by Deborah Hale
“Very well, then. Lead us to this hiding place of yours, Snake.”
When the boy let go of her arm, Maura fished in the pockets of her sash for pinch of madfern and a few strands of spider silk. She meant to be prepared in case anyone tried to get in their way.
If only she’d been prepared when the Han had come down that alley, rather than taken unawares, Rath would not be fleeing for his life now.
Good! The Han were chasing him—both of them. Rath had hoped to draw off one, at least, so Maura could take care of the other. Two in pursuit of him alone was better still.
Well... perhaps not.
The Han appeared to know what was what and where was where in this village. He did not.
He heard them bellowing for reinforcements to join the chase. He had no one to help him—unless he counted Maura and Blen, whom he did not want to get involved.
His years as an outlaw had taught him to be fast on his feet and to think fast in a tight spot. This was one of the tightest he’d ever landed in.
He leaped over a fence, ducked under a line of drying clothes, climbed a rough stone wall, then twisted his ankle when he jumped down the other side.
If only he could find a spot to hide until nightfall.
Spotting a fowl coop set a little off the ground to discourage predators, he dove underneath it.
The stench of droppings made him gag, but he would have stayed there had he not heard a woman shriek, “There he is, under the coop! Get him!”
Rath rolled out, scrambled to his feet again and headed off in a direction from which he heard no Hanish voices.
He ducked into an alley, shinnied up a drain pipe and ran across the ridge pole of a roof.
An arrow whizzed in front of him. A step faster and he’d have been done for.
As it was, the shot startled him—checking his pace for an instant too long, making him lose his footing. He tumbled down the steep slope of the roof, arms flailing, hands groping for anything to stop his fall. But they found no hold.
He had only time for one thought as he plunged toward the ground. It was more of an appeal, really, in case there was a Giver and it could hear his thoughts.
“Let me land hard enough to kill me.”
Any other outcome could only be worse.
When the racket from the streets finally quieted, Maura feared the worst.
She and Angareth cowered in a hollow gouged into the embankment beneath a bridge. She had sent Snake to see what he could find out, and to fetch the packs from Blen’s wagon. While she waited for him to return and for darkness to fall, she fought to keep her fears at bay.
“Is it dark enough to come out now?” asked Angareth.
“You may go if you like. I had better stay until the boy gets back.” If the boy got back. “I wonder what can be taking him so long?”
Maura leaned out of the hollow to listen, but a sinister hush seemed to have fallen over the town. All she could hear was the gurgle of the river, the patter of rain and the distant regular tramp of feet that sounded like a night patrol.
Where was Snake? Why had he not returned? Had she been wrong to trust him?
Perhaps he had run off with their packs to sell what he could in a neighboring town.
No. She would not let herself think that. “I hope no harm has come to him.”
Angareth began to weep again. Sorry as Maura felt for the girl, she could not stem a rising surge of impatience. As Rath had once told her, in times of crisis folks could not afford to indulge their feelings too much if they meant to survive.
“I am so sorry I brought this trouble on you and your friend,” Angareth sobbed. “You are one of the few folk who have shown me any kindness. Then your friend risked his safety so we could escape. I fear it may have all been for nought.”
“Take heart, now.” Maura wrapped her arm around the girl’s shoulder. “We both made a choice, my friend and I. You are not to blame for our decisions. But you can make certain we did not act in vain.”
“How is that?”
“Do not give up. Do whatever you must to make your way home. Raise your child well and be ready to give a hand to someone else who might need it. ‘Give to others as—’”
“Shh!” Angareth pressed her fingers to Maura’s lips. “I think I hear something.”
Once Angareth fell silent, Maura heard it, too. The soft furtive sounds of someone approaching. Thinking it might be Snake returned at last, Maura brushed Angareth’s hand from her mouth to call out to him.
Then it occurred to her the muted scramble of footsteps might belong to a Hanish soldier trying to sneak up on them. She pulled a wisp of spider silk from her sash and waited, her heart beating a rapid tattoo against her ribs.
“Psst!” Snake called in a whisper. “Are you still here?”
Maura’s pent up breath gusted out of her in a sigh of relief. She leaned out of the hollow. “We’re here. Are you all right? What news?”
As the boy moved closer, Maura heard the soft scrape of a bulky object along the loose-packed earth of the embankment. He had the packs, bless him! One of them, at least.
“There!” The boy sank down on the lip of the hollow. “We are even now for your hiding and feeding me.” His gruff tone rang with a contrary note of satisfaction.
“I told you,” Maura reminded him. “Our help was freely—”
Before she could finish, Snake interrupted her. “Do you not want to hear about your man?”
Her man? Those words sent a sweet ripple through Maura that was far too beguiling. Rath Talward was not hers. Nor could he ever be. But until that moment, she had never admitted to herself how much she wished he could.
“You saw him? He is alive? Why did you not bring him?”
“Hush!” snapped the boy. “Do you want every Han in this miserable village to hear you?”
Maura clenched her lips tight. She had not realized how loud she’d spoken. “Please,” she whispered. “Tell me.”
“He is not dead,” said Snake, “and that is a bit of luck, for he fell off a roof.”
“Can I go to him?” Maura’s mind churned with balms and tonics she would need to prepare.
“Are you daft?” asked the boy. “The Han have him, of course, and you want to stay clear of them. I overheard two of the soldiers talking. They plan on sending him to the mines tomorrow, with their regular batch of prisoners.”
A horrible sensation seized hold of Maura, like the one that had gripped her when she’d first looked over the edge of Raynor’s Rift. She’d been horrified when Rath told her of the mines—the brutality, the danger, the slag poisoning a man’s senses and his spirit. She had heard the dread and despair in his voice. He had been there once, or come near to it. Or perhaps someone dear to him had.
“The poor man,” Angareth whispered in a tone she might have used if the boy had reported Rath dead.
Snake gave an indifferent grunt of agreement. “He was not the pleasantest fellow, but he led the Han a fine chase, I hear. The whole town is buzzing about it.”
“I told that farmer fellow to get out of town before the Han start asking questions,” he added. “And I fetched your packs. They were heavy to carry. Got any more food in ’em?”
A bewildered numbness eased the first sharp wrench of fear and grief that had torn Maura’s heart. “I gave you all I had, but there might still be something in Rath’s pack.”
She groped in the darkness at the two packs, recognizing Rath’s by its shape and the faint scent of him that clung to it. She reached in and hauled out a hard sausage and some bread. A shiver ran through her when the backs of her knuckles brushed against the copper wand.
An idea began to take root in her mind.
Breaking the bread and sausage in two, she gave half to each of the others. “I am sorry I have no more to offer you.”
“Where will you go?” asked Snake, while chewing a large bite of food. “Now that he’s gone?”
“He is not gone!” Maura clung to that feeble
crumb of comfort.
“He might as well be. And it will not be safe for you or the other lady to linger in this town after sunrise. Once I eat, I am off.”
“Where will you go?” Maura turned the question back on him.
“Away from here.”
“I will not need both of these packs.” Maura pushed hers toward him. “I can give you one to use or to sell as you wish.”
“For what?”
“For helping Angareth, here, get back to her village. She needs the aid of someone like you, who knows his way about and how to survive.”
When the boy did not reply right away, Maura fumbled in the darkness for his hand. “Will you... please?”
He only let her hold it a moment before he pulled away. “I reckon so.”
“Good.” Maura wondered how she could feel such a weight of responsibility for two people she had barely met. “Now, I need one last favor from you before we part. Not because you owe me anything. You have already more than paid any debt between us. And not because I can barter for it, because I have nothing left that I dare give away.”
“What?” Snake sounded altogether suspicious of such a one-sided exchange.
“Earlier you said you do not know where to find the twarith.” Though torn about what she must do next, Maura knew she would need help. “Please think. Is there anywhere I might go to look for them?”
“Sorry,” said Snake. “You get to hear about them from folk. Or one of them turns up out of nowhere, then disappears just as quick.”
Maura swallowed her disappointment. Once she made her choice, she would have to operate alone. The prospect daunted her but she would not let it stop her. She had come too far and learned too much for that.
Angareth tugged at her sleeve.
“Your pardon,” said Maura. “I know you must want to get on your way while the darkness lasts.”
“I do,” said the girl, “but it is not that. I know where you might find the people you seek. At least, I think I do.”
“Truly?” Maura caught the girl’s hand in a tight squeeze. “Where? How?”
“In the next village north. I was looking for something to eat and an old woman told me I might get help at a tavern called ‘The Hawk and Hound.’ When I found the place, I saw some Hanish soldiers coming and going, so I kept away.”
That did sound suspicious, even to Maura.
But Snake piped up, “I hear the twarith like to work right under the noses of the Han, but I never knew what that meant.”
“It makes a kind of sense, I suppose.” Maura pulled Rath’s pack toward her. “I reckon I must go and see for myself.”
If nothing else it would put her some distance closer to Everwood. And the walk would give her time to decide what she must do.
Follow the dictates of duty and destiny? Or heed the pleading of her heart?
The pain brought him back to consciousness. Rath cursed his ill luck for being alive now that he had lost his freedom.
And yet, a small but stubborn part of him clung to life. For he now cared for something more than his own life or even his freedom. Not just Maura as a woman, but also as a token of something greater.
The pain struck him again. On the other cheek this time, accompanied by a jingling sound. At least it was ordinary pain, not mortcraft. Rath wondered how long his luck would hold.
“What is a dung-throwing hired guard doing with so much silver in his pouch?” someone asked.
Rath coaxed his eyes open a slit to find himself tied to a chair in a bare room, facing a dark-masked Xenoth who swung his well-laden coin pouch with lazy menace. Staring at it, Rath regretted every silver he had kept Maura from giving away. If he’d shared her generosity instead of guarding against it, those coins would have done some good, rather than making the pouch heavier to strike him.
Though he knew it would invite another blow, at the very least, Rath could not resist shrugging his shoulders and giving an impudent answer to the death-mage’s question. “Perhaps I am very good at what I do.”
To his surprise, the Xenoth let out a raspy laugh at his show of audacity. “An Embrian with some spirit—what a novelty. I am also very good at what I do.”
The coin pouch flew upward, catching Rath under the chin in a blow that jerked his head back and made him bite his tongue.
“Enough jesting,” his inquisitor snapped. “Where did you get the silver?”
Rath spat a mouthful of blood onto the floor. “Stole it.”
“That is better.” The Xenoth tossed the bag of coins into the corner as if it had served his purpose and no longer interested him. “Who did you steal it from?”
“A trader.” That was almost true.
“Where did you come from?”
“The Hitherland.”
The death-mage’s parched lips curved in chilling mockery of a smile. “What a pity you had not stayed there.”
A man in his right wits should be terrified at this moment. Paralyzed, soiling-his-breeches terrified. Rath was not.
Perhaps unmasking that death-mage back in Prum and seeing the frailty that lay beneath the menacing image had robbed the Xenoth of their power over his fears. Or perhaps that fall from the roof had knocked all sense out of him.
“I will make you a bargain.” Rath coaxed the words around his swollen, throbbing tongue. “I will go back where I came from if you go back where you came from and take your whole slagging race with you.”
The Xenoth whipped out his wand. It was wrought of a rare green metal known as strup. In its tip glittered a venomous green poison-gem.
Now, fear snaked through Rath’s marrow. He had heard what poison-gems did to a body—the excruciating corruption that swelled and twisted limbs, making the victim retch blood while his flesh broke out in festering sores.
“Nefarion!” A voice rang out from behind Rath.
Though it was scratchy and strident, Rath thought it as sweet as bird song, for it delayed his coming torment.
The death-mage glanced away from Rath. He switched from Comtung to Hanish. “What are you doing here, Varoque?”
“I have come to fetch more workers for the mines,” announced the other man—another death-mage, Rath assumed. Ordinary Han did not speak to the Xenoth in that contemptuous tone. “They are dying off faster than we can replace them up there. Our production is falling and the Lord Governor is not pleased.”
Though Rath grieved the dead miners, he was glad they were finally free of the mines and the slag. He even admired them for dying at a rate to cause trouble for the Han. Closing his eyes, he struggled to keep his features slack, so the Xenoth would not guess he understood them.
“Climbed a little too high, have you, Varoque?” asked Neferion, his tone as venomous as his wand. “It is a steep fall from where you perch, and there is always someone looking to give you a little nudge over the edge.”
“Are you too comfortable here, fool? Torturing petty miscreants to keep your powers from failing?” Even in a foreign language, Rath understood that threat.
“Perhaps you would like to be sent on a mission over the mountains? The Lord Governor thinks we have not kept a careful enough eye on those barbarians.”
“You would not dare give me such an opportunity to prove my worth.”
“A chance to be broken or stripped, you mean. Mordake shattered his power on some old fool of a sorcerer. Vulmar has disappeared along with two of his men. And Nithard did what honor required after he was stripped of his mask and wand.”
That piece of information intrigued Rath and made him struggle to conceal a flicker a pride. Did he understand right? If someone took a death-mage’s wand and mask, then the mage was obliged by some twisted code of honor to do away with himself?
He must find a way to live long enough that he could relay this news to someone capable of using it to advantage.
The first name that leapt to mind was the Waiting King.
Chapter Eight
BY THE TIME she found her way to “The Hawk
and Hound,” Maura was reeling from fatigue
She had hoped to reach the tavern before too many customers arrived, especially Hanish ones. Unfortunately she had lost her way for a time in the dark after parting with Snake and Angareth. It had not helped that she’d been too preoccupied with the struggle inside herself to keep her wits about her.
Part of her insisted she must leave Rath Talward to look after himself while she made haste to Everwood. The ivory maps sewn into the hem of her tunic seemed to grow heavier with every step, reminding her of the responsibility with which she had been entrusted. She must not put the quest at risk to gratify her own selfish desires. Even if he did not believe in the Waiting King, Rath would not want her putting herself in danger on his account.
She did not need him to reach the Secret Glade. Every challenge overcome since leaving Windleford had helped convince her she was more capable than she had ever imagined. Once she woke the Waiting King, she could beg him to deliver Rath from the mines—the first and only favor she would ever ask of her lord.
Despite all those excellent arguments, she could not bring herself to abandon Rath without at least trying.
That was what had brought her here, to a village whose name she did not know and a tavern rumored to host some people who might help her.
Under her breath, she murmured a plea to the Giver, an old one Langbard had taught her many years ago. “Light my path. Guide my steps. Throw the mantle of your protection around me.”
With that, she hurried across the street and pushed open the tavern door. For a moment she stood just over the threshold, letting her eyes grow accustomed to the dimness inside. The smells of hearty food and strong ale washed over her along with the sound of music from a flute and drum all but drowned out by a few loud voices.
When her vision brightened she saw the place boasted a dozen tables, less than half of which were presently occupied. Some Embrian villagers sat at those nearest her, while most of the noise came from a far corner table where three Hanish soldiers sat, quaffing the contents of oversized ale mugs.
Even though she was mostly screened from their view by the other patrons, and two of the soldiers had their backs to her, she still felt horribly exposed and vulnerable. Flitting from shadow to shadow, she made her way to the bar where a short woman was filling mugs from an ale keg.