The Halo Of Vakh (BOOK 1)

ALLIANCES

Lysander's head snapped up from the place it had been resting on the tree. He winced at the soreness in his neck. He looked around. Thomas and Andrew were sprawled on the ground, faces pressed into the mud. He looked towards the two strangers who had set up their small camp slightly away from theirs. The woman sat kneeling on the ground, hands working a pestle relentlessly into a mortar. She had shed her cloak and pinned her hair into a hill on top of her head, dark as the night sky. He watched as she poured water into it from her waterskin and stirred it with the pestle. She turned towards the older man and Lysander noticed he was awake. The man drank whatever the woman gave him and lay down. The woman turned around to put the utensils into the saddle bag on the ground and their eyes met. She arched her brow and Lysander turned away with a sigh.

He did not know where the two strangers intended to go or if they had been locals from Medlar. He snuffed out the latter thought as soon as it came.

Locals don't take up residence in an inn, you idiot.

The only logical conclusion he could draw was that the two were travellers. Yet, their faces were oddly familiar, like a memory sitting in his reach that he was failing to grab from the recesses of his mind. He'd have to ask Thomas or Andrew if they had the same suspicions or if it was just his mind playing tricks on him. Maybe, his paranoia was finally catching up to him. He looked towards his sleeping friends. He had forgotten to disguise them as they went. He couldn't do it now. It was too late.

How could he have been so stupid? He had changed the colour of his hair the minute they had left the hold. He knew it drew too much unwanted attention. But, he had forgotten to change the features of his two friends who were in as much danger as him. He hoped against hope the two strangers did not pay too much attention to the newspaper. They would be doomed otherwise. An owl hooted somewhere and he looked up. The sky was turning brighter. He had to wake everyone up. It was better they were out of Medlar's periphery as soon as they could. There were soldiers marching city to city and they could not let themselves be detected.

All traces of their camp were gone within minutes as they got up. It was decided without any words that they would continue on their separate journeys; it was no use getting in each other's paths. It was when Lysander took the reins to their mare that Thomas spoke up.

"I know who you are."

His voice was loud and rang over their small group in ripples that caused the father and daughter to pause. Lysander stared at his friend. Thomas looked at the pair with a frown settled between his brows. Lysander saw as the two companions shared a wide eyed, their eyes appearing strikingly similar. It passed as fast as it had come.

"I'm afraid we've never met before," the man said. His eyes appeared bored, all traces of the instantaneous panic dusted away from the planes of his face.

"No, we haven't met," Thomas continued. "However, you've been all over the newspapers, I'm afraid. And on the walls."

Lysander saw the colour rise lightly in the woman's cheeks and she tugged her cloak closer towards her and shivered despite the warmth of the ending twilight. He looked closer, inspecting the delicate yet fierce features. At the very least, he knew he was not going mad. If Thomas recognized the two people, then he knew them too. He just could not remember. Neither the father nor the daughter jumped to protest against the claim.

"You're the ones who fooled Toluer into thinking that you had escaped to Nirrin. And now... you're on the run for the murder of Redmord Elyane."

It clicked in his mind at that moment. It was James and Rueen Blake. He saw the woman's jaw tighten and the man's hand clench at his side.

"That's a false claim," James spoke up and his hand slowly crawled towards the hilt of a dagger poking out of one of the saddlebags. Lysander lowered his hand to the pistol in his belt. He did not want it to come to blows, but there was no harm in being prepared. He did not care if it went against all his beliefs.