Fidelias twisted himself up and out of the chilling waters of the angry river, frozen fingers clutching hard against the branch of the tree he had crafted within his reach. He felt numb, and his heart labored painfully against the shock of the cold water. The cold beckoned him with a slow, seductive caress, encouraging him to simply sink into the waters, relax, let his troubles slip away into the darkness.
Instead, he secured a hold on the next higher branch and hauled his body up out of the water. He huddled there for a few moments, shaking, struggling to gather his wits about him again, while the furystorm raged around him, winds hauling at his sodden clothes.
The one good thing about the flood, he decided, about the freezing water, was that he could no longer feel the cuts on his feet. He'd done his best to ignore them while recovering the horses, but the rocks and brush had been merciless to his skin. The woman, the watercrafter, had been onto them from the beginning, he decided. Clever, getting his shoes like that. She'd been planning on the boy running, and on hampering pursuit.
Fidelias leaned against the trunk and waited for the waters to subside.
They did, in rapid order, proving more than anything else that the flood had been a deliberate crafting rather than a natural event. He shook his head. Odiana should have given them warning-but perhaps she had been overmatched. The locals were no amateurs at their furycrafting and had lived with the local furies for years. They would know them, be able to use them more effectively than even a crafter of Fidelias's own level of skill. The Steadholder, for example-he had been formidable. In a direct, fair confrontation, Fidelias was uncertain whether or not he could simply overcome the man. Best then, to ensure that any future contact with the fellow discounted the possibility of a fair fight.
But then, that was in general Fidelias's policy.
Once the waters had receded back down into the river's original bed, Fidelias slipped down from the tree, grimacing as he got back to the ground. The pitch of the winds had only increased since the storm had rolled over them, and surviving in it had to be his first priority. He knelt by the trunk of the tree, resting a hand lightly on the sodden ground, reaching out for Vamma.
The fury responded to him at once, vanishing into the deep earth for several moments before rising back up toward him. Fidelias cupped his hands, and Vamma returned, providing what it had been sent to retrieve-a handful of salt crystals and a flint.
Fidelias pocketed the flint and swept the salt into a pouch, keeping a few pieces in hand. Then he rose, noting how slowly his body responded, and shook his head, shivering. The cold could kill him, if he didn't get warmed up, and quickly. Rising, he dispatched Etan to look for signs of his companions, and Vamma to search through the surrounding earth, for signs of movement. If the locals, either the Bernardholters or those they had been fighting, were still at hand, they might feel few compunctions about finishing the job the watercrafter had started.
Fidelias had to hurl salt at a swooping windmane, while he waited for his furies to return to him. It didn't take long. Etan appeared within a few moments and led him forward, through the blinding storm, down along the path of the river.
Several hundred yards downstream, Fidelias found Aldrick. The swordsman lay on the ground, unmoving, his fingers still locked around the hilt of his sword, buried to its hilts in the trunk of a tree. He had apparently managed to keep the flood from sweeping him away entirely, but had not taken
into account the threat the elements represented. Fidelias checked the pulse at the man's throat and found it there, still strong, if slow. His lips were blue. The cold. If the swordsman was not warmed, and quickly, he would die.
Fidelias debated allowing it to happen for a moment. Odiana remained an unknown quantity, and as long as she had Aldrick with her, she would be difficult to move against. Without the swordsman, Fidelias could remove her at leisure, and if Fidelias was fortunate, perhaps Aldrick's death would unhinge her entirely.
Fidelias grimaced and shook his head. Aldrick could be arrogant, insubordinate, but his loyalty to Aquitaine was unquestioned, and he was a valuable resource. Besides which, Fidelias liked working with the man. He was a professional and understood the priorities of operating in the field. Fidelias, as his commander, owed him a certain amount of loyalty, protection. Convenient as it might be to him, in the long term, he could not allow the swordsman to come to grief.
Fidelias took a moment to draw strength from the earth, pouring into him in a sudden flood. He jerked the sword from the tree's trunk, and peeled Aldrick's hand from its hilt. Then he picked up the man and slung him over one shoulder. His balance wavered dangerously, and he took a moment to breathe, to steady himself, before taking up the naked sword and turning, with Aldrick, to march away from the river, up out of the flood-saturated ground of the river's course.
Vamma shaped out a shelter from a rocky hillside, and Fidelias ducked into it and out of the storm. Etan provided ample kindling and wood, and Fidelias managed to coax a pile of shavings into flame using the flint and Aldrick's sword. By slow degrees, he built up the fire, until the inside of the furycrafted shelter began to grow warm, even cozy.
He leaned back against the wall, his eyes closed, and dispatched Vamma and Etan again. As tired as he was, there was still a job to do. Fidelias remained silent for a moment, letting his furies gather information about those who still moved in the wild storm outside.
When he opened his eyes again, Aldrick was awake and watching him.
"You found me," the swordsman said.
"Yes."
"Blade isn't much good against a river."
"Mmmm."
Aldrick sat up and rubbed at the back of his neck with one hand, wincing,
gathering himself back together with the resilience of his craft-and of comparative youth, Fidelias thought. He wasn't young anymore. "Where's Odiana?"
"I don't know yet," Fidelias said. "The storm offers considerable danger. I've found two moving groups, so far, and I think there's at least one more that I can't pinpoint."
"Which one is Odiana in?"
Fidelias shrugged. "One is heading to the northeast, and one to the southeast. I thought I felt something more directly east of here, but I can't be certain."
"Northeast isn't anything," Aldrick said. "Maybe one of the steadholts. Southeast of here, there isn't even that. Turns into the Wax Forest and the plains beyond it."
"And east is Garrison," Fidelias said. "I know."
"She's been taken, or she'd have stayed close to me."
"Yes."
Aldrick rose. "We have to find out which group she's in."
Fidelias shook his head. "No, we don't."
The swordsman narrowed his eyes. "Then how are we supposed to find her?"
"We don't," Fidelias said. "Not until the mission is finished."
Aldrick went silent for several seconds. The fire popped and crackled. Then he said, "I'm going to pretend I didn't hear you say that, old man."
Fidelias looked up at him and said, "Aquitaine assigned you to this personally, didn't he?"
Aldrick nodded, once.
"You've been his right hand through most of this. You know all the details. You're the one who has handled the money, the logistics. Yes?"
"What's your point?"
"What do you think is going to happen if the mission fails, hmm? If Aquitaine is in danger of exposure? Do you think he's just going to give you a wink and a nod and ask you not to mention it where anyone could overhear? Or do you think he's going to make sure that no one ever finds your body, much less what you know about what he is planning."
Aldrick stared steadily at Fidelias, then tightened his jaw and looked away.
Fidelias nodded. "We finish the mission. We stop whoever is going to the local count, send in the Windwolves, and turn the Marat loose. After that, we'll find the girl."
"To the crows with the mission," Aldrick spat. "I'm going to find her."
"Oh?" Fidelias asked. "And how are you going to manage that? You have many skills, Aldrick, but you're no tracker. You're in strange country, with strange furies and hostile locals. At best, you'll wander around lost like an idiot. At worst, the locals will kill you, or the Marat will when they attack. And then who will find the girl?"
Aldrick snarled, pacing back and forth within the confines of the shelter. "Crows take you," he snarled. "All of you."
"Assuming the girl is alive," Fidelias said. "She is quite capable. If she has been taken, I am sure she is well able to survive on her own. Give her that much credit. In two days, at the most, we'll go after her."
"Two days," Aldrick said. He bowed his head and growled, "Then let's get started. Now. We stop the messengers to the Count and then we get her."
"Sit down. Rest. We've lost the horses in the flood. We can wait until the storm is out, at least."
Aldrick stepped across the space between them and hauled Fidelias to his feet, eyes narrowed. "No, old man. We go now. You find us salt, and we go out into that storm and get this over with. Then you take me to Odiana."
Fidelias swallowed and kept his expression careful, neutral. "And then?"
"Then I kill anyone that gets between me and her," Aldrick said.
"It would be safer for us if we-"
"I couldn't care less about safe," Aldrick said. "Time's wasting."
Fidelias looked out of the shelter at the storm. His body ached in its joints, groaned at the abuse that had already been heaped on it. His feet throbbed where they were cut, steady, slow pain. He looked back to Aldrick. The swordsman's eyes glittered, cold and hard.
"All right," Fidelias said. "Let's find them."