by Claire Luana
“I don’t need your help. You’re a spoiled rich ass who won’t last two days in the real world.”
Hale weighed his options. He needed that horse. He could try to take it, but Griff struck him as surprisingly scrappy. The lad was the only one who had escaped the bandits unscathed. He needed the boy’s help. He looked back at Cal’s body, biting his lip. Being Hale wasn’t working very well for him in the real world, as Griff had so aptly noted. What would his brother do?
“Please,” Hale said. “Griff. I can’t change being a spoiled rich ass, but if you help me, I’m your man. If not for me, for my mother. She doesn’t deserve whatever those monsters are going to do to her. She’s all I have left. Please. Let me help you rescue them. Don’t leave me here.”
Griff chewed on the inside of his cheek, his eyes narrowed. “If I help you—”
“Thank you, Griff. Thank you, thank you!”
Griff held up his hands. “If I help you. I’m in charge. You do what I say when I say it. None of that attitude I saw on the ship. You hear?”
“Whatever you say goes. I swear it.” Hale would have promised his left arm if it meant getting on that horse.
Griff heaved a sigh. “I have a feeling I’m going to regret this. But fine. You can come.”
Hale pulled Griff into a hug, crushing the smaller boy to his chest. “Thank you.”
“Air!” came Griff’s muffled voice.
Hale released the boy, stepping back. “Do you have any water?” Hale asked.
Griff rolled his eyes and tossed his waterskin to Hale. “I’m going to search the wagons for provisions.”
Hale, after taking a long drink, looked back at Cal. “Do we have time to bury my brother?”
Griff softened and nodded. “There’s a shovel in the back wagon. But be quick about it.”
Hale buried Cal beneath the carob tree where they had honored his father just last night. It seemed an eternity ago that the three of them had stood, exchanging stories, listening to his mother’s clear voice ring out between the pines. Tears dripped down his nose as he tossed the last shovelful of earth over Cal’s grave. He stood for a long moment, his thoughts numb, his body aching and protesting from the punishment it had been through.
Hale finally spoke. “Don’t know what to say. Except I’m sorry. For all of it. I’ll find Mother. I’ll keep her safe and be as good a son as you were. Because that’s what you’d want me to do.”
Hale took a knife he had snagged from one of the bandits’ bodies and stepped forward, carving into the tree trunk. The wood was hard and thick, and so he scratched Cal’s initials next to his father’s. WJF and CAF. With that, he turned, walking back towards the lonely wagons to the task of burying the rest of the men.
Hale found he didn’t have much to say over these mens’ graves, but he didn’t complain about the mess of blisters on his hands, or the work. He figured that, together with the burial, was something.
“I found a few more waterskins,” Griff said when he was done, sorting through a little pile she had made on the ground. “Some good provisions. Dried meat, cheese, oats for the horse. Chiron had some clothes in there if you want to change…his stuff should fit you.”
Hale looked down at his clothes, bloody and torn. He nodded woodenly, rinsing the blood off of his face before making his way into the covered wagon to change. He stripped down to nothing, hissing as fabric separated from raw parts. He put on a set of Chiron’s clothes—pants, shirt and leather vest, jacket, and a wide-brimmed hat. All around the wagon were signs of the inhabitants. Strings of Emery’s lace ribbon tied to the slats above her bedroll, dried flowers in a little jar. A paper bag full of the caramels that he had helped her roll. He reached out and grabbed them before hopping out of the wagon. He pulled Chiron’s sword belt off his body, re-sheathing the sword at his hip. A smaller sheath on the other side of the belt held a dagger.
“Ready?” Griff asked. He had filled the horse’s saddlebags to bursting with their provisions; Hale had to wedge in the bag of caramels.
“I’m ready,” Hale said.
“You’re bigger than me,” Griff said, pursing his lips. “You take the saddle. I’ll sit in front.”
The old Hale would have cracked a joke at that, but Hale simply nodded, swinging gracefully into the saddle. He leaned down and offered his hand, helping Griff scramble up in front of him. The lad weighed as much as a feather pillow.
Griff took the reins, and without a backward glance, kicked the horse forward.
Hale did look back, saying a silent goodbye and thank you to Chiron, Stiv, and the other men who had lost their lives. Hale looked down at himself as they rode past—bloodied and dirty, wearing a dead man’s clothing. And grateful for it. He felt something shift inside him. Harden. Griff was right—the old Hale wouldn’t have lasted two days in the real world. But that Hale had died—had been buried alongside Cal. This new Hale might stand a fighting chance.
Chapter 11
As it turned out, the journey to Sryalta wasn’t the problem. It was getting in.
Hale’s uneasy alliance with Griff held for the two-day journey. The boy was about as talkative as a stump, but he had been to Sryalta before—that much was clear. He directed their horse with sure knees. When Hale mustered the energy to attempt a plan, shoving aside the looming specter of his brother’s death and the physical depravities likely being visited on his mother at this very moment, Griff rejected every one of Hale’s suggestions.
“Sryalta isn’t a city you enter unnoticed,” Griff said over breakfast, drawing a rough map in the dirt with a stick. “The only entrance is through a narrow pass between two cliffs. The city is built into the hillsides and the base of the cliffs between the gorge.” They had made camp at the foothills, where the mountains started to rise, to the east of the entrance Griff spoke of.
“Stupid place for a bandit to build a city. No way out if the army comes.”
“Well, yes, but first they’d have to get in through the canyon. And they never have.”
“Remind me again why we can’t just walk through the front door?”
“We could, if we wanted to be arrested and sold as slaves. I’m not too keen on that myself.”
“I’m open to suggestions,” Hale said with a sigh, unwrapping a caramel from the little brown sack in the saddlebags. He had eaten half the bag in the last two days.
“How can you eat candy for breakfast?” Griff stuck his tongue out with an expression of disgust.
Hale shrugged. “Makes me feel better. My sugar habit is the least of our concerns right now. How the hell are we going to get in?” Not to mention getting out. He couldn’t even begin to worry about that little problem.
“There is a way I know of. It’s…harrowing, to say the least.”
“My favorite kind of entrance.”
“How are you at climbing?”
“Griff, I’m a picture of physical perfection. There’s very little this body can’t do.” Hale attempted a wry grin. There was a grain of truth to his boast. Even as a boy, he’d always been able to tackle all sorts of physical challenges. Whatever else the Sower had given him, he was gifted with uncanny reflexes, aim, and endurance.
“So…never climbed before?”
“How hard can it be?”
Griff let out a grunt. “Assuming the weight of your ego doesn’t drag you down the cliffside…pretty hard. But I don’t see another way.”
“Is that how you got out last time?”
Griff’s head shot up. “What did you say?”
“It’s pretty obvious. Your face turns white every time we mention it.”
“I don’t want to talk about that. Drop it.”
Hale held up his hands. “You’re the boss. But whatever you can tell me about the city…it could make a difference. If things go sideways in there.”
Silence. Followed by a heavy sigh. “I escaped…that place. I made it out, but I didn’t have any supplies… I was on my last breath out here. Right around her
e, probably. Captain found me. Coulda turned me in, but he made me a member of his crew. Swore I’d never go back. But I can’t just leave him.” Griff’s smooth face was as hard as stone.
“What’d the captain do? To get the bounty on his head.”
“Raided another vessel, fair and square. Turned out to belong to some Alesian merchant who takes himself way too seriously.”
“What’ll they do with him?”
“Turn him over to the merchant. Who’ll probably have him executed.”
“What will they do to my mother?” Hale asked, the words soft.
Griff swirled a pattern in the dirt with his stick, not meeting Hale’s eye. “Fine lady like that, they probably won’t rough her up too bad. Sell her to some perverted old lord or earl to be his personal plaything.”
Disgusting. An image surfaced in Hale’s mind, unbidden—Sim Daemastra bowing over his mother’s hand, his too-tight skin stretching back from his lecherous smile. The soldier had said that the man wanted his mother. Surely his reach couldn’t extend so far? Was it possible the bandits’ attack was not as random as they had thought?
“Do you know where the bandit might be keeping them?”
“He probably already sold them to Sim Rakoni. He’s the slaver who owns Sryalta’s auction house. He handles all the sales.”
“Have you met this Rakoni?”
“Yes. He’s a bastard, but a civilized bastard. He loves nice clothes, expensive food, and wine. The auction house is designed like a fancy brothel or something, with booths for patrons, private back rooms, gambling…”
“Gambling?” Hale perked up. That was a useful tidbit.
“He runs the fighting arena too. Takes all the bets on the fighting champions.”
Hale popped another caramel in his mouth, savoring the smooth flavors of coffee and beer mingling with the caramel itself. A man of refined taste. There had to be something there they could use. A play…a gamble to win his mother’s freedom. And the captain, he amended.
“Need a minute before we go,” Griff said, standing and stretching, heading towards a boulder a few yards away.
Hale stood, dusting off his trousers. He swallowed a dig about Griff’s strange shyness. The boy hadn’t taken a piss in front of Hale in the two days they’d traveled together. He sighed. The old Hale might have made a comment, but not the new Hale. Whatever Griff did behind boulders was Griff’s business.
“We should get a move on,” Griff said, reappearing. “It’ll take the better part of the day to hike up to where we can start to climb down into the ravine behind the city.”
“Hike?” Hale asked. “We’re not taking the horse?”
“Too obvious. We’ll tie him up in those trees where he’s relatively hidden. We go on foot.”
On foot. Hale suppressed a shudder. Were there any two worse words?
Griff set a punishing pace up the mountainside. The air smelled earthy and sharp from scrubby underbrush that grasped at his trousers as they passed. The sky was a cloudless blue, the same pure azure that used to paint the backdrop of his perfect life. Now, it seemed to mock him. Where were the gray storm clouds and tempestuous rain that matched his current predicament? Up, up, up they climbed, but Hale’s mood foundered, sinking low. Surely, he could have done something differently back in the camp—could have fought harder, not left his brother’s side. He’d been standing watch. If he’d been more vigilant, the camp would have had more time. Chiron and his men could have gotten the women to safety. A thousand scenarios played out in his head, a thousand ways he could have turned the tide, done one thing different to stop that sword from piercing his brother through. He wasn’t used to these feelings. Regret. Guilt. They were gnawing parasites, eating him from the inside out. What would be left of him when they were finished? He wasn’t sure he could bring himself to care.
Griff slowed down before him, his hands on his hips, blowing out a long breath. “We’re close to the top. We’ll be able to see the town once we’re over the edge, and in theory, they could see us if anyone was looking close enough. Try not to…do anything stupid.”
Hale’s brows drew together. “What stupid thing are you referring to?”
“I don’t even know,” Griff said. “I’m sure you could come up with something if left to your own devices. Don’t…start a rockslide, or holler at the wind, or anything.”
Hale pressed a finger to his lip in mock confusion. “So when we’re sneaking into the city, I shouldn’t do anything to obviously announce our presence? Is that right? This is all so new and strange.”
Griff scowled. “Just…follow me.”
“Thanks for the vote of confidence,” Hale muttered under his breath.
Hale scrambled up the steep incline after Griff, rocks and dirt giving way beneath his feet. When he reached the summit of the ridge, it took him a moment to steady himself. They could see for miles from their new perch—north across the plains that stretched towards Se Caelus, west to the shining ribbon of the sea. And before them, a bustling metropolis of rock-hewn buildings, colorful tents, and narrow corridors.
Hale gawked at the sight, trying to calculate how many people actually lived here.
“Thousands,” Griff said, as if Hale had spoken his question out loud. “Thousands of the worst types of lowlives and thieves. Trust no one. Talk to no one. Keep your head down. You’re conspicuous enough, but no need to be challenging every man we pass to a fight with your eyes.”
Hale opened his mouth in affront.
“Don’t.” Griff held up a hand. “I’m going to go down first. You follow me precisely. If you fall, try not to fall on me, will you?”
Oh, yes. The climb. With a knot in his throat, Hale looked over the edge. It had to be several hundred feet of sheer rock, punctuated only by little jagged outcroppings and knobby bushes growing at impossible angles. “We’re climbing…down that?”
“How hard can it be?” Griff smirked before lowering himself over the edge.
Hale took a deep breath in. An adventure. Just another adventure. Beating the odds. He was good at that. He just had to beat these odds too.
The climb wasn’t as bad as Hale expected. Sure, his fingernails were bloody nubs, sweat poured buckets into his eyes and down his ass-crack, and his muscles ached and cramped, but they were making steady progress. The cliff face was surprisingly sturdy—he’d only sent a few rocks tumbling down towards Griff when he tried to grab onto them. He tried not to look down but had to from time to time to find an appropriate foothold. About fifty feet above the roofs of the first houses, the cliff face jutted out into a little ledge about a foot wide. It was here that he caught up with Griff, putting a shaking foot on the ledge, laying his face against the rock as he let his arms hang limp.
“Well…that sucked,” he finally said, turning to face Griff.
The lad’s face was pale and sweaty, his chest heaving. “For once, I agree with you.”
“What’s the plan once we get in there?”
Griff looked down with a shrug, examining his bloody fingernails. “Not sure.”
Hale narrowed his eyes. “You’ve been cagey the whole ride. You know what we’re going to face in here to get them back. You do have a plan, don’t you? What are we going to do?”
Griff finally looked up, still not meeting Hale’s eyes, gazing at the maze of buildings below them. “I was going to offer a trade.”
“A trade?” Hale recoiled.
“Keep your voice down!” Griff cringed. “We’re not far from the surface now. We don’t want to draw attention.”
Hale had gone as cold as ice. The little viper was going to betray him! Trade him for Captain Brimmer. What a fool he’d been, trusting him. He’d tried to act as saintly and meek as Cal for two days and look what it would’ve gotten him. Well, time for the old Hale to make a reappearance.
Hale grabbed Griff by the front of his shirt, lifting him off the ground. “You trading me to a slaver was not part of our deal.”
“Put me
down, you stupid ox.” Griff grunted, his hands scrambling towards Hale’s face, through Hale’s arms were far too long. Griff’s feet flapped in the open air until one found purchase, kicking Hale directly in the kneecap.
“Ow!” Hale cried, doubling over and dropping Griff back on the ledge, clasping his offended leg. But the motion of leaning over unbalanced him and his heel slipped off the edge of the rock wall. Hale straightened, trying to regain his equilibrium, his arms windmilling, his eyes going wide.
“Hale!” Griff said, reaching for Hale’s shirt to haul him back up.
But it was too late. Hale was already falling into open air.
Chapter 12
A rotted wooden roof slowed Hale’s momentum, but it was a serendipitously-placed bed that broke his fall. Breathe, Hale thought when his stunned mind began working again. Breathe! Air! His lungs felt like they had collapsed in on themselves. Finally, with a shuddering gasp, he forced blessed air into his body, nearly weeping in relief. He sat up slowly, his pounding head reeling at the movement. After a quick examination, Hale concluded that nothing was broken. He had been lucky.
The house he had crashed into so unceremoniously seemed empty—another stroke of luck. Through the hole in the roof, Griff was visible scrambling down the mountainside after him. He ran around and came bursting through the front door. He sagged in relief when he saw Hale sitting up, his legs over the side of the bed. “Holy hell, man. You should be dead!”
“I got lucky,” Hale said with a wheezing cough. “Now stay away from me. We go our separate ways from now on. I’m not letting you hand me over in exchange for the captain.”
Griff crossed his arms over his chest and stuck his hip out in that way Hale had come to learn meant—you’re an idiot. “I was going to turn myself over for the captain, you idiot!”
Hale stood up slowly, a hand to his back as he slowly inched towards Griff. Everything hurt. Even things he didn’t know could possibly hurt. “You were going to turn yourself over? That’s your grand plan?”