Mastiff by Tamora Pierce

Author:Tamora Pierce
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: Romance, Mystery, Young Adult, Science Fiction & Fantasy, fantasy
ISBN: 9780375893285
Publisher: Random House
Published: 2011-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Wednesday, June 20, 249

Queensgrace

For all that I’ve risen at dawn nearly every day of my life, if only to visit the privy or take Achoo to do the same, it is always a source of unhappiness to me. I am used to true wakefulness around eight of the clock, being an Evening Watch Dog who comes off duty at the first stroke after midnight. That brief waking at dawn is the world’s and the gods’ way of saying they still own me. My body wants relief, my hound wants relief, and one day a week I must report on my hobblings in the magistrate’s court beginning at seven in the morning. On this Hunt, of course, we rise at dawn to make use of the daylight. I would be far unhappier about it, I suppose, did I not want to find that poor lad and those Rats that have done this to him and his parents.

When Achoo nudged me awake, I groped for my clothes and belt. I did not bother with stockings, but thrust my bare feet into my boots. I tiptoed around Sabine’s cot and opened the door to the solar. “Quietly,” I whispered to Achoo.

I heard a rustle and turned. Sabine stared at me, one hand clutching a knife that had not been in view a moment ago. I pointed to Achoo. She blinked, then nodded.

“Take weapons,” she mumbled. “Nowhere’s safe.”

“Boots and belt,” I said, wondering if, in her half-sleeping state, she’d remember the nasty things in my belt pouches and the blades in my boots.

Seemingly she did. She slid her blade under her pillow, and was instantly asleep. Pounce moved onto the warm spot I’d left to continue his own slumbers. Even constellation cats like their naps.

Achoo and I slid into the darkened solar. Two lamps, one by our door, one by the main door, offered a bit of light, enough that I could see a path between the ladies on their pallets. Some offered snores to the Dream King Gainel. Others murmured. Their dreams were more peaceable than mine, where Holborn and I had been fighting again. That made dawn rising easier. It put a halt to the sight of his face, red with the fire spirits he’d been drinking, eyes narrow and cruel as he cried that I wrung all the joy out of life.

Carefully I opened the door, fearing to wake a lady and start an outcry, praying the guards outside were asleep. In fact, the guards were no longer there. Mayhap Niccols thought all those ladies were enough to keep me inside. In any case, the broad hall was empty.

We left the castle near the area where Tunstall and Farmer camped with the prince’s men. Certainly I couldn’t let Achoo ease herself where they walked, but the servants’ privy and the chicken coops were close by, and the barrels in which castle garbage was put. Surely no one could object if I took Achoo there.

We hurried past the men’s camp. Some of their hounds came to attention, watching us, but they were well trained.

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