Rebecka Evertrue's Arc

Chapter 57 of 66

They rode two days to the salt town at the river mouth. Marcus stayed at the homestead with Ninka and Katia under the fae dome. Aiyana rode with Rebecka as far as the last ridge, then went ahead on foot to scout the streets. She came back at dusk with a face like set stone. "The broker keeps a shop above a salt warehouse. Two guards at the stair. He will not open the door for a stranger. He is waiting for a northern buyer. Word is the buyer wears a red cord at the wrist and carries a broken coin cut on the diagonal. The broker matches the cord to the coin. No match, no door." Rebecka had no red cord. She had no coin. She had eleven days shrinking to nine. "We could take the shop by force," Aiyana said. "You would lose half the arrows to the fire he would set before he let us in." "Then I need the buyer's tokens before the buyer arrives." They camped outside the town in a shelter Aiyana raised from a bundle she carried — a small teepee stitched with charm patterns, its runes glowing soft blue at the seams. Inside the air went quiet. Rebecka's shoulders dropped for the first time in a week. A man's voice spoke from the flap. "Rebecka Evertrue. Don't shoot. I know your name from a manifest." Rebecka had an arrow on the string before he finished. Aiyana lifted the flap one inch. He stood in the sand with his hands open. Thin, sunburned, a courier's cloak with the seal torn off at the shoulder. Not the courier from the gate. A different one. His eyes moved like a man who had run a long way and did not intend to run again. "Who are you." "Thunder Darkwolf. I read the manifests I carry. Three couriers before me took the main road to your gate to warn you. All three are dead. I came the back roads." "Warn me of what." "Your name is on a death list under a line about a quiver. The northern buyer is the one who put it there. He is four days out, not eleven. The broker moved the sale." Rebecka lowered the bow one inch. "Why tell me." "Because I know what he'll do with twelve star-forged shafts." He did not blink. "And because I can walk into that shop. I carried for the buyer's house last winter. I know the cord. I know the coin. I have both in my pack." Aiyana looked at Rebecka. Rebecka took a small bottle from her coat — shimmering glass, an eye stamped on the stopper. A gift from Makani, meant to guide a seeker to a lost thing. "Then you walk in as him," Rebecka said. "I follow behind with this. If you lie, it finds the arrows without you. And I find you after." Thunder nodded once. "Fair." The door had a key now. Four days to use it.