rebecka drew the knife across his throat. She sat back on her heels and breathed. Two hours south of here he was expected. When he did not come, the woman would move. Rebecka pulled the pendant from under her shirt and lifted the satchel. Inside were folded orders in the same slanted script. She read. A crossroads inn. Three days' ride. A name in the woman's own hand at the bottom. "We have her place," Rebecka said. She stood. "And she does not know we are coming." Aiyana was already at the door.