Raven's Strike (Raven #2)(15)

She didn't know what showed on her face, but it made him laugh. Even as her face burned, part of her observed that Jes's laughter warmed her cold center. It made her want to touch him.

"Look at that," said Tier pointing at a mountaintop. "See that peak? I'd know it anywhere. We're closer to home than I thought."

"Skew's been walking faster for an hour or so," Seraph told him, just as the first drops of rain began to fall. "I think that we're no more than an hour's walk from home. Maybe less. I've only been over this road once."

She glanced up at her husband and smiled to herself at the intent look on his face. It had been autumn when he'd seen Rinnie last, more than half a year ago.

From somewhere on the side of the trail came Jes's too-loud boisterous laugh. Branches rustled and shook, and Hennea burst onto the path, looking uncharacteristically disturbed.

She marched up to Seraph and shook her finger at her. "You tell that boy of yours that he is too young for me. I don't take babes fresh from their mother's milk."

"She likes me, Mother," said Jes, following Hennea with a wide grin.

"I can see that," said Tier. "But take it from me, son. It's time to let her settle her feathers."

Hennea shifted her hot gaze to Tier. "You will not encourage him."

Seraph had never heard of a Guardian stable enough to contemplate a romantic entanglement. There were any number of problems. Even simple touching was difficult - when the Guardian slept, its Order Bearer, who was always an empath, was too raw to allow anyone to touch him. When the Guardian was in control, the nameless dread that accompanied his presence was more than enough to cool the ardor of the most heated lover.

But Hennea's training as a Raven gave her enormous control that seemed to protect Jes from her emotions so that he could enjoy her touch. And as for the Guardian, Hennea didn't appear to be intimidated by him in the slightest.

It gave Seraph hope.

As Tier and Hennea exchanged a few words, sharp on her part and teasing on his, Seraph watched Jes, enjoying his laughter until it abruptly stopped. Amusement died in his eyes first, but quickly faded altogether, leaving a face that looked as if it had never smiled.

Before she could ask what was wrong, Lehr emerged from the forest on their left with Gura. "Papa, Mother, something - "

He was interrupted by the shrill scream of a stallion. Skew answered, half-rearing.

"Easy," soothed Tier, and Skew, his warning given, allowed himself to be gentled. "What's wrong?"

The storm chose that moment to turn from a gentle rain into a downpour; Seraph ducked her head involuntarily. When she looked up, there was a horse facing them in the middle of the path.

It was pale as death - a dirty off-white that darkened to yellow on the ends of his ragged tail. It looked cadaverous, with a full fingerspace between each rib and great hollows behind its sunken eyes.

"What's wrong?" said Jes, and at first Seraph thought he was just repeating Tier.

But then the horse spoke in a voice as rough and terrible as the storm.

"Come," it said, then dashed into the trees.

Both boys and the dog disappeared behind it. Skew took a bounce forward before Tier stopped him and looked at Seraph and Hennea.

"It's the forest king," said Seraph as soon as she realized it herself. "Go ahead. Hennea and I'll catch up."

He didn't wait for her to say it twice.

"That's Jes's forest king?" asked Hennea as she scrambled beside Seraph in Tier's wake. "Not exactly what I expected."

"He seldom is," agreed Seraph absently as she tried to pick a quick way through the undergrowth near the trail.

"Do we need to track them, or do you know where we're going?"

"Can't you feel it?" asked Seraph. "I wasn't paying attention until it worsened - but this storm is called."

"Rinnie?"

"Unless there's another Cormorant in the area. Something is very wrong."

They fell silent then, Seraph turning all her energies to climbing. The shortest path home was steep, forcing them to slow before they were halfway there.

"I'm going to the farm," she told Hennea, between gasps for breath. "That's where it feels like she is. I'll be able to tell for certain once we top this rise."

Hennea didn't bother to try and talk.

Seraph stopped at the ridgetop. The farm lay below, but she couldn't see it for the trees and the darkening skies. She had more than vision to call upon, though.

The first thing Seraph had done when she and Tier had moved to the farm was to walk a warding that surrounded it. The farm was too close to the old battlefield, Shadow's Fall, to be entirely safe without protection from the kinds of creatures attracted to shadow. Several times a year for twenty years she'd added to its potency.

Her warding traced along the crest just here.

Seraph knelt in the pine needles and touched the threads of her spelling. Power swept through her in a heady rush - something shadow-touched was trying to cross it at that very moment. Like a spider at her web, she waited, letting her breathing slow, while she waited for the warding to tell her more.

It settled back down after a moment, though she could tell that whatever shadowed thing had touched it was still near. There were some weak areas in the warding, she noticed, as if it had been much longer than the six months or so when she'd last reworked it: something or a number of somethings had been trying the warding while she'd been gone.