It won't work. He was suddenly certain of this. He felt closer to them than he'd ever thought possible—they had the same mother—but it didn't matter. One look at their eyes killed his hope.
"Iggy," Harth said.
Iggy silenced him with a hand, fighting to keep the despair from his face. Something else caught him, something he couldn't have seen before the nightmare dreams and insights of Keldale. An echo of the Pulse near the animals, deadened and grey.
Just like at the inn. It was like rounding the corner to find your parents being crucified.
He was starving and spent, his body lurid with saddle sores. His crippled mind struggled with this insight like an ape with a book, trying to figure out what it meant.
They hunger. The mare's plea shivered with panic.
"By Akir." Harth drew up, his eyes riveted to the wolves. "So many."
"Why stopping." Lyseira might have been talking in her sleep.
Iggy glanced back, looking for some sign of their pursuers, but there were too many hills. They could come over any one of them without warning, at any time. It was too late for second guesses.
He swung down, his legs wobbling like sodden branches. He'd brought them here. He had to try. "Wait here."
Seth shook his head. "Iggy—"
"If we get into the woods, they can't follow us."
"We don't have time for this!" Harth snapped. "These are rabid wolves! You can't—!"
"They're not rabid," Iggy threw back. "They'll—"
They'll listen, he'd started to say, but the words shriveled on his tongue. His friends were looking at him like he was a stranger, a madman with Iggy's face. They won't understand. The old terror of being discovered froze him.
Beyond the nearest ridge, a cloud of dirt was churning.
"Please," he said. "Wait." He turned his back on their outrage and went to the wolves. They rose as he came, the air suddenly humming with growls.
You, said the wolf with the burn on its cheek. It was the white he'd talked to on the way north. You lied.
It must have ranged miles north to meet him. It had to be a good sign. We need to enter the wood, Iggy whispered.
No. Turn back.
We're hunted. We've nowhere to go.
You may not enter here. Slaver glittered between its teeth.
We won't harm you. I know you now.
Turn back! It tensed to leap. The motion rippled through the pack as it followed his lead.
Iggy fumbled for something that would convince it. Please, he begged. Behind him, hoofbeats thrummed in the air. The Tribunal was coming. Please. An epiphany sparked, and he grabbed it.
Our mother sent me.
The white's growl stopped. It looked down. A whimper stole from its chest.
But when it looked at him again, its eyes glinted with murder.
I don't want to kill you, it said. But I will. Turn back, or be slaughtered.
The Pulse echoed between the words, tainted with grey.
By Akir, Iggy realized. The mare was right. They're compelled. His mind whirled.
We can help you, he said. My friend knows this magic. She might be able to—
In his urgency, Iggy took a step. The spell suffusing the wolves flared.
No! the white shrieked, but the sorcery seized it. Its next call crackled with frenzy.
Slaughter them! Keep them out!
They leapt as one: a wall of slavering fangs that shot through the grass like wildfire. Behind Iggy, the horses screamed. He turned to run, panicked—and his mind went blank with horror.
A squad of horsemen had crested the ridge.
He screamed a warning, but his companions mistook it. Seth dropped to the ground, eyes trained on the wolves. Syntal rose her hands, somehow mustering the strength for a final chant.
His stomach roiled as the Pulse shuddered behind him. Even at the edge of death, her magic repulsed him.
Then the enchantment on the wolves spasmed. Syntal's magic seized it, writhing and thrashing. The transformed spell blasted through the wolves like an invisible lightning strike. It punched Iggy in the back, sent him sprawling to the frozen ground.
The white's voice became an echo, grey and mindless. Spare the chanter's pack. Allow them no harm.
They thundered past him, splattering his face with grass and frozen dirt. As he struggled to his knees he saw Harth wheeling about to escape. Behind him, a soldier raised his sword. It flashed in the winter sun like a guillotine's blade.
Before he could swing, the wolves had him.
A breaking wave of teeth and claws crashed into the city soldiers. They screamed, slashing at the onslaught. Some turned to flee, and the avalanche of beasts tore their mounts' legs out beneath them. The road became an ocean of fur and blood.
Seth leapt to Lyseira and snapped a wolf's neck. It didn't fight back; the spell wouldn't allow it.
The sight triggered Iggy's voice at last. "Seth, no!" His friend snapped his gaze up, wild with the fever of combat. "They defend us! Look!"
Seth froze, trying to comprehend him—and a bugle call split the air. A second squad broke the ridge, this one with Preservers and clerics.
"Into the wood!" Iggy screamed. His eyes darted for his mount, but she had fled. "Follow me! Into the wood!"
His companions launched past him, Seth slowing just enough for Iggy to swing up behind him. They thundered toward the tree line, chased by the screams of soldiers and wolves alike.
Then they gained the trees, and the cursed forest swallowed them.
Chapter 18
i. Angbar
Oh, the stories he could write now.
Weeks ago, when they'd first escaped from Southlight, he'd caught himself putting the events into a story; constructing an epic from the stuff of his own life as he ran. He'd been appalled. This is no story, he'd told himself. Be serious. Now, as branches slapped at him and the boughs of Veiling Green choked out the setting sun, he was doing it again. This time, though, turning everything into fodder for his epic wasn't appalling him. It was keeping him sane.
The hate in the eyes of the mob. The fire leaping as it devoured Marlin. The flashing arrows from the alleyways, the wolves crashing over the road, the—oh, God—the blood at the gates.
All of it held at arms' length, like an enraged dog snapping at the end of its leash.
They tromped through the trees, nearly delirious with exhaustion, he thought. Still, somehow, the wolves left them alone. The Tribunal was nowhere to be seen. They had survived another night. He blinked as he stared at the trees, fighting to stay upright. He didn't even care. His eyelids had anchors tied to them. He was sore down to his bones. All he wanted was sleep, and to get off that curséd horse.
"Here," Iggy called from ahead. They'd come to a little stream. A doe and her fawn bounded away. There was no snow on the ground. Angbar stared, waiting for these impressions to become something that made sense.
Seth swung down and helped Lyseira, then Marlin. Syntal crumpled when her feet hit the ground; Helix tried to hold her up and nearly went down with her.
Need to help them, Angbar thought, but instead he just stood there. His legs felt like jelly. Had he dismounted? He didn't remember dismounting.
"Is everyone... is everyone well?" Lyseira aimed the question at the trees, staring like a blind woman. Her hair was wild with sticks and char.
"We're all here," Iggy said. Angbar remembered watching him disappear beneath an avalanche of hacking swords, and felt a scream boiling in his throat. He grabbed the memory and stuffed it into the story to get away from it.
His companion was dead. He'd been sure of it. But the girl with the long hair had healed him. Her God was as powerful as she'd always said.
"Wasn't there a pack horse?" he said, surprising himself.
"Lost." Harth's voice was like lead. "Going out the gates." He blinked and looked at Helix. "Do you still have the money?"
Panic flickered in Helix's eyes. He was sitting with his back to a tree. He twisted
to look at his belt, searching with his hands, and heaved a sigh. "Yeah," he managed. "Yeah, I still have it."
How are we going to make camp without the pack horse? Angbar said. Or meant to; his tongue never actually moved.
He realized he was sitting down now, his saddle sores blaring.
"What's your plan?"
The words froze everyone. They were the first Marlin had uttered since Keldale.
He was leaning against a tree, draped in rags and a blanket Seth had found for him. Without his hair or goatee he looked naked and old. "Do you have one?"
He was glaring an accusation at Lyseira. She stared past him, heedless.
Yeah, Angbar answered. We're gonna die in the woods. It was funny in his head. Something told him it wouldn't be funny out loud.
"I..." Helix stammered. "We have to... I have enough money for..."
"I'm talking to her," Marlin snarled. His voice was raw: burlap scraping over rocks. "Hey!" He snapped his fingers. "Did you have a plan when you charged into the fire?"
Lyseira started. "Me?"
Marlin scoffed, shaking. "Sehk'akir. Yes, you! You're the witch who charged the fire!"
Seth bristled. "Watch your tongue."
Marlin ignored him. "Did you have a plan?"
Lyseira's mouth worked. Nothing came out of it.
"You're going to die here," Marlin said. "You brought me out here to die."
"You were going to die in that fire!" Iggy snapped, incredulous. "You want to go back?"
"You have no idea what you've done. They won't stop until they have you."
Some change of pace that'll be, Angbar thought.
Iggy glowered. "You should be thanking her!"
"She's a child!" Marlin threw back. "You all are, and stupid ones at that! I gave you that spell," he seethed at Syntal, "so you could hide. Do you even understand that? How did you expect to survive this? They'll find you, and they'll gut you. All of you."
He threw out a hand in disgust and turned away. Lyseira stared at his back as if it were covered in maggots.
Angbar glanced at the others, dumbstruck and slack-jawed. Only Syntal seemed to have the right response: she lay down and passed out.
Shrugging, Angbar followed her lead.
ii. Iggy
He woke to a horn blast, sharp as an accusation, and bolted upright.
"Up," he said. The Tribunal was in the woods. They'd gotten past the wolves. They were coming. "Up, come on, we need to get moving."
Seth was by the fire, the only other person awake.
"The horn—didn't you hear the horn? Wake them up, come on!"
"No horn," Seth said. "You were dreaming."
No horn. He waited for his frantic heart to slow, searching the tree cover for some sign of the sun. There was light bleeding through the branches, but it was still low. Morning, then—unless the sun was moving backwards today.
Iggy rubbed his forehead, the horn's blare still echoing in his ears, and narrowed his eyes at Seth. "I said no fire."
Seth gave him a flat look. "We'd all have frozen to death in the night without it. It's winter. There's no choice."
The forest won't let us freeze. It brought us here. He could say the words. He might even mean them.
He could also just say, Help me, Seth. I've lost my mind.
The fire made him nervous, but there was something different about burning dead branches from the forest floor. No one was murdering trees here. The disgust that had seized him in Keldale left him alone.
He shrugged and went to relieve himself. When he came back, the others were awake.
"I told you," Harth was saying, "Shientel is out of the question."
"It's the only place Lorna's money will do us any good," Helix countered.
"It's the first place they'll look," Harth said.
Marlin sat hunched on a log, picking at a piece of bread. Iggy caught himself glaring at the man and looked away before speaking. "We can go anywhere the forest goes. Shientel, or the foothills of the Tears. Even around the Tears altogether. Head up toward Tal'aden."
"That'll take weeks on foot," Harth said.
"We have the horses," Angbar said.
"There are no roads!" Harth snapped. "The horses are just a liability until we get clear of the trees."
"We tried Keldale, Helix," Lyseira said. Her eyes were clear this morning. A night of rest had done her good. "It's time to go to the Fatherlord."
Helix's face fell. "Lyseira..." he started.
Seth shook his head. "Things have changed," he told her. "You stopped a witch-burning. Everyone saw Syntal. We've no chance of getting anywhere near the Fatherlord. We'll be arrested the instant we enter the gates."
Lyseira shook her head, stubborn. "He needs to know—"
"About the bad apples in Southlight?" Helix broke in. "And the priest that tried to burn Marlin, was he a bad apple, too? How about the ones that are still chasing us, the ones that might be in the woods right now? Them too?" He snapped his mouth shut, fuming. The fire crackled. "The whole Church wants us dead, Lyseira. I'm not going to Tal'aden."
"Then where—?" Lyseira demanded, but this time Harth cut her off.
"You really want to go to Tal'aden? Are you mad?"
"You're not coming!" Lyseira snapped. "We're done with you."
"Damned right I'm not coming. You'll freeze to death before you even—"
"Then shut your mouth!"
Harth's eyes flashed. "You would be dead if I hadn't—"
Angbar shot to his feet. "Enough! Hush! They might be in the woods right now!"
Everyone fell silent, glaring. In the back of the group, Marlin rolled his eyes.
Something about that triggered Iggy's tongue. "Southwest," he said. "We'll head to the edge of the Valley. Shientel's not safe, Keldale's not safe, Southlight's not safe. We have to get out of the Valley. From there, everyone can go wherever they think best."
Harth scoffed. "That's weeks away! We're gonna freeze—"
Iggy spoke over him. "You want to go back to the road?" he demanded. "You?" he spat, looking at Marlin. "Then go. Get out of here." He stalked to the fire and doused it. "But southwest is that way, and anyone who comes with me can get there."
~ ~
His scolding got them in line. They followed him as he picked his way through the wood, but he could feel them fraying behind him. Southwest was as good a direction as any, but really, Harth was right. They all were. There was no good choice. It would take weeks to reach the mountains of the Tears, with every night colder than the last.
Just keep them moving. While they were moving, they weren't fighting.
As highsun drew close, he started watching for a place to halt for lunch. A stream, maybe, or a meadow where they could see the sky for a time. He spotted a small stand of butterwoods dotting the banks of a creek. Butterwood was a rare tree here—except for their camp the night before, most of what he'd seen was spruce—and its broad cover had kept the ground free of snow.
"Here," he said. "Lunch."
Yes, something told him. It's a great place for lunch, just like it was a great place to camp last night.
His stomach flipped. We've been hiking west for hours. This isn't the same place. It can't be.
The others filed past him. None of them said anything. He put the similarity out of his mind, but when they started hiking again, he watched for landmarks.
Like the ravine they followed for a half-mile. The thin, frozen stream at its end. The fallen butterwood, two hours out.
At dusk, he started watching for another camp. He found a creek dotted with butterwoods.
"Iggy," Syntal said. "Is this—?"
"Shhh," he said. "I have to think."
"Circles?" Marlin sneered. "We've been running in circles?"
"I said shut your mouth," Iggy snapped. Think, think, think.
He closed his eyes, reflecting on the day's hike. After lunch he had changed course, but he'd still recognized the landmarks, and now he was back whe
re he started.
The Church had to have gotten past the wolves by now. They could be here any minute.
What did I do wrong? he thought, fighting down his panic. What am I missing? How—?
He reached for the Pulse. It would give him his bearings better than any landmark. Every time he tried to focus on it, though, all he felt was a twinge of stale grey.
When he realized what was happening, his fear ruptured. Anger boiled out of it like pus from a boil.
"A spell," he spat. "There's a spell on the wood. Marlin's right; we've gone in circles all day."
"A spell?" Lyseira parroted, as Angbar said, "How do you know?"
"I just—" He snapped his mouth shut. Careful. "I don't get lost easy. Never have. It's..." An excuse came to him, and he grabbed it. "It's Veiling Green. Remember the old stories? It has to be why no one ever gets out."
As the words passed his lips, he realized he believed them.
He'd never actually thought the old stories were true. After the Storm, nobody ever told them. No one got lost in Veiling Green anymore. No one could get past the wolves to even try.
A chill stole through him. He'd led them into a spider web, and now they were trapped. The wolves tried to warn me.
"Those are just stories," Harth said.
"Did you watch the moss?" Helix pressed. "The moss grows—"
"Yes, I watched the moss!" Iggy snapped, insulted. "And the sun." And the Pulse. "Come on, Helix. It's me. I'm telling you, there's something about the forest." His mind spun. Suddenly, he desperately wanted to find a wolf. Are they actually trying to protect people? Do they know about this? It sounded like a million other stories he'd heard after the Storm—a cursed forest, where no one who entered escaped alive. But it wasn't. That legend of Veiling Green was as old as he could remember. His dad had talked about it when Iggy was little, before the Storm.
Then why did the wolves start guarding the borders after the Storm?
The others were arguing: Harth insisting they head back to the road, Helix pushing to try again, Lyseira trying to calm everyone with her certainty that Akir would provide. They were a cloud of gnats, swarming in his ears. He couldn't think.
Children of a Broken Sky (Redemption Chronicle Book 1) Page 31