The summons came folded inside a piece of parchment that was, itself, also blank.
Idris turned it over in his hands twice before he noticed the seal — pressed into the lower corner with so little ink that it might have been mistaken for a fingerprint. The seal of the Ministry of Borders. Underneath, a name he had not expected to read again.
Halberd Renn. Minister, Second Secretariat.
Halberd Renn had drowned in the Eastern Reach six winters ago. There had been a procession. Idris remembered the procession because it had rained, and the standards had bled their dye into the cobblestones, and afterward the road in front of the ministry had been faintly blue for a week.
He read the summons three times. There were only four lines.
Come at once. Bring no instruments. The roads will be different than you remember. Trust the apprentice. Do not look at the river.
He folded the parchment back along its creases. The apprentice was watching him from the doorway with the terrible patience of someone who had not yet been told what was happening, but had already guessed.
“Pack a bag,” he said. “We’re going to the capital.”
“Sir.” She hesitated. “The river is between us and the capital.”
“I know.”
“Are we going to look at it?”
He thought about that for a long moment.
“No,” he said. “We are absolutely not.”
They left before dawn, and the bell was still ringing when they crossed the first bridge.