The coach rocked as it tore over the road leading from Java. Without the luggage strapped to the back of it, they made good time. Gruffydd drove while Prince Anryn sat beside him and kept an eye out for the turn off from the road into the woods. He shouted it out when they came to a place where the trees grew thickly together.

　　Could the fools be thinking of burning witches here? Professor Lawson wondered. The trees here grew far too close together to build a pyre.

　　Maertyn Blackfire fell on him as the coach jolted over a rock in the road, knocking the wind from the professor. The smell of gin and whiskey nearly gagged Professor Lawson, and he fretted that one of them might vomit in the enclosed space. The windows on the coach could not open, but he was able to unlatch a door and hold it open a crack, just in case.

　　I will see Prince Anryniel to the throne, whatever it takes, the professor vowed. This was a necessary detour, he told himself. While they may be no closer to sussing out the assassin, Prince Anryniel took another step toward the throne intervening in this dispute. Professor Lawson vowed he would see Anryn through the woods, literal and figurative.

　　After an hour rattling between trees, they came to a place where the trees thinned into a bald patch of grass beneath an open sky. From the window of the prince`s coach, Professor Lawson could see carriages parked in the clearing. One was stacked with planks and timber, another cart right beside it. Men wearing the mayor`s colors unloaded tools from the second cart, and the professor saw the skeleton of a pyre laid out in the grass. The third cart was a woman`s covered carriage, the back of it latched shut from the outside. The professor could see small hands clinging to the frames of the tiny windows from inside.

　　He heard Gruffydd mutter a curse. "The bastard picked only women to burn."

　　"Keep one hand on your sword," Prince Anryn told him.

　　His students jumped down from the driver`s bench. Professor Lawson watched them from the window to see what the young men would do, left to their own initiative. He was amused to see that each of them behaved as if he were the hero of some fairytale. Young Gruffydd played the gallant there to rescue fair maidens, going straight to the covered carriage to reach for the small hands that poked through the window. Prince Anryn played the knight, shouting at the laborers as if he challenged a dragon.

　　"How dare you," Professor Lawson heard him shout. "This is my father`s dominion—these women have had no trial and no lord to pronounce their sentence. By what right do you take the King`s justice into your own hands?"

　　The professor squinted across the clearing. Only twenty yards at most lay between them, and yet even at that distance, he could see the mayor`s men shifting from foot to foot. Professor Lawson counted eight men—some of them rather rough looking. Prince Anryn must have noticed just how outnumbered he was just then, because he glanced back at the coach.

　　For a moment, Professor Lawson thought the prince meant for him to come and intervene—but then Maertyn got up from his seat and jumped down from the coach. Prince Anryn turned back to the laborers as Maertyn came to stand behind him. Now the professor could be sure he saw the mayor`s men draw back, anxious at the size of the prince`s companion.

　　Professor Lawson was so intent on watching the scene unfold that he did not notice the coach door swing open behind him.

　　"Hello, Haley Lawson."

　　A man slid into the seat across from Professor Lawson. The professor had the vaguest impression of the face—suntanned skin, white teeth. Then the stranger who knew his name uttered a phrase in a foreign language. Numbness struck the professor in the chest.

　　A mage! Professor Lawson struggled as the enchantment spread down his legs and his arms. The cry in his throat died as the spell spread to his face, locking it into place. Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

　　The mage uttered another word in his native tongue, and ran his hand across his tanned face. Crows` feet sprouted at the eyes, a layer of flesh folded out from the chin. Silver hair whorled from the man`s scalp, and the eyes changed in a blink from brown to Professor Lawson`s own pale blue.

　　The mage who now wore Professor Lawson`s face lifted a finger, and then pointed at the floor of the coach. The professor`s body slid down to the floor, his motions jerky and awkward as he fought to shake the enchantment off.

　　"It pains me to harm a fellow dottore," the mage whispered. Even his voice was an exact copy of the professor`s. "But what happens next, you will not feel. I promise."

　　The mage pulled a small sickle knife from the pocket of his copied clothes. Powerless even to close his eyes, Professor Lawson watched the silver blade glitter in the sunlight as the mage leaned down to rest it against his throat.

　　A moment before the mage could cut him, Maertyn Blackfire ripped open the door to the coach.

　　"You," Maertyn snarled, his face dark with fury. He lunged across the seats.

　　Professor Lawson saw the sickle knife flash, and red welled up from Maertyn`s cheek. Maertyn swore and fumbled, trying to pin the smaller man to the seat with both hands. The mage writhed away, shouting.

　　Now that Professor Lawson knew to listen for Nynomath`s tongue, he understood the incantation. These words weren`t like the letters he translated. Mages spoke their spells in stilted, formalized speech: "Come wind, come to me and bind his hands to his side&!"

　　Maertyn`s hands stayed free. He wrapped one around the mage`s neck and use the other to punch downward. Professor Lawson was horrified to see his stolen visage twisting, breaking apart as Maertyn beat it with his fists.

　　"Come tree, fall onto the carriage!" the mage cried.

　　Outside, Professor Lawson heard the crack and groan of a tree trunk giving. Its branches barely brushed the top of the coach as it crashed to the ground, narrowly missing the coach.

　　Inside the cabin, the mage struggled to break Maertyn`s grip. Maertyn started to beat him in the mouth, trying to prevent the mage from uttering another spell. The mage managed one more: "Come fire! Burn him! Burn them all!"

　　Maertyn, understanding the words just as well as Professor Lawson did, laughed at the mage.

　　"That will not work on me," he said.

　　Instead the spell worked around Maertyn Blackfire, Professor Lawson observed. Orange flames sprung up from the curtains, the leather. Smoke filled the cabin. Still lying on the floor of the coach where the mage left him, the professor watched in horror as the flames licked down across the floor of the coach, catching his robes. He couldn`t feel the fire burn him, but he could smell his skin as it started to cook.

　　The horses scented the smoke and surged in their harness. Professor Lawson bounced hard on the floor when the coach collided with the covered carriage. It was not enough to break the spell that held him, but it did throw off Maertyn`s balance enough for the mage to slip free.

　　The mage cried out in natural speech: "Oh God, it`s him. It`s really him& The Winze&!"

　　The glass windows of the coach shattered from the heat of the fire. The women screamed as the fire spread to the covered carriage. Professor Lawson could hear Prince Anryn shouting.

　　The mage bolted. Maertyn was out the door after him, leaving Professor Lawson on the floor of the burning coach.

　　The further the mage got from Professor Lawson, the weaker the spell grew. Until Professor Lawson could feel the flesh in his throat burning. With feeling back in his arms and legs, he fumbled blindly in the smoke, trying to pull himself out of the inferno.

　　Hands were on him. Prince Anryn`s face swam into view as he dragged the professor from the fire and rolled his body on the ground, smothering the flames. Dazed, Professor Lawson lay on his side, sipping shallow gasps of air into the raw lining of his airways.

　　Prince Anryn turned to the covered carriage, somehow found the latch to the door amidst the thick black smoke. He wrenched it open. The women trapped inside the carriage tumbled out. They tore their veils from their faces and gulped down air between wracked sobs of relief.

　　The last thing Professor Lawson managed before fainting was to avert his eyes from their faces out of respect.