Brys’. Leferic gave her a bandage from a basket on the shelf and she blew her nose into it loudly. It seemed to calm her a little, and she managed a weak smile. “Thank you.”
He brushed off her thanks with a wave. “Begin again. What happened to Wistan?”
The girl twisted the sodden bandage around her fingers, dabbing alternately at her eyes and nose. “He was—I think he was hurt in Willowfield, I don’t know how, but he was weak from the first time I saw him. We went to Tarne Crossing, hoping to find the Blessed, but she was gone. I would have waited for her to come back, truly, but …”
“But what?”
“But he was so weak, and … and there was a dead man.” Her eyes darted up to meet his and away again; she made an uneasy try at a laugh that came out as a sob. “I know how ridiculous that sounds. I do. But it’s true.”
“It is true,” Brys said flatly. “The same Thorn who killed Willowfield used one of the men murdered there as her puppet. Caedric Alsarring. You might remember him: he served your father and your brother. She turned him into a monster and sent him to hunt Wistan.”
“I believe you,” Leferic said. The mercenary’s expression did not change in the slightest, but those three simple words seemed to relax the girl more than anything else Leferic had done or said. She gave him a grateful glance and went on, wringing the scrap of cloth unconsciously as she spoke.
“We had to leave Tarne Crossing so she wouldn’t find him. We went with the Vis Sestani. I tried to find a healer among them, but … I couldn’t, my lord, and he died. I left him in the snow with a candle. I know it wasn’t right, but we didn’t have time for a proper pyre. I’m sorry, my lord. I hope it was enough for his soul to find its way home.”
“Then who is the child you carry? Tell me again.”
“Aubry. He’s my own.” She said it fiercely, twisting the bandage until her fingers went white in the knotted linen. “His father died in Willowfield. I’m all he has, and he’s all I have.”
“But you were going to pass him off as Wistan? Is that it?”
“More money in it.” Brys made the admission bluntly, without shame. “Yes. I was going to say he was your brother’s child and hope for some reward. It was my idea, so if you’re going to get angry about it, get angry with me, not her.”
“No,” the girl protested, “no, that’s not true. I mean, it is … but I agreed to it. I thought—I thought it could be a chance for my son to become someone important. If everyone thought he was Wistan. That’s why I agreed. But I can’t do it. I can’t lie, my lord. I’m sorry we ever had the idea. You saved us and brought us here and had the Blessed heal us, and I was going to lie to you. I’m sorry.”
“You needn’t be sorry for that.” Leferic said the words absently, not really hearing them, for the implications of their plot had finally sunk in and they left him thunderstruck.
His first reaction had, indeed, been anger—but that was foolish. Wasteful. Why should he be angry that they’d considered deceiving him? They hadn’t done it. By confessing the deception and throwing themselves on his mercy, they’d presented him with a gods-sent gift.
Adopting “Wistan” was the perfect solution. The simplicity of the idea was staggering. Leferic cursed his own stupidity in failing to think of it earlier. He’d never considered that Wistan could or should survive, but adopting his brother’s son as his heir would solve so many problems. In one fell swoop he could legitimize his own rule, remove a rallying figure from any would-be rebels, and bind Galefrid’s loyalists more tightly to his own side. News of “Wistan’s” survival might even pry loose from Maritya’s parents the money that Bulls’ March so desperately needed.
And if the child should ever become a threat, why, then he could drag out the girl and put her before a Blessed to confess the truth of how she had deceived him by substituting her own son for the realm’s true heir.
Leferic turned the idea over in his mind and could see no flaws. Certainly none that compared with the pitfalls of his current predicament. Both the child’s parents were dead, so there would be no one