Chapter 740: A Beautiful Night
As night fell, Wendy came to the door of Scroll’s bedroom and raised her hand to knock.
She hesitated.
The door opened.
“I knew you would come,” Scroll said, and smiled in the way she kept for moments she was privately pleased about. “I also wanted to talk — just like we used to.”
She had already bathed; her long hair hung loose and damp over her shoulders, a towel draped across them to keep her night robe dry. At first glance she looked younger like this, the hair falling over the lines at her temples and forehead, softened. Neverwinter’s comforts had done something to her face over the past two years — something more than rest, something more like the absence of a permanent tension she had carried so long it had become invisible. The change was only fully apparent in moments like this.
Her eyes were exactly as they had always been.
Wendy found herself smiling. “My room or yours?”
“Yours. Nightingale will be home much later than Leaf.”
“All right.”
“You’re serving the drinks.”
“What?”
“Whoever initiates the conversation provides the drinks. That is the old rule and you know it.”
“That’s why you waited behind the door, isn’t it?”
“Patience is the most important lesson life teaches. Have you learned yours?”
“Fine.”
They moved down the corridor to Wendy’s room and cleared the small desk in the corner. She took two glasses and a bottle of Chaos Drink from the drawer and poured. Against the light of the Magic Stone, the orange-red liquid caught like trapped flame.
“This is what you have?” Scroll took a sip and considered it with professional attention. “In winter, this is as good as Fire Dragon Wine. Lucky.”
“I’m jealous of you.” Wendy stretched her arms and let them fall.
“Don’t be. We have Miss Evelyn to thank.”
Roland had devised a system for distributing the Chaos Drinks. Each witch in the Union received one bottle per month through a numbered draw, the flavor hidden until the draw was revealed. On distribution days, the witches traded freely — or drank what others offered — and somehow Maggie always ended the day with the most popular bottle, which made everyone wonder if Evelyn had been whispering in her ear beforehand.
They settled in. The cold wind moved against the windows without finding a way through. The warmth inside was the particular warmth of a small room with a good fire and someone you didn’t need to perform for, and they let it build around them quietly.
They didn’t need to say much. They could read each other at the level where words were supplementary.
Wendy closed her eyes, and what she found behind them was Roland Wimbledon’s voice from earlier that afternoon — the precise cadence of it, unhurried, carrying the weight of a certainty that didn’t need to be argued:
Only I will lead.
Before today, he had been — in her mind — approachable. Almost too approachable. She had worried about that, sometimes: whether someone so easy to be near could be sufficient to what a king was called on to do, could project authority in the moments when authority was the only thing that would hold. She had seen it fail in other men. She had seen the softness that passed for kindness become, at the crisis, simply weakness.
He had not been that today. He had said the thing directly and without softening it, and he had said it to people who had every reason to push back, people who had spent four centuries accumulating the right to be taken seriously. And they had listened. Not happily — not all of them — but they had listened because the thing he said was true and because the way he said it left no comfortable place to stand in opposition.
The kindness was still there. She was sure of it. It was just that the kindness and the authority had finally become the same thing.
She thought Scroll had noticed this too. She thought that was why Scroll had been waiting at the door.
It was an old habit — the three of them, once: Wendy, Scroll, and Cara. Good news meant gathering. Ale, when they had it; wild fruit-water, when they didn’t. Talking until the candle burned low. But gradually the good news had run out and the ale had run out and eventually Cara had become someone with a different purpose — had stopped wanting what the other two wanted, and left them behind with it. After that it had been only Wendy and Scroll, and what they talked about was mostly survival, and how to keep the others going when going was the only option left.
That was then. Or rather: that keeps becoming the past.
Each year it receded a little further. The suffering became memory, became the thing they referenced rather than the thing they inhabited. Wendy found she was grateful for the distance — and then, sometimes, guilty for the gratitude, as if forgetting were a betrayal. But it wasn’t forgetting. It was just that time moved, and that was what it was supposed to do.
“After the meeting,” Wendy said, setting her glass down, “I submitted the assessment results for the witches from Wolfheart to His Majesty.”
Scroll tilted her head. “What kinds of abilities do they have?”
Wendy gave a general summary — she was deliberately vague about Broken Sword. “Can you guess who he assigned her to?”
Scroll thought about it. “Nightingale or Ashes, most likely. They’re the ones who can make the most of what she offers.” A pause. “Anna and Leaf have strong power, but neither of them fights face-to-face. The Witch Union is short on combat witches.”
“That’s reasonable — but he didn’t assign her to anyone.”
Scroll blinked. “Why?”
“His reasoning: a weapon needs to be carried by its owner all the time, which would limit Broken Sword’s freedom. The enemies won’t always appear during her duty hours, and her sword’s protective aura isn’t as decisive as gunpowder anyway. So instead of assigning her as a weapon, he wants her to partner with each witch in turn — test which abilities overlap, see what combinations are interesting. Then, based on how interesting the combinations turn out to be, he’ll find her a role.”
“Based on how interesting they are?”
“Those were his exact words.”
Scroll sat with it for a moment. Then she made a small sound — not quite a laugh, but the sound of something clicking into place.
He had made a choice that preserved Broken Sword’s freedom rather than constraining her utility. Which was exactly what Nightingale had trusted him to do, long before the rest of them were certain. That trust had looked like a gamble at the time — Nightingale running toward something the others were still watching carefully from a safe distance. Looking back now, it had not been a gamble at all. It had been a reading.
Wendy filled her glass again and held it out toward Scroll.
“To us,” she said. “For finding such a good king.”
Scroll raised her glass and touched it against Wendy’s, gently. “To our Holy Mountain.”
The bottle was lighter than it had been. Wendy looked at it with the specific surprise of someone who has been talking without tracking the time and finds the evening further along than expected.
“Is there any left?”
There wasn’t.
“Should I go get mine?” Scroll looked at the drawer. Looked at Wendy. She was clearly prepared to be persuaded.
“No — we follow the rule. But next time, I’ll wait for you to knock on my door.”
“Wait.” Scroll’s eyes moved to the second drawer. “Isn’t that Nightingale’s?”
“Yes.” Wendy opened it without hesitation. “She doesn’t mind.”
They poured again. The wind outside found nothing.
They talked on into the warmth of a night that had earned its beauty.