by Janice Hardy
“Sorry.” I picked up the pace again.
Three men rounded the corner in front of us, their gazes scanning the street. The tracker’s men? I turned around, heading back the way we’d come.
The tracker woman stepped out of an alley.
I froze. So did Aylin and Danello, now in front of me and on the other side of the tracker. Having her trapped between us didn’t make me feel any safer.
A plan, I need a plan.
The tracker smiled, but there was nothing friendly about her grin. She had a sword out this time and her knife in the other hand.
“Found you before lunch,” she said. “Stewwig owes me ten oppas.”
“You must have me confused with someone else,” I said, trying to hold her attention while Aylin and Danello crept up behind her.
“I don’t think so.”
Danello dived at the tracker, sending her flying forward and into a pain merchant’s window. The glass cracked but didn’t break. Folks turned, their hands covering worried frowns.
“Run!” I yelled. Two of the three men closing on us blocked my way. Another was coming up behind them. Huge, with thick arms, his sleeves rolled up like those of a man who was there to do a hard day’s work.
I shoved Tali away from the approaching men. She stumbled a few steps then stopped, her expression waffling between fear and anger. The Taker and her brother fled for the canals.
“Tali, go,” I cried.
“Not without you!” She darted over and grabbed my hand, trying to pull me away. Aylin was running at us, her hand outstretched as if she planned to grab me too.
The tracker was on her feet again. She whipped out another pynvium rod and aimed it at Tali and Aylin.
Whoomp.
A strange tingle ran down my arm. Aylin screamed and collapsed to the street. Tali didn’t, but she should have.
We gaped at each other longer than was wise. She’d resisted the flash! She’d never done that before. I’d seen flashed pain hurt her. She wasn’t immune like I was. How had she done it?
Two of the tracker’s men tackled us. I dropped and landed hard on the street next to an unconscious Aylin. I grabbed her ankles and drew.
Tingling pain ran up my arm, not nearly as sharp as real pain would have been, and it wouldn’t last long. The tracker’s men grabbed me. I struggled to turn and grab their exposed flesh but couldn’t reach them.
Danello leaped onto the big man from behind. He spun and punched Danello in the face. Danello snapped back and went down.
I kicked the shins of one of the men holding me. He cried out and loosened his grip on my arm. I yanked hard, sliding my wrist out enough to get my hand on his skin.
I pushed.
He hissed and let go, shaking his arm like something had stung him. I reached for the man holding Tali a heartbeat before thick arms wrapped around my shoulders. I reached up, barely able to get my fingers on his forearm. I shifted the last of what I’d taken from Aylin into him. He grunted softly but didn’t let go.
Tali’s arms were pinned now, and another man was tying her hands. She tried to bite him and he slapped her.
“Hey!” I kicked out at him but missed.
A few fishermen scowled and started forward, but the tracker stepped up and held something out.
“This is a legal bounty warrant on the Duke’s orders.” She smiled briefly, satisfied as a cat. “Any interference in this claim is punishable by conscription.”
That stopped the fishermen. They might risk prison to help me, but no one wanted to fight for the Duke. The crowd that had gathered grumbled and moved away.
“You’ve given us quite the chase,” she said.
“Who are you?” I asked, shaking as a soldier bound my hands with rope. Danello lay on the street, softly moaning.
“Most call me Vyand.” She stepped forward and held the reward poster next to my face. “Good likeness, except for the hair. That was smart.” Vyand grinned at the big man. “Look at that, Stewwig, two Takers for the work of one. Not bad.”
“Let her go!” I said.
Vyand stayed just out of kicking distance. “Merlaina Oskov,” she said, using the name I’d given to so many who now wanted me captured. “On the order of Duke Verraad, I herby bind you for the murder of Luminary Duis Steek.”
She leaned in closer and whispered into my ear. “But we both know that’s not why he really wants you.”
Ropes bound my wrists together, same as Tali. Vyand had thrown us into a prisoner transport waiting in the rear courtyard of the Healers’ League. High stone walls and wrought-iron gates I recognized well fenced us in even more.
The courtyard gate clanged open and Vyand entered, followed by four armed men. Tali slid closer and grabbed my hand.
“Listen up,” Vyand called, walking over to us. “You have been extremely annoying. If you give me any more hassles, you’ll spend your nights in a box belowdecks, where it’s hot. Behave yourselves and you’ll get to sleep in a cage on deck, where it’s cool.”
She flicked a hand in the air. “Mount up.”
The cage dipped to one side as men climbed onto the driver’s bench. Seconds later the transport lurched forward and rolled onto Grand Canal Street. I frowned. Vyand was going to parade us through the streets, as if proving to Geveg that I was caught.
Crowds of Baseeri gathered and watched the transport pass. I’d never been booed before. Yelled at, spat on, beaten, yes—but not booed.
“Abomination!”
“Murderer!”
“I bet I’ve healed some of those people,” Tali muttered, dodging a rotten orange.
“Tali, about that. What did you do when Vyand flashed us?”
“Nothing.”
“You had to do something. The flash didn’t hurt you.”
“It burned a little, but that was it. Think I’m immune like you?”
“You weren’t before.”
She shrugged. “I was trying to get you to leave. I wasn’t thinking about anything but dragging you out of there.”
Wait…dragging. She’d been touching me. I closed my eyes, pictured us standing there. I’d felt something just before Vyand flashed us. A tingle, like she was pulling something from me. What if it had been my flashing immunity? Did she borrow it?
“Put your hands over mine,” I said. “See if you can shift into me.”
“What? I can’t do that.”
“Just try.”
She put her hands over mine and…
“Nothing.”
“I didn’t feel a tingle this time either.” Maybe she hadn’t done anything. I could have blocked her from the pain, or the angle of the flash had missed her. Maybe I’d drawn it away just as it hit her.
“You have a plan to get us out of here, don’t you?” She looked at me, hope in her eyes. Her confidence was touching, but I wasn’t so sure I could live up to such faith. I had no idea how to get out of a locked prisoner transport. I couldn’t even escape in a city I knew as well as my own name.
“They can’t keep us in this cage forever. When Vyand opens the door, I’ll shift and we’ll run.”
She frowned. “That’s not one of your better plans.”
“It’s all I have right now.”
“Okay. Tell me when you think of something else.”
“We’re going to get out of this,” I promised. She smiled, but I don’t think she believed me.
The taunts and thrown items stopped when we reached a rundown neighborhood. People watched us go by, their expressions hard and cold, but for Vyand’s men, not for us. I could see the hopelessness, the defeat. That’s what the Duke had done to us: turned us into people who let our children be dragged through the city on display and hauled off to the very man who’d beaten us.
“Free the Takers!”
Danello? Shouts rang out all around us. Men with clubs and nets ran from the crowd. They swarmed over the main guard, catching him in a net before he could do more than turn. A half dozen more ran for the horses. Ayli
n, Jovan, Bahari, Enzie. Even Winvik!
A high-pitched whinny split the air. The horses reared, front legs pawing as some fishermen tried to throw blankets over them. The driver was on the ground, unconscious. I caught a glimpse of Barnikoff swinging a stick at one of the soldiers.
“See? We don’t need a plan. We’re being rescued!”
The horses shrieked again, and one kicked out its rear legs. The cage shuddered as hooves cracked against the front. The horse kept thrashing, trying to throw off the man clinging to its harness. The cage rocked like a boat on rough water.
“Push harder!” Danello called above the noise.
I screamed as the cage toppled and dragged the horses to the ground. Tali tumbled over me, her knee smacking painfully hard against my head. The door screeched open and a man hauled her out. Another seized my arm and yanked me to my feet. He hurried me away from the cage.
“No, my friends are that way.” I tugged to return, but the man wouldn’t stop. Vyand’s men might have been surprised by the attack, but they hadn’t stayed that way long. More had appeared, surrounding the others with swords and pynvium rods. Danello backed away, shielding Tali and Aylin.
“Wait, please!”
The man kept leading me down the street.
Away from Danello and Tali.
Away from everyone.
Saints and sinners! This wasn’t a rescue. It was a kidnapping.
“Let go of me!” I couldn’t break free of the man’s grip. I pounded on his hand, but it was like smacking rock. I leaned over and bit his shoulder.
He gasped and let me go.
“I don’t think so,” said another man, coming up behind me before I could take a step. He grabbed my arms and half carried me down the street. There wasn’t a soul around.
They hauled me into a rundown boardinghouse half a block farther along the street. The first man opened a door on the ground floor and shoved me inside.
“We got her,” he said, shutting the door behind us.
“Good.”
I snapped around. A boy about twenty stood there.
“What’s going on?” I asked, though my guts knew only one reason why anyone would save me from a tracker and take me away from my friends.
“We’re earning a quick five thousand oppas.” He elbowed the man standing next to him. “See, Uncle? I told you this would work.”
FIVE
They wanted the bounty. Wanted it so much they’d kidnapped me from a tracker. A good plan, actually. Insane, but good.
“What about the girl in the transport with me?” I asked as they bound my hands.
“Don’t know, don’t care,” said Uncle, rubbing his shoulder. “She might even be free by now. Those men at the docks were pretty unhappy about a pair of Takers being arrested.”
The boy nodded. “Especially that one guy, right, Fieso? Blond hair, tall. You should have heard him going on and on about you being a hero. He had the whole berth in an uproar.”
Danello.
“Oh, yeah.” Fieso chuckled and shook his head like he couldn’t imagine anyone sticking their neck out for someone else. “Resik listened for a minute and started smiling.”
“That’s when I got the idea.” The boy, Resik I guess, winked and tapped his temple. “Let them do the risky work, and if they pulled it off, we’d grab you right out from under their noses.”
These people would see soldiers burning houses and use it as an excuse to steal what was left behind. My escape options were few. I had little pain to use, and outrunning them with my hands tied was unlikely. I couldn’t count on a rescue, and I wasn’t even sure the others had gotten away. Vyand might have captured them all.
“What are you going to do to me?” I asked.
“Kill you,” said Uncle, casual as you please.
“Head works as proof, right?” Fieso added. “We got a box anywhere? Heads are messy.”
My stomach threatened to make a mess right there. “You don’t have to do this.”
“You got five thousand oppas? We’ll turn you loose.”
“Wait! The posters don’t say anything about me being dead.” They paused. “The Duke wants me alive. Kill me and you’ll get nothing.”
Fieso frowned. “Nobody ever wants criminals alive.”
“The Duke does. He needs me.” For what I wasn’t quite sure, and I hoped they wouldn’t ask. Luckily, they didn’t strike me as the smartest fish in the lake. I didn’t want to be handed over to the Duke either, but it beat having my head chopped off. Hard to think up an escape plan without a head.
“I don’t think so.” Fieso picked up an axe I hadn’t noticed on the table.
Please, Saint Saea, no.
Resik held up a hand. “Hold on, what if she’s right?”
“Easier to carry a head to Baseer,” muttered Fieso.
“Not if it don’t get us nothing.” Uncle stared at Resik as if he could divine the future from the pattern of his freckles. After a long minute he walked over and sat on the table next to Fieso. “It’ll be harder to get her there, but the boy makes sense. Posters said nothing about killing, and they usually do. The carriage is big enough to take her.”
“Not big enough to hide her.”
“Resik,” Uncle said, waving him over. “Go fetch that trunk off the carriage. She oughta fit in there.”
“Wouldn’t it be easier to let me walk?” I asked.
“Not if you run.”
“What if I promise not to?”
“You know,” Fieso said to Uncle, “heads don’t talk so much.”
I shut up.
Resik laughed.
“Go get the trunk so we can get out of here.”
This was so not good. I casually studied the room, hoping something would inspire a perfect escape plan. One table, three thugs, three chairs, and four bedrolls. No windows. Just the one door. Uncle had already demonstrated his viselike grip, and Fieso was bigger and wider, with so many scars he obviously didn’t mind getting a little bloody in a fight.
Uncle wasn’t paying attention to me. He had his head down, studying papers spread out on the table. From the glimpses I caught, they were maps. Fieso watched me the entire time, his face blank.
He chuckled. If crocs could laugh, they’d sound exactly like that. “She’s a sly one. Look at her—planning her escape.”
“Was not,” I said.
“Oh, sure. I saw them pretty brown eyes looking around.”
“Can always blindfold her,” Uncle said without looking up from the maps.
Fieso slid off the table and walked to the bedrolls. “And gag her. Ten oppas says she’ll scream all the way to the traveler’s house if we don’t.”
Uncle nodded. “Yeah, fine.”
Fieso pulled some cloth strips out of one of the packs and came to me. I had no idea what the strips used to be, but they didn’t look clean or soft. The closer he got, the more I could smell them. Something sour.
“Please, don’t.”
“Look at that,” he said, tying a heavy knot in one of the strips. “Manners and sneakiness. Open.”
I shook my head. He grabbed my jaw, pressing his fingers into my cheeks. My mouth popped open and he shoved the knot into it, then tied the ends behind my head. I winced as he snagged some of my hair in the knot.
Fieso grinned and snapped the second cloth tight between his hands. Dust sprang out and floated around my head. I held my breath so I wouldn’t sneeze.
“Might wanna close your eyes.” He stepped behind me. “This one’s a bit dirty.”
I squeezed my eyes shut as he tied the blindfold around my head. At least it made it easier to hold back the tears.
Heavy thuds, muffled voices. The first sounds I’d heard in close to an hour. I’d been counting the minutes but lost my place at twenty-something when someone sneezed. I’d hoped it was Fieso, though it wasn’t much in the way of revenge.
The door opened and the thumps grew louder.
“What took you so long?” Uncle asked
.
“It’s a trunk. It’s heavy,” Resik said, followed by a large bang. “And there’s lots of people out now, all yelling and throwing stuff. The streets are swamped.”
Hands seized my arm and yanked me to my feet, dragging me toward—I assumed—the trunk.
“Grab her,” Fieso said, and hands lifted my feet. I writhed but they just gripped me tighter. I reached out and found flesh, maybe an arm, and pushed my aching head into it. A man cried out and dropped me into something that smelled of fish stink and mold.
Something smacked me in the head as I tried to get up, and they all laughed.
“Stay,” Resik ordered as if I were a dog.
The lid thumped shut, and what little light came through the blindfold vanished. He’d bound my hands, but not my arms, so I pulled off the blindfold, then yanked the gag out of my mouth. My mouth felt dry as a beach, but as soon as I heard crowds, I’d yell my lungs out.
One end of the trunk lifted and I knocked against the side. The other side rose a moment later and we were moving. Faint noises reached me after a few minutes, growing louder with every jostle. I rocked as the trunk rocked, banging into the sides as we went down the front steps. I’d never been one for lake sickness, but the heat and the swaying had my stomach flipping.
I listened, straining for sounds of people who might actually help if I started shouting. I prayed the others were safe and sound and heading for Barnikoff’s.
Voices yelled—commanding voices. Soldiers or guards for sure. “Settle down or you’ll be arrested,” said someone who had to be a guard.
“Help!” I kicked and pounded my fists on the sides of the trunk. “Help!”
The trunk dropped hard to the ground. I kept kicking and yelling, until a six-inch chunk of knife blade sliced through the top, cutting into my cheek. I jerked away and pressed a hand against it. After a heartbeat, the blade was yanked out.
“Next one goes through the side, where it’s heavy,” Fieso said through the hole. Most of me rested on that side, my back flat against the trunk. “I don’t want to risk the money, but heads don’t try to escape.”
I stayed quiet. And still, despite the sting in my cheek and the blood trickling down my neck. Smells from the tannery oozed through the cracks in the trunk, mixing unpleasantly with the fish and mold. The smell of fish got stronger. Horses whinnied, wood creaked, and waves swished around dock pilings.