Red Sister

‘Save your breath for running.’ Nona led off as the wind started to build.

The edge of the squall caught them before they’d covered fifty yards, whipping the screw-pines into a frenzy, howling between the trunks, seizing icicles as long as Nona’s blade and shying them across the track.

‘You … you killed the person who had that sword … didn’t you?’ Clera ducked beneath a broken length of icicle, hunska-swift.

‘They’re not alive any more.’

The wind took whatever answer Clera had to that and for the next ten minutes they ran in a maelstrom of ice, wind, and flying branches, dodging what they could, relying on the thickness of their coats and hoods to take the brunt of any impacts they failed to avoid.

An hour later they were crunching their way through frozen puddles on a lane between beleaguered potato fields. The hedgerows bore scattered stands of hoare-apple, the dark red fruit glistening with frost.

‘Where is she? Typical Ara. She’s going to have me running all the way to the Kring.’ Clera pulled level again.

‘You’re very keen to find Ara,’ Nona said, eyeing her friend. ‘I didn’t think you liked her.’

‘Well I do.’ Clera snatched a breath. ‘And you should throw that sword away. It’s weighing you down, and you’re hardly going to use it. We haven’t moved past knife-work yet!’

‘I should throw this sword away?’ Nona slowed.

‘It must weigh a ton.’

Nona came to a halt. She held the sword up between them. ‘I should throw it away?’ She met Clera’s dark gaze. ‘I don’t need it?’

Clera looked away, her eyes on the track ahead. ‘… Nona …’

Nona let the sword fall. It fell point first and stuck in the ground between them. ‘Come on then.’ And she ran on.

‘Hey! Novices!’ The cry came from behind them.

Nona and Clera stumbled to a halt and turned. A moment later Nona had Ara in her arms. The Jotsis heir, eyes bright, face reddened by the wind, returned the hug grinning. ‘Who are you and where have you hidden Nona?’ Ara squeezed her and stood back. ‘Since when are you a hugger?’

‘I’m your Shield. You have to hold your Shield tight.’ Nona glanced around at Ara’s cold camp. Just the windbreak and a log to sit on. ‘We have to find Zole next.’

‘What the hell for?’ Clera looked suddenly fierce.

‘Zole?’ Ara’s smile fell away. ‘She’s Tarkax’s responsibility. We need to find Jula and Ruli!’

‘Zole,’ Nona confirmed. ‘Because Sister Apple isn’t looking after you any more and we need Tarkax in case anyone makes a move on you. Also, the countryside is thick with Durnish raiders. I saw another party two miles back. That’s the third I’ve seen.’

‘Sister Apple wasn’t looking after me in the first place!’ Ara glanced around as if the Poisoner might be standing behind a tree. ‘Was she?’

‘More raiders? I didn’t see any!’ Clera turned to look back along the road.

‘We need to get moving!’ Nona started back towards the track.

‘Nona!’ both of them shouting.

Nona stopped and turned back towards them. ‘Sister Apple was shadowing you. She’s a senior Sister of Discretion – you would hardly expect to see her. And yes, Clera, more raiders. They didn’t see us in the squall, or did and weren’t interested. They may be next time.’ She set off again. ‘Let’s go,’ offered over her shoulder.

Ara wanted to know how Nona knew about Sister Apple’s presence or absence given the impossibility of spotting a Grey Sister who didn’t want to be seen. So while they hastened along the road Nona told them the whole story, except for the part about Zole being a four-blood-prophecy-fulfilling legend. She wasn’t entirely happy with that part herself. Not that she wanted to be Sister Wheel’s darling or anything … it just didn’t make sense. By giving Zole into the church’s care Sherzal had made Abbess Glass trust her intentions. It was a precious gift: it removed any suspicion that the emperor’s sister wanted to steal Ara or Nona to control the Argatha or the prophecy. She had just given Abbess Glass the Argatha and put into her hands control of the prophecy, fake though it might be.

And yet … Nona knew that Sherzal’s intentions were not to be trusted. She had tried to abduct Ara. And she had put Yisht into the convent to steal the shipheart … Had Zole just been the price she was prepared to pay for the chance to steal it?

When Nona had finally laid the whole thing out for them Ara seemed satisfied.

‘So … if you spent the morning hunting the forest and helping Sister Kettle … that explains why you had to run so hard to catch up with me.’ Ara jogged on, gathering her breath. ‘But you said Clera was racing to catch up with you … so why was she so far behind too? Sister Tallow said to take things slow and steady – so since I got clear of the chaos at the river I’ve been doing just that.’

Both of them turned to look at Clera, running beside them, red-faced, holding her side. Under their stares she stumbled to a halt. ‘I need a rest. I can’t run all the way to the Kring. There’s the best part of sixty miles left!’

‘Why were you so far behind Ara?’ Nona asked.

‘Got lost, I said already. All right?’ Clera scowled, exasperated. ‘I’m a city girl. You may have been brought up by wolves, and Arabella here might have had estates to hunt on, but I know streets and markets and houses, and if I see three trees together I know I’ve gone the wrong way.’

Shelter that second night came in the form of a pigsty among a collection of hovels that made Nona’s village look prosperous. Their initial welcome was the two points of a pitchfork and a hasty assembling of fierce-eyed peasants armed with hatchet and hoe. Through Ara’s smooth diplomacy the opening offer of brutal murder was negotiated down to room in the unoccupied sty on fresh straw and the threat of violence if they tried ‘anything funny’. Clera, fishing in her habit in the privacy of their new accommodation, came out with a handful of silver from which she dug out a copper and went on to purchase a slab-like loaf of black bread and a wrap of rancid butter.

‘Where did you get all that money?’ Nona asked, chewing on her portion of the loaf.

‘I told you, my father’s fortunes have changed.’ Clera’s jaw bulged as she ground away at the bread. It seemed as if more grit had been used than flour. She played her gold sovereign across her knuckles. ‘The church teaches faith – but what you learn is that it’s money that moves mountains. The church preaches the Ancestor’s creed, but it’s gold that talks. Everything we do, all this business of emperors and temples, all the war, alliances, murders, hospitals … all of it floats on money. The currents that move these things, make them dance, are all financial. Politics, religion, love, faith, even hate, are just the things people say. This—’ she held the coin before her eye between finger and thumb. ‘This is what they mean.’

‘That’s a shallow view of the world, Clera.’ Ara watched from the corner, hunched in her ice-rimed coat.

‘Says the girl whose whole life was built on gold.’