Seren jerked her foot out of his hands before he could do anything at all—and then immediately winced. “See?” he said. “Was that really the best thing to do?”
“I’d already hurt it before you ever came along,” she muttered, bending her leg so she could rub her ankle. She frowned. “Dammit.”
She winced again when she stood up, but though her first few steps were shaky, she could still make them. Seth got to his feet too. “How bad is—”
“Quiet,” she hissed, and then he could hear it too—multiple sets of footsteps coming toward them.
Seren darted over to her knife and snatched it up, then turned back to peer through the trees. Seth tried to hope that it could be Deinol and Ritsu, but he was almost certain it was three people, not two. But there was no way Horace Greenfield could have survived the cut Deinol had given him—did that mean there were three more people hanging about?
The answer to that question turned out to be yes: he didn’t recognize any of the men who drew toward them. It was clear Seren did, however, and she tensed, clutching the knife tightly. She backed up a couple of steps, but she must have realized it would make no difference. So she stopped, holding her ground as they advanced, no doubt trying to surround her.
Then one of them noticed Seth. “Who’s the boy, then?”
“He’s of no concern to me,” Seren replied.
It stung Seth, but only for a moment, and then he realized: if she’d acted like he was important to her in any way, they’d never let him live. But if they thought he was some oblivious stranger … well, they’d probably still kill him, but his chances were better.
None of the men responded—they were probably wary of taking their attention off Seren. She kept still as they closed in on her, and Seth tried to swallow the lump in his throat. Could she really take on all three of them at once? She’d been plenty fearsome when they were on the road together, true, but he still wasn’t sure how hurt she was. She relied upon her agility to fight, and if she couldn’t dodge and counter as quickly as she was used to …
The man in the middle and the one to the right both took another step forward, but the third man hesitated, picking his way over a root. Seren chose that instant to move. She feinted toward the man in the middle, then spun off to the left, lunging at the one on the outside instead. She caught him unprepared, and her thrust connected. But the other two men were already starting toward her, and there was no way she could turn to meet them in time.
Before he could even decide how best to hinder them, Seth had already thrown himself at the nearest man, jumping on his back and hanging about his neck. The man swore, trying to shake him off, but Seth held on as tightly as he could, hoping he could force the man to the ground.
He couldn’t see much beyond the back of the man’s neck, so he couldn’t tell how Seren was faring; he thought the other men gave a muffled noise or two, but he didn’t hear anything from her, which was probably either good or very, very bad. His own opponent twisted himself about, and Seth finally slipped to the side, clutching the man by the front instead. But there he was within reach of the man’s arms, and his assailant battered at him and muttered curses, striking him so hard in the side it nearly knocked the breath out of him. His grip started to weaken, and he was just about to let go when the man suddenly stopped struggling. Seth stood up, releasing his hold, and the man slid away and to the ground, pierced by Seren’s knife. The other two were already dead, bleeding fitfully on the forest floor.
“Thanks,” Seth said, winded. He hunched over, trying to get his breath back. He couldn’t see her face like that, though, so he craned his neck, pressing one hand against his aching side.
Perhaps it had been too much to hope for to see her smile back at him, but he certainly hadn’t expected what he did see: she was staring at him wide-eyed, something almost like horror on her face. “Why did you do that?” she asked, gaping at him in the pauses between words. “Why on earth did you do that?”
“Well,” Seth said, panting, “you’d have been—ah—in a right bit of trouble if I hadn’t, wouldn’t you?”
Her eyes only widened farther, and she shook her head, the knife hanging limp in her hand. “Do you—do you not understand?” she asked, hoarse. “Do you not see what you’ve done?”
Seth looked down, puzzled, and drew his hand away from his side, staring at the blood that coated it. “I— When did that…” He felt for the lip of the cut and blanched when he realized he could put his fingers—he could put his fingers right inside, where there was a great hole in him that hadn’t been there before. The man had struck him all right, but not with his fist—he had hacked into Seth with the edge of his sword, tearing him open.
He looked to Seren for guidance, but her expression hadn’t changed. “What’s going to happen?” he asked her. “Is it—bad?”
She said nothing—perhaps she couldn’t say anything. I don’t think she liked to lie, Seth had told Roger, what seemed like a lifetime ago. She swallowed, clenched her fist around the knife, and looked at the ground.
Seth tried to take a step toward her, but he was overcome by a sudden wave of dizziness, and he staggered. Seren moved to steady him, her hands on his shoulders, and he felt the knife’s hilt digging into the side of his neck. He searched her face. “What—what should I do?”
Her fingers fluttered against his shoulder blades. “I can— You should lie down. I must have something in here that can bind this up.…” She dropped one hand to her side, feeling for her satchel, but it wasn’t there. Her eyes began to dart around the clearing instead, searching for it among the fallen leaves.
“Have you had to tend to your own injuries before? You have, haven’t you?”
She swallowed hard again. “I have, but—I…” She shook her head. “I’ve never had a wound like that before.”
All her years adventuring, and she’d never been hurt like this? He really had mucked it up, hadn’t he?
Before he could say anything, Seren caught sight of her satchel. “There it is. If I ease you down, can you…?”
They didn’t have much of a choice; Seth couldn’t stand on his own anymore. She helped him lie down, then brought the satchel over and rummaged through it. She finally pulled out a long strip of linen, and unfurled it, hesitating. “I’ve got to bind it up, but…”
Seth winced. “Is it really—going to do any good?”
She was quiet again. “What else can we do?” she said at last. “This is the only thing.”
He nodded weakly, and she wrapped the cloth about his waist, while Seth gritted his teeth and tried to think about anything else but what was happening. The linen strip probably wasn’t as long as it should have been, and eventually Seren was forced to tie it off. But his wound just kept bleeding, soaking the cloth right through.
Seren was as pale as if she’d lost the blood herself. “All right, so now…” Her jaw clenched. “You can’t stand, can you? What if you leaned on my shoulder?”
They tried it, but the pain was so great as she started to raise him that Seth had to bite back a scream. “No,” he gasped, “no, no, I can’t, I can’t, put me down.”
She did as he asked, her hands shaking. “Saltmoor isn’t far, and it might be they have someone there who’d know how to treat you. My foot…” She grimaced at it, out of frustration rather than pain. “It’s nothing serious—in half a day I’ll hardly notice it. But you can’t wait that long. And I can’t carry you, not … not with my foot like this.”
Find Deinol, Seth thought, but his head was swimming. He moistened his lips. “If … maybe if Deinol … carried me—”
She frowned at that. “He’s here? I guess he would be. And the other one?”
“Lucius? No, he’s … It’s Ritsu instead.”
That was doubtless incomprehensible to her, but she gave no reaction. “There are more of them out there,” she said. “If we call … we stand as much chance of bringing them down on us as of alerting your friend.”
And even if Deinol did carry him the rest of the way to Saltmoor, would he even get that far? Bleeding like this … there couldn’t be much left of him, could there? He groaned. “I’m so—I—I wish I could’ve told them.” It was so easy to call their faces to mind—they were much clearer than the trees, than Seren’s face above him. He knew it was his fault they’d all been scattered to the winds like this—if he hadn’t been caught, and they’d never tried to rescue him … But if that hadn’t happened, he’d never have met Seren, or Ritsu, either. And if he hadn’t been here now, Seren would’ve had to face them all alone, with her foot stuck and without her knife. How could you tell what was a mistake, and what wasn’t?
He hadn’t realized Seren had slipped an arm behind his head until he felt her fingers tighten on his shoulder. She was looking off into the trees, her face turned away from him. “What on earth did you do it for?” she said again. “I could’ve—if you just hadn’t—”
“Don’t say that,” Seth said. He reached for her other hand, and when he wrapped his fingers around it, hers stiffened, but she didn’t pull away. “That makes it sound like—like I did it for nothing.”
* * *
Deinol made certain Seth was well out of sight before turning his back to the place where he’d disappeared. It didn’t take him half a dozen exchanges with the two louts in front of him to know he’d felled men thrice their ability, but there were two of them, and Lucius wasn’t with him this time. Worse, they knew how to rely on each other: every time he broke one’s guard, the other would step in until his friend had recovered. Deinol could create openings, but he never had enough time to take advantage of them, and he soon found himself being driven back, forced onto the defensive.
He spared what freedom he had to glance at Ritsu, but the fellow was still just standing there, gaping at his own sword as if he’d never seen it before. “But,” he said again, “but if I pick this up…”
“You’d better fucking pick it up,” Deinol snapped. “Do you want to die?” Before he could say any more, he was distracted by a slice that missed his cheek by a hair’s breadth. He gathered his strength, swung at them as furiously as he could, but he could not get his opponents to give any ground.
If one of them would just break off from him to attack Ritsu, perhaps that would force him to defend himself. But they were smarter than that, and doubtless saw that their swords were best used to dispatch the one who was trying to kill them, not the one who might eventually decide to get around to it.
Deinol felt his arms tiring, and the first accompanying throb of fear. “Help me!” he screamed at Ritsu. “Help me, you idiot! What are you doing?”
Ritsu tensed at the noise, and finally reached out, grasping the sheath in one fist. His movements remained slow until his free hand closed around the hilt of his sword, but when he pulled it free, all his hesitation had gone.
Deinol turned with the other two men, watching Ritsu’s blade. It was such an ugly sword, he couldn’t help thinking—the metal was so dull, it couldn’t give off the faintest shimmer of sunlight. Could Ritsu really wield it as well as those villagers had said?
His first charge was impressive, but one of the men quickly moved to block it, and Deinol winced, remembering how easily the sword had given when he’d struck it against the tree before. Yet when the swords clashed it was the stranger’s blade that recoiled, and Ritsu who pressed his advantage forward, slashing first at the man’s unprotected side and then at his neck. The first stroke sliced his arm off at the shoulder, and the second took off his head with such force that it went flying, hitting the ground with a wet splat.
His eyes flicking from Ritsu to Deinol and back again, the second man hesitated—but Ritsu didn’t. There was something inhuman about the way he moved—he was amazingly fast, to be sure, but so were Lucius and Almasy. But where they had rigorous technique behind them, Ritsu had something almost bestial, like a wolf lunging at his prey out of pure instinct. He charged again at his second opponent, that useless sword bared—and cut him right in half, all the bloody way through.
Ritsu stood there, panting slightly, and Deinol stood watching him, as much at a loss as he could remember being. How had Ritsu learned to fight like that? How had it even been possible for him to fight like that, when Deinol had tested that sword’s uselessness for himself?
Ritsu picked up the sword belt he’d discarded and buckled it back around his waist, sliding the sword into its sheath again with a visible shudder. He looked at the ground, where the pieces of the dead men lay, and shook his head violently. “No,” he muttered, “no, no, no, I shouldn’t have picked it up, I shouldn’t have picked it up—”
Deinol grasped him by the shoulders, peering down into his eyes. “Ritsu. Hey. Ritsu, look at me.” Ritsu did as he said, and he seemed to calm down as they stared at each other. Finally Deinol released him, stepping back. “Are you all right?” he asked—he hardly knew what to say. “Did something … happen?”
Ritsu closed his eyes, opened them again, flexed his fingers. “I should not have touched it. But I think I’ll be all right.”
What in all the hells was wrong with him? “Why would you get so upset over it? It’s not as if they’re the first men you’ve killed.”
“No,” Ritsu agreed. He paced a few steps around the bodies. “There were many others. I grew used to that part of it. Besides, these men … they intended much ill. I need not regret killing them.”
Did that mean there were others he did need to regret killing? Deinol set the question aside; there wasn’t time to worry about whatever passed for reasoning with Ritsu just now. “Did you see which way Seth went?” he asked. “I watched him go, but I got all turned around in the fighting.…”
“Hmm.” Ritsu looked slowly about him. “Was it not in that direction?” He cocked his head. “We should not lose sight of the path, though.”
That was, Deinol admitted, a good point. He’d never been outside a city until several weeks ago; he didn’t want to imagine how long he’d be wandering if you turned him loose in the middle of a forest. “All right,” he said. “You’re sure Seth went that way? And can you remember that the path is this way?”
Ritsu shook his head. “I don’t know; I merely think. As for finding our way back, you might mark the trees.”
Deinol frowned. “That’ll be loud, though. We don’t know if there are more of those fellows wandering about; three seems rather a small number to kill Seren Almasy, especially three as sorry as that lot.”
Ritsu shrugged. “What else would you have us do?”
That was another good point. Deinol sighed. “All right, tree marking it is.” He aimed a slice at the nearest one, then marked every few trunks as they went, peering about for any sign of Seth.
But he didn’t see a thing, and finally he decided to chance a call—they’d never find the boy otherwise. “Seth? Can you hear me?”
For several long moments there was no reply, and then someone said, “Here.” It was Almasy’s voice.
When Deinol saw him lying in Almasy’s arms, at first he couldn’t move or speak. Part of him would almost have welcomed misunderstanding, as a chance to let anger drown out everything else, but there could be no doubt of what had happened. The wound in his side was far too large to have come from a knife, and the bloody sword of one of the dead men lay in full view, slowly staining the fallen leaves. Even without all that, Almasy’s face, which he’d never been able to read before, would have told him everything he needed to know.
She had not killed him, but Deinol might have said that he had died because of her. It was so tempting to lay it all at her feet, to say that everything that had happened since Hornoak had been her fault. But he knew whose fault this was; the certainty fell upon him like a heavy cloak, smothering and inescapable. There was only one man responsible for this.
Almasy looked up at him, her face bleak, but still with the ghost of that composure she seemed to prize so much. Her voice came slowly, and so softly that Deinol wo
uld have missed it if the forest had not been so still. “I’m so sorry,” she said. “I’m so sorry.”
He heard her words, but they provoked no response. He couldn’t seem to attach any meaning to them, and they blew past him like dead leaves in the wind. “Give him back,” he said, hardly understanding his own words. “Give him to me.” And that was right—Seth shouldn’t be with her. Seth was his boy, even before he’d been Morgan’s. It was Deinol who’d found him first, thin as a rail, half starved and bleary-eyed but still gentle, still with that grateful smile he’d show at even the simplest things.
“Give him to me,” he said again. “He belongs with me.”
Perhaps Almasy nodded, and she started to raise Seth up, to put him into Deinol’s arms—and then they both halted, turning to look at Ritsu.
He was standing there trembling, whining like a wounded animal as he stared at Seth, eyes wide and unblinking. “Sebastian,” he whimpered. “Sebastian—”
Deinol did not precisely mean to do anything, but his anger, frustrated at being unable to latch on to Almasy, finally found a target. He lashed out with one fist—where had his sword gone? Had he dropped it?—catching Ritsu just below the temple. “He’s not your fucking Sebastian, you fucking idiot! Will you stop your pathetic gibbering and act like a fucking man?”
Ritsu recoiled, touching his fingertips to the place where Deinol had hit him, along the ridge of bone between ear and eye. For several moments he just stared at Deinol, his eyes so strangely innocent and so openly betrayed that Deinol didn’t want to meet them. One hand drifted down to the hilt of his sword, clutching at it as if it could protect him. And then he turned and ran, head down, into the depths of the woods.
Deinol felt a weight settle in his gut as he gazed after him, but what could he do now? It was Seth he had to see to, not some baffling stranger.
Almasy stirred, and he turned back to her. Her eyes were cast down, but the set of her mouth was firm. “I cannot stay here,” she said. “If I don’t get back…” She shook her head. “I have to go.”
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