Rhal darkened again. "Just see to it that both of you keep to your cabin until we arrive. Play your parts until you're out of sight of my ship and don't ever let me set eyes on either of you again!"

Striding furiously out, he collided with the first mate in the hall. Before the man had time to do more than grin, Rhal snarled, "See to your duties, Nettles!" and slammed into his own cabin.

"Well, that was undoubtedly one of the most embarrassing moments of my life," Seregil groaned, bravado falling away. "It's no easy matter, facing down a big, angry sailor in nothing but a woman's nightgown."

"You threw your sword away!" Alec exclaimed in disbelief, pushing the door back into place.

"We'd have fought if I hadn't. Win or lose, you and I couldn't afford the results. How would we have explained things if I'd killed him, eh? You defending my virtue? The crew would kill you in an instant, and Illior only knows what they'd do with Lady Gwethelyn. If he'd killed me, things would turn out just about the same. No, Alec, it's best to talk your way out whenever you can. As it stands, I don't think our secret could be in safer hands. Besides, he interests me. Blustering rogue that he is, I suspect he's intelligent and shrewd enough when women aren't involved. You never know when someone like that might be useful."

"What makes you think he'd ever help you?"

Seregil shrugged. "Intuition, maybe. I'm seldom wrong."

Alec sat down and rubbed his eyes. "What was all that commotion before we came in?"

"Oh, just another of those nightmares," Seregil replied, affecting a nonchalance he didn't feel. He didn't like to think what might have happened if Alec had been in the cabin with him when he'd thrashed his way up out of this latest one.

Sitting up, he reached for his cloak on top of the trunk. The torn nightdress slipped off his shoulder, revealing a patch of reddened skin on his chest, just above the breastbone.

"What's this?" asked Alec, reaching to move the wooden disk aside for a better look.

Icy fingers clamped around Seregil's heart.

Overwhelmed by a sudden, inexplicable fury, he caught Alec by the wrist and shoved him roughly away. "Keep your hands to yourself!" he snarled.

Yanking the cloak around his shoulders, he retreated into the corner of the bunk. "Go to bed. Now.

Hunched in his alcove much later that night, Alec heard Seregil stir.

"Alec, you awake?"

"Yes."

A long pause followed, then, "I'm sorry."

"I know." Alec had been thinking and already had the beginnings of a plan. "Micum said you know a wizard at Rhнminee. Do you think he could help you?"

"If he can't, then I don't know who can." There was another pause. Alec heard something like a dark chuckle, and the sound raised the hair on the back of his neck.

"Alec?"

"Yes?"

"Be careful, will you? Tonight, for just an instant—" Alec tightened his grip on the sword lying across his knees. "It's all right, now. Go back to sleep."

Their last day aboard the Darter was a long one. Seregil spent the morning staring morosely out the window.

Alec maintained a careful distance, preoccupied with his own plans. By afternoon, he was ready to chance Rhal's displeasure and went above.

He settled behind the cutwater, hood pulled up against the wind. By the time they neared Torburn just before sundown, he'd managed to speak with the helmsman and several of the other sailors without their captain noticing. If it was up to him to get them both to Rhнminee, then he had to know how to get there.

To Rhal's relief, Lady Gwethelyn did not appear until the ship had put in at Torburn.

The first mate's tale, already gleefully if discreetly spread among the crew, had amply explained both the silence of the lady and his sudden coolness toward her. Surreptitious nods and nudges were exchanged all around the deck when she finally came above to disembark.

No one but Rhal noticed, however, when the lady slipped a small something into his palm as he handed her down the gangway. Unwrapping the little silk square later that night in his cabin, he found the garnet ring his strange passenger had worn.

"A peculiar character, and no mistake." he exclaimed under his breath. Shaking his head in bemusement, he hid the ring safely away.

11 Dark Pursuit

The cart bumped along over the rutted dirt road through the rolling Mycenian countryside. Seregil sat huddled in his cloak beside Alec on the single rough bench. It wasn't as cold here yet as it had been in the northlands, but snow wasn't far off and the chill seemed to get into his bones.

He found that if he stayed very still he could clear his mind, holding both the pain in his head and the increasingly frequent fits of irrational rage at a manageable level. It was exhausting work. In his more lucid moments he was relieved at how well Alec was managing, though the fact that the boy had not yet slipped away, despite ample justification and opportunity, continued to baffle him.

Their first night ashore in Torburn, they'd taken a tiny room near the riverfront and changed back into their stained traveling clothes. It was then that Alec had calmly outlined his plan.

"You're sick," he began, looking very deliberate. "Since you think this Nysander is the only one who can help, I say we push on for Rhнminee."

Seregil nodded.

Taking a deep breath, Alec continued, "All right then. The way I understand it, the fastest route this time of year is to go overland to Keston, then take a ship to the city—one that goes by way of a canal at somewhere called Cirna. I don't know where any of those places are. You can help me or I'll ask directions as we go, but that's what I mean to do."

Seregil began to buckle on his sword. After a moment's hesitation, however, he handed it instead to Alec. "You'd better take this, and these."

He gave Alec his belt dagger and a small, razorlike blade from the neck of his cloak.

Alec took them without comment, then said almost apologetically, "There's one more."

"So there is." Seregil drew the poniard from his boot and handed it over, fighting back another twinge of hot rage as he did so.

It was an uncomfortable moment for both of them, each knowing perfectly well that these precautions would be useless if Seregil made up his mind to retrieve his weapons. Alec, Seregil noted, kept his own weapons about him.

"How many days will it take to reach Keston?" Alec asked when they were done.

Seregil lay back on the bed and fixed his gaze on the rafters. "Two, if we ride hard, but I doubt I'll be able to do that."

His head hurt again; how long now until another fit came on? A brisk walk in the night air might have helped, but he was too sick to attempt it. Better to concentrate on helping Alec with the details at hand.

"I'll need money," Alec said. "What do you have left?"

Seregil tossed him a purse containing five silver marks and the jewelry he'd worn aboard the Darter.

Turning out his own pouch, Alec added two copper halfs and the Skalan silver piece.

"Hang on to the jewels for now," Seregil advised. "You're not dressed well enough to hawk them without attracting notice. Sell the clothes, though."

"They won't bring much."

"Illior's Hands, money's not the only way to get something! I should think you've been around me long enough to have learned that."

It was dark by the time Alec entered the Torburn marketplace. Only a few of the booths around the square were open, but he finally found a clothier. The dealer proved to be a shrewd bargainer and he came away with a disappointing four silver pennies.

He let out a harsh sigh, tucking the coins away. "That's not going to make my task any easier."