Rebecka Evertrue's Arc

Chapter 34 of 66

The mare came off the between-road at midmorning, one ridge short of the inn. Rebecka walked her the last mile through scrub and pulled up behind a stand of pines. The inn sat at the fork below, gray timber, steep roof, two chimneys, a porch with flower boxes. Riders were coming and going. She could not see faces from here, and she had never seen the woman she was hunting. If the woman rode out past her now, she would not know it. "I need her face," Rebecka said. "Or her hand. Anything I can hold to." Aiyana slid down and set her palm flat on the ground. "The orders named her. Speak her name to the eye." Rebecka drew the folded page from her coat and read the name once, quietly. Then she spoke the eye out of its vial. The blue eye opened above her shoulder. It turned toward the inn. "Find the woman these orders name," Rebecka said. "Show me what she looks like before she rides." "She is in the back room," the eye said. "Saddlebags on the bed. Gray coat. Left hand shorter two fingers. Braid down her back, half gray. A scar under the jaw, thumb-wide." "How long until she mounts?" "Minutes." "Which door?" "The side yard. A bay horse waits saddled at the rail." "Which road out?" "South fork. She means to ride hard." Rebecka drew the compass her mother had wrapped for her and set the name against the glass. The needle steadied on the inn and did not drift. Alive. In the building. Still there. She walked the mare down through the pines to a bend where the south fork ran between two banks of loose stone. Aiyana climbed the upper bank and lay flat. Rebecka strung the bow and nocked a star-forged arrow. The bow woke against her palm and hummed low, reading the road. The side door of the inn opened. A woman in a gray coat came out with saddlebags over one shoulder. She swung them onto the bay and mounted with a short left hand. A braid, half gray, fell down her back. She turned the horse south. "That is her," the eye said. The bow's hum climbed as the rider came into the cut between the banks. At forty paces the hum went to a single clear note. Kill range. Rebecka hated the sound. She let it stay. She loosed. The arrow took the woman under the collarbone and dropped her from the saddle. The bay shied and ran on. The woman did not move. Rebecka came down the bank. In the gray coat's inner pocket she found a sealed packet and a small black book. She opened the book to the first page. A list of names. Ninka's was the third. "There are more," Aiyana said behind her. "Then we are not done," Rebecka said.