by Kyra Halland
“Be careful,” Lainie said as he walked over to the bank of the wash. “That water’s still moving awful fast, and there’s going to be more coming down.”
“I know. Don’t worry,” he called back. He knelt in a gap in the brush at the edge of the wash and began dipping the canteens into the rushing water, which looked to Lainie to be no more than a hand-width below him. She watched him closely, not daring to take her eyes off of him, as though her watching him was all that was keeping him from falling into the flooded wash.
“Gotta piss again,” Fazar said. He hobbled over next to Silas, fumbling at the buttons of his pants with his bound hands.
“Downstream,” Silas growled.
“Yeah, sorry.” Fazar stepped behind Silas to move to his downstream side, then stopped and leaned over Silas’s shoulder. “You got my canteen there, right –?”
He lost his balance and fell against Silas. Then, as Lainie watched in horror, both of them tumbled into the rushing creek. “Silas!” she screamed. She ran over to the bank and peered past the prickly, tangled brush to see Silas and Fazar being swept downstream, hanging on to each other and thrashing around wildly.
“Silas!” The desperate cry tore itself from her. She had seen men washed away by flooded streams before, like Carden’s miner in Yellowbird Canyon. They almost never survived; the waters were too fast and strong to let them come up for air, and the rocks and branches and roots along the way would bash and batter them nearly to pieces. She ran downstream, dodging the thick brush growing along the bank, catching occasional glimpses between the brush and the branches of Silas and Fazar struggling in the water. She couldn’t tell if Silas was trying to save Fazar or if Fazar was trying to save him, but what it really looked like to her was that they were fighting. Silas had lost his hat, which only showed how desperate the situation really was.
The water was carrying them faster than Lainie could run. Up ahead, the wash on her right met with a feeder wash coming from the left, that they had crossed earlier. Beyond that, the creek was even deeper, wider, and faster-running. Once Silas was swept beyond that confluence, there would be no hope of him making it out alive.
And then, with a growing roar, a second deluge tumbled down the wash and buried Silas and Fazar in a wave of muddy water.
“Silas, no!” Lainie cried. Anguish swelled in her heart. It was so fast and so sudden; how could she lose him like this? She collapsed to her knees, doubled over, her lungs burning, her heart racing, her grief threatening to burst inside her.
Then, from the brush along the bank ahead of her, just before the place where the two washes met, Lainie heard a loud thrashing noise accompanied by a string of curses in Silas’s voice. She looked up, overjoyed relief suddenly replacing her sorrow, to see a thoroughly drenched Silas climb up out of the wash. He was holding his hat in one hand and dragging Fazar by the collar of his shirt with the other.
He threw Fazar face-down into the dirt. “Gods-damned sheepknocking sonofabitch, what in all the blasted gods-damned hells did you think you were doing?”
Fazar coughed up a bunch of water. “Sorry.”
“Sorry? Sorry? What’s sorry is your gods-damned blasted mangy sheepknocking hide. The only reason I let you live this long is because you’re going to help us find that killer. But now I’m thinking your help is more trouble than it’s worth.” He drew his gun and aimed it at Fazar. Water dribbled from the muzzle.
Silas exploded into more oaths. He shoved his revolver back into the holster, jammed his hat onto his head, and stalked over to Lainie, leaving a wet trail in the dirt behind him. “C’mon, darlin’. He can crawl after us like the worm he is.”
Lainie’s thoughts were reeling at the rapid turn and turn again of events. Her cheeks now wet with tears of joy, an irrepressible smile threatening to split her face, she hurried beside him back to where the horses and their belongings waited. Two of their water bottles were still slung around Silas’s neck; the others were lost. Lainie hoped the keeper charms on them would work as well as the one on his hat, and the bottles would magically reappear. But right now she couldn’t really care too much about that, not as long as Silas was safe and not dead and drowned.
Silas stripped down and wrung the water from his clothes, then draped them over some bushes to dry. Lainie couldn’t tear her eyes from him. She had come so close to losing him and now here he was, safe and sound. She wanted to wrap her arms around him and keep him close and safe forever; settling for the next best thing, she fetched a dry set of clothing from his knapsack and took it to him.
“I didn’t know you were a good swimmer,” she said, silently thanking all the gods that he was. Swimming was a rare skill in the Wildings; there were few places in the flatlands where there was enough water to swim in, and most settlers thought of swimming as something that only rich Granadaians did.
“My family used to spend summers at one or another of our houses on the coast,” Silas said as he pulled on his pants. “Swimming is an important part of Islander heritage and customs, and every child in an Island mage family learns to swim as soon as he can walk, or even sooner.”
Houses on the coast. Swimming in the ocean. Lainie could hardly even imagine such a world. She wondered if she would ever see the ocean. They said the water in the ocean stretched all the way to the horizon, as far as the eye could see. Try as she might, she couldn’t picture that much water. “It’s a good thing for him you are. He would have drowned if you hadn’t pulled him out. You’re a lot more charitable than I would have been, even if he is going to help us with the killer.”
“He didn’t need me to save him. He’s got Island blood; he knows how to swim, too, even tied up. It’s a safety float we learn. The only reason I dragged him out is because I had to take control of him so he wouldn’t pull me back in.”
It took Lainie a moment to realize what he meant. “You think he pushed you in on purpose?”
“I know he did. He was fighting me the whole way, trying to push me under.”
But why would Fazar try to drown Silas when he was so scared of the killer and wanted Silas to help him get rid of him? That didn’t make any sense at all. The only explanation Lainie could think of was that Fazar was still mad at Silas about last night and about being tied up. Either that, or Fazar was crazy as a rabid squirrel, which seemed at least as likely.
Fazar came hobbling back as Silas was pulling on his socks. He was drenched and muddy, but neither Silas nor Lainie made any move to help him. He could catch his death of chills, as far as Lainie was concerned. Silas left his boots to dry and sat down to clean his revolver. Lainie got out some food for her and Silas, and they ate a little.
“I’m hungry, too,” Fazar whined.
“Shut up,” Silas said.
“C’mon, Vendine, be a pal. It was an accident.”
“An accident, my granny’s hairy backside.”
“Come on, now, why would I try to drown you? And drown myself at the same time?”
“I don’t know. Why don’t you tell me?”
Fazar heaved a long-suffering sigh. “If it’s about that thing with the girl, have some pity. I haven’t had any in months. And I gotta regenerate all that power I was using to hide from the killer. I couldn’t help myself.”
Silas fixed a murderous look on Fazar. “I don’t take it kindly when someone tries to rape my wife.”
If Fazar hadn’t already been a dead man walking, he was now, Lainie realized. There was no way Silas could afford to let him live, knowing what he knew.
“Your wife?” Fazar licked his lips. His eyes went from Silas to Lainie and back again. “I’m sorry, I swear I didn’t know, I never would have touched her if I did. I figured she was just some birdie –”
Silas silenced him with another glare. “You just don’t know when to shut up, do you?”
Fazar shrank back. “Shut up. Right. Whatever you say.”
* * *
THE NEXT MORNING, Silas still couldn’t believe he had let Fazar pul
l a stunt like that. It had looked like an accident; it was perfectly reasonable and logical to call it an accident. But Silas knew the difference between the struggles of a man panicked by fear of drowning and a man who was deliberately trying to drown another person. And Fazar had been trying to drown him; there was no doubt in Silas’s mind about that.
The question was, why? Was it about Lainie? Or was Fazar just plain crazy? Not that it mattered now. He should have just killed the bastard at the start. Maybe he should go ahead and kill him now; Fazar knowing what he knew about Lainie’s power and their marriage, Silas was going to have to kill him sooner or later, or at least Strip him, which most mages considered worse than death. But Silas was still determined, if it was at all possible, to keep Lainie out of the upcoming confrontation with the killer, and he wasn’t fool enough to want to face the man who had single-handedly overpowered Verl Bissom and Garis Horden by himself. Therefore, much as he hated the fact, he still needed Fazar alive. If nothing else, he could use Fazar as a shield during the fight.
Silas used a spell to finish drying out the inside of his boots, then checked to make sure that the charmed canteens and waterskins he had lost in the creek had returned. Lainie’s was there; she was getting good at keeper charms – as well as at some mighty unexpected things. When the present business was over, he was going to have to give some serious thought to her ability to suppress another mage’s power and what it meant, aside from the fact that if the Mage Council found out about it, the two of them would be in even worse trouble than they were already.
Now that there was no longer any need to hide Lainie’s power from Fazar, before they started out Silas had her look again for the Wildings-born mage she had sensed. She rested her palms flat on the ground and sat still and quiet, eyes closed, for several long moments. Out of curiosity, Silas tried to follow her mage senses with his. He felt her power flowing down her arms to the earth, where it disappeared, sinking down into the ground. He tried to follow, and found the way blocked to him.
After several moments, Lainie withdrew her power from the earth and looked at Silas. “He’s up that way, all right. Lots closer now, too.”
“Hide your power,” Silas said. “You too,” he told Fazar, and he also put up a shield on his own power. It might not matter, the killer might already know they were coming, but there was no sense in making things easier for him by announcing themselves.
Lainie’s arm was back in the sling; Silas helped her mount up, then took his own saddle. Fazar, his hands and feet still bound, led the way. Even though their destination was clear now, Silas still wanted to keep Fazar out in front where he could watch him. He wasn’t going to make the mistake of turning his back on the little bastard again.
Chapter 10
SILAS GUESSED THEY would reach the hills by about the middle of the day, assuming there wasn’t any more trouble. A big assumption, he thought sourly as he eyed Fazar trudging along ahead of him.
The creek bed had nearly dried out, with few signs remaining of yesterday’s flood. The sky over the hilltops was clear, and the sun beat down hot and strong. There would be no rain today. As they traveled, the wash narrowed and the ground rose towards the opening of the small canyon that was their goal.
Just below the mouth of the ravine, Silas called a halt. He dismounted and helped Lainie down from her horse, and they stretched, and ate and drank a little. Despite Silas’s expectations, Fazar, probably realizing that Silas’s patience was worn thin, had been good as gold all morning. Now he watched with a mournful look as Silas and Lainie ate. “I’m hungry, too,” he said.
Silas shoved a piece of flatbread into the renegade’s bound hands. He didn’t particularly care about Fazar’s comfort, but he didn’t want to listen to him whine all the way up the canyon.
“The going would sure be a lot easier if you’d untie me,” Fazar said around a mouthful of hard bread.
Silas studied the steep, rugged ravine. Reluctantly, he had to agree. But he didn’t trust a free Fazar more than about two steps. Fortunately, years of experience with transporting prisoners to the Gap – those who lived long enough to be transported – had taught him a solution to that problem. From his saddlebags, he took a long rope. “You haven’t earned your freedom,” he said to Fazar as he uncoiled the rope, “but it would be an inconvenience to me if you fell and broke your head. Lainie, darlin’, keep your gun on him and be ready to shoot if he tries anything.”
With Lainie’s revolver aimed at him, Fazar stood still, meek and placid as a lamb, while Silas tied one end of the rope to Fazar’s right wrist, fixing the knot with a charm so it couldn’t be worked loose. Then he wrapped the rope around the renegade’s left ankle and knotted it. Leaving just enough slack in the rope between Fazar’s feet to allow him to walk, Silas wound it around Fazar’s right ankle and knotted it, brought it up to Fazar’s left wrist and tied it there, then finished off by bringing the end of the rope back to Fazar’s right hand and tying it off. Bound that way, the renegade would be able to walk and climb, slowly and with great care, but anything more would result in a tangle.
“How far up?” Silas asked as he worked, keeping his voice low in case the killer was within listening distance.
“Not far. Maybe half a league, or less.”
The A’ayimat markers were visible about six or seven measures up the canyon, their tufts of feathers blowing in the hot, dry breeze. “What about the A’ayimat? Are they going to give us any trouble?”
“I didn’t see any blueskins when I followed him before. I mean, you know they’re around here somewhere, but none of ’em showed themselves. Maybe they’re waiting to see if we take care of the problem ourselves, so they don’t have to be bothered.”
It was true, the A’ayimat preferred to be left alone and to let the Granadaians solve their own problems. If it did look like there might be trouble with them, maybe the A’ayimat’s respect for Lainie would head it off. Which meant she had to come with them at least part way up the canyon, though he would rather leave her down here, well away from the fight.
“What about my ring?” Fazar asked when Silas finished setting charms on the last of the knots.
“You haven’t exactly behaved yourself, now, have you?”
Fazar looked sheepish. “Well, no. But if I’m gonna fight another mage –”
“You made that shield without your ring, when you tried to rape my wife. You can do magic well enough without it.”
“That was easy. Fightin’ this fellow – he’s stronger than any mage I’ve ever seen, and it’s a strange power, like nothin’ I’ve ever seen before –”
“We’ll see.” He didn’t like the idea of Fazar having more use of his power, but right now the most important thing was to get rid of the killer.
“You won’t regret it, I promise,” Fazar added in a wheedling voice.
Silas had his doubts about that. Still, he took the ring from his knapsack and put it in the inner pocket of his duster. He left Fazar’s weapons where they were; he might give the renegade his ring, but there was no way he was letting Fazar hold a gun or a knife in his presence. He made sure his own gun was loaded and that he had plenty of extra bullets, and checked Lainie’s gun and supply of ammunition as well. “How’s your arm?” he asked her. It was her off arm that was injured, but heading into a dangerous situation, it would be better if she had the use of both arms.
She moved it in the sling. “I don’t think I need this any more.”
She pulled off the sling, and Silas returned it to his knapsack. “Come part way up with us,” he said, “a little past the markers, in case we run into any A’ayimat. But when I tell you to stop or go back, I want you to do what I say.”
“Uh huh,” she answered.
Silas would have liked a response that sounded more like she meant it. He didn’t want to have to order her; his hope was that if he only gave her orders when it was absolutely necessary, she would be more likely to follow them – a hope that he fully realized was pr
obably in vain. Either way, though, the longer they stood here discussing it, the more advantage they were giving up to the killer. He would just have to be satisfied with her answer for now, and hope for the best.
It was too dangerous for the horses to come up into the ravine, so Silas put a keeper charm on them that would keep them from wandering away until the next morning, when the charm would wear off. If he and Lainie weren’t back by then, they probably weren’t coming back.
With the horses secured, he motioned Fazar to go on ahead. “Let’s move.”
Fazar began climbing up the narrow, rocky ravine. Silas’s heart was pounding as he followed, and his mouth was dry. He wasn’t ashamed to admit he was a little nervous about facing the man who had killed Verl Bissom and Garis Horden. Only a fool wouldn’t be afraid, and fear sharpened your senses and prepared you to act. Less useful than his fear for himself was his fear for Lainie; he didn’t want to have to make a choice between protecting her and fighting the killer. He prayed hard to the Defender and any other god who might care that she would do what he said and stay out of the fight – and that he wouldn’t need her help against the assassin’s Wildings magic.
The ravine got narrower and steeper, and the actual creek bed dwindled away to almost nothing. The midday sun, high in the sky right above the crack between the hillsides, shone hot and bright. Everything was silent in the heat except for their labored breathing and their feet scuffling on the ground as they climbed. Though Silas kept his physical senses alert, paying careful attention to everything he saw, heard, and smelled, he found no sign of anyone else in the ravine, not even a whiff of charred wood from a campfire. He even made a quick, careful probe with his mage senses; nothing. It shouldn’t be possible for the assassin to suppress his power and conceal his physical presence with a shield at the same time. But Silas was fast learning to question everything he thought he knew about what was and wasn’t possible. And anyhow, Lainie had been certain the killer was up this way, and that was good enough for him.