“Sir Willard?”
“Mhm.” He opened an eye. “Meditating,” he said, very softly, as if speaking louder might disrupt the trance.
She nodded and released one arm, then the next. He stood, eyes still closed. “Be careful of the bank,” she said, as she gathered up the chains and lifted them.
A wicked gleam in his eye revealed her mistake, and she barely got her arm up in time to deflect the hand snaking toward her throat. With a cry, she shoved the chains at him and knocked another fist aside. He lunged to his feet, but his boot slipped down the edge of the bank. As he windmilled to catch his balance, she put a boot on his hip and sent Willard-Krato sliding the rest of the way to the stream.
Bellows of rage filled the air, and Caris stared about in terror. Her first instinct was to run for Rag, but the moment he got on Molly’s back, the race would be over, and Molly would tear Rag to pieces. And she couldn’t lead Molly away from him on a string, like she could a regular horse. Her only real option was to mount Molly herself and ride away so Willard-Krato could not have her, and then keep her away until Willard had returned to normal.
But she couldn’t. She had vowed, and she’d rather die with Rag than break it.
All this flashed through her mind in the space of two heartbeats. On the third beat, she turned from the tree and ran for Rag. She hadn’t made four strides in her direction before Molly cut her off and reared before her, huge hooves pawing the air.
Caris skidded to a halt and whipped her sword from her sheath. “Back off,” she spat, “and stay away! I’m done with you. And stop waving your fool hooves. You wouldn’t have marked me just to kill me.”
Molly snarled in fury, but Caris held her sword between them and circled around until she could back her way toward Rag. Molly rotated with her, stamping and glaring violet rage.
A groan from the ravine made Caris pause.
“What the Black Moon…?” Willard said. “Where am I? Girl! Girl, are you there? Are you all right?”
“Here. I’m fine.”
Molly reared back and brought both front hooves down hard before Caris, as if demanding her attention. As Caris glared back, Molly presented her shoulder as if she wanted Caris to cut her, and a surge of guilty desire rose in Caris, accompanied by a pall of horror.
She could not—she would not—take the Blood. She had vowed.
And as she backed away, she sensed Molly’s fury at the rejection, like the fury she surely harbored for Willard for all those years he would not bleed her because of the Lady Anna.
“I’m not climbing this blasted bank,” Willard said. “Unhitch Molly and she’ll bear me up.”
Caris circled back around Molly to the edge of the ravine, keeping both eyes on the Phyros. A glance below showed her Willard standing at edge of the stream, mud caking parts of his armor. His face flushed violet-blue, and his shoulders rose and fell with as if still contending with the Blood rage. When he saw her, he stared up, unseeing.
“Willard?” she said. “How do I know it’s you?”
He closed his eyes. “I take it I’m down here because of something he did?”
“Yes, sir.”
Molly lunged, and Caris’s heart did a flip inside her, but the beast soared past Caris and over the rim of the bank. The Phyros plowed to a stop at the knight’s side, and Willard gave Caris a grim look. “You’re lucky it’s me and not Krato in my flesh,” he said, as he climbed into the saddle. “Or this would be the end for you.” As if to second his words, Molly glared murder at Caris, and Caris turned before Willard could notice the connection.
Gods take it, what’s she trying to do?
She did not want to think of it. She ran for Rag. Molly made her feel dirty. But when she returned to Rag’s side, she felt nothing but relief that she’d kept her vow and foiled Molly’s efforts. She spent quiet minutes with the mare, nuzzling and hugging her, speaking quietly.
When Willard rode past her, he appeared to be deep in trance, eyes half closed. Caris pointedly ignored Molly’s gaze, and mounted to follow with a long stretch of yoab run between them. She missed sharing senses and touching minds with Rag, but her heart warmed with the knowledge that she’d won that pass against Molly and kept her vow, even in a moment of crisis.
She grinned and rubbed Rag’s mane.
Just as I’ll win the next, and the next after that. I’m just as smart as you, monster. And I have more to lose, so I’m even more determined.
*
The moment they returned to the others, Caris saw Harric and Kogan scrambling to mount and ride. Kogan stashed Worsic, still wrapped in her oilcloth, on the musk auroch, and Harric stowed the spitfire pack behind Snapper’s saddle. As he mounted, he glanced at her, which called up a hot flame of anger in her breast…not aching love, she realized, but good old anger.
She’d experienced this once before, when she’d touched Molly’s mind in the stables back at the pass. On that day, the fires Molly’s mind had somehow burned out the enchantment of the ring, and now they’d done it again.
She smiled. It felt good. She felt strong.
Questions swam in Harric’s eyes as he watched her, and she stared back, her lip curling involuntarily. He looked like he’d been up all night—gray-faced and sunken—and she shrugged away a pulse of guilt. A different Caris. The true Caris. And it wasn’t until he dropped his gaze that she realized she’d been touching eyes with him without pain or noticing.
She’d been doing that a lot.
Her heartbeat quickened as understanding dawned on her: Molly’s fire was still in her from that morning, and not only did it snuff the ring’s power, but it also snuffed her horse-touched aversion to touching eyes! Nothing had ever helped her with that aversion. Nothing but Harric’s trick of looking at people’s noses instead of their eyes, but that was just for hiding it, not a remedy.
The implications staggered her.
Molly’s fire could be a cure for everything. It could make Caris whole as she’d never been.
She knew what happened if the touch was too strong, and she did not want that. But surely if she only touched Molly’s mind a little each day, just enough to kindle her fire and keep it burning, so she wouldn’t be overcome with rage, she’d be free her of the ring’s tyranny, and free of her horse-touched anxieties and foibles. The evidence seemed clear: the ring’s ache was gone, and in spite of the chaotic events of the morning, she had not once needed to reach out to any horse for comfort.
Gods leave me, I could be free.
Molly cast back a glare like a burning challenge, and it sent a shiver up Caris’s gut. Molly changed her so she hardly recognized herself. She was a monster.
Changed for the better, part of her whispered.
She considered this and concluded it might be so. She had to admit it. But who said it was better to be free of the aversions she’d known all her life? Her aversions were part of who she was, part of what made her strong. And she knew beyond any doubt that her connection to Rag would not survive such change. Rag wanted nothing to do with the Phyros and couldn’t bear the heat of the Phyros in Caris.
She buried her face in her hands. Rag. If she touched Molly’s fire in any form, it would be nothing short of alienating and betraying her dearest friend for the sake of a misguided ambition.
Rag let out a worried whinny and Caris shook her head hard.
I will not forsake you! I have sworn it. You’ll see.
And then she felt the last of Molly’s fire dwindle to nothing, and the roar of horse-touched confusion rising between her ears. Her connection to Rag was too feeble to shield her from it, and as the roar grew in strength, she felt her world narrowing. Pain filled her head, and she had nowhere to hide.
Curling over her saddle, she squeezed her eyes shut and pressed her hands to her ears.
“You’ll see,” she whispered. “Just like before.” And the storm overwhelmed her.
*
She returned to herself exhausted and dull. In her absence from he
rself, Rag had borne Caris faithfully at the rear of their procession, and the forest had gone gray with dusk and a smoke that hung heavy in the air beneath the canopy. She’d been lost in the roar for hours.
Rag glanced back at her and flicked her ears to acknowledge her. Behind her, Holly gave a nicker of greeting.
Caris smiled and murmured, “Yes, girls, I’m back.”
Vaguely, she realized someone had just been speaking. It had been Willard. She searched her memory for conversation she’d been half listening to, like recalling a dream after waking. He’d said something about the wind shifting, which would explain the smoke.
“Is it in the valley, Will?”
“How could I know that? I see no better in smoke than you do. I see no choice but to ride on as we have been until we either see fire in our path or some view of where it’s got to.”
“We could be riding to our doom.”
“Or to our salvation. I’ll take even odds of fire before us over the certainty of Bannus behind.”
They now rode at a walk between looming shadows of giant trees. Someone struck a light and held a lantern in the murk. The glow cast the hulking form of the priest in silhouette as he turned to peer back at Caris. She raised a hand in acknowledgement, and he gave her a slow nod and finally faced forward again.
She groaned inwardly. Probably thinks I’m a natural fool, huddled on my saddle for hours. Hope I wasn’t moaning the whole time.
It was Harric, riding in front of Kogan, who held the lantern on a pole. He too glanced back at her, a hint of worry in his eye, and at the sight of him, her heart swelled with longing so strong that she had to choke back a cry of pain.
It felt like someone rammed a leatherman’s awl through her sternum.
No. No.
The ring was back. And beyond a doubt, she knew that the only thing that could make the pain stop was Harric. Embracing him. Squeezing him. Holding him. Kissing him.
No!
Like a woman on fire, she flung her senses at Rag as if the mare were the water that would quench her, but Rag still shied away. Flailing, feeling like she was suffocating, Caris flung her senses to Snapper and dove into him without preamble. The gelding snorted and startled and nearly threw Harric, but the combination of his Phyros conditioning and Caris’s mastery allowed her to quickly restore his calm. The moment she did, she submerged her senses in his, leaving only a tiny connection to her own body as it hunched again over her saddle.
It took her some time for her to feel her heartbeat calming. And though Snapper allowed her in, he was not a comfortable host. His was a less sensitive awareness than Rag’s, with harder edges, as might be expected of a Phyros-trained horse. He formed colder connections, and had less complex desires, as might be expected of a gelding. Nevertheless, he accepted her presence, and his even-tempered mind sheltered her from the worst effects of the ring.
When the combination of full dark and a blanket of smoke made it hard to see the path, she heard Willard speaking, and reluctantly returned half her concentration to her human ears.
“We don’t dare continue,” he said. “If we meet a yoab now, we’ll be at a significant disadvantage. I see a knoll that will give us high ground for camp. Follow me there.”
To Caris’s relief, the ring’s initial surge of longing had receded to a steady, miserable ache—and a persistent idiotic urge to make her bed with Harric. With half her concentration still in Snapper, she was able to tolerate and resist the urges.
The others took their horses to the top of the knoll, but she tethered Rag and Holly at the bottom, far from Molly. Willard instructed them to prepare their gear and saddles for departure at a moment’s notice, and to sleep beside their horses. Caris did as told, and as soon as she fed and groomed the horses, she collapsed onto her bedroll. Too soon, she’d have to rise again to help Willard, but she did not want to. She felt as though she’d betrayed him, too, with Molly. And she felt cornered by the Phyros. Lured. She felt her integrity and honor being bent, and she no longer wanted to be near her at all. But she did not know how to tell Willard.
Too tired to think on it, she sent her senses into Rag, and though the mare’s distrust allowed only a shallow and tentative connection, they were both so tired that they plunged into sleep.
Bright Mother, Mad Father, Hag.
A white maiden in a black bag.
Old crone
Old stone
Where did she go?
I’ll never tell
She’s in the well
As bright as newest snow.
—Arkendian Children’s rhyme referring to the Bright Mother’s eclipse during Krato’s Moon
43
Web Strands & Moon Spirits
Just as Harric’s eyes began to win a tedious tug of war with his will, something pinched his arm. He looked for the source, but saw nothing. When he opened his oculus, he found Fink’s nose jutting dangerously close to his eyes.
Fink clapped a hand over Harric’s startled cry. “Time to work on that stamina we talked about,” he whispered, and plucked at the top button of Harric’s shirt to indicate he should strip and join him in the Unseen. With a nod in the direction of the horses, Fink mimed something like a jerking wooden puppet, which Harric guessed meant Mudruffle was scouting nearby.
Harric rose and walked out of camp as if to piss, then stripped and joined Fink in the Unseen.
When they were well away from camp, Fink finally spoke. “Yeah, twig boy is all fancy tonight. You should see him: his eyes bugged out, ears the size of soup bowls.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean he’s playing watchman, so we need to be extra careful getting you in and out of camp.”
“You mean he altered his…head? To see and hear better?”
Fink nodded, jiggling his numerous chins. “Think of a bug-eyed, bat-eared apple and you have the right idea.”
“If Kogan sees that, it’s the end for Mudruffle. Where is Mudruffle now?”
“Last I saw, he was off to the north, examining a circle of toadstools.” Fink shuddered. “Souls, those White Moon spirits are creepy.”
“Right. Because you and your sisters aren’t creepy at all.” Harric’s brow wrinkled. “I almost forgot. I agreed to let your sister take a look at the ring.”
“She isn’t into toadstools.”
“I mean Caris’s ring. Are we in for the treat of seeing Missy tonight?”
Fink’s talons clicked in a messy wringing motion. “Haven’t been able to find her; she’s out in the edges of the Web somewhere. But I sent messages. And I have three days, remember? She should be here by tomorrow or the next night.”
*
An hour later, Harric was hiking south down the Yoab Highway in nothing but boots and shorts as Fink hop-flapped alongside. Smoke made a fog of essence in the Unseen, so Harric walked more slowly as he practiced holding himself in the Unseen while navigating the trees and boulders and keeping his oculus tightly shut. It was not easy, and though the late summer evening would normally require an extra jacket, the exertion was enough to keep him warm without a shirt.
“You’re doing well,” Fink said, “but you’re making a racket like a one-man market up above us. It’s like a dinner bell to the scavengers every time you move.”
Harric blushed. “You only told me about a smooth entrance into the Unseen, not a smooth transit of the Unseen.”
“You weren’t ready.” Fink grinned at some private humor, and drew Harric to a stop. “Now you’re ready. Look behind you and see for yourself.”
All around them, placid strands rose like ghostly sea grass, streaming to the sky. But where Harric had passed, the strands swirled and wavered as if thrashed by a rogue breeze.
Harric winced. “Oops. At least they’re calming down, right? No harm done?”
“No, up, kid. Look up. See? You did that, too.”
Harric looked up through the smoke to where the rising strands interlaced and joined to form thicker and thicker rib
bons that banded together until they were as thick as the heavy cables that once held the thunder spire above Abellia’s tower. Those seemed to be the main strands of the Web, and it was there among the thickest strands that the Web was in tumult.
Not only were the thicker strands swinging and oscillating, but each one appeared to surge and tug against the next, increasing the discord. And rather than dissipating like waves in a disturbed pool, these vibrations took longer to diminish.
Fink winced at the sight. “Pretty impressive in a not-good way.” He raised a finger to one side of the sky. “There’s why.”
Harric followed his gaze and saw for the second time in his life the vulturelike creatures of shadow that he’d watched feeding on the ghosts of Bannus’s army. Three of them. His blood turned to ice as the shadows drew near, sliding down strands of the Web like beads on a string, their hollow eyes staring at Harric.
“Moons, Fink,” Harric said. “Can you make them go away?”
Fink shook his head, scowling. His taloned hands twisted together. “They won’t come. They know my sisters.”
Harric thought he heard doubt, and stepped behind the imp as the shadowy spirits reached a place in the Web no farther than a stone’s throw above them.
“Fink? How sure are you that you’re on good terms with your sisters? Because these things don’t look friendly.”
One of the vultures leaned down from a strand as if it would drop like a spider on their heads. A weirdly keening hiss emerged from its gaping beak. “Your man tears the Web.”
“It must be stopped,” whined another.
“We will devour it,” said the third.
“The man learns,” said Fink, white eyes flicking from one to the other. “He will not disturb the Web anymore.”
“It will not disturb the Web because I shall consume it,” said the second.
“I shall consume it!” said the first.
“We shall together,” said the third.
The Jack of Ruin Page 37