Truthwitch (The Witchlands 1)

Iseult hated when Safi’s Threads got so bright they blazed over everything else. When they seared into Iseult’s eyes, into her heart. But Habim didn’t slow as he guided Iseult around a one-legged beggar singing “Eridysi’s Lament.” Then they’d reached a narrow slip of space between a dingy tavern and an even dingier secondhand shop. Iseult staggered into it. Her boots kicked through unseen puddles and the stench of cat piss burned in her skull.

She shook out her wrist and spun back to her mentor. This behavior wasn’t like the gentle Habim. He was a deadly man, certainly—he had served Eron fon Hasstrel for two decades as a man-at-arms—but Habim was also soft-spoken and careful. Cool and in control of his temper.

At least he was normally.

“What,” he began, marching at Iseult, “were you doing? Pulling your weapons out like that? Hell-gates, Iseult, you should have run.”

“That cleaving Tidewitch,” she began—but Habim only stomped in closer. He was not a tall man, and his eyes had been level with Iseult’s for the past three years.

Right now, those line-seamed eyes were rounded with his ire, and his Threads glittered an irate red. “Any Cleaved are the city guards’ problem—and the guards are now your problem. Highway robbery, Iseult?”

Her breath hitched. “How did you find out?”

“There are blockades everywhere. Mathew and I met one on our way into the city—only to learn that the city guards are looking for two girls, one with a sword and one with moon scythes. How many people do you think fight with moon scythes, Iseult? Those”—Habim pointed at her scabbards—“are obvious. And as a Nomatsi, you have no legal protection in this country, and simply carrying a weapon in public will get you hanged.” Habim pivoted on his heel to march away three steps. Then back three steps. “Think, Iseult! Think!”

Iseult compressed her lips. Stasis. Stasis in your fingertips and in your toes.

In the distance, she could just hear the growing roll of snare drums that meant the Veñaza City guards were on their way. They would behead the Tidewitch’s body as required by law for all cleaved corpses.

“A-are you done screaming at me?” she asked at last, her old stammer grabbing her tongue. Distorting her words. “Because I need to get back to Safi, and we n-need to leave the city.”

Habim’s nostrils fluttered with a deep inhale, and Iseult watched as he pushed aside his emotions. As the lines of his face smoothed out and his Threads turned calm. “You cannot go back to Safi. In fact, you will not leave this alley by the way you came in. Guildmaster Yotiluzzi has a Bloodwitch in his employ, and that creature is straight from the Void with no mercy or fear.” Habim shook his head, and the first hints of gray fear twined into his Threads.

Which only made Iseult’s throat clog tighter. Habim was never scared.

Blood. Witch. Blood. Witch.

“Safi’s uncle is in town,” Habim went on, “for the Truce Summit, so—”

“Dom fon Hasstrel is here?” Iseult’s jaw slackened. Habim could have said a thousand things, but none would have surprised her more. She’d met the battle-scarred Eron twice in the past, and his sloppy inebriation had instantly verified all of Safi’s stories and complaints.

“All Cartorran nobility are required to be here,” Habim explained, falling back into his three-step pace. Left. Right. “Henrick has some grand announcement to make, and in his usual fashion, he’s using this summit as his stage.”

Iseult was scarcely listening. “Does all the nobility i-include Safi?”

Habim’s expression softened. His Threads flickered to a gentle, peach tenderness. “That includes Safi. Which means she currently has her uncle—and an entire court of doms and domnas—to protect her from Yotiluzzi’s Bloodwitch. But you…”

Habim didn’t have to utter the rest. Safi had her title to protect her, and Iseult had her heritage to damn her.

Iseult’s hands lifted. Rubbed her cheeks. Her temples. But her fingers were only a distant sensation of pressure on her skin—just as the crowds were a throbbing hum, the rattle of the guards’ drums a low hiss.

“So what can I do?” she asked at last. “I can’t afford passage on a boat, and even if I could, I have nowhere to go.”

Habim waved to the end of the alley. “There’s an inn called The Hawthorn Canal a few blocks away. I’ve hired a room and a horse there. You’ll stay overnight, and then tomorrow, at sunset, you can travel to The Hawthorn Canal’s sister inn on the north side. Mathew and I will be waiting for you. In the meantime, we’ll deal with the Bloodwitch.”

“Why only one night, though? What could possibly h-happen in one night?”

For a long breath, Habim stared so intently it was as if he could read Iseult’s Threads. As if he could search her for truth or lies. “Safi was born a domna. You have to remember that, Iseult. All her training has been toward that one thing. Tonight, she is needed at the Truce Summit. Henrick has openly demanded her presence, which means she cannot refuse—and it means you cannot stand in her way.”

With those simple words—you cannot stand in her way—Iseult’s breath hardened in her lungs. For all that Safi might have lost their savings, and for all that a Bloodwitch might have latched on to their trail, Iseult had still believed that everything would blow over. That this snarl in the loom would somehow untangle, and life would return to normal in a few weeks.