“R’shiel!” She opened her eyes slowly and looked up, surprised to find Mahina bending over her. Next to the old woman was a man who looked like Tarja, only it couldn’t be Tarja because this man was wearing a uniform and Tarja wasn’t a Defender anymore. She felt as feeble as an old woman.
“Bloody hell,” Tarja muttered. Mahina studied the somnambulant girl for a moment before slapping her face. R’shiel jerked back at the pain and her vision began to clear, but she still felt as though she was swimming through molasses. She looked at Loclon and began to tremble violently.
“R’shiel! We have to get out of here! Now!”
Loclon lay unmoving beside her. His face was a bloodied pulp where the boot had landed. Blood streamed from his mouth and broken nose, mingling with the blood that still dripped from his slashed throat. He looked dead.
“R’shiel, we have to get out of here,” Mahina told her again, more urgently. “Do you understand me?” The old woman looked at Tarja. “She’s in some sort of shock. Can you carry her?”
Tarja nodded and scooped her easily into his arms. With Mahina leading the way, they headed for the door. R’shiel glanced up and noticed that his hair was damp.
“It’s raining,” she told him.
“I know it’s raining,” he said. They had only taken a few steps when he stopped. Then she realized that Sunny was there, too.
“What happened?”
“I don’t know, and we’re not hanging around to find out.”
“You can’t take her outside like that. Let me get something to cover her.”
Sunny disappeared into the hall, while R’shiel was still trying to wade through the molasses of her mind. Sunny came back with a warm Defender’s cloak. R’shiel hadn’t realized how cold she was until the warm wool of the cloak touched her clammy skin.
“How are we going to get through the gates?” Sunny asked as she tucked the cloak around R’shiel.
“I’ll take care of it,” Mahina announced.
Tarja looked as if he might argue the point, but Sunny laid a hand on his arm. “You can’t do this alone. Not with her like this.”
“All right, but only because we don’t have time to argue about it. Check the yard is clear.”
Tarja carried her at a run out of the office and down the long hall to the back of the building. When they emerged into the yard the rain pelted down on them, and R’shiel’s trembling grew worse. Tarja held her close as Sunny led three horses toward them. Lightning crashed overhead as Tarja lifted her onto the horse and then swung up easily behind her. She snuggled into him trustingly as he urged the horse into a canter.
R’shiel had her eyes closed, so she didn’t see the reason that Tarja suddenly hauled on the reins and dragged their mount to a halt. She opened her eyes and squirmed a little in her seat to see what the problem was. Dace was standing beside the horse, holding the bridle.
“Hello, Dace,”
Dace didn’t answer her but looked up at Tarja. “Did she kill him?”
“Let me past, boy.”
Another flash of lightning lit the rain-drenched road, and R’shiel caught sight of Brak. She pressed back into Tarja’s solid and reassuring chest. He has come for me, she suddenly knew.
R’shiel tried to pull away as Brak reached up and gently touched her face. A wave of calm swept through her; a gentle peace seemed to flow through her body and she relaxed. Her mind was still foggy but her trembling stopped. She could hear everything that was going on, but it no longer seemed to matter.
“Come with me. I can help you,” Brak said.
“Like the last time I needed your help?” Tarja asked.
“You’re in no danger from me. But you will never get out of the Grimfield without me. I can help you in ways you cannot possibly imagine.”
“Let’s go with him, Tarja,” she heard Mahina urge. “Any minute now the whole damn Garrison is going to be after her. And you.”
“The old lady’s right. We don’t have time to discuss it here.”
“Let’s move it then,” Tarja snapped. He didn’t sound very happy. Dace let go of the bridle and ran to his own mount.
“Is she all right with you? I can take her if you can’t manage.”
“I can manage, Brak.”
R’shiel was having a great deal of trouble staying awake, even though the thunder still crashed and boomed overhead. The lightning hurt her eyes, and a headache of mammoth proportions was beginning to make its presence felt. The rain was cold, but Tarja’s chest was warm and solid so she cuddled up to him as they moved off, and somehow, in the middle of their escape, she managed to fall asleep.
chapter 42
The storm blew itself out close to dawn. Brak glanced up at the slowly brightening sky and cursed. The horses were nearly finished. Tarja’s was carrying a double load, and although they had swapped mounts at frequent intervals during the long night, there wasn’t much more they could do but rest them. He would have traded every horse in Medalon for a Hythrun sorcerer-bred mount right now. A mount like Cloud Chaser who, when linked with his rider, had the stamina of three normal horses. In battle, their intelligence made them almost invincible, although the Harshini had never bred them for war. The horses had been slaughtered in the thousands by Param and the Sisterhood. It was an unfortunate human trait, this desire to destroy things they did not understand.
He looked around at the others and decided it wasn’t just the horses that were almost at their limit. They were all cold and wet, their clothes plastered to them by the insistent downpour. Dace, riding in the lead, appeared to be holding up, but then he was immortal. The plump court’esa and the old woman looked about ready to drop. Tarja’s back was straight, and he hugged the still unconscious R’shiel to him. Brak knew grim determination kept the rebel in his saddle.
With another muttered curse, he decided that this wasn’t going well at all. All he wanted was get R’shiel back to Sanctuary in one piece and discharge his debt to the Harshini. Once there, she was Korandellen’s problem. When he learned what the gods wanted of the demon child, he decided to let the Harshini King decide if she was up to the task or too dangerous to be allowed to live. It was a decision he did not want to make. Brak had seen R’shiel with the rebels, seen what she had done to Loclon, perhaps even worse, what she had wanted to do to him. There was a streak of ruthlessness buried deep within the half-human girl. He was certain there was a rough road ahead for all of them. Just accepting that she was only half-human might prove an insurmountable hurdle for her.
Dace’s addition to the party was more than an inconvenience. He was a Primal God and sufficiently powerful to assume whatever aspect he chose, but he was still bound by the nature of his divinity. He was the God of Thieves and as such was basically dishonest, unreliable, and opportunistic. Dace would only stay with them as long as it suited him and would probably leave them at the most inconvenient time imaginable. He would only be of real assistance if they were trying to steal something. Brak wasn’t sure if that was because he couldn’t help or wouldn’t. Perhaps it was better not to ask. A demarcation dispute between the gods was something to be avoided.
Brak had no idea who the chubby woman was – a friend of R’shiel’s he guessed. That could prove awkward. As for the other woman, the thought of her made him pale. Brak tried to imagine the look on Korandellen’s face when he appeared at the gates of Sanctuary with a former First Sister in tow. How in the Seven Hells had she become mixed up in an escape attempt?
And then there was Tarja.
Brak just knew there was going to be trouble with him. Tarja thought he had betrayed him at the inn at Testra. He doubted Tarja would be interested in explanations regarding the nature of the glamor Brak had used to conceal himself, or his reasons for it. Tarja was a soldier, and soldiers tended to see the world in black and white. There were no shades of gray that would allow him to consider Brak’s actions as anything other than treachery. At the very least, Tarja probably thought Brak was working for the reb
ellion and his task was to kill him as a traitor. Not an unreasonable assumption, under the circumstances, but one that would take some explaining. The trouble was, the explanation was likely to be unbelievable. Sometimes the truth was just plain awkward.
They had begun with about a three-hour lead over the Defenders sent to hunt them down. Dace assured him that Loclon wasn’t dead, not yet at least, and had been discovered by Corporal Lenk, who had raised the alarm. Only the fact that the majority of the Defenders were at the mine dealing with the riot prevented a full Company from riding after them. As it was, there were ten of them, closing the gap fast, unhampered by a horse carrying a double burden. Brak figured they couldn’t be more than half an hour behind them now, and they would soon forfeit whatever small advantage the rain and darkness had given them.
“Hold up,” he called to the others, dismounting stiffly. Dace wheeled his horse around and trotted back to Tarja. He slipped off his own mount and reached up for R’shiel. Tarja lowered her down and then slowly dismounted himself.
“What’s the matter?”
Brak glanced up at the sky again. “It’s almost dawn, and we’re still too close to the Grimfield. They’ll be on us in less than an hour.”
“How do you know?”
“I know,” Brak told him, then turned to Dace. “Can you keep going on your own for a while?”
The boy pushed back his damp hair. “I live to serve, Lord Brakandaran.”
Brak frowned. Dace did not appear to be taking this very seriously. “Keep going with the women. Tarja and I will take care of the pursuit.”
“I’m not going with him!” Sunny objected, still mounted.
“You’ll go with Dace and do what he says, or I’ll kill you now and have one less human to worry about.” The woman must have decided he was serious, which was a good thing. Brak had little stomach for killing these days, but she didn’t know that. She sniffed at him and looked away without any further sign of rebellion.
“Can you guarantee that we will be safe if we follow this boy?” Mahina asked.
“No harm will come to any of you while you’re with Dace,” he promised. “You could say the gods will be watching over you.”
She studied him for a moment longer with an unreadable expression. She nodded slightly and wheeled her horse around.
Brak turned back to Tarja. “You got enough strength left in you to fight?”
“I can keep going as long as you can.”
“I seriously doubt that, my friend,” he muttered to himself. “Dace, come here.”
The god was bending over the unconscious girl. He led Dace a little way off, out of the hearing of the humans, ignoring their suspicious stares.
“Keep heading southwest, toward the river. We’ll catch up as soon as we can. And try not to get distracted.”
“You show a disturbing lack of faith in me, Brakandaran.”
“I prefer to think of it as a firm grasp of reality. If you start getting ideas about wandering off, just try to imagine what Zegarnald will do when I tell him it was your fault we lost the demon child.”
“That’s not fair.” The boy-god frowned for a moment then shrugged.
That was one good thing about the gods. They didn’t agonize over anything for very long. “Will R’shiel be all right? I’m not sure what I should do with her. I don’t know much about humans. What happens if she dies?”
“She’s not going to die. All you have to do is keep her safe. You can do that much, can’t you?”
“I suppose,” Dace sighed. “Are you sure you wouldn’t rather I helped you and Tarja? Looking after the women is sort of... well... boring.”
“We’re going to kill them, Dace, not steal their horses.” Then he decided to try a different tack. This was a god he was talking to, after all. Their egos tended toward the majestic. He lowered his voice and added in a conspiratorial whisper, “You have to stop R’shiel from being stolen away from us. Who better to do that than the God of Thieves?”
Dace brightened considerably at the idea. “Do you think someone might try to steal her?”
“Definitely. They’re probably combing the hills as we speak, just waiting for a chance at her. Of course, if you don’t think you’re up to the task...”
“Don’t be ridiculous! If I can’t thwart a miserable bunch of humans, I’ll give up my believers and become a demon. You take care of the pursuit, Lord Brakandaran, and I will ensure that the demon child is safe.”
“I knew I could count on you,” Brak replied gravely.
They walked back to Tarja, who was bent over R’shiel. The girl’s face was peaceful and serene. The magic that had possessed her earlier vanished as if it had never been. The humans eyed him dubiously but stood back to let him check on her. Her pulse was steady and even. He picked her up off the muddy ground and handed her up to Dace, who had mounted again.
“Vigilance,” he reminded the god.
Dace nodded and clucked at his horse. They moved off into the dim morning, Sunny trailing with slumped shoulders, although Mahina’s back was ramrod straight. Brak turned to his black gelding, whose head hung miserably, his breath steaming.
“There’s a gully about a league back,” he explained as he tied the gelding to the branch of a twisted white-gum. “We’ll wait for them there.”
Tarja tied up his own mount and followed Brak back onto the narrow track. They made good time, but the sky was considerably lighter by the time they reached the gully. The track cut through a long-extinct watercourse, although the night’s rain had caused a trickle to gather in the center of the path in an echo of its former glory. The cutting was about the height of a man on horseback and near thirty strides long, wider at the far end than the end from which the two men approached. Brak could hear the soldiers faintly in the distance.
“They’re coming.”
The rebel glanced at him skeptically.
“Trust me, they’ll be here soon.”
“So what’s your plan? You do have a plan, don’t you Brak?”
“When they ride into the gully we’ll bring down the trees at either end of the cutting. With a bit of luck, a few of them will fall and break their necks in the confusion.”
“Bring down the trees? How?” Tarja was looking at him like he was a simple-minded fool.
“Magic,” he said. “We will call on the gods for help.”
“Who are you?”
“I doubt you’d believe me if I told you, Tarja. Just accept the fact that I’m on your side, for the time being. Explanations can wait.”
Tarja did not look happy with his answer, but the rattle of tack and pounding of hooves, loud enough for even the human to hear, distracted him.
Brak turned his attention to the cutting and wriggled forward on the muddy ground toward the edge. He picked out the two trees he had in mind and reached inside himself, his eyes blackening as the sweet Harshini power filled him. He reached out for the slow, lumbering touch of Voden, the God of Green Life. Voden was a Primal God in the truest sense of the word. He rarely concerned himself with human affairs. Voden would listen to the smallest blade of grass or the most ancient, massive tree, but he generally ignored the Harshini. As for humans, Voden considered them a kind of annoying blight that destroyed his trees for shelter and firewood. Fortunately, they occasionally redeemed themselves by planting things, which placated the god enough to leave humanity alone.
Brak felt incredibly puny under the weight of the god’s notice, but he concentrated on a mental image of what he needed, hoping Voden would understand. He let his mind fill with thoughts of Xaphista, the demon child, and finally the present moment when the Defenders were hunting them down. One could not use words with a god like Voden. One could only hope that he gleaned enough from Brak’s mind to understand that Xaphista could only be destroyed if the demon child lived and that the men who followed them threatened her. It seemed to take forever before he felt Voden’s somewhat reluctant agreement.
“Get around to the othe
r side,” Brak ordered. He half-expected Tarja to argue with him, but the rebel merely slipped away silently. Within a couple of minutes he was in position.
The first Defender came into view not long after. The hollow was lit in the eerie predawn light, a mass of shadows and darkness. The Defenders rode at a trot, two abreast, following the muddy tracks cut into the ancient watercourse. Brak reached out to Voden, felt the power surge through him, and was gratified to hear the crack of splintered timber, startlingly loud in the gully. The lead horse reared in fright as a white trunk crashed down in front of him, throwing his rider. The other horses reacted to the fright of the first as the base of another tree exploded behind the last rider. It crashed down, cutting off their retreat. He then began, somewhat reluctantly, picking off the riders one by one.
Voden’s power was the power of growing things. Long-dormant roots broke through the ground and reached for the soldiers hungrily, strangling them with living tentacles that tightened inexorably around limbs and throats, cutting off terrified screams. The soldiers hacked wildly at a threat they could not comprehend, as the very ground they stood on suddenly became their enemy.
Tarja leaped into the melee and took on the remaining Defenders single-handed. The roots had killed three, and there were two others down, injured in falls from their terrified mounts and unable to get clear of the stamping hooves as the horses dodged and squealed in fright. Brak stayed his power and watched the rebel. He moved like a dancer, one movement flowing into the next with no effort, to the accompaniment of the ring of metal on metal, echoing through the cutting like discordant music. Brak was fascinated. Despite his own low opinion of sword fighting, he had to admit that Tarja was very good. He caught sight of a Defender coming up behind Tarja, his blade raised and ready to plunge between the rebel’s shoulders. The man dropped like a sack of wheat, screaming in agony as the ground beneath him erupted in a mass of deadly, writhing roots. Tarja had cut down two Defenders and was tiring, but Brak still stayed his hand, morbidly curious as to how long Tarja could keep up his violent dance of death. The third man fell, impaled on Tarja’s blade. The rebel jerked it free and turned to the last survivor. He abandoned all pretense of style and swung the blade in a wide arc, decapitating the shocked Defender where he stood. Exhausted, Tarja slumped to his knees amid the carnage.
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