Fearless

by Jennifer Jenkins

  Joshua stared up at the night sky. “You could have slipped away without us. Just like Gryphon.”

  Zo had certainly thought about doing that very thing. “Several reasons.”

  Yes, she’d promised Tess not to leave her again, but the whole truth ran deeper than an underground spring. Ice cold and completely filtered of all of her good intentions, the truth was she needed Joshua to help convince Gryphon to abandon his plan. Gryphon cared for Joshua more than anyone else in the whole world. Gryphon would do anything for the kid.

  Joshua was quiet for a while. “He loves you.” The words hung on the stale breeze like a bubble of promise that might pop at any moment.

  He left me. Zo mentally corrected.

  Just like her parents.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Out in the muddy plains of the valley, Gryphon didn’t know whether he wanted to speed up or stop. Either option was a vile, cruel beast that ripped at the thin strings of his heart. There was no winning this battle. Not for him.

  “Link!” Gryphon called when camp had broken. The sound of forty shields sliding into tight formation brought back a little piece of home. Gryphon had always loved that sound. It was the sound that preceded adrenaline. Adrenaline preceded victory.

  Funny how something that once mattered more than anything else could be degraded to merely noise. Walking in stride with the men he’d grown to respect over the past few weeks, Gryphon thought of other noises.

  Joshua’s easy laughter. His endless questions about anything and everything. The sound of his clumsy feet as he stumbled through the brush. Tess’s high-pitched voice that rang like bells and chimes even when she was vexed. The sweet sound of Zo’s sigh as he kissed her by the stream.

  Gryphon shook his head. It wouldn’t serve him to focus on such things. Not when his men depended on him.

  Such little time.

  “This is where our paths split, young Ram.”

  Gryphon turned to find Ikatou with one foot planted in the soil and the other propped on a rock. The man had adopted a glow ever since learning the Allies would help free the Nameless. “I want you to know that, even though we don’t technically have our families back yet, my brothers and I have deemed Zo’s blood oath complete. We’ll perform the ceremonial release with Zo when the conflict is over.”

  “That means a great deal to me, Bear. Thank you.”

  Ikatou pushed away from the rock and reached out to grasp Gryphon’s forearm. Gryphon returned the gesture. “I will see you in the life after this one.” He cleared his throat and looked away, but not before Gryphon caught sight of tears rolling down his cheeks. “None of this could have happened without you.” He pulled out an ugly bear claw dagger and drew it across his palm, right next to the bright pink scar made when he’d promised Gryphon to protect Zo on their trip to the Caves. “I would call you my brother by blood.”

  “What kind of blood oath is this?” asked Gryphon, wearily.

  “The kind that binds families.” He offered Gryphon the hilt of the claw-blade. “I would be honored to call you my family and give you a place in my house. My posterity will be stronger with you in my line.”

  “Even in death?”

  The Kodiak nodded. “Even in death.”

  Gryphon dragged the rudimentary blade across his palm and shook Ikatou’s hand, grafting his blood to that of the Bear.

  “We are family now.” Ikatou offered him a clipped nod, and left to join the rest of the Kodiak and Freemen headed to a grouping of nearby caves. Their resting place until the Ram army passed by, assuming they’d covered their tracks properly.

  Looking down at his bloodied hand, Gryphon noticed Sani’s beads. For a man without a clan, he certainly felt connected.

  Gryphon looked up to see Gabe jogging back from his own command of forty. Men nodded in respect as he worked his way down the train of Allies. Gryphon had hardly seen the Wolf since the night before they left the Allies’ stronghold.

  Gabe stepped in line with Gryphon. The two men walked side by side, neither bothering to offer a greeting. After a while Gabe finally said, “There is talk that your forty will lead us out to battle. Many other captains have adopted your … training methods. I have too.”

  Gryphon gave Gabe a knowing look. “I will not be leading anyone anywhere. You know that as well as I do.” Gryphon grounded his knuckles into his side. “Besides, Commander Laden makes the decisions. Not I.”

  “Exactly.” Gabe looked around to make sure they weren’t overheard. “What if Laden orders you to stand down?”

  “We have a deal,” said Gryphon. “When the two forces are set to battle, I will join him on the field to meet Barnabas. The exchange will happen as planned. My brothers’ lives depend upon it.”

  Gryphon trusted Laden enough to know that he would keep his word.

  “Can’t you convince your mess brothers to join us? I’m sure many of them look up to you as their Striker.”

  Gryphon frowned. “Perhaps they did at one time. Not now.” He shook his head.

  “I have to ask you something that’s been bothering me for weeks.”

  Gabe took Gryphon’s lack of objection as an invitation. “Inside the Gate, when I was to be executed and you let me fight, why didn’t you just kill me?”

  Gryphon didn’t answer at first, but eventually the truth spilled out. “She loved you.” He snorted. “I couldn’t watch her suffer.”

  Gabe’s eyes narrowed. “Yet you would let me watch her suffer?”

  Zo awoke to the sound of skittering rocks and murmured voices. The sky outside was still mostly dark. She thought of the disturbance more as a nuisance than anything else until she propped up onto her elbow and glanced down.

  Choking on her gasp, she crawled over to Raca and shook the Raven princess’s arm. “Ram.”

  With that one word, Raca’s eyes flew open. Together they slithered to the edge of the cliff and peered down at the formal procession of deadly men. The Ram marched in tight formation, five wide and in clusters four rows deep. A small gap in ranks divided each mess unit of twenty men. They wore their traditional fur-lined boots with boiled leather vests and wrist guards, their notorious round shields held like a mantra at their chests.

  “Too soon.” Raca breathed an unsteady breath. “No one expected them to come so far so fast.”

  Given the winding, curving nature of the canyon road, the ranks of Ram mess units seemed to go on forever. And since there was no other path south, waiting was the only option.

  “Hopefully the Nameless are far enough behind so we can follow the Ram,” said Zo. She had to find some way to overtake them. Some way to get to Gryphon before he … well, before. But with Tess in tow, she didn’t see that happening.

  I can’t lose you too, Gryphon. I refuse to let you go.

  “Murtog,” Raca whispered under her breath. “I hope you’ve covered your tracks.”

  It took nearly two hours for the Ram to pass. Zo drew a line in the dirt for every Ram mess that marched by. One hundred and fifty-two lines in the dirt. Almost three thousand men—well more than the two thousand anticipated by Commander Laden. More than even Zo imagined, given her time inside Ram’s Gate.

  Where had they all come from? How could she have been so wrong? With a force this large, the Ram would barely be outnumbered two to one, and they had a history of defeating their enemies even when they were outnumbered ten to one.

  The Allies were depending on their numbers to save them. Without that, what hope was there for victory? And if they failed, what would happen to the Valley of Wolves? To the Raven and Kodiak refugees? The Ram raid that took Zo’s parents replayed over and over in her mind. Panic hijacked her breath. The Allies had no business fighting. They needed to retreat. Race to their loved ones, and leave this region all together.

  “We wait an hour and then we leave,” said Raca with a firm nod.

  Zo couldn’t disagree. “The pass opens up to forest soon. We�
��ll have to run through the night and take our chances with the Ram.” Zo swallowed, not daring to think what would happen if they were caught.

  After hours of nerve-splitting walking in the Ram’s fresh tracks and with—what they assumed were—a host of Ram who didn’t make up the main fighting force at their backs, Zo, Tess, Joshua, and Raca crossed the Iiná river under the cover of night to the forest on the other side. If they’d continued walking east, they would have eventually run into the river Totoom. For now, they walked the land wedge that divided the two living bodies of water.

  Undergrowth scratched and snagged at Zo’s legs as they pounded through the trees. Pine branches whipped Zo’s face, their woodsy scent lingering with the sting of the needles. Raca kept a steady pace, jumping and ducking through the foliage with animalistic agility. She rarely looked back to make sure the others were on her tail.

  Zo welcomed the challenge—any pain was worth reaching Gryphon before the Ram—though it took most of her waking brain to concentrate on not falling with Tess strapped to her back. After a few hours of relentless running, Raca finally slowed to a halt.

  Joshua nearly ran into her. The boy didn’t even seem tired. “Why are we stopping?” he complained.

  In contrast, Zo felt as though her legs were detached from her body, wobbly and numb. She didn’t trust them to support her weight so she slumped down to the moist ground to stretch.

  “Someone’s been through here.” Raca pointed to a series of bent branches and a few scattered footprints. If Zo hadn’t been looking, she never would have noticed them.

  “How could you see that while running?” she asked in unbelief. The veil of night cast a dark net over the forest, compounded by the rushing of the two rivers on either side of them. It wouldn’t be long before the two bodies of water connected.

  Raca didn’t seem to hear her. “These tracks are fresh.” She used her dark arms to wipe the sweat from her brow. “We passed the camped army hours ago. If it’s a Ram scout, it means two things. First, we can’t be more than a few miles ahead of the army. Maybe less. Second, they will see our tracks on their way back. Barnabas will send out a mess to track us down.”

  Joshua paced with adrenaline. “But we are so far ahead. We must have covered five miles of forest. They won’t catch us before we reach the point where the waters meet.”

  Raca looked directly at Zo wrapping a blanket around Tess to help support her when carried on her back. “We’re too slow.”

  Zo pushed up to her feet. Her knees complained and her vision spun, sending her off balance. “I can go faster,” she said, even the thought made her want to vomit.

  “Let’s move.” Raca hadn’t even finished the word when an arrow cut through the air like a whistle and sank deep into the flesh of her left shoulder. She staggered a step then drew her bow and strung an arrow. “Run!” she called.

  In half a second Tess wriggled off of Zo’s back, hand firmly set in Zo’s as Joshua drew his short sword.

  “Go!” Raca growled.

  The three immediately took off. All she could think about was how that arrow could have found a home in Joshua’s chest. He could have died. It would have been her fault. “Faster, Joshua.” The trees grew thicker, the unmarked path harder and harder to navigate. They took turns tripping and scrambling back to their feet.

  Zo felt like her heart might explode, but she didn’t dare stop. Raca twisted and let loose an arrow mid jump. The wound would catch up to her as soon as her adrenaline was spent. The rivers roared even louder with life on either side of them.

  So close. Just a little farther.

  They came to a felled tree blocking the trail. Joshua practically threw Tess over the four-foot-high log before careening over it himself. Zo helped Raca over when she crumbled on her first attempt. The Raven princess let out a ragged cry of pain when she landed hard on the other side, unable to support her weight any longer.

  When Zo decided to offer herself as a spy inside the Gate, she’d had no intention of surviving. It was easy to be brave when you had nothing to lose. Looking back now, she could see that what she thought was bravery was merely selfish indifference. Now she wanted to live. She valued her life and the people in it. Bravery seemed impossible.

  “Through here.” Joshua beckoned, darting swiftly to the right. The trail became more rocky, the trees less dense. They would be harder to track but had little cover. Zo felt naked as they raced along. The rocky ground often moved beneath her feet, sending her painfully to her knees.

  “Hurry, Zo,” Joshua begged. The kid was thirteen years old and notoriously clumsy, but here, in the thick of danger, his focus was centered. Today Joshua was a Ram. Zo pushed to her feet and wrapped Raca’s good arm around her shoulder, redoubling her efforts to put distance between them and the enemy.

  All she could think of was how proud Gryphon would be of Joshua. Of how badly she wanted to survive today so she might have the chance to tell Gryphon what a great job he’d done with the kid. For some reason that one desire seemed ridiculously important. A ferocious need.

  But the shouts from their pursuers rang out close by, and no matter how brave, no matter how hard she tried, Zo knew she wouldn’t have the chance.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  The Allies would reach the point where the two rivers converged by midday tomorrow. Gryphon’s men marched in tight formation. The closer the men came to battle, the quieter they became. A common side effect. There was nothing like death to force a man to ponder the deeds of his life. The things left undone.

  Gryphon drew his sword as they walked, turning the blade over and over in his hand, enjoying the feel of the hilt’s comfortable grip. Like the handshake of an old friend.

  He’d taken to calling out each of his men, one by one, to help them work with their sparring. He knew every one of their names now. They were, by nature, different from the Ram, but it didn’t take long to see past their differences. They were good men. Humble, but strong. Willing to work hard. Less proud than the Ram. Driven to protect those they loved.

  Their lives had value.

  His entire life, Gryphon had been trained to think of everyone outside of the Gate as lesser. Human, yes, but only in the simplest, unimportant form. Zo had forced him to reconsider everything he’d ever believed to be true.

  “Isaac,” he called to the youngest member of his company. The boy rushed over, bouncing on the balls of his feet, his sword held aloft and a gleam in his eye. His enthusiasm reminded Gryphon of Joshua.

  Gryphon swiftly knocked the sword out of his hand with a backward flip of his wrist. The young man turned around to pick up his weapon, and Gryphon pushed him face first into the dirt with his shield.

  “Never turn your back on your enemy,” said Gryphon.

  A mud clot hung from Isaac’s eyebrow when he rose from the ground. “Only a dishonorable coward would attack a man whose back is turned.”

  Gryphon nodded. “And only a fool would rely on his enemy’s honor in the midst of battle.” Gryphon crouched deeper into his stance, short sword raised. “Again.”

  The young Wolf had some basic skill with a blade, and he was light on his feet. He was almost as good as Joshua, meaning the kid had no chance against a Ram mess soldier. He didn’t belong in this fight.

  One of Commander Laden’s runners sprinted up to Gryphon. “The Commander has called a war council. He needs you at his tent when we make camp for the night.”

  The last thing Gryphon wanted to do was sit through another meeting regarding a war he would not live to see. Laden had called for his opinion on several occasions, earning Gryphon the grudging regard of the other clan leaders and captains.

  The runner didn’t wait for a response. No one questioned Commander Laden. Gryphon had hoped to spend his last night with his men. He had explained to them several times that Commander Laden asked him to train them, not to fight alongside them. Every time the question arose a fleck of hope dimmed from their faces.
They needed him. They would think he abandoned them when he left to confront his fate. Abandoned them like he abandoned Zo, Tess, and Joshua.

  Why couldn’t there ever just be one right answer? Gryphon was tired of feeling torn between two impossible choices. For once, he’d like to know that his actions would benefit everyone. That by protecting one thing he wasn’t condemning another.

  Gryphon didn’t bother waiting to be announced when he reached the Commander’s tent, much to the guard’s distaste.

  “Sorry, sir,” said one of the guards as he trailed in after Gryphon.

  “Leave us,” said Laden.

  “Yes, sir.” The man eyed Gryphon with contempt before exiting.

  “You needed me?” Gryphon’s voice sounded as hollow as he felt.

  “You’re the first to arrive. Sit.” Laden gestured to the open chair at his right.

  “I’d rather not, sir.” Gryphon folded his arms. He didn’t want this to be a long visit.

  “The men of the Allies have gone from hating your very existence to looking up to you. They are a superstitious lot. I’m told they hold your presence as a sign of victory.”

  Gryphon sighed. “No offense, sir. But if praise is your only reason for calling me to your tent, I’d like to be excused. I have no use for flattery. It will not bring my forty comfort tomorrow when I leave them to fight and die without me.”

  Commander Laden studied Gryphon for a long moment. The leader’s hand cupped his own chin as he brushed the full beard now growing there. “Don’t give yourself over to Barnabas. Stay and help me. Become a true leader of the Allies. Fight by my side.” It wasn’t a command but an earnest plea.

  Gryphon couldn’t seem to hold Laden’s pained gaze. “I will honor the promise I made to my brothers.” He cleared his throat and looked into the depths of Laden’s wounded expression. “Will you honor your word, Commander?” All it would take was one nod from him and a swarm of guards could prevent Gryphon from fulfilling his duty.