Raven's Strike (Raven #2)(6)

Dark eyes looked up, and Tier saw Jes, his Jes, rise up to answer his question. "I d-don't know," he stammered. "We just smelled it and knew." A breath later, and the Guardian's sharp darkness was back in his eyes.

Tier had never seen him do that before, transform from Guardian to Jes and back again, though it happened the other way around from time to time. It made him wonder why it had been necessary for Jes to answer that question rather than the Guardian.

All of his children knew that, as a Bard, Tier could hear a lie as clearly as an off-pitch note. Would the Guardian have felt compelled to lie if he had answered the question and so had given way to Jes?

"It's all right, Jes," said Lehr. "It doesn't matter. Now we know what we're dealing with."

Lehr was right, time enough to worry about Jes when this mess was cleaned up. Assuming the Guardian was right about what they were facing - and he certainly hadn't lied about it - they had trouble enough facing them.

Tier looked around the hut and pulled together a plan of attack. "Jes, I want you and Lehr to go back to the clan and tell your mother and Benroln what we've found here. Tell them we need Brewydd for the wounded and whatever people it takes to get rid of a tainted mistwight."

"Both of us?" asked Lehr. "Jes can stay to keep you safe."

Tier shook his head. "Both of you." It wouldn't do to say that his part of this, soothing the smith, would be better done without his sons, so he chose another truth. "If Jes stays, I'll never be able to keep him away from the mistwight until your mother gets here. Take Skew with you, so he doesn't get eaten while we're waiting."

"What will keep you safe?" asked Jes.

"If these people have been snug in here for days, I expect I'll survive a couple of hours," Tier said.

Jes frowned unhappily, but in the end he went out and gathered up Skew's reins. After a brief argument about who would ride, they set off at a rapid jog, leading the horse.

Once his sons were gone, Tier closed the door and barred the window again because their being open seemed to make the smith nervous. Then he sat on the floor and braced his back against a wall, sighing with the relief of getting his weight off his knees.

He looked away from the oppressive fear on the face of the smith. The fear of the thing in the well was stronger right now than the man's dislike of Travelers, but he wasn't getting any happier trapped in the tight quarters of the hut with Tier.

Tier decided to give the smith time to calm.

"Hello," he said, directing his remark to the two children, who huddled against the opposite wall.

The boy responded with a wary nod, the girl just tucked herself closer to her brother's side.

"There's a healer coming now to take care of your folk. We'll get rid of the creature who hurt them, too," he told them. "I know that it's pretty scary, but so is my wife."

"Your wife is scary?" asked the boy.

Tier nodded solemnly. "She is."

"That man was scary," whispered the girl, then pressed her face against the boy's arm. "The cold one."

"Jes?" said Tier. "You don't have to worry about Jes, his job is to protect people. It's just that he has a special kind of magic, and one of the things it does is make people around him nervous. Travelers don't just have one kind of magic the way we do, you know."

"We?" asked the smith. "Aren't you a Traveler?"

Tier shook his head. "No. My wife is, but I'm from Redern in the Sept of Leheigh over in the Ragged Mountains."

There was a tug on his shirt, and Tier looked down to see that the girl had left her seat to get his attention. He smiled at her. "Yes?"

"What kind of magic did the cold man have?"

"Jes is a Guardian," Tier explained. "His magic makes him a good guard against all kinds of evil. He can turn into animals or make it hard for others to see him if he wants to. The other man, my son Lehr, is a Hunter; he has a different magic. He can track things, and his magic helps him aim his arrows."

"Traveler mages aren't as good as ours," said the boy. "Our mages can do anything."

"I wouldn't say that." Tier felt no guilt at revealing things the Travelers liked to keep secret. "They're just different. My wife, Seraph, is closest to our wizards. Travelers call her Order either Mage or Raven - each of the Orders has a bird associated with it."

"How many kinds do they have?" asked the boy.

The tension in the hut had dropped off. The girl was leaning against Tier's arm instead of her brother's, and the boy had quit hugging the post as if it were the only thing that could keep him safe. Partly, Tier knew, it was that he was a distraction from the thing they were afraid of. Partly it was Tier's own magic, Bardic magic, easing their fears.

"Six." Tier ticked them off on his finger. "You've met Guardian - that's Eagle, and Hunter the Falcon. Then there's Raven the Mage. Lark is for Healer - and you are lucky the Traveler clan we're with has a Lark for your mother. Cormorant is Weather Witch, and Owl is Bard."

"Why birds?" asked the girl. "Why not fish?"

The boy rolled his eyes. "Nona, don't be stupid. Why would they name their powers after fish? How would you like to tell people that you were a garbagefish or a trout? That's stupid."