Changing the World: All-New Tales of Valdemar

Emmerdale was an unexpectedly pretty town. It nestled amid green fields at the foot of a mountain range so small it barely rated a name. To the west of it was a stretch of forest; it reminded Egil somehow of the Pelagirs, and yet it seemed as peaceful and empty of fear as a forest could be.

Egil’s senses came to the alert. The last such place had turned out to be under a dangerous and deadly spell. But this one lacked a certain something. Foreboding, maybe. The deep hum of magic running underneath it all. There was no ill magic in Emmerdale: Egil would have laid a wager on it if he had been a wagering man.

The only strangeness here was basking in the sun in the field that belonged to the best inn. The Companion was a stallion, and while he was not as tall as Rohanan, he was more substantially built.

His Chosen should have been hanging on him, unable to let him out of her sight. Or their sight, if the message from Emmerdale told the truth. He was alone, and he seemed content.

“Maybe he hasn’t Chosen anyone yet?” Egil wondered aloud.

:Oh, he has,: Cynara said. Egil could not tell what she thought of it, or of the stallion, either. Her tone was unusually bland, as if she had no opinion at all.

That Egil could not believe. Cynara always had an opinion.

He glanced at Bronwen. She stood with her Companion in a crowd of townspeople, basking in their admiration. They seemed to have forgotten that Egil was there, in spite of his Whites and the shining coat of his Companion.

That suited him admirably, but Bronwen was too hemmed in with people to either catch his glance or hear him if he asked the question that was in his mind. He asked Cynara instead. :And Rohanan? Is he as noncommittal as you?:

Cynara did not trouble to answer. Egil had known she would do that. He drew his breath in sharply, as close to a fit of pique as he ever came.

Fortunately for his peace of mind, Bronwen asked the other question, the one that had brought them here. “Pardon my impatience, but your message was urgent. There is a problem with the Companion’s Chosen?”

The man who answered was no older than Egil, but he carried himself with an air of easy authority. “There is,” he said. “It seems he’s been unable to make up his mind. He’s Chosen two of our young women: my daughter and Hanse’s daughter.”

“I gather they’re not friends,” Bronwen said.

Both fathers rolled their eyes. That they were friends was unmistakable, which made it odder that their daughters were not. “They hate each other,” Hanse said.

The other nodded. “There’s no sense or reason to it. It just is.”

“Nothing ever just is,” Bronwen said.

“Then maybe you can find out why they were born like that,” said Hanse. He sounded more tired than skeptical.

Egil was in full sympathy with the man. When Bronwen did not ask the next and essential question, Egil did it for her. “Where are they, then, sirs?”

They started a little at the voice that to them must seem to come from nowhere. Hanse recovered first, enough to answer. “Secure under lock and key,” he said grimly.

“Well,” said the other, “more or less.”

“Pitar,” Hanse said. “By the Powers. You trust her?”

“I trust my daughter,” said Pitar somewhat stiffly, “to do nothing foolish while under the watchful eyes of my apprentices.”

“So you hope,” said Hanse.

People started to rumble around them. Some spoke for one, some for the other: a low growl of division that made Egil’s nape prickle. He had felt something like it before, long ago, while he was still a Trainee. Within the hour there had been a riot.

Egil interjected politely but firmly. “I think we’d best begin our inquiry. Which of them would be closer?”

“That would be Kelyn,” said Hanse. His voice and face were tight.

With a last glance at the Companion who had done this baffling thing, Egil followed both Pitar and Hanse down through the town.

Kelyn was not in her room. The cousin who had been guarding her was almost in tears, which was disconcerting: He was head and shoulders taller than Egil’s middle height and as broad as a barn door. The tiny woman who had reduced him to a quivering wreck whirled on Hanse in such a fire of fury that even Egil fell back a step.

“She went to the privy,” the woman said, biting off each word. “Two hours ago. Rickard only began to worry, he tells me, after an hour. Because every girl takes forever to do what she will do. And then,” she said, “he was afraid to tell anyone.”

“I can hardly blame him for that,” said Egil mildly.

The woman bridled, then transparently remembered what his white uniform meant. “Herald,” she said with prickly respect. “Thank the Powers you’ve come. The girl has bolted. If she’s not with the Companion, someone had better make sure Nerys is still home and safe.”

Pitar muttered something that sounded like a curse, spun in the doorway and ran.

Nerys was nowhere to be found either. The apprentices who should have been shadowing her had fallen for the same ruse as Kelyn’s cousin.