Red Gold Bridge

by Sarath, Patrice

  “Kate, you can’t go face him alone.”

  “I have to. I have to. If he sees you or anyone else, he’ll kill them in front of me.” Her voice hardened. “I’ll make sure I separate him from Mom and Dad. I’ll let him take me to the new gordath. That’s where you’ll meet us. We need to keep three horses back. Allegra and, um, Cinnamon and Hotshot.” They were two of the school horses: sturdy, quiet beasts who would bear up to a long ride. Allegra was more delicate, but she was Kate’s, or practically so. Anyway, Lynn would understand. She was on the same mission. “You’ll need to get the gear and the horses to the new gordath and wait for us there. I’m going home, and I’ll bring Marthen there.”

  “There’s a problem. I don’t know how to get there,” Colar said.

  “That’s okay. Gary does.”

  They both turned to look at the homeless man. He stood with the police, talking seriously with them. Somehow, the crying, desperate man had disappeared. He stood a little taller in his worn and dirty clothes, his back straight.

  “Can he ride?” Colar said skeptically.

  “Probably not, but you can put him up on Cinnamon on the way, and you can lead Allegra. Or Hotshot,” she added hastily. Colar was a good rider. She could trust him with Allegra as she had trusted him with Mojo.

  He grinned at her. He kissed her quickly and said, “I’ll take care of your horse.”

  She shivered at the kiss and blushed. “I know.” Deter- minedly she turned back to her task. She had to go rescue her parents and face down Marthen. “All right. Call me if you run into any trouble, and I’ll call you.”

  “I don’t like you facing him alone.”

  “Me, either,” she said, wrinkling her nose. “But I don’t want to push him too far. If he saw you, he could—he could—” She couldn’t finish the thought. Kill my parents. Kill you. “Wait till we get to the gordath. We’ll take care of him then.”

  She didn’t say how, and he just nodded. He didn’t look like a kid anymore.

  They kept one eye on the cops as Colar got his gear and her backpack out of the Jeep, trying to keep the sword out of sight. He hustled the bags off into the lower barn, where the school horses were waiting their turn to be loaded onto the vans. Kate watched him go, then got behind the wheel and started the Jeep, bumping up the driveway and over the grass behind the hill barn. She turned out onto the road, accelerating away from the farm. All she had to do was go home, rescue her parents, and bring Marthen back through the gordath. Piece of cake.

  Her house appeared silent and undisturbed from the outside, except that the garage door was open. Both her parents’ cars were parked inside. She parked the Jeep in the driveway and steeled herself, walking up to the front door. It felt strange to have to knock on her own front door, but she wanted to alert him to her presence, let him feel he was still in control.

  Well, he was, she admitted to herself. But he was expecting the quiet little mouse he had captured last year, and she would give him that, right up until the time she roared.

  The door opened, and she was yanked inside. Kate stumbled forward, putting out her hands as she was shoved roughly to the floor, her face mashed down on the smooth parquet hardwood.

  “Got her,” a strange voice called out. So he had brought his crows. She thought about what Gary had told them. With the attack on Hunter’s Chase foiled, he brought his worst men with him. Her stomach roiled at the thought of her parents having to face crows.

  “Don’t hurt her. Bring her in here.”

  That voice she knew. It had terrified her to her bones last year with its quiet menace, its softness hiding violence to come. The crow pulled her to her feet and pushed her forward into the kitchen.

  Her parents sat at the table, her mom white-faced, with tears welling in her eyes. Her dad was curiously ashen and unwell. He had just been put on heart medication, and Kate felt a squeezing of her own heart. Please hang on, Daddy. Please. She hurried over to them, pretending to ignore the two crows and Marthen, and knelt and hugged them both.

  “You shouldn’t have come. You shouldn’t have come,” her mom said, her voice breaking. And her dad, low-voiced, “Did you call the police? Where are the police?”

  “Shh, shh, it’s going to be okay,” she said, reaching around and patting them both awkwardly, trying to think. Two crows, both armed with rifles. Marthen, armed as well with a rifle of his own and a handgun tucked into his belt. She waited for a second, gathering herself before she had to face him. Finally, she stood and turned to him.

  The meticulous man she had known last winter had transformed into a homeless drunk. His hair was long and tangled. He had not shaved. He stank. His clothes were no longer the fine clothes she remembered, pressed and brushed by his orderly. His boots were covered with mud. Only his eyes were the same, burning dark, almost black. Her back itched, and she clenched her fingers into fists, letting her fingernails bite into her palms. He had not wielded the whip that had been used on her, but he had ordered it.

  “General,” she said curtly.

  “Kate Mossland,” he said, and he gave her a courteous bow. She heard her mom gasp.

  “So you have me,” she said. “Now you can let them go.”

  “No.”

  Both her parents started protesting. Before Marthen could order the crows to silence them Kate raised her voice. “Mom, Dad, stop.”

  “Kate—” her father began.

  “Dad, he’s really dangerous. You have to stop.”

  Her mom put her hand on her husband’s arm, and he subsided, but grudgingly. Kate turned back to Marthen.

  “Again, let them go.”

  “Again, no. They are your safe-conduct.”

  “I’m not leaving them here with your crows.” Despite her attempt at calm, she could feel her mouth twist in disgust. “Let them go, call off your crows, and I’ll go with you willingly.”

  “Kate!” her mother screamed. Kate held up her hand, and her mother began to sob. The crow who had knocked her down in the foyer advanced on her mother, and in one swift movement, Kate moved in front of her to block him, hands up to ward him off.

  “Back off,” she said, eyes and voice blazing. She didn’t know where it came from, this sudden strength, but she rev eled in it, and she let the crow see it. To her astonishment, he stopped, lowering his hand, and she could see uncertainty in his expression. She turned on Marthen. “Call them off.”

  His expression was soft, approving, and she felt sick to her stomach again. Ewww. Ewww. Gross. He nodded at the crows, and they stepped back by the fridge, but they kept their weapons trained on the little crowd.

  “You have fire in you,” he said. “I always knew you were strong. I think you have something of a warrior in you. Yes, we will do well together. The Aeritan Council will agree to our alliance, or will be made to agree, and then we will see. We will see.”

  With an effort, Kate kept from puking. Instead she said, her voice only shaking the least bit, “I propose this. We drive to the gordath, all of us. I go through with you and the crows. My parents stay here. I’ll see if you or your men shoot them, and if that happens, not only won’t I marry you, I’ll kill you myself.”

  The only sound in the kitchen was her mom’s crying and her dad’s shallow breaths. The crows stood silently. Marthen considered her proposal.

  “Where’s young Terrick?” he said.

  “Helping at the stables,” she said.

  He didn’t believe her. She could see that. She kept her silence, challenging him.

  “If he shows up at the gordath, I’ll shoot them all myself.”

  She let herself shrug. “I have the car, and he doesn’t even know where it is.”

  Again he considered, and again she kept her attention focused on him. Finally, he nodded.

  “Done,” he said. “But if there is any treachery, any trickery, if I see Terrick or the police, or anyone else, your parents will not live.”

  Kate just said, “We need to wait until nightfall.”
/>   Twilight came down over the peaceful barns at Hunter’s Chase. The vans had all gone, and the stalls were empty, their doors swinging wide and the comfortable wood shavings bedding waiting for their occupants. Only three horses remained in the farthest stalls in the school barn. Allegra had been indignant at her move to rustic quarters, but Colar forked down a few flakes of hay, and that had mollified her. He tacked up the other two horses and left them in their stalls with their halters on, but he knew that it would drive the sensitive mare crazy to be treated that way. He’d tack her up last, when it was time to go.

  The police kept a few squad cars at the farm and a fire engine, but Colar could tell that they thought the whole thing was a bust, and their interest in Gary had changed into disgust. Although he had told them the truth about the crow camp, by the time they found the place, it was empty except for a few tents, a few firepits, and a broken crate that had once held guns. Marthen must have already sent them on to the gordath.

  Kate had not called, and he didn’t dare call her, lest he ruin whatever she had going on. He hated letting her go alone, but he knew that Marthen would not hurt her, or at least not yet. The idea of the general touching her sickened him. Had she been his paramour in camp? Everyone thought so, but now he wasn’t so sure. Kate would have been worse off if it had been so.

  He started to notice a few stars in the twilit sky. Time to go. He gathered up his gear and Kate’s backpack and lashed both packs onto Cinnamon’s saddle. The chestnut gelding nudged him peacefully. He was a broad-backed horse and would do for a packhorse, though the small English saddles were not the best for the job. Colar balanced the load as securely as he could and bridled the horse.

  He heard a noise. It was Gary, ducking into the barn. “We better go,” the man said. “The police are talking about bringing me in for more questioning.” He looked nervously at the horses. “Which one am I riding?”

  Colar brought out Hotshot, another chestnut who had once been a police horse and could be relied upon to stay calm under stressful conditions. He could be stubborn, but he would follow the others, because that’s what horses do.

  “Here,” he said, lowering the stirrups to the end of the leathers. He held the rein and helped Gary into the saddle. The man was awkward and leaned forward, grabbing the reins and the horse’s mane in a big tangle. “You won’t have to guide him,” Colar said. “He should just follow.”

  He left Allegra for last. There was no way the light-boned, temperamental mare would go easily. He spoke softly to her, and though she laid her ears back, she let him saddle and bridle her. She got nervous around the other two horses, and it took a few minutes to sort them all out, Colar on Allegra, leading Cinnamon, Hotshot bringing up the rear so as not to be left behind.

  They clopped softly out of the back of the barn, their stirrups scraping the sides of the narrow door, toward the trails. The little train wound up toward the roads.

  “Can you get us there from here?” Colar said. Gary nodded, clutching the reins and looking around to catch his bearings.

  “I think so. You want to stay off the roads, right?”

  “As much as possible.” To emphasize that, headlights showed up ahead as a car came around the bend. They waited for the car to pass. It never slowed down, the driver never catching sight of three horses and two riders on the side of the darkening road.

  “All right then. Let’s try this way.”

  They rode like ghosts in the night. Gary led them overland, from horse farm to horse farm, cutting cross-country and only riding for short distances along the road. They opened gates and closed them behind them, so the only creatures that would know of their passage were a few horses that had been turned out to enjoy the cool night air. They came out along driveways of houses that had been shut up tight for the night, the horses’ hooves crunching on gravel. A few times they set dogs to barking, and at one farm a light went on in a second-floor window. Once an owl wafted overhead on silent wings, and a few moments later they heard the shuddering, high-pitched cry of a dying mouse. Gary stopped occasionally to get his bearings, but he managed to cross them over the major roads with no one to see them. The night was dark, not even a bit of moonlight to illuminate their path. All they needed was a horse to injure itself, but they had luck—or the gods of this world—on their side. By the time they reached the trailhead, they had been riding for a couple of hours. There was a gravel parking lot and an information kiosk. It was silent and empty.

  “This is it,” Gary said, low-voiced. “Marthen said he came out here and walked about a mile into town, where he saw the girl the first time.”

  Colar nodded, recognizing where they were. Yes, that would be about right; the crossroads and the stand of pines Kate had seen Marthen in was less than a mile away. The gordath was near here.

  “All right,” Colar said. “We need to hide our mounts, make sure that when Marthen comes he doesn’t know we’re here.”

  They backed all three horses into the woods and dismounted, Gary with difficulty and thankfulness. He rubbed the seat of his jeans. Colar, meanwhile, prepared. He took down his gear bag from Cinnamon’s saddle and pulled out his leather armor, throwing the duffel bag into the bushes to hide it. The smell of oiled leather and chain hit him. He hadn’t worn his gear since last winter, when he had been shot and almost killed by one of Tharp’s weapons. No, one of this world’s weapons, he reminded himself. He pulled the leather shirt on over his T-shirt, strapping himself in awkwardly. He and his father helped each other dress for battle, but he didn’t think Gary would know what to do. He buckled on his sword belt and drew his sword.

  With Gary watching him, wide-eyed, Colar sank to one knee, planting the sword in front of him. He kissed the pommel.

  Soldier’s god, if you can hear me all the way from Aeritan, give me strength. Help me protect Kate, her parents, and Gary. And if you can, let my father and mother know that I’m coming home.

  The sound of a car caught their attention, and they both looked up. Once again headlights stabbed through the darkness, and then a car slowed and turned in to the parking lot.

  Fifteen

  Lynn came out of the woods into unfamiliar country. The land rolled away from the outskirts of the forest, the trees thinning and then becoming scrawny and finally giving way to scrub and brush. The dirt was black but hard, covered with gray and brown and gold grasses. A ridge to her east made a jagged line against the sky.

  The warmth of the sun on the grasslands felt good, but it was bright despite her baseball cap. She pulled out her sunglasses and put them on and scanned her surroundings. The dog sat beside her, panting, and Red Bird waited patiently, whisking his tail lazily. Lynn stood in the stirrups to ease her butt and shaded her eyes against the diffused sunlight. The trail, a roughly chopped-out path over the rocky, inhospitable soil, stretched toward the ridge.

  She frowned. She guessed that was the way, but . . . Some instinct prompted her, and she closed her eyes. For a moment she could see nothing except the afterimage of the ridge. She waited though, and then she thought she could see it. A spark, almost at the edge of her vision, lit like a firefly and was gone. She waited again, and the spark showed again. This time Lynn swung her head toward it, a few degrees to her left, and now it stayed in the center of her vision. Warily, she opened her eyes again, blinking at the brightness.

  She was looking at another trail. It curved off the one she was on and was so faint as to look at first as if it were nothing but a depression on the rough terrain. But it was a trail, and though it, too, led to the ridge, it would take her slightly more north.

  “Okay then,” she said. “Thataway.”

  She gathered the reins and pushed Red Bird onto the new trail. The dog sprang up and took its usual point position, trotting ahead.

  Hero clattered across the soaring bridge, and the gate to Red Gold Bridge rose above them. Crae took it in with mixed feelings. The strongholders had patched the walls of the mountain keep, the fresh mortar still dark again
st the reddish stone. The big gate was open, and there was plenty of bustling foot traffic. He pulled Hero to a walk and they threaded between the strongholders, merchants, and forestholders, all coming back and forth, laden with goods. He couldn’t see the wide river from here, but the forest stream that crashed under the bridge tumbled merrily down toward the waters.

  “Halt, rider!” called a voice from above. “Name yourself!” Crae pulled up and looked overhead. A guardsman he didn’t recognize challenged him from the guard post over the gate. Two men beside him each carried crossbows. Good, he thought, approving. Tal had trained them well.

  He no longer wore Trieve’s colors of gray and green. He no longer carried the chain of command. But he was still Lord of Trieve until the Council officially revoked his rights, and, he supposed, the high god turned his back as well. But neither of these things had happened, and so Crae stood in the stirrups and shouted back,

  “I am Lord Crae, late of Trieve. I have come to Red Gold Bridge on a matter of great urgency!”

  Now he would find out if he would be clapped into irons and thrown into prison. With difficulty he kept his sword hand off the hilt of his sword.

  The guardsman disappeared, though the two with crossbows held their position. Crae waited as men and women eyed him curiously as they passed by. The air was cool, the bridge mostly in shadow from the tall trees pressing in. It felt good after his long ride. Hero remained collected underneath him, neck arched against the light pressure on the reins. He didn’t want to flee, but in case the two guards had been given orders to shoot, he wanted to have some chance to live to fight again.

  Nor did he wish to have yet another good mount shot out from under him.

  When the guard came back it was through the main gate, and he had Tal with him. The young captain’s face lit up and he hastened over to Crae.

  “Captain! My Lord, that is!”