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“Why?” Brayden wanted to know. “Are you going to have a problem sharing with the horses?”

Wil paused for a moment, blinking until the question sank in. And then he laughed out loud, almost doubled-over with the irony and the sheer relief at not having to deal head-on with the niceness thing. “Sorry,” he chuckled when Brayden’s brow twisted and he tilted his head. “No, really. But if you’d seen some of the places I’ve slept…” Wil swept a hand up and down the length of the structure. “This is very fine and more than I’d hoped for.” He smirked at Brayden in the dark. “You definitely have your uses, Constable Brayden.”

“It’s best if you do it away from you,” Brayden advised, watching carefully as Wil trimmed wet bark away from pine branches with Brayden’s wicked dagger.

“Do it toward you and slip…” He opened a hand and shrugged.

Wil nodded and adjusted his hold, the heft and grip of the big knife a surprisingly comfortable fit in his palm. It had been awkward going, getting used to doing it with his left hand, but once he caught the rhythm, his speed picked up considerably. Brayden was working on the bigger limbs with the hatchet, sitting atop one of the saddles, propping the branches from shoulder-to-ground between his legsl, and hacking off chunks in a steady spray. His boots were already half-buried in bark and curled shims.

34

Carole Cummings

He was angled away from the fire, gaze shifting constantly to different points in the forest, doglegging around the curtain of the cloaks with every other sweep.

Wil sat on his bit of carpet with his back leaning against his own saddle, legs stretched out and feet crossed at the ankle. His boots sat next the fire, drying, his stockings hanging over their sides. The detritus from his own work steadily piled in his lap, and every once in a while he stopped to brush it away and wiggle his toes in the warmth of the flames.

Supper had been an interesting stew made of lumps of jerky and selections from the sacks of dried vegetables in Brayden’s pack. Brayden had added the medicinal dose to Wil’s bowl only
after
he’d pointedly asked Wil if it was all right. Considering how bad the dose had tasted without anything to camouflage it, and how sore he was, Wil allowed that it was absolutely all right. It was amazing what a little salt could do for the flavor of what would have otherwise been rather bland fare. Combined with the hardtack, two diced potatoes from Wil’s pack, and one each of the somewhat bruised apples afterward, Wil’s stomach had stopped complaining, the dose had taken the edge off the aches, and with the activity and the warmth from the fire, the chill in his bones was starting to recede.

They’d hung the cloaks from the branches closest the fire, hopefully to dry a little before morning. The crude partition offered the additional advantage of providing a bit of a boundary between themselves and the horses, which, if it wasn’t exactly a marker of civilization, was at least a reflection of it. With the excuse of making sure the animals were set for the night and checking the hobbles, Wil had earlier ducked around the makeshift curtain to make good on his promise of treats for the mares from his rapidly depleting store of apples. It was all right—they’d both nickered happily at him and seemed to enjoy them 35

The Aisling Book Two Dream

a lot more than he did. Anyway, it wasn’t likely he was going to starve without them, not with Brayden around.

And if Brayden had been watching from the other side of the drying cloaks and snorting at Wil’s bit of altruism, he at least had the perspicacity to pretend he hadn’t been.

“So, I’ve been thinking,” Brayden began, tossing one trimmed branch toward the pile near the fire and picking up another.

“Oh, good,” Wil muttered, mouth slightly pinched.

Brayden shot him a sideways glance but didn’t acknowledge the sarcastic bent to Wil’s retort. “There are so many things in all this business that don’t connect, so many loose threads flapping about in a windstorm.

My job is to find answers, and it’s a habit I don’t intend to shake. And since you’re the only one here…” He shrugged.

Surprisingly, Wil’s supper still sat pleasantly in his stomach and didn’t roil about in agitation. He hewed away several sprigs from his branch, slicing off their small stumps. “I don’t know what answers I can give you,” he told Brayden quietly. “But I suppose it’s your right to ask.”

“I appreciate that.” Brayden went silent again until he’d finished with the limb he was working on and chucked it over to join the others. He flipped the hatchet’s blade into the soft ground between his feet and turned to Wil. “Why didn’t you ever kill Siofra?”

The name, coming so abruptly like that, hit Wil in a way that made him startle a little. The knife slipped along the branch, and he tightened his fingers about it, paused for a moment to make himself start breathing again, then resumed shaving away bark.

“I’ve seen you kill,” Brayden went on determinedly. “It takes a certain cold-bloodedness to do what you did, and what happened with that man in the cell…” He shook his 36

Carole Cummings

head with a frown. “You’re full of rage, I can see it every time Siofra’s name or the Brethren come up, and you’re not incapable, so why haven’t you just taken him out?”

Wil was quiet for several long moments, staring at his hands but not really seeing, whittling the branch away to a weak, flexible spike. “You didn’t see me kill,” he reminded Brayden softly. “You saw me abuse a corpse.

If you’d seen me kill, you likely would have seen terror first, and then surprise that the man had let me get close enough to knee him in the stones to get him down.” He dropped the branch, leaned to the side, and stabbed at the ground with the knife, leaving it hilt-up between them.

“The rage came after.” He looked up at Brayden, noted nothing in his eyes but interest, then turned his gaze to the fire. “You would name me a murderer, then?”

And why did he care what Brayden thought?

“No,” Brayden answered immediately, “I think you’re a killer. Some would see no distinction, but those are the ones who’ve never had to choose between someone else’s life and their own.”

Wil was slightly taken aback to hear his own estimation of Brayden turned back on him like that. “I never killed Siofra,” he told the fire, “because I couldn’t.” He flicked a glance over at Brayden, shrugged and turned away again.

“There was no question of doing it when he followed me—I couldn’t do anything but what he told me to do.

And by the time I was grown enough… well.” A bitter snort. “Leaf and violence are rather mutually exclusive.”

Brayden pondered that for a moment in silence. After a short stretch of it, he ventured, “All right, but what about… well, can’t you follow
him
?” Wil frowned at him sideways. “You describe what you do when you dream as tending the Threads of men, lacing them into the Weave where they belong—can’t you sort of…?” Brayden’s hands waved about, and he shook his head. “I don’t know, can’t 37

The Aisling Book Two Dream

you find his thread and… rip it out?”

“If it were that easy, you really think I wouldn’t’ve done it already?”

“Well, that’s rather the question, innit?”

It was so… reasonable. Why did Brayden always have to be so damned
reasonable
?

“I don’t
know
why I can’t,” Wil barked, sitting abruptly and swatting shavings from his trousers to keep from looking at Brayden. “I don’t know why I can’t find him, or why he can’t find me—he did it once, right?

You’d think he’d’ve caught up to me within days, but somehow he can’t, and I can’t hunt him down, or the damned Brethren, either—believe me, I’ve tried—and yes, I would’ve taken them
all
out, if I could’ve done, and what’s more: I don’t
care
if that makes me a murderer.”

He took a long breath, tried to calm the anger that was ramming about his veins before turning squarely to Brayden. “Put me aside for a moment. Pretend I’m not a person and it doesn’t matter what happens to me. Look at what Siofra’s already done, look at what the Brethren want to do—is it murder to take men like that from out the world? Is it murder to keep someone from in turn murdering who-knows-how-many others, and not for any kind of higher purpose, but because they think it’s their
right
?”

Brayden stared at Wil, rubbing a hand over his mouth.

“No,” he said slowly. “But I’ll admit I’m a little surprised to know you’ve thought of it like that.” He shook his head when Wil’s eyebrows twisted. “I don’t mean it in a bad way—I only mean that… well, I understand why the politics of all this mean little to you; it’s right that they should. And it would be just as right if you didn’t give a rat’s arse about what those men could do with that power if they managed to get hold of you.” He shrugged.

“You’ve every right to not give a fuck about the rest of 38

Carole Cummings

the world. I’m just somewhat…” He paused, apparently searching for the right word. “I’m impressed that you do.”

Wil was caught between indignation at being judged so, and an embarrassing grudging pleasure at being assessed as something other than a… well, as something other than a mutinous little badger. He sat back, looked down, cheeks heating. “Don’t be too impressed,”

he muttered to his knees. “If I had to choose between another, even someone I liked, and letting one of them get me, I’d choose me, and it wouldn’t necessarily have anything to do with worrying about anyone else’s fate.

Given that choice, there is no one I wouldn’t throw in front of a bullet.” He looked at Brayden straight. “I can’t go back. I
can’t
. There are worse things than death—I know, I’ve lived them—and I can’t…” His jaw clenched tight. “I
won’t
. And if I have to throw my
self
in front of a bullet or cut my own throat to prevent it, I’ll do it, and I don’t care what that makes of me.”

Brayden stared at him, eyes slitted and brow contorted in a thoughtful frown. “We’ve spent an awful lot of time on your need or lack thereof to fear me,” he said quietly.

“Do I need to fear you?”

Again, there was cool interest and sincere curiosity, but no condemnation. The question was straightforward and genuine. Wil almost barked a sharp laugh at the idea of this man, of all people, fearing him. Brayden was almost an entire person wider, after all.
And the Guardian, don’t
forget
, Wil mused. There was more power crouching inside Brayden than he’d probably ever want to know about. For pity’s sake, Brayden could swat Wil like a fly, if he ever let himself see it. So how exactly was Wil supposed to answer a question like that? In the end, he decided to return the favor of bluntness in kind.

He wrested Brayden’s knife from its seat in the ground, 39

The Aisling Book Two Dream

held it out hilt-first. “I don’t intend to murder you in your sleep,” he said evenly. He shot a pointed glance at the rifle, propped against a tree, Brayden between it and Wil.

And he hadn’t missed the way Brayden had practically slept atop his weapons last night. “I don’t intend to steal one of your guns and shoot you in the back. I choose to trust you because I believe that perhaps Siofra did lie and you’re not what I’ve always thought you. I believe you want to help, and I think any danger from you will be unintentional. But I won’t trust you blindly. If it comes to a choice between you or me…” He shrugged, waggled the knife a little. “I’ll still choose me.”

Brayden nodded slowly, eyes on the blade. “Fair enough,” he finally answered. He nodded at the knife.

“Keep it.”

Wil frowned, let his hand fall open, the knife balanced across his palm. “It’s a nice knife.”

“It is,” Brayden agreed. “My foster parents gave it to me when I was inducted into the army. It’s served me well.”

“You were in the army?” Wil didn’t know why he was so surprised. Brayden was exactly the type: honor, duty, rectitude. All of those things necessary to men who fancied themselves guardians of anything, and liked to play with guns. It was amazing, upon reflection, that it had taken Brayden so long to admit what he was, regardless of what he was meant to guard. Wil’s frown deepened, the knife a growing weight in his hand. “Were you an officer?”

Of course he was an officer—he had an air about him as one who’d been giving orders all his life, and was used to having them followed.

But Brayden just waved a hand at the knife. “It’s a good blade,” was all he said.

Wil didn’t miss the deliberate change of subject, but he didn’t pursue it just now. He shook his head. “Why 40

Carole Cummings

would you give it to me?” he wanted to know, trying for suspicion, but only achieving consternation.

Brayden didn’t answer, just leaned toward the fire, poked at the coals with a long stick, then stood. He shouldered the rifle and turned his back to the fire and to Wil. “Get some sleep,” he said. “If the weather lets up tomorrow, I’ll teach you to shoot, so you—” He turned with a frown, waved a hand at the sky. “D’you, um…

d’you make it stop, too?”

Wil blinked. “I haven’t before. Should I try?”

Brayden thought about it for a moment then shook his head. “I can’t think why. Anyway, if the weather lets up, I’ll teach you to shoot so you can take a watch. In the meantime, at least one of us should get some rest.”

Wil looked from Brayden to the knife in his hand, and let his arm drop. He refused to let himself ponder it, at least not tonight; instead, he turned the knife over in his hands, watching the firelight glance and shiver over its etched surface, its sharp edge. He peered up at Brayden’s broad back, smiled a little, then slipped the dagger beneath the saddle.

The clearing was silent, the air still heavy and rimy with yesterday’s rain. They’d struck out south when they broke camp that morning, the forest petering out along the way, from dense and thick to sparser growth that grudgingly let through moody, erratic sunlight. There were fewer evergreens here—more oaks and elms—

and the leaves and deadfall on the forest floor slipped and slid in the muck beneath their feet and the horses’

hoofs. Dead vines wound thick and treacherous, so the speed they should have gained through clearer paths was cancelled out by another day of cautious stepping. Still, 41