‘And what about me?’
He gave a sad smile. ‘I’m fulfilling my duty, Evie. You are a Valisar.’
‘So I’m just a duty now. A chore to be done?’ She watched his eyes flash with pain but for once she felt no guilt; her confusion demanded more answers.
‘Don’t ever think that,’ he hurried to say. ‘I have loved youas … ’He appeared flummoxed. ‘I care about you as if you were the most precious thing in the world.’
She nodded, hating to see her favourite person looking so tongue-tied. Reg had never been anything but a rock in her life. If she were honest she couldn’t imagine her life without him in it. ‘I love you too,’ she said without hesitation, surprised when he glanced at her with strange sorrow.
‘You say it so easily,’ he replied, looking away.
‘Because I mean it. I only hesitate if I’m telling a lie.’
‘I know,’ he said softly. Clearing his throat, he continued more curtly, ‘If I’m going to keep you safe, you must listen to what I say and follow my lead in all things. There is no technology here. None at all. But there is magic, as you’ve discovered for yourself. I know it all sounds like a confusing dream but I stress again, this is your new reality. You must … ’
‘Acclimatise?’
‘Yes, but don’t use words like that again.’
Evie sighed. ‘Reg … I’m tired of arguing with you. All right, I’ll try to speak “plain Denovian".’
He found a smile. ‘It’s in your soul. Hunt it down. You know how to do this.’
She looked at the impressive stone building as they slowed on their approach and shook her head.
Just as she fell into step alongside Reg, vowing to try very hard to acclimatise as her friend needed, three men rounded the bend in the path they had been following.
‘Aye, aye, what have we here?’ the eldest of the trio asked.
‘Morning,’ Corbel said, surprising Evie at how cheerful he could sound. ‘All well with you?’
‘Now it is,’ the youngest said. He had a black tooth at the front of his mouth and a smile that suggested he was a few strides short of a span.
Evie felt a tremor of alarm.
Corbel sensed the danger immediately. Years of training in his youth alongside his father and then two decades on the streets of a city in the other world had taught him plenty about people. And he’d learned that one could tell a great deal about a man long before he spoke. And Corbel was reading only the most dangerous of language from the silent newcomer whose gaze had yet to alight on him; so far his eyes were only for Evie.
‘Morning,’ Corbel repeated, deliberately slowing, loading his tone with lightness and cheer but all the while using the time to gauge what he was up against.
The black-toothed one was gormless enough not to trouble Corbel. The elder one who spoke first looked wiry and strong but he was small, with a limp, and carried only a dagger at his belt. It was the middle fellow who troubled Corbel the most. Silent, powerfully built and clearly with mischief on his mind, he wore a sword on his hip and moved like a fighter.
Evie had paused, he noticed, presumably sensing the man’s interest. He stepped slightly ahead of her to shield her.
‘Tasty lady,’ said Blacktooth, leering around him at Evie before grinning stupidly at his companions.
Corbel raised a hand. ‘We want no trouble here.’
‘Forgive our Clem, he has no manners at all,’ the dangerous one said.
The man’s voice was mellow, almost silky, but Corbel wasn’t fooled. ‘We don’t want trouble either.’
‘None from her, anyway,’ Clem said and now the older man grinned.
‘This is a lonely track for travellers,’ the dangerous man continued.
‘Yes it is,’ Corbel admitted. ‘But we are taking the shortest route to the convent.’ He shrugged, noting as he did so that theman’s hand was resting easily on the pommel of his sword. ‘How about yourselves?’
‘On our way to Francham.’
‘Francham? You have a long walk ahead,’ Corbel remarked, taking note that it wasn’t the old man’s leg that was injured; it was his hips, if he wasn’t mistaken. ‘No horses?’
‘Lost them,’ Blacktooth chimed in, chortling. That won a glare from their leader.
‘Lost them?’ Corbel repeated, using the time to take in his immediate surrounds.
The leader sighed. ‘An unwise gamble.’
Corbel gave a soft shrug as though he understood it was none of his business. ‘Well, we must continue. Come, my love.’
‘Is this your wife?’ the man asked.
‘Er, yes. We are newly wed.’
‘On our way to pay a tithe to the convent,’ Evie piped up, surprising everyone, most of all Corbel. ‘My father insisted,’ she added with a shy smile. ‘Well,’ she said, ‘nice to meet you. Safe travels.’ She took a step forward.
‘Now what is a pretty young thing like you doing marrying a rough-looking older man, I wonder?’
Corbel stepped between Evie and the stranger, all of his senses on high alert. The older man was reaching for his dagger and the younger one had only dopey amusement in his eyes, as though he’d witnessed similar scenes previously.
‘I thought you wanted no trouble,’ the stranger remarked, still appearing loose limbed and relaxed.
‘I still want no trouble,’ Corbel replied, a new hint of warning in his tone.
‘Then why this confrontation?’
‘Stranger, my wife and I just want to continue to the convent. We have no money worth stealing.’
‘Other than the tithe,’ the man corrected.
‘Other than the tithe,’ Corbel repeated, ‘which I fully intend to pay to the convent and not to bandits.’
The man and his elder companion feigned shock. ‘Did you hear that, Barro?’ the older man said. ‘He reckons we’re thieves.’
‘I heard it,’ the dangerous one drawled, and blinked slowly.
Corbel tensed and pushed Evie back. ‘Corbel!’ she murmured, anxious, as the ring of a sword being lifted from its scabbard sounded harshly in the peace of the countryside.
‘Hush, now, Evie,’ he said, keeping his voice low and calm. ‘These men intend us harm.’
‘It didn’t have to be like this,’ the stranger said. ‘I just want your money but Clem here will probably settle for a grope between your wife’s legs.’
Evie made a gagging sound of revulsion. ‘Go fu—’
‘Evie! Hush,’ Corbel cautioned, not once taking his eyes from the sword that was now being weighted in his opponent’s hand.
‘What a pity it had to come to this,’ the man remarked casually. His companions sniggered.
‘I have no time for thieves,’ Corbel warned.
‘Even when they are carrying weapons and you have none?’ the man asked, surprised.
‘Even then,’ Corbel replied.
‘Corb–’
‘I said quiet, Evie. There is no further need for us to be civil,’ he cautioned, silently measuring the distance between himself and the old fellow.
‘Actually,