Five: Watcher

"You look like someone just crapped in your food."

Koen's chirpy mood was a stinging contrast to Jordan's abject misery. Jordan's friend and fellow apprentice strolled inside the training room after this pronouncement, leaving Jordan staring glumly after him as he greeted Astra and then Nika.

The training session had gone well – for Astra. Jordan blamed his bad performance on fatigue and the injuries he had sustained during the robbery, but it was a feeble excuse considering Astra was grieving and had still found time to excel in her studies. Her intensity unnerved him and he couldn't match it, which meant he was endlessly grateful that they were only sparring with wooden sticks. Despite the blunt weapons he was covered in bruises and he'd strained muscles in places he hadn't even known he had muscles.

To make it worse, Astra made no effort to salve the embarrassment with friendly banter or teasing. She worked in total silence and preferred to pretend she and Jordan had never so much as spoken to each other.

"Had a rough time?" Koen's tutor Hap sounded a lot more sympathetic. He and Jordan gripped elbows in greeting as the old man hobbled inside.

"She's really good," Jordan muttered, and cringed when he realised he hadn't made it sound much like a compliment.

"She is," Hap agreed. "She's also got a year of training on you. Don't be so hard on yourself."

Jordan grunted. He didn't feel much better about it.

"Your footwork is improving a lot," Nika said. The Unspoken appeared at Jordan's side.

"I fell over twice."

"Better than last time."

Jordan scowled, forced to concede the point, even though anything would have been an improvement on last time.

He glanced over at Koen and Astra chatting quietly in the corner. Astra caught him looking and abruptly stopped talking, then patted Koen's shoulder and walked away down the corridor. A moment later a door snapped shut.

"She really hates me, doesn't she?" Jordan mumbled, face burning. "I don't think I did anything to her."

"She doesn't hate you," Koen said, shoving his hands in his pockets and ambling over to join them. "She takes a while to warm up to people. Longer than usual at the moment." They all fell silent for a time, and then Koen added, "Anyone fancy a drink?"

"Yes," Jordan said immediately, ignoring the heated look Nika directed at him. The Unspoken hadn't taken well to finding out that Jordan also partook of Yddris's extensive collection of drink, but Jordan wasn't about to make the prying worse by admitting it was the only thing that helped him sleep.

"Demon's Brew?" Koen asked, either oblivious or ignoring the sudden tension.

"Where else?" Hap asked, clapping Jordan on the shoulder as his face burned anew. The owner of the Demon's Brew inn had a daughter who Jordan had always got along extremely well with, a fact that the other Unspoken teased him for relentlessly.

They left the house together – Astra was staying in a communal boarding complex, where the Unspoken had hired a building for guild use over the dark season. It was in a slightly shabbier part of the merchants' quarter, bordering the large estate where Lord Harkenn housed the families of his staff and soldiers. Jordan preferred this part of the city; it was more homely than other parts of the quarter, without being run-down. He thought it might be a good place for him to rent a house with Grace someday, when he had the money. Perhaps Harkenn would even let him buy it.

Not that the lord was all that fond of doing favours.

He looked up at the sky as he stepped out into the street, heart sinking at the indigo cracks across the sky. It felt as though the daytime had never got started, and it was already ending. He and Grace had arrived in Nictaven on the cusp of the dark season, so Jordan had never seen the city in full light. He missed the sun more fiercely than almost anything else from earth.

"Did you hear the bell earlier?" Koen said. Hap and Nika had fallen back to talk about other things.

Jordan shuddered. He and Grace had both heard it while out in the courtyard; a temple bell, a distress signal, which he had only heard once before. Only he knew that Arlen had been the cause of it that time; that a man he was now taking lessons from had orchestrated the murder of the second most powerful man in Nictaven. Not even Yddris knew that.

"Did we find out what it was for?"

"No," Koen said. "I was hoping you had some idea. I only know it was Kiel's."

The tightness in Jordan's chest eased; it wasn't Orthan again. "Maybe Yddris will tell us later."

"Well, he's definitely been dragged into it. The poor sod doesn't escape anything up there."

"No, he doesn't." A fact Jordan didn't like to be reminded of, considering he was lined up to take Yddris's job in the not-so-distant future.

The city hummed quietly around them. Runes glittered on walls alongside the bright flames of candles and streetlamps. A few civilians were out, but it was getting dark for business and many windows were shuttered. Only the taverns and inns were open, spilling warm light and chatter into the street, a sign that the season was finally on the turn. All the same, there was an uneasiness to it, and there were signs that things were not as good as they initially seemed. Many shops were not just shuttered but boarded up, and many roofs had missing shingles or deep gouges from the passage of demons.

"Wait a second," Koen murmured, as they turned the corner into a narrow road and a shadow flickered into a side alley. Jordan paused as Koen followed the shape, tensing. He associated flickering shadows with the dead quarter, and his hand started creeping towards his knife. But the shadow had only been a young boy in ragged clothing, who accepted the silver Cert Koen gave him with wide eyes. As he backed away down the street to join several more shabby figures in the distance, Jordan spotted strips of shiny new skin all over the boy's right side; demon damage.

"Find a shelter," Koen called after the boy as he scampered off, then continued walking. Jordan followed, throat tight. "They shouldn't be out at all."

"They can't earn money in a shelter." Jordan shoved his hands in his pockets. Grace had spent the dark season working in a community shelter run by the head of House Kiel, and recalling some of the stories of people who used them always brought a haunted look to her face. When Jordan had gently suggested that she take a break, though, she had tartly reminded him that it was her only escape from the endless housework Harkenn employed her for.

Jordan would have taken endless housework over his own balancing act, but he could hardly tell her that.

"No, I suppose not." Koen lapsed into an uncharacteristically brooding silence that lasted until they reached a bridge over the Aven, on the other side of which was Kedrick's inn. The water was still running high, and a heaviness in the air promised impending rain. Nictaven didn't experience rain as often as Jordan had been used to back home, but when it did, it was usually torrential. It looked like another downpour might cause the black waters below them to burst the banks.

"How's your studying coming on?" Jordan asked. He didn't like being left alone with his own thoughts these days.

Koen visibly deflated. "Hap's pushing hard."

Koen was preparing to take the black cloak at the start of the light season; the Unspoken graduation. From then on, he was a practicing guild member, and as such Hap had been training him hard to fill all the gaps in his education before the ceremony came around. Some days Koen seemed as worn out as Jordan felt.

Jordan still hadn't quite got over the sting. Koen was the closest friend he had in Nictaven – though it had only been a few months – and already there was another barrier going up between them. It made Jordan feel more trapped than ever. The only other apprentices in the guild were Astra, who hated him for some reason or another, and Oloe, who didn't hate Jordan but also never spoke.

"Are you still getting to do your rune netting work?"

"It's my registered specialism," Koen said, sounding pleased. His voice became less enthusiastic as he added, "But it's not a priority at the moment."

"Sucks," Jordan said. He wondered what his specialism would be, when he reached that point. From where he was standing it was starting to look an awful lot like it would be going weeks on end without sleep and somehow not dying.

They reached the inn door, and it swung open before Koen had raised his fist to knock. A young woman stood framed in lamplight, and a moment later Jordan staggered back under Laurel's weight as she threw herself at him. Inside his hood, Ren protested loudly with whining and the generous application of her claws.

"Jor- Thorne," Laurel said, as caught out by his new name as he was. He had been using it for weeks and still forgot on a regular basis. "Well met."

"Are you wearing perfume?" Jordan asked. A cloud of heady scent had enveloped him when they embraced, tickling his nose.

"I am! Do you like it?" Her bright brown eyes glittered at him. Her hands hadn't left his shoulders, a fact he realised with rapidly heating cheeks as Nika and Hap caught up with them. "I'm glad someone noticed. Killian still can't work out what I keep hinting at."

"Y-yeah." He shrugged loose, covering the movement by grasping her elbows gently and then letting go. He didn't get away with it; her mischievous smile alighted on the Unspoken behind him, who were both radiating amusement.

"Come on in," Laurel said, taking his hand instead. "I just made soup."

As he was dragged away Jordan glowered over his shoulder at Koen , who had loosed a betraying snort of laughter. "Shut up."

The inn's taproom was quieter than usual. A few patrons decorated the corners, but the only other occupants were Kedrick, Laurel's father, and her brother Killian. They sat at the bar together, and looked round at the same time as Laurel skipped inside, Jordan still stumbling after her. He wasn't entirely unhappy about the arrangement, but might have enjoyed it a deal more if he hadn't just heard Nika muttering about how Yddris would have pissed himself laughing if he'd been there.

"Well met, Thorne," Killian said. "She got you already, huh?"

"Maybe she'll stop talking about you for five minutes," Kedrick added.

"Well, at least he noticed my perfume," Laurel said, finally letting go of Jordan and heading off to the kitchen. "Unlike you two unobservant louts."

"I'm your brother," Killian protested, "I don't notice this stuff."

"Oh, you don't say." She disappeared behind the kitchen swing door.

"Showing me up, then?" Killian grinned, hopping down from his stool and grasping elbows with Jordan. "It's good to see you. You've been busy, I expect?"

"Haven't we all," Nika said. He all but collapsed into a chair at a nearby table. "I'll have a mead, Kedrick."

Jordan joined Nika at the table, seconding the order despite feeling like something stronger. He had a feeling it wouldn't go down well, and he'd spent enough time disappointing Nika already today. When all of them had a drink in front of them, Kedrick and Killian sat down and Laurel backed out of the kitchen bearing a tray with several steaming bowls. Jordan caught himself just before he shot up to offer help. Laurel didn't need it, and he didn't need the ribbing it would cause.

"Does this have mountain buck in it?" Koen said, sniffing appreciatively at the soup. "Can't remember the last time I had any."

"Stock." Laurel shrugged. "I got the bones for a good price."

"Really? Where from?" Nika asked. "I haven't been able to find anyone who has any left by the time I get there."

Jordan tuned out of the conversation, trying not to think about Marrowhawks and the wobbly piles of hide and muscle they left behind when they'd picked all the bones out. On one of his patrols with Yddris they had come across a dead Listener that had been torn apart by the other demons. It was not an image Jordan's subconscious seemed eager to relinquish, try as he might to forget it.

He let Ren clamber down his arm and squat on the table next to his bowl. As the others talked, he flicked bits of vegetable off his spoon for her to catch. His muscles ached from training in combination with the long walk from Astra's, and he was already dreading going back to the dead quarter the next day. Arlen's moods got darker every time.

"Are you alright?" Laurel asked softly, touching his hand under the table. Jordan felt Koen's glance, but ignored it.

"Yeah, I'm fine." He tried to smile, then realised she couldn't see it anyway and gave up. "Tired."

"Do you want to stay over tonight?" A lull in the conversation made Jordan choke on his soup. Laurel scowled. "You boys need to mind your dark-damned business. All of you."

Before Jordan could really work out what was happening, she pulled him out of the chair and dragged him up the stairs. Halfway up, Jordan heard the conversation resume, and his face burned. He was glad, though, to be led away. He wasn't much in the mood for socialising.

The darkened landing was quiet. Jordan had stayed here once before, when he and Grace had first arrived in Nictaven and before he had manifested the Gift. Even though it hadn't been a long stay, there was a comforting familiarity to it. Laurel led him to the end, to the room he'd once stayed in. Nothing had changed inside. He wandered to the bed and sat down as Laurel lit the lamp, watching her silver hair shine as the match flared to life.

"Tell me what's really up," she said, still with her back turned.

"Nothing. Really. I'm just sleeping badly." This was the part Jordan hated most; the lying, the evasion. A part of him resented Yddris for always being so busy, because his tutor was the only person with whom he never had to pretend.

She joined him on the bed, eyes scanning the darkness of his hood. He wondered how much of him she could see, and how well she remembered his face. It had been a few months since she had last seen it.

"I know what you Unspoken are like," she murmured. "But just because you don't show your faces doesn't mean you have to keep everything to yourselves. You're human too." He started to get up, but she pulled him back down. "Thorne."

"Don't call me that," he mumbled, and to his horror, the floodgates creaked open.

She held him as he cried. When it had finally subsided, she didn't ask him again what was wrong, and he was grateful for it.

"Have you spoken to Yddris about it?" she asked.

Jordan pulled off his gloves and wiped his eyes dry. "In a sense. He's not about much."

They sat in silence for several moments. Laurel's hand hadn't left his, but he found he didn't want to move it.

"I thought homesickness was meant to get better," he said, staring out at the darkness through the window. The pinpricks of green from his eyes reflected back at him. "It just keeps getting worse."

"That's understandable," Laurel said. Jordan shook his head.

"We barely said goodbye to our parents. It was supposed to be a two night trip. We were supposed to be back before anyone had time to start missing each other." He took in a deep, shuddering breath. "God knows what my mum would say if she saw me like this. I'm surprised Grace is taking it as well as she is."

"I never said goodbye to my mother, either," Laurel said. At some point while he was talking she had linked their fingers together. "We went out to get bread from the market. We took a detour that strayed too far from the rune paths and she pushed me out of the way when a Listener came for us. I watched her die. I would have died too, if Yddris hadn't been there." She smiled, eyes bright. "But I know she'd be proud of me. She's watching me, I know it. And yours will always be thinking of you. She'd be proud. And she'll live."

Jordan untangled their fingers and wrapped his arm around her shoulder instead. "I'm sorry about your mum."

"Me too. And I'm sorry about what happened to you." She twisted her mouth, thinking, and then said, "But life is what you make of it."

The atmosphere changed subtly.

Jordan felt a familiar flash of apprehension. After accepting Marick's deal, his resistance against a closer friendship with Laurel had crumbled – partly out of sheer loneliness – but even knowing that his cooperation at least ensured her safety for the time being, it made him nervous. Marick was the most unpredictable force Jordan had ever encountered.

But he didn't resist as she nudged him back on the bed, welcoming the feeling of human touch for the first time in a couple of weeks. Grace generally avoided skin contact, but his crackling magic didn't bother Laurel at all. The bruises on his torso made her frown, but that didn't matter after he blew out the candle and plunged them into darkness. Despite throwing caution to the wind in many respects, he still only removed his hood in total blackness.

Something woke him not long after they had settled beside each other, hot and exhausted. Beside him he sensed Laurel's gentle breathing, her back turned to him and covers pulled down to her waist. The onset of sleep had been fast and blissful, and the most peaceful he'd known in a long time. He scowled, hoping that whatever had woken him was worth it. With a groan – his muscles hadn't taken kindly to the extra exertion – he rolled back the blanket and shoved his feet into his boots before stumbling to the window. As he cast out with his senses, he found nothing amiss within the inn. Nika and Hap were downstairs, and Koen was further down the corridor. It was completely silent.

The road outside was deserted, and Jordan had just resigned himself to the fact that he'd woken for nothing when he caught a flash of movement on the roof of the opposite house. He swallowed, scanning the tiles, and spotted a figure obscuring some of the runework. As his eyes adjusted, he made out that they were crouched down, not very big in stature, had their face partially covered – and that they were watching him.

"Night take me," Jordan muttered. He glanced back at Laurel, but she hadn't stirred. Ren, who had been curled up in the scattered pile of abandoned clothes on the floor, sat up and chirruped. "It's him again."

He turned back to the window. The figure hadn't moved, nor had he expected them to. Jordan had seen Arlen's ex-student many times. Never once had he done more than watch, and while it was getting extremely tiring, there was very little he could do about it.

"I'm ignoring it," he mumbled, turning back to the bed and clambering in. Ren bounded up to join him this time, snuggling into the gap between his chest and Laurel's back.

He was just drifting back off to sleep when Ren sat up and growled, propping herself on his shoulder to stare at something behind him.

The window squeaked.

Jordan was up like a shot, knife drawn from under the pillow where he'd stashed it. He scrambled free of the tangle of blankets just in time to see Silas drop out of sight.

"What's going on?" Laurel said, scrabbling to cover herself as he careened across the room and shoved the window up. "Jordan!"

The street was empty. Jordan checked below the sill and looked to either side before he pulled the window back down with a bang, heart pounding.

"Jordan!" Laurel grabbed his arm and he jumped, knife falling from his bloodless fingers. She gripped him hard, eyes wide in the dark. "What happened?"

Someone knocked on the door, and Nika called through, "Is everything alright?"

"Y-yeah." Jordan swallowed bile. "Everything's...fine."

"Are you sure?"

"Nightmare," he said. And Arlen's ex-student fanboy just tried to make good on his promise to kill me.

He didn't sleep for the rest of the night.