“Tell me again. I love happy endings.”
She sighed. “Rollan, don’t you remember what it was like when you called up Essix? Was she what you expected?”
Of course she hadn’t been expected. Rollan hadn’t been expecting much of anything, as he had been sitting in a prison at the time, and in prison, disappointment was generally the most practical thing to expect. And even if he hadn’t been incarcerated, he couldn’t have expected Essix to appear. Nobody called up Great Beasts.
“Sure,” Rollan replied easily. “Miracles happen to me all the time.”
Abeke made a face. She touched the tuft of coarse fur at Uraza’s shoulders, as if for comfort. “Don’t you remember how uncertain everything was? Nobody knows if they are going to call up a spirit animal at all. And the rituals make it so nerve-racking. Everyone is looking at you. There is so much pressure.”
“I didn’t have a ritual,” Rollan said. “I had a homeless guy and a rat. But I get the idea.”
Abeke stopped. “Do you want to talk about it?”
“No. Actually, I don’t. That’s basically the beginning, middle, and end of it, anyway: homeless guy, rat, magical falcon. Happy ending. Told you. I love those things. Go on with your story.”
She said, “My ritual was very well attended. We desperately needed rain, and there was hope that a new rain dancer would be named. Then, all of a sudden I had a spirit animal, and it was a Great Beast and then it began to rain! My father had never looked at me like that before. My sister had never looked at me that way before — no one had. Everyone thought I was the new rain dancer. I was still trying to understand that I’d summoned a spirit animal! And then in the middle of the commotion, Zerif appeared and told me that he needed me to help save the world. Maybe you would have done better, Rollan, but during all that, I really didn’t think to ask him, Are you telling the truth?”
Rollan thought back to his own summoning. Zerif had appeared not long after Essix had. But Rollan had doubted him. And then taken off running.
To be fair, that was how Rollan approached most situations in life. He’d pulled the same stunt for the Greencloaks too: doubt and run. Never a bad plan.
Abeke broke in ruefully, “You did ask him, didn’t you? Or at least, you didn’t trust him.” When he looked at her, surprised, she added, “I could tell by your face. You were thinking I was foolish to go with him.”
“A fool’s better than a traitor.”
Very serious, she nodded. “Rollan, I want you to know that I won’t let the Greencloaks down.”
I’m not a Greencloak, he thought. But he didn’t say it out loud.
Instead, he watched Uraza slink damply after Abeke as they retreated to the ship’s cabin. After they had gone, Essix flapped down to join him, her talons tight on the wet wood.
“Thanks for your help back there,” he told her. “What do you think about her?”
Essix stretched out a leg and chewed on one of her talons.
“That,” Rollan said, “is exactly how I feel about it.”
It kept pouring. Once they made landfall, they transferred the supplies to the horses and set off through the damp evening. Technically, the horses were supposed to be a privilege. A way to make the long journey faster and more agreeable.
But practically, Rollan wished they were walking. Neither he nor Essix got along with his horse. For starters, Rollan wasn’t the best of riders. Life as a street urchin hadn’t exactly prepared him for hours in the saddle. Back in Concorba, if he’d wanted to go somewhere, he’d gone on the bottoms of his own two feet. It was only because of their last mission that he’d had any experience on horseback at all. In fact, after that ride across Amaya, he still had blisters in all kinds of places where blisters shouldn’t be.
Also, his horse was a terrible animal. Terrible to look at, with its flecked gray coat, and terrible to be around, with its habit of biting Rollan. If he relaxed his hold on the reins at all, the creature would bend itself almost in half to nip at his legs. It hated Essix too. If the falcon got anywhere near, the horse would rear and snap toward the bird.
“Maybe it’s hungry,” Conor suggested as they rode side by side through the drizzle.
“Hungry for human flesh, maybe,” Rollan replied.
Overhead, Essix cried out; the horse pinned its ears back angrily. “Falcon flesh too.”
“If you treat him with respect, he’ll treat you with respect,” Tarik called.
Easy for him to say, Rollan thought as Tarik and Meilin began a conversation about the pleasures of being taught horseback riding before one could walk.
After a few hours, Rollan was wet to the skin. His scruffy hair stuck to his forehead. The rolling, treeless countryside was already soaked green and black. Even if they’d wanted to stop, there was no shelter.
“Oh, yeah,” he said, “this reminds me of home.” He’d spent countless evenings on the streets, pressed against a wall, barely out of the rain. Stomach growling, always hungry.
Well, at least now his stomach was full.
“Too tough for you?” Meilin asked sweetly. Her black hair was slicked on either side of her face.
“Oh, no,” Rollan replied. “I’m great at being cold and wet. One of my finest skills.”
Meilin shot back, “Did you have tutors for that?”
“I taught myself.”
She smiled at that, then hid it, fast. But Rollan had already seen. Ha! Score one point for me.
He was a little worried at how much he was getting used to not living on the streets, actually. He still hadn’t made up his mind over whether or not he wanted to work with the Greencloaks permanently, but if he left now, he’d have to get used to being hungry and dirty and mostly dead all over again. Just a few weeks ago, all he’d cared about was whether or not he’d get to eat once every three days. Now he had stopped worrying about meals and was instead concentrating on getting a smile out of a snotty general’s daughter.
Slippery slope, Rollan, he reminded himself. Don’t forget how to be on your own.
“It will be better once we get in the trees,” Tarik said, gesturing to a small copse of oaks ahead.
“We’ll need to be on our guard,” Finn spoke up, the first thing he had said since they mounted the horses. “Eura is not as safe as it once was. You all should remember the lessons you learned in training before we left.”
The main lesson Rollan had learned in training was that Meilin was dangerous with a handkerchief.