Ice Burns (8 page)

"Stop," the guard had come to his senses. "Master Dreys said to keep you locked in your room, and Andre was to take care of your books and supplies."

"Well Master apparently left an incompetent in charge of taking care of the needs of his Apprentice," she hissed, leaning into the guard's face with her eyes narrowed. Both men flinched when she said "Apprentice" as though it were a swear word.

Chandra could feel her pulse jumping in her neck. She fought the urge to step away from the guard. The guard's eyes were wide and his face pale as though he were caught somewhere between surprise and discomfort. It crossed Chandra's mind that the guard had probably never had someone push so close to him in such an aggressive way. The sword at his belt and knives across his waist and arms no doubt prevented such closeness.

The guard held his ground but turned to Andre, who had risen. Chandra didn't want them to have a moment to think and turned away from both men to head down the hall.

"Hurry along Andre," she called over her shoulder. "I will need you to carry the books back for me."

Chandra slowed the pounding of her heart and thought about all of the ways that could have gone wrong. She had seen guards raise a hand to servants before for various infractions and had half expected the guard to do the same to her. Master would not be upset if it was done to maintain his order. Thankfully, she wasn't sure that the guards or even Andre realized that.

Chandra had always loved Master's study. The room was warm and inviting in dark wood tones and plush furnishings. The walls had shelves from floor to ceiling filled with books and oddities; Chandra didn't know where they all came. It was something else she had asked about. Rarely had Master even bothered to acknowledge the questions.

She moved across the room and climbed the ladder to the upper shelves of his books. The top shelf was forbidden to her as were the shelves directly behind Master's desk. No doubt that Andre had a similar knowledge of the books, so she would have to be very careful about what she took. If it came back that Master was angry that she had borrowed from his private collection, hopefully, Chandra would have learned something that assisted her magic and made it worth it. If not, she considered blaming Andre.

It isn't like he would help me if he could, she reasoned. Her chest got tight at the idea of what might happen to the manservant if Master thought Andre had directly gone against his wishes. She tried to shake it off and decided that success was the best approach because then no one would be in trouble.

"Miss, you know the top shelf is off limits," Andre's voice was one-quarter whine and three-quarters snarl in the quiet of the study. The high pitch of his childish voice made her hair stand on end.

"I know that," she said slowly and with exaggerated enunciation. "The shelf below it has some local information I want. Instead of telling me the obvious, find the books on meditation for me and put them on Master's desk. I know you won't find the exact one I want, so bring them all."

Andre made a sound that Chandra wasn't sure if it was an attempt to cover up a word or annoyance. She heard his slippered feet shuffle across the wooden floor and thick rugs. When she knew he was engaged in pulling out meditation books, she skimmed the upper shelf with her eyes and rested on a gray binding and a book without a binding that looked to be a bunch of individual items of parchment worked together and covered.

The one without the binding was only as large as her two hands put side by side, so she tucked it into her tunic, thankful for the belt at the waist to hold it in. She slid the other in between a book on the shifting land masses of the continent and another on farm rituals. She stacked them and climbed back down the ladder.

Andre's bald head had turned a pinkish color, and his lips looked white as he carried five oversized books on mediation to the desk. He set them down as she got to the bureau.

Chandra put down her stack, ensuring that the pages instead of the bindings were visible.

"I want the one with the illustrations in it," Chandra said with a wave of her hand.

Andre gave a look that would wilt a flower and carried the books back over to set down near the shelf. Chandra turned the books she had selected and opened the top book so she could skim the contents of the messy shelf behind Master's desk while appearing to read in case Andre looked up.

The tombs on the shelf were in varying colors, wear, and size. Few of them had any writing on the cover and most were like the other she had taken, with no spine binding. Chandra had no idea if any of them would be useful.

"I think it is a gray book, with a worn binding," she called out to Andre without lifting her head. She saw him turn to glare at her out of the corner of her eye. That only narrowed the pile down by one, and it happened to have been the only book he had pulled from the shelf. Chandra reached over and grabbed a tiny book that caught her eye. The cover was a cracked animal skin and written on with a flowing, curved print like she would imagine a woman of high standing to create.

Andre had wrestled three books from the shelves, and Chandra was rapidly running out of time. She tucked the tiny book in her tunic with the other and grabbed another book at random in the hope that one of the three contraband would hold something that could help her.

Andre brought the books over, and Chandra opened each, skimming through them. She picked up the thickest of the stack and set it aside.

"This one," she told him. "Carry it back to my room, and be careful of the binding."

Chandra lifted her stack of books and started off ahead of him. She could have given him time to put the books away, but she didn't want him to have the opportunity to look too closely at what she held in her arms. It also meant that he would not be at her door for a while because he would have to come back to clean Master's study. Knowing him, he would polish everything she had gone near as though she were some disease sullying Master's spaces. It was a good thing that Master had so many books, or Andre would have likely caught her with his obsession for keeping Master's things in order.

The bookshelf behind Master's desk would never be a worry, though. Even Andre didn't touch it unless Master had cleared it off which he only did once he had gone through all of the books there and made notes about them. After that, they would be put away and the space cleared for new books to come in. Chandra had no idea where they all came from, but it was a bit of an obsession for Master, as though he thought he, like Chandra, could find the answers to what they wanted in a book.

When she returned, Chandra was relieved to see that Frostwhite was not in her room because Andre followed her in to drop the book on the table. She imagined that it would have been more of a startled mistake rather than an angry retort if the hawk had been in her room. She fought a smile at the expression she imagined on Andre's face were he to come face to beak with Frostwhite. It almost made her wish her friend had returned.

Andre lifted his eyes to her for a moment, and Chandra saw the pure hatred there in the smoky blue depths under storm cloud eyebrows. Even though she knew that Andre didn't like her, and she had used that to her advantage to get to the study, the intensity of that look made Chandra's breath catch in her throat, and her heart pounded a little harder. Something in her froze as though prey sensing a hunter.

Andre didn't say anything, but offered a sharp, quick bow and turned on his heel to leave. He didn't slam the door this time, though the click of the lock on the door seemed oddly pronounced.

A chill ran down her spine and Chandra took a deep breath to calm her mind and slow her heartbeat. She turned away from the door slowly, almost unable to do even that with the wrenching fear of Andre. It was as though she thought turning her back on him, even with a closed door, was dangerous.

She had barely sat down at the table when a gust of air and rain rushed into the room as the window blew open as wide as the tie on the latch would allow. Frostwhite angled in and then up as he tucked his massive wingspan into somewhat ungracefully drop onto the table. Chandra scurried over to move the books away from the hawk who was now dripping on the table. It was a good thing since Frostwhite chose the next moment to ruffle his feathers and shed drops of water all around the room.

"Watch it!" she called with a startled laugh as cold water sprayed her. Chandra laughed harder when she looked at Frostwhite, who had gotten all puffed up from getting the water off. He looked like bread dough before the cook beat it down to bake it. She shook her head and went over to the wardrobe.

"Silly bird," she clicked her tongue at him and dug around in the drawer at the bottom of the closet until she found an old, tattered blanket. When she pulled it out, the smell of cedar wrapped around her, and she inhaled deeply.

"I saw this at the bottom when I got put in this room and thought it might come in handy," she said as she brought it over to Frostwhite. When she reached him, she paused. What had she been about to do? Had she actually thought she would walk over to the hawk and wrap him in a blanket to dry him off?

Frostwhite watched her internal struggle for a moment before doing an awkward hop toward her on the table.

Okay, let's see if this works.

Chandra steeled herself with a deep breath, opened the blanket and held it in both hands before taking a small step toward Frostwhite.

"I'm going to dry you off with this blanket," she told him, taking another step. "I don't need you dripping all over the place, especially on the books. Master would not be happy if that happened and I doubt he would accept the explanation that a wild bird came in and dripped all over them."

Frostwhite bobbed his head for a moment and then lowered it a little. Chandra nodded and stepped forward to put the blanket around the hawk and patted him with it. She wasn't sure about the best way to dry him off. He wasn't a person who you would wipe off and go, and squeezing the blanket around him would not likely make him happy. She continued to pat at him with edges of the blanket until she thought she had gotten most of it. Then she bunched the blanket around his feet to form a sort of nest for him. She stepped back, and he bobbed his head a couple of times before settling into the blanket "nest".

Chandra nodded and walked over to sit down in the chair. She picked up the top book on the stack, moved it aside, pulled the two out of her shirt, and grabbed the one she had gotten from the top shelf. She realized she had enough reading for several days, heaved a sigh and opened the first book.

Frustration and a hawk were her company in hours of solitude. Chandra looked up at Frostwhite, who perched on the window sill. Frostwhite had wandered freely around the room. He had flown out the window around mid-afternoon but had returned to reside on the sill. His presence in no way alarmed her anymore though she wondered what had become of its Master.

Chandra looked up to watch the bird.

Frostwhite turned to look at her with one luminous, colorless eye. He made no other movement but waited.

"I can't imagine that you're from around here," Chandra speculated. "With your coloring, there is no way you would ever blend in enough to be a good hunter in the forest."

Chandra tapped her chin while she looked at the hawk. Frostwhite was the same color that the rabbits turned when the weather grew cold. They didn't get a lot of snow in Malofa, but it happened now and then. When it did, the rabbits were able to camouflage themselves entirely.

“I’ll bet you’re from the North, aren’t you?” she asked him. “You would be a magnificent hunter there, with your coloring.”

The bird cocked its head at her and eyed her steadily. It felt to Chandra as though he were looking at her with an arched eyebrow at the implied insult.

“Don’t get me wrong, I’m sure you’re a magnificent hunter anywhere, but your coloring would surely be an asset in the North.” The hawk shook its feathers and resettled in its roosting posture.

Chandra rested her chin on her hand and looked back to her book. After a moment, she reached over to pick up her goblet and the pitcher of water. She found both to be empty.

“Were I in the North, I could stick the pitcher out the window and scoop up some snow for a refill,” she huffed. Chandra put the pitcher down on the table. She knew she could get the guard to have someone bring her more, but she didn't like the thought of having anyone possibly see Frostwhite.

Of course, realizing that she would have to go without made her thirstier, but the rain had shifted away again, so that was no help. It wasn't as though she had any way to strain out the sand and debris that would likely come with it if she were honest with herself. She swallowed dryly and thought about how long she would be waiting for dinner and a fresh pitcher of water.

As she sat there, she heard a quiet tinkling sound. She turned to look at the window, wondering if something had chipped or broken pieces off when she wasn't watching, but it was intact. Frostwhite was looking at her with both eyes wide. She eyed the pitcher.

Chandra hadn't seen any rocks or bits of rubbish in the pitcher when she had looked before, but it wasn't unheard of for one of the other students or kitchen staff to put things in her water. She frowned. It was a little sad that it would be logical to assume someone did something to show how much she was hated.

Chandra picked the pitcher back up to look inside and almost dropped it. The pitcher became cumbersome with water that was almost frozen solid. The clink had been the layer of ice on the top of the pool breaking. She put the pitcher down, rubbed her eyes and picked it back up. It was still full of icy water.