Marek tore another piece of bread from the loaf. “The Descendants still haven’t figured out how to detect us Wolves. Even their guard dogs can only smell us, not hear us. They look in our direction but don’t bark. It’s like we’re just another animal.”
Rhia snorted. “To the Descendants, we are just another animal.”
“Meanwhile,” Jula continued, “I’ve been working with Panos, the other Wolf, riding on his back so he could cloak me with his invisibility. We got up close to the camp so I could hear one of the commanders’ voices. Then we had to wait until he was off-duty so I could take his place and order your guards to bring you out.” Her brows pinched as she looked at Rhia. “Sorry I scared you with the execution.”
Rhia shook her head. “There was no other way to get Mali and me out at the same time.”
One of the horses began to stamp and whinny. Bolan held up a finger. “Someone’s coming.”
Bow in hand, Marek accompanied him to the barn door. Rhia saw Bolan poke his head out to look toward the house, then wave to beckon someone over. She hurried toward the door, hoping to see Mali.
Instead Endrus and Medus appeared. They staggered toward the food but stopped when they saw Rhia.
“Traitor,” Medus spat, and lunged for her. Jula screamed. The other three men barely caught the Badger in time to keep his hands from her throat.
“She sat there, in that prison, while they burned me,” he said, “while they cut me. She sat there and watched!”
“I saved your life,” Rhia said. “They would have killed you if I hadn’t stopped them the last time.”
“You should’ve let them,” he growled. “I wanted to die.”
“I’m sorry.” She looked at Endrus. “But this was the best way to find out what the Descendants know about the resistance.”
“While saving your own skin, no doubt.” Medus gave her one last glare, then his shoulders sagged. “Which I can’t really blame you for.”
“It almost killed me to watch them hurt you.” Rhia stepped forward, close enough to touch, and spoke to both men. “Please forgive me.”
Endrus nodded slowly. “You were as much a victim as we were.”
Medus stared at her with bloodshot eyes and finally assented. The others released him, and he shook his arms and straightened his back. Then the Badger and Cougar turned to the food and set upon it like starving dogs.
“Where’s Mali?” Bolan asked.
Endrus spoke through a mouthful of bread. “Thought she was right behind me, but when I turned around, she was running back into the prison.” He shook his head. “No one came out after that.”
“You left her there?” Marek said.
“What were we supposed to do,” Medus grumbled, “storm the place?” He glared at Rhia. “After what they did to us, we could barely walk.”
“Do you think she’s dead?” Rhia asked Endrus.
His mouth formed a grim line. “If not dead, recaptured.”
Rhia sank onto the floor next to Jula and put her face in her hands. Surely the Ilions would kill Mali now, as a precaution against her future escape, or even as punishment for releasing Endrus and Medus. The Wasp’s only hope was that they still considered her suitable bait for Lycas.
The question was, would her brother take it?
21
Sangian Hills
Nilik tried not to flinch as the Otter healer stitched the wound on his right hand.
“Third time this week,” she said.
He put his other hand behind his back, as if that would undo its two cuts.
“Been doing a lot of these lately.” She tied off the thread and cut it. “Not just you, Nilik. You all need to be more careful.”
He flexed his fingers and examined the neat sutures on the base of his thumb. “Is it unusual to have so many injuries in training?”
“Unheard of. Next!” She pulled a clean needle and thread from her kit and beckoned to the Wolverine at the head of the line, one of Nilik’s comrades from Tiros, who was holding a bloodstained bandage around his outer wrist.
Nilik shuffled back toward the men’s barracks, which consisted of a long tent that held the bedrolls of twenty to thirty soldiers. There wasn’t room to do anything in there but sleep, something he needed desperately. It was nearly dusk; he’d been up with the sun to train, and train, then train some more. His hand throbbed, and he cursed his own carelessness.
The older Wolverines, including his uncle Lycas, gave frequent lectures, complete with diagrams, on the safest and most efficient ways to kill the enemy. Instinct told Nilik to go straight for the heart, but the ribs and breastbone usually slowed the momentum, making his hand slip forward over the hilt onto the blade. Hence his injuries.
As his feet dragged him toward the barracks, Nilik recited the soft spots on a human body, especially places that would provide the most blood for the effort. Throat, upper arm, upper thigh, under the ribs on the left side. They’d practiced on fresh deer corpses provided by the Cougars and Wolves.
Then there was his first battle, the ambush in the northeast Sangian Hills.
He’d fended off two Descendants with his dagger and short sword. He hadn’t struck a killing blow, but the rush of survival and victory were more than enough to satisfy him.
But not Lycas, who had saved him two Ilions to slaughter.
The first was the captain of the platoon, conscious but barely breathing, an arrow embedded in each lung.
“He can die fast or slow.” Lycas lifted the soldier by his hair, making him groan with what little breath he had. “Your choice.”
Nilik’s hands shook as he grasped the captain’s hair and placed his knife to his throat.
“Ear to ear,” Lycas whispered.
“No.” The Descendant started to struggle. “Not that way. Please.”
Nilik held him still between his knees. “I’m sorry,” he whispered, and made the cut.
Blood fountained from the man’s throat. Nilik yelped and leaped back, shoving the captain to the ground.
Lycas put a hand on his shoulder. “Good. Next time, not so deep. Ideally you want to cut the vein but not the artery. But it’s better than making the opposite mistake and cutting too shallow.”
Nilik swallowed the bile in his throat as he watched the blood steam in the night air. The man stopped twitching.
“He’s dead already, see?” Lycas steered Nilik to the left. “Let’s try again.”
“Now?”
Lycas squeezed his shoulder. “Everyone talks about their first kill, but the second is actually the hardest, because now you know what it’s like. Best to get it over with so that next time you won’t hesitate.”
They stopped in front of a young soldier, no older than Nilik himself, who was bleeding from a sword wound to the stomach.
“The enlisted are tougher,” Lycas said, “because they don’t have enough hair to grab. Take him by the back of the collar.”
Nilik hesitated, but not long enough to need prodding. He couldn’t let his uncle see the fear that, as predicted, had increased since his first kill.
He lifted the man easily, his new Wolverine strength surprising him again. Barely conscious, this one didn’t protest, but Nilik apologized anyway, and whispered one of his mother’s Crow prayers as he put blade to skin, then sliced.
“Perfect.” Lycas squatted and pointed to the soldier’s throat, ignoring the young man’s death spasms. “See how the blood cascades straight down, like rain over a sheer rock face. Hold him up a few more moments so his brain can drain. It ends it faster.” He glanced up at Nilik. “There wouldn’t be time during a battle, but it’s a courteous gesture if you have the leisure.” He stood up. “There, you can put him down.”
Nilik gently lowered this one to the ground, laying him on his back. On an impulse, he placed the hilt of the soldier’s fallen sword in his hand and rested it upon his chest.
“Another reason why the enlisted are harder to kill,” Lycas said. “They’re more like
us. This boy might have been a farmer a few months ago, or an artist or a produce merchant on the streets of Leukos. The army takes them all, no matter their ability, because it’s desperate. Ilios eats its young.”
Nilik could only nod, afraid to open his mouth.
“You’ve done well,” Lycas said. “Now go throw up.”
“Thank you, sir.” And he had, barely making it around the corner of the ravine before losing what felt like his dinner, lunch and breakfast from three days ago.
When his stomach stopped cramping and he could stand upright again, Nilik went to push back the hair that had fallen in his face.
He saw his hands. They’d been stained with blood before, but never a life’s last drops. Cold and sticky, the fingers gummed together, and the lines on his palms glared up at him. These hands had brought death.
But they no longer shook.
Now Nilik shoved his hands inside his pockets as he made his way to the barracks. The rough material scraped the stitches, but he ignored the pain.
Someday soon, when he entered the Velekon garrison and grasped the throats of Lania’s killers, he wouldn’t apologize, wouldn’t pray. He would laugh.
“Lycas!”
Nilik stopped when he heard the familiar female voice coming from the eastern edge of the camp. It couldn’t be, not here.
Unless she’d followed him.
Nilik’s stomach sank. His mother had arrived. Soon Lycas would know of Nilik’s disobedience and deception. He’d be lucky to get home to Tiros on his feet instead of a stretcher.
For a moment he considered running in the opposite direction. But that would only put off the inevitable reprimand. He squared his shoulders and turned toward the voice.
Outside Lycas’s tent, Nilik’s entire family was gathered around the Wolverine. Lycas lifted Rhia in his arms, far off her feet, then set her down again.
“What are you doing here?” he said.
“Originally, to find my son and bring him home.” She looked past Lycas and saw him. “There you are.”
“Nilik!” Jula ran to him, slamming into his arms. “You’re alive!”
“Of course I’m alive.” He hugged her much as Lycas had embraced his own sister. “Why shouldn’t I be?”
She clutched his hands. “We were so worried. It’s all my fault.”
Lycas’s expression darkened as he looked at Nilik. “I thought you gave him the password,” he said to Rhia.
“I gave it to him.” Jula dipped her head. “I’m so sorry.” Then her face brightened. “But then I helped Father break Mother out of prison.”
“Prison?” Lycas held up a finger to Nilik. “You stay right there.” He turned to Rhia. “Why were you in prison?”
“We were on our way to get Nilik.” His mother gave him an imploring look, as though she wanted to embrace and smack him simultaneously. He stood his ground so she couldn’t reach him to do either. “We came across the remnants of your ambush, and the Ilions found us.”
Nilik felt sick. He had put his own parents in mortal danger. He stepped forward. “Mother, I’m so sorry. Please forgive me.”
Lycas raised a hand to him. “Shut up until we tell you to speak.” He looked at Marek. “Were you both taken?”
Nilik listened with a growing dread in his gut as his father told them the story of his fall and recovery, then his and Jula’s harrowing rescue attempt.
“We tried to break out Mali, too,” Marek said, “but she went back in to release the other prisoners.”
“Endrus and Medus escaped,” Rhia added, “thanks to her. They’ll be here soon.”
“They’re good men, and valuable to the resistance.” Lycas shook his head. “Mali was recaptured because she didn’t run away with you?”
Marek sighed. “Brave to the end.”
“We don’t know if it’s the end,” Rhia said. “They might still keep her alive as bait for you, Lycas. Just like I was.”
Nilik saw his uncle’s brows lower in suspicion. “Wait a minute.” Lycas looked at Marek. “That message from Tiros, the one about Mali, came on your orders, didn’t it? Why didn’t you tell me Rhia was in prison?”
Marek crossed his arms, undaunted. “I knew you’d try to rescue her and probably end up captured, because they were waiting for you. We couldn’t take that risk. Besides, I had it under control.” He gestured to Rhia. “Obviously.”
“You lied to me.” Lycas loomed over Marek. “You kept secret my own sister’s imprisonment.” He gave him a look of disgust. “What else could I expect from a Fox?”
Nilik stepped forward. “Don’t speak to him that way. It’s my fault Mother was captured, not his.”
“Lycas, there’s something else.” Rhia put a hand on her brother’s arm. “Sirin’s dead.”
Nilik caught his breath. Lycas stepped back, looking at Rhia as if she were a stranger.
“That’s impossible. He’s too valuable to execute.”
“Maybe they couldn’t risk his escape. Maybe orders came from higher up.”
Lycas half turned away from her, swallowing hard. “Are you sure?”
“I saw him drown. His heart stopped.”
“Did Crow take him?”
Rhia hesitated. “I don’t know. When they took him away, Crow hadn’t finished his journey.”
He whirled on her. “So he could still be alive.”
“They said they were going to bury him.”
Lycas’s face fell. “Then I pray he really was dead when they took him.” He ran a hand over his scalp, pressing hard on the long black hair. “How do you know this? Was it a public execution?”
“No.” She gave Nilik a long look, then turned her gaze back on Lycas. “They used me to make sure their interrogation wouldn’t kill the prisoners, and then they used me to tell them when Sirin was finally dead.” She shrank back as her brother’s expression turned dark and menacing. “Please don’t be angry with me.”
Nilik’s stomach churned. They’d as good as tortured his mother, shown her things a person should never see, and it was his fault.
Lycas’s lip curled. “Not only did they execute my best friend, but they made my sister watch?”
“I’m not sorry I did it.” She bit her lip. “It was horrible, but I learned a lot. I found out they know about the Acrosia, they know you’re planning something for the first night of the Evius festival.”
He cursed. “How can they know this? There must be a spy.” He stalked back and forth, rubbing his face. “What else did you learn?”
“Ilion troops are landing the night before the festival. At the garrison. A general will be aboard one of the boats.”
Lycas turned to her, a glint in his eye. “The garrison?”
Nilik’s own skin tingled. The garrison was the only place he wanted to fight. Lania’s killers waited for him there.
Lycas remained still for a long moment, eyes darting. Then he strode across the small clearing to his attaché. “Send for Feras, but don’t tell him why.”
As he came back over to them, Rhia asked him in a hushed voice, “You think Feras could be the source of the leak?”
“If he’s not, he’ll find out who is, or we call the whole thing off.”
Nilik moved forward, heart pounding with hope. “Are we going to attack the garrison?”
Lycas’s eyes narrowed at him. “If we are, whether I let you come along is still in question.” He stroked the hilt of his throwing dagger. “Either way, that general will find himself facedown in the sand.”
Rhia stepped between them and looked up at him. “Lycas, you can’t have my son.”
Nilik had never felt so small.
He stared at the floor of Lycas’s tent, unable to meet his parents’ eyes. “Mother, I’m sorry I disobeyed you.”
“You’re a man now,” she said. “My wishes are to be respected, not obeyed.”
“Then I disrespected you. It almost got both of you killed.” He looked at them. “Don’t blame Jula. She thought she was helpi
ng me fulfill my destiny.”
His mother seemed to shudder. “Nilik,” she said softly, “please come back to Tiros with us.”
His jaw tightened. “I can’t. I’m needed here in Velekos.”
“You’re needed more in Tiros. It’s your home.”
“How can you say that?” His face contorted with disbelief. “You taught me that we’re all one people and we have to fight for each other. If we can beat them here, it’ll be the beginning of the end of the occupation.”
“They’ll have to win without you. You’re not ready.”
“Lycas says I am, so does Feras. Why can’t you just have faith in me?”
“It’s not a matter of faith,” Marek said. “We believe in your abilities.” He stepped forward and dropped his tone into a non-negotiable territory. “But you’re coming home with us.”
“No, I’m not. How can you even ask me? I’m a Wolverine.” He tapped his fist to his chest. “My Spirit is calling me to fight.”
“Yes, but not here.” Marek crossed his arms. “Come back and defend Tiros, or go north in the hills to the guerrilla command center.” His jaw set. “Anywhere but here.”
Nilik shook his head hard. “I don’t understand. What’s so bad about Velekos that I have to—”
His face froze as he suddenly understood. His mother was a Crow. She’d have only one reason for wanting so desperately to bring him home.
He looked at each of his parents while he tried to make his mouth and lungs work at the same time. His gaze finally settled on Rhia. “I’m going to die here, aren’t I?”
She didn’t look away or even blink. “I can’t tell you.”
“You don’t need to.” The agony in her eyes said it all.
Nilik’s hand curled into an impotent fist, straining the new sutures. He wanted to rip them out with his teeth. No wounds mattered now, if he was about to die.
His gut ached, collapsing in on his last meal. What if it were his last meal? What if he’d already drunk his last ale, stalked his last prey, watched his last sunrise?
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