He was running out of time. The thought raced through his mind over and over, and try as he might, he could not push it away.
If Kiara's information proved correct, he was getting closer to the Lost City. He had to reach it ahead of Sir Danna if he was to have any hope of evading capture—or being forced to fight the Cambionari and Warrior Priests. Surely the Serenii city had places where he could hide, perhaps even a way to conceal Soulhunger's presence from her. It was all he had to go on.
He could feel Her presence waiting for him far ahead like a lighthouse across a dark and empty ocean, a beacon in the back of his mind, drawing closer with every step he took up the path. She was so close. He would find Her after all these months. He would finally look Her in the eye, take Her in his arms, feel Her warmth against his skin. He'd dreamed of it for decades. Though he'd only truly remembered Her clearly since Voramis, he knew She had been with him all those years, the memory that drove him onward.
The first rays of dawn began to appear over the eastern horizon as the Hunter pounded into their makeshift camp.
"Rassek, Darillon, Evren!" he shouted. "We need to move, now!"
Darillon and Rassek stumbled from their tent. "What's the fuss?" the younger man asked, rubbing bleary eyes.
"We need to move." Even as he spoke, the Hunter set about saddling Ash and Elivast. "Our pursuers will be coming for us hard at any second. We need to get as far ahead of them as we can."
"What did you do?" Darillon's fatigue didn't diminish the force of his scowl.
"Slowed them down as best I could." The Hunter waved away the question. "But I doubt I did little more than set them back an hour or two." He turned to the two men, urgency flaring within him. "Hours we could spend riding, if you'd stop dragging your feet."
Before either man could protest, the Hunter scrambled into his tent and shook Hailen awake as gently as he could manage. The boy woke slowly, but a smile wreathed his face at sight of the Hunter.
"Hailen, we need to go now," the Hunter said. "Can you get dressed quickly? I've already got Ash saddled and ready for you."
Worry crossed the boy's face. "Are the bad men coming for us?"
The Hunter nodded. "But if we move quickly, maybe we can ride faster than they can. All that heavy armor will slow them down."
The lines smoothed out as Hailen's expression relaxed. "Oh, good. I like it when Ash runs fast. The wind plays funny tricks with my clothes, and it feels like I'm flying." The boy kept up a steady stream of conversation as he pulled on his tunic, jacket, and the little baldric the Hunter had fashioned for him.
The Hunter's eyes dropped to Soulhunger. He could feel the dagger's presence in the back of his mind, faint and distant, but no less insistent. The presence within the gemstone hadn't been as affected by whatever changed the demon in his mind, but its demands had grown stronger. The Hunter dreaded what would happen if he got too far from Hailen.
Being near the boy kept the voice at bay, and kept Hailen's Irrsinnon from overtaking his mind. But he couldn't fight Sir Danna with Hailen beside him. Would the dagger's voice overwhelm him as it had that night in the House of Need in Malandria? Would he once again wake up in a pool of blood, lifeless bodies sprawled at his feet? In the red haze that had come over him, he could hurt Hailen, Kiara, Evren, or the mountaineers without realizing what he was doing.
Yet he had no choice. If, as he feared, Sir Danna caught up to him, he'd need Soulhunger for the inevitable fight. He'd have only the barest hope of defeating more than a dozen highly trained warriors wielding iron weapons. Soulhunger would give him a chance of survival, which meant a chance he could reach Enarium with Hailen, stop the Sage, and save Einan. He'd endure the voices in his mind for their sakes.
"Hailen, I need to carry Soulhunger for a little while." His gut clenched as he said the words.
"Okay," the boy said with a bright smile. "I think it wants to be with you anyway."
The Hunter's eyes went wide. "You…you can hear it? Does it talk to you?"
"Hear it?" Hailen's brow furrowed. "It's just a dagger, it doesn't talk, silly."
The tension drained from the Hunter's shoulders. "So why did you say it wants to be with me?"
"Whenever you're around, it feels like it's pulling me toward you." Hailen said it in a matter-of-fact tone, as if it was the most normal thing in the world, and gave a little giggle. "It's a funny feeling."
The Hunter hesitated a moment before removing Soulhunger's sheath from the baldric around Hailen's shoulders. He could sense the dagger's eagerness to be drawn and wielded, but he had no idea the boy could as well. Was it one more side effect of the Serenii blood running through his veins?
He pushed the question from his mind and buckled Soulhunger to his belt. He'd have time to answer it and all his other questions when he reached Enarium. First, he had to survive Sir Danna and the Stone Guardians and reach the Lost City.
The Stone Guardians. He reflected on the conversation he'd had with Evren last night. He'd given it a few minutes of thought as he crept toward Sir Danna's camp, but his encounter with Kiara—Celicia, as he'd known her in Voramis—had driven it from his mind.
He ran over the passages from The Singer and His Muse as he finished packing their meager belongings into his satchel. Though he had no idea how talk of the bard’s manhood could help him, he felt more confident about his guess that blood attracted the Stone Guardians. They'd only shown up after he'd killed the Warrior Priests, and they hadn't returned since.
If Sir Danna caught up, he'd have no choice but to fight, and the blood he'd be forced to spill would attract more Stone Guardians. Could he use that to his advantage?
He worked at the thought, examining it from all angles, until the beginnings of a plan formed in his mind. As he emerged from the tent, he found Evren awake and helping the mountaineers tear down the camp.
"Evren," he said as he hurried toward the boy. "You read that bit about the king’s guardians, right?"
Evren turned to regard him with a curious expression. "Yeah."
"And you think it could be blood that the book's talking about? That attracts the Stone Guardians?"
Evren's expression grew pensive. "It seems like the most logical answer, but I ain’t never really sure with Taivoro."
The Hunter nodded. "Good." He turned to Rassek and Darillon. "Listen, I've come up with a plan, just in case things go sideways."
Darillon's eyes narrowed. "What sort of plan? One that's going to get us all killed?"
"Maybe." The Hunter shrugged. "But if it works, it'll be the only thing that gets us out of this alive. And, it could very well help us get rid of our pursuers once and for all."
"What d’ye have in mind?" Rassek asked, gripping Darillon's forearm before the older mountaineer could growl a retort.
The Hunter told them.
"I don't like it." Darillon folded his arms over his chest.
"Got any better ideas?" The Hunter cocked an eyebrow. "Unless you've got a Stone Guardian-slaying weapon hidden in your gear or some ancient magick up your sleeve, of course."
Darillon's scowl deepened.
"And ye think it will work, do ye?" Rassek asked. "Ye won't be gettin’ caught in the middle of things?"
The Hunter shook his head. "It's the only shot we've got. The only chance the boy has of getting away in case things get hairy." He fixed the two men with a hard glare. "And no matter what happens, the boy has to be safe."
"Understood." Rassek nodded. "We'll be followin’ yer lead."
"Good," the Hunter said. "Then let's move."
He felt the tension drain from his shoulders as he secured his pack on Elivast's back and climbed into his saddle. His plan involved a very good chance of him ending up dead, but it was the best way he could think to deal with Sir Danna and the others once and for all. It would get Hailen out of harm's way. In the end, that was the most important thing.
"I'll bring up the rear," he told the mountaineers. "Just in case."
Ras
sek nodded and took the lead, with Darillon and Evren forming a line behind him. The Hunter tugged on Ash's lead rope and kicked Elivast into a trot. He cast a glance over his shoulder as they rode from their campsite. Though he saw no sign of pursuit, he had little doubt Sir Danna and the others were somewhere behind him. How far? Now that was the question he'd pay a fortune to know the answer to.
The day dawned cool, but the rising sun soon filled the mountain with warmth. Within an hour, the chill had left the Hunter's hands, and sweat trickled down his back. Hailen seemed fully alert and energized, taking in the mountains around him with childish wonder.
The trail continued to rise at an incline, not too steep but steadily climbing the mountains. A noticeable edge of cold hung thick on the air, and white snow dappled the tips of the jagged peaks around them. The very stones of the mountains had begun to lighten from a dark grey to a muted reddish-brown. Bright sunlight set the slopes and cliffs around them glowing, painting the landscape with an almost ethereal brush.
The mountaineers, Evren, and Hailen seemed to struggle with the thinner air up this high, but the Hunter barely noticed the difference. After all the time he'd spent in Kara-ket, his body adapted to the altitude without difficulty.
Oddly enough, plant life still flourished this high in the mountains. Slow-growing ironwood trees filled the air with the sweet fragrance of their yellow-centered white flowers, while cushion plants, moss, and algae covered the rocky faces with a vivid layer of green. Here and there, patches of blue mountain irises and yellow Wolf’s bane flowers provided a relief from the expanse of dull red rock.
A spot of bright color high on the cliff walls drew the Hunter’s eye. He squinted in an effort to make out the details of the small, mushroom-like growth forty paces above the trail. It had a long stalk and bulbous cap of deep crimson threaded with purple veins, and grew in tight clusters of four.
The Hunter's brow furrowed. It can't be a coincidence. Red velvet length, soft flesh, thick purple veins. An incredulous grin spread on his face. Taivoro, you mad bastard!
As with every other clue, the playwright had concealed the truth within what at first glance appeared to be nonsense. For thousands of years, the way to Enarium had hidden in plain sight. No one had uncovered it because no one knew where to look. No one but the Sage, and now him.
After everything else they'd learned from the Taivoro book, the Hunter knew with reasonable certainty that this had to be what he thought it was. The “guardians of my love fair” in the story referred to the Stone Guardians, which could only mean these plants were the secret to dealing with the massive creatures.
The Hunter wanted to pause and re-read the passage to see if he could find any hint as to how a little plant could drive off a monstrous beast—a beast more than twice the height of a man and with skin of stone—but that would cause a delay they could ill-afford. His urgency to escape pursuit meant he couldn't simply climb the cliff face and pluck one of the mushrooms for observation or testing. Right now, they were about as useful to him as Serenii magick or the alchemist secrets locked in the Temple of Whispers.
Though it grated, he kept riding, pushing Elivast and Ash as hard as the horses could manage. The incline was gentle, the stone smooth, but the altitude affected the horses as much as the mountaineers, Evren, and Hailen. Though he kept the pace as slow as he dared, by noon he could see all of them growing tired.
Dread filled him as his sensitive ears caught a sound from behind. Hoofbeats on stone. He glanced over his shoulder, and a ball of ice formed in his stomach. There, less than two hundred paces below him, Sir Danna rode at the head of her Cambionari and Warrior Priests.
Chapter Thirty-Four
Shit! The Hunter's gut clenched. No chance of outrunning them now.
A bend in the trail obscured the pursuers from view, but the Hunter had no doubt they would catch up within an hour. Even if he pushed the pace as fast as he could manage, only he and Hailen rode horses able to run.
Tense minutes passed as the Hunter forced himself to remain calm. The trail was too narrow to push past Evren and the mountaineers. He had to match their pace or else risk riding them off the cliff's edge. Yet with every thundering heartbeat, he knew Sir Danna was closing the gap.
Things truly had gone sideways, as he feared. All he could do now was find a place where his back-up plan wouldn't get them all killed.
His eyes tracked the trail upward as far as he could see. The path disappeared around a cliff, then doubled back fifty or sixty paces higher. There the trail narrowed to a point barely wide enough for two men to walk side by side. The sharp turn in the path meant Sir Danna couldn't simply ride him down. She'd have to send her men at him one at a time. They'd never get past him.
He glanced backward, but the cliffs hid his pursuers. He'd have minutes from the time he reined in before Sir Danna and her men caught up. Hopefully, that would give Rassek and Darillon enough of a head-start that they could cover serious ground with Hailen.
"Darillon!" he shouted as he pulled Elivast to a halt at the narrow section of trail.
The older mountaineer reined in and twisted in his saddle. His gaze went to something behind the Hunter, and his eyes went wide. "They're coming."
"Go!" The Hunter thrust a finger toward the trail. "Keep riding hard."
"We can't," Rassek panted. "The horses are too tired, says I."
"I know." The Hunter released Ash's reins and jumped from the saddle. "But you have to try. I'll buy you time, but you have to go on."
"Hardwell?" Fear shone in Hailen's eyes. "What are you--?"
The Hunter's gut clenched at the boy's panicking expression. "Hailen, I need you to go with Darillon and Rassek. They're going to keep you safe."
"I don't want to leave you!" Hailen cried.
"You have to, Hailen." He pointed at the approaching riders. "I promised I'd never let the bad men hurt you again, and that's what I'm going to do."
"But what if they hurt you?"
The question brought a lump to the Hunter's throat. Hailen cared more for the Hunter's wellbeing than his own. Just one of the reasons the he'd known all those months ago that he would die to keep the boy safe.
He swallowed hard. "I'll follow as soon as I can. I promise." He didn't dare take the boy's hand; he couldn't risk Hailen's blood drawing the Stone Guardians. All he could do was squeeze the boy's boot in what he hoped was a reassuring gesture. His eyes burned, and he quickly turned to Evren and the mountaineers. "Take care of him. I'm right behind you."
Rassek nodded. "May the Apprentice smile on ye, Hardwell." He gathered up Ash's reins and tugged the desert horse into motion behind his own mountain horse.
The Hunter had one last glance of Hailen's fear-filled face before the four of them disappeared around a bend in the trail. Blinking hard to banish the burning in his eyes, he turned to Elivast.
"Well, boy, looks like it's just you and me again."
He unslung his sword sheath from his saddle, strapped it to his belt, and adjusted his cloak. The sound of pounding hooves grew louder as he strode down the trail to meet his pursuers.
Sir Danna reined in twenty paces away, surprise and suspicion in her eyes. He made no move toward her, but stood with his arms folded and a blank expression on his face.
If she wants me, she'll have to come and get me.
He tensed as the knight dismounted, her mail jingling as her heavy boots thumped on stone. To his surprise, the rest of her men made no move to dismount. The Hunter scanned the figures on the trail and found Kiara riding third from the front of the line. He raised a questioning eyebrow, but her expression revealed nothing.
Sir Danna strode toward him, her face as hard as the mountains around him. The reek of iron grew with every step closer, accompanied by her unique scent of steel, sweat, leather, and wisteria. Hours of pursuit had done little to dim the fire of enmity burning in her eyes.
She stopped four paces away, just beyond the reach of the greatsword she carried on her back.
A tense silence hung between them. He had no idea what to say to her. Though she made no move to draw the blade, every fiber of her being radiated menace.
"Demonspawn," she growled. She barely reached his shoulder, yet her heavy armor and broad shoulders made her seem somehow larger and more imposing.
"Really? This again?" The Hunter cocked an eyebrow. "I have a name, you know."
Sir Danna sneered. "The Hunter of Voramis, or so Kiara tells me. The name of a killer, a murderer."
The Hunter shrugged. "If it's all the same, I've grown quite fond of it over the last few decades. Demonspawn doesn't quite roll off the tongue as easily."
"Is that why I am here?" The knight's face hardened. "So you can prove you are as glib-tongued as you are treacherous?"
"Treacherous?" The Hunter found his voice rising in anger. "If I remember correctly, it was you who poisoned me and threw me off a cliff."
"You are a Bucelarii." Fire flashed in Sir Danna's eyes. "Your kind has plagued this world for far too long. I was simply doing what I trained my entire life to."
The Hunter folded his arms. "So you say. Which begs the question: why aren't you ordering your men to kill me? After all, you have me cornered, don't you?"
Sir Danna snorted. "You hold the high ground, forcing me to send my men at you one at a time. My revulsion for you and everything you represent has not dulled my wits. I will not lead my men to a slaughter."
"You've come to face me yourself, have you?" The Hunter smiled. "A glorious battle to the death. Righteous knight, servant of justice, versus assassin, demon, and killer."
"No." Her words came out clipped, tight. "I am here…to talk."
The Hunter's eyes flashed toward Kiara, who gave a little nod.
"Somehow, you convinced Kiara that you had something worth saying," Sir Danna said. "So speak your piece, murderer."
The Hunter drew in a deep breath. "What would you have me say? You’ve already made up your mind to kill me."
Sir Danna's expression turned icy. "Every man, even one with the blood of demons running in his vein, deserves a fair trial. I will be judge and jury here."
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