They would breach that easily and then the sphere and all that it contained would be theirs. He looked at the girl again but she stood beside Daniel, her form dwarfed by his height.
Tucker turned and cupped his filthy hand underneath the spigot, using one hand to pump the water that evacuated in a rush, soaking his pant leg as he gulped greedily. Others of the fragment lined up behind him, muttering and groaning from the travel.
*
Daniel watched Tucker studying him and realized the element of surprise was fast dissipating. Tucker knew there was something afoot and would be watchful. He looked down at the blond head of the young female and thought about what might occur. They'd seen the two of the Band charge after them while they stood at the portal's door and if he understood the Band correctly, they'd follow them through the Pathway. The only respite they could hope for would be the Band would assemble more, then follow. Hopefully, he could dispatch Tucker, take hand of the fragment and enter into peaceful negotiations with the sphere before the Band came upon them and slit all their throats. He'd met them in battle but a handful of times and knew that although the fragment outnumbered them four to one, it mattered not.
They were fearsome.
Evelyn looked up at Daniel, her belly in knots. She had managed not to heave the contents of her stomach as many of the males had and the cold had left her. But the oppressive weight of the travel still lay heavy upon her, she did not feel herself, sluggish. Daniel appeared to have fared the best. He stood tall and unmoved. She knew he had not vomited, nor did he appear tired and dizzy like the others.
“Do you not feel ill?” she asked in a whisper.
He looked down at her and lied, he couldn't have anyone thinking he was different. “I have felt better. My stomach hurts and my head swims, but not so much now.”
Daniel actually felt almost normal. When they had first evacuated the Pathway, there was a period of intense dizziness when they had fallen from a point mid-air in the sphere tunnel to the floor. His stomach had lurched horribly but he grit his teeth, fighting the physical malaise, finally overcoming it.
The fragment came together and Daniel fought the urge to put the girl behind him.
Tucker looked at each face, some had the pallor of ash. “We must press forward. Daniel and I saw two of the Band approach as we entered the Pathway. They'll follow. I think this female somehow belongs to them.” His malevolent gaze rested on Evelyn. “Do you?”
She did not answer and he stepped forward, reaching for her from Daniel. He moved to stop Tucker and his eyes met Daniel's. “Why do you protect her?”
Daniel thought quickly. “She can be used as a hostage should the Band follow.”
Tucker thought his logic sound. He looked at the girl again. “Will they follow?” he ground out.
She nodded. “They shall.”
He huffed in disgust. “The Band and their servitude to the weak females. No matter, they can't save them all,” he said as he smiled to himself.
Evelyn gulped and heard a dry click. Daniel led her to the spigot and she cupped her hands under it, filling them fully then splashing it on her face. She winced at the contact, her swollen face protesting under the cold water. It was at once refreshing and painful. The next handful was for her parched throat.
“Let's move!” Tucker said. He gave instructions to two of the fragment that were low to the ground and fast. Mayhap only ten and five, Evelyn estimated.
Evelyn watched them race ahead, moving in the shadows like eels in a stream.
****
Clara fell, weightless through the darkness, ice coating her body as she hurtled through the inky black of the Pathway. She could not feel the arms that had bound her to their bodies: Edwin's and Matthew's. She felt utterly alone. She knew that they grew closer to the end when the black became murky and her stomach lurched inside her, rising of its own accord. And as if she were underwater, she began to see a light shining below her. She shut her eyes as colors raced alongside in the periphery, the velocity making her nauseous.
When she opened her eyes, she saw Edwin beneath her and had but a moment to put her hands before her as she landed on top of him.
He grunted as she fell from a height of at least one horse length, mayhap two. She tried to scramble off but Matthew was at her back and rolled her away from Edwin. Turning he leaped to his feet with her in his arms and backed away as the Pathway spit the remainder of their party onto the floor beneath it. As a giant mouth, it expelled them onto the dirt floor while Edwin and Bracus drug them away before the next expulsion.
There would be bruises, Clara thought. Her stomach felt terrible and her head spun. She would not have been standing if Matthew did not have her in his arms. “Matthew.”
Matthew looked down at her, the bruise at her temple almost a memory. He cocked his brow.
“Please, put me down.”
He did, his hand remaining at her elbow. She watched as Charles and Clarence stumbled to the side, vomiting where some already lay. Anna came next and threw up with them, Joseph holding her hair away from her face as she did.
Philip had Sarah in his arms where she lay unconscious. Clara rushed to her side. “What is wrong with her?”
Philip shook his head. “I do not know. But she was held by me the entire time.”
Clara looked at her. She placed her ear above Sarah's mouth. “She breathes. Mayhap she needs more time to recover?”
Philip shrugged. “We do not leave until she awakens. That I do know.”
Clara turned away with a smile. It faded when she saw what lay around them. Aside from vomit still cooling in the tunnel, there was a great mud pool around the base of the spigot.
Fragment.
They had been here and gone.
Clara looked at the faces of the Band. They stood straight and true. A furrow formed between her brows. “How fare you?”
Bracus and Rowenna came forward. “I feel somewhat off-kilter, otherwise much as I usually do,” Rowenna said and the remainder of the Band nodded assent.
Clarence, Charles, Anna and even Sarah seemed quite ill. She herself felt affected, but not to their extent.
Clara said what she thought, “I think the savage blood affords a barrier of sorts. The Band is not sick. The fragment will be. I am mixed, so I am affected less. Nonetheless, I would not take on my normal tasks with any reasonable amount of vitality,” Clara said as she swallowed the bile that threatened.
Bracus nodded. “It seems the Travelers extended that protection when they tampered with who remained.”
“It would seem so,” Edwin murmured.
“I would like to put them through the Pathway,” Philip said with venom.
“Mayhap one hundred times or so,” Matthew smiled.
“Excellent, my brother,” Maddoc said.
Rowenna rolled her eyes. “If you males are finished making jest there is a sphere to save.”
They smiled, the tension lessened with their humor. Clara looked at Charles and Clarence. They were holding on to the side of the sphere wall, their hands sinking into the surface a few inches, the flesh buried out of sight.
“Clara, do not go without Clarence and myself,” he rasped out through a throat raw from expunging.
Matthew growled low in his throat. “The Band will protect her. You are not able to do much more than raising your head, sphere-dweller. We must go. Do you not wish to secure the safety of your family? Do you not have younger kin that sit in wait, unprotected? Do not let your pride hamper your intellect.”
Clara looked down, Matthew was extremely unskilled in conveying things in a diplomatic way. The affect of that was apparent in the brick red flush that crept up Charles neck. “I would not leave our queen defenseless.”
Matthew raked a hand through his hair, exasperated. “Do you think the Band would?”
Clarence staggered forward, catching himself on the back of the bench which stood close to the brass doorway that led Outside. “You do not understand our duty to
her.”
Matthew's expression darkened and that of the other Band. “Aye, we understand duty. We have pledged ours to her.”
“I advise you shut that hole beneath your nose before one of us fills it with a fist,” Philip said, moving forward.
Sarah stirred in his arms and he halted. Clara saw that he had forgotten she lay there when his temper flared.
Good Guardian.
Clara flung up her hands. Everyone's eyes fell on her. “Joseph.”
He stood, making sure Anna was secure by seating her upon the bench.
“Would you stay with them until we send someone when things are ascertained?”
He nodded, then looked at the others of the Band.
“Someone must guard the females that are too weak to travel,” Bracus said logically, tactfully leaving out the fact that both Clarence and Charles would have had a tough go as well.
Charles looked defeated and Clara's heart ached for him. But they must go to the sphere. She turned away from that look and with a hand motion from Bracus, they left.
*
Philip looked back at Sarah, his intent obvious. He did not wish to leave her here in the tunnel with only one of the Band for protection. Yet, what lay ahead of them was unknown as well.
He was needed.
He tucked her in beside Anna, her head resting on Anna's lap.
He ran after the others, his duty before him, his heart behind.
CHAPTER 30
Clara heard the screams before she saw the scene which greeted her. The pleas and shouts were horrible. Matthew took her behind him, the Band spreading into a V-formation with Bracus at its point. Rowenna at his side, her dirk naked in her left hand.
He looked at her for the briefest moment. “Fight by my side so I do not become distracted thinking of your welfare.”
She held his gaze for a heartbeat then nodded.
Clara saw that the suspended clock had been ruptured, a great fissure had spread and shattered its beauty, a casualty of the violence. The fragment having killed every man in sight, they lay bleeding and torn all around.
Clara knew a rage unlike anything she had ever experienced. These were her people and they were being killed for no reason.
Save greed.
A heat began in her torso and spread out to the tips of her body, the very roots of her hair felt on fire. She charged forward into the melee.
*
Matthew watched as Clara surged forward, rage contorting her face and was instantly by her side, preemptively striking the first fragment before she could be in his path. He used his longsword and with a downward sweep severed the arm at the shoulder. It fell off and the fragment, his mouth an “O” of surprise, fell to the side as a boat without a rudder.
He jerked Clara to her feet and launched her behind him roughly, giving himself swinging room. He located Edwin, battling three fragment, the other of the Band avoiding bleeding bodies, two deep in some spots.
Clara stumbled backward, nearly falling, trying to keep Matthew's broad back in sight while she kept a distance that allowed him to defend. Everywhere she looked the cobblestones of the street of her youth held blood, it ran in the cracks and crevices like a stream of life now lost.
Her mother and Bracus fought, their backs touching, an uncanny dance of intimate battle ensued. A male of the fragment would approach Bracus and he would swing Rowenna around to meet the enemy with a blade.
Her blade.
Clara watched as her mother swung it high as Bracus wrapped his hand on her forearm, giving her momentum as she brought the longsword down as she came about the front of him, the curved portion biting the flesh of his neck. Bracus swinging his dirk into the thigh of another, severing the precious artery that ran the junction of thigh to body. The fragment toppling, his blood spraying out as a geyser.
Clara backed away from the scene, her breaths coming quickly. It smacked so much of the battle with the fragment Outside one year past it was as though she relived it now.
She saw Matthew turn to gauge her position and his mouth opened in a scream. She could not hear what he said but saw her name upon his lips and turned to see what lay behind her.
Prince Frederic stood just behind her, upon his neck stood a grievous slash, the flesh an angry red gash, healed badly. She stood completely still for one moment, then turned. He reached out and grabbed her, pulling her completely off her feet. She screamed and it was swallowed in the clang of swords and thump of flesh smacking flesh.
Her fear choked her, she could not get breath in her body. She felt her gills burst from her flesh and sweet oxygen filled her lungs. She did what she had seen the Band do and swung her head backward into the prince's nose. A satisfying crunch sounded, making her ears ring and head swim.
She began to lose consciousness as she felt him connect his fist with her face. She slipped to the ground and began to crawl away from him, her vision trembling before her as her palms maneuvered ground fouled by blood and gore.
He came after her, his face a mass of blood, the cartilage of his nose revealed as dull ivory. He had a dagger in his hand as he bore down upon her.
She rolled onto her back, her hand slapping the ground behind her in a futile search for something to help her. A weapon.
Anything.
He landed on her body, straddling her. She could hear Matthew and Edwin approach, screaming her name.
They would not make it in time. She watched as Prince Frederic raised the dagger, the soft light of the sphere causing the blade to flash silver. A drop of blood from his nose hung on his jaw then fell to land on her breastbone.
Time hung suspended.
A figure loomed behind Frederic and an arcing blade came down just as his blade made its descent for her heart.
A fist punched the blade away as it grazed the flesh of her bosom just as a dagger struck the meat of the prince's throat, the hilt an obscene flag standing at attention at his neck. He gurgled, clawing at the dagger.
Clara watched as his crazed eyes flooded with the knowledge of his death.
And she was glad of it, a fierce joy squeezing her heart with his imminent demise.
She watched the figure kick the body of the prince off her where he lay, gasping for breath beside her.
Daniel looked down at Clara, thinking that he had never done something he felt better about in his life.
He also saw how beautiful she was as she lay there, how alive.
*
Clara rolled over and away from Prince Frederic and saw Matthew and Edwin circle Daniel. He looked at them and unsheathed his matching daggers as he faced them, one in each hand.
“No!” Clara croaked, rising to her shaky feet.
Matthew's eyes flicked to hers, his fist bleeding freely from where it had connected with the blade meant for her heart.
“Do not!” she wailed, running to Daniel. They did not know that he had spared her much from before.
She slithered between the men and crashed into Daniel, her legs giving way from weakness and injury. He scooped her up against him. His eyes searching his opponents.
“Drop the queen, fragment,” Matthew said in a conversational tone.
“If I'd wanted to hurt her, I could've,” Daniel responded in the same way.
Matthew felt a strange tingle begin at his words, but left his weapon at attention.
“Let her loose or suffer the blade. Ours do not have enough blood, we would be happy to add yours,” Edwin said, his eyes shifting to Clara, hanging onto consciousness by a thread.
“He is not...” Clara began, struggling with staying alert so they would not cut him down. “He is not as he seems.”
Matthew and Daniel regarded each other. The heat of recognition igniting in their bodies.
Matthew's blade dipped and he straightened. Edwin looked at him. “What say you? This is our enemy and he holds that which is most precious.”
Matthew nodded and looked into Daniel's eyes. “What say you?”
“Br
other,” Daniel said, sheathing his blade and picking Clara up into his arms.
Brother? Clara thought as her body sucked her under into a blanket of healing unconsciousness.
CHAPTER 31
Clara came awake in stages. She felt battered and ached but the battle was over, her people safe.
She opened her eyes and it was precious Olive who greeted her. “I say, you are in deplorable condition,” she said, softening her words with a smile.
Clara grinned. It was divine to be home. “Yes,” Clara croaked out, agreeing, as Olive brought her a cup of water.
“How fare you, Queen Clara?”
Clara thought it through, wiggling her bare feet under the covers, noticing her familiar nightgown was encasing her tired body. “Very well, thank you, Olive”
No one but she and Olive were in her chamber and Clara sighed with relief. It was good to come to herself and regain her bearing. She had many questions but she would bathe and eat, then address the myriad of horrors which awaited.
“I have drawn a bath. I had a sense of when you may awaken.”
Olive had been her attendant following the beatings, she knew the symptoms of consciousness. It was a horrible knowledge but one bred through experience.
Clara made her shaky way to the necessary and its bathing apparatus.
She sunk to her armpits in the copper tub, the steam rising in fragrant swirls of heat about her and sighed. She did not think she would ever come clean from what they had just gone through.
What her people had just gone through.
Olive studied her face and her smile that had been so ready, faded.
“How many?” Clara asked directly.
“Many,” Olive whispered, intuiting Clara's inference.
The Savage Blood (Savage Series, Book 2) Page 22