“I know you freed them.”
“Really? What do your guards say?” Rox ripped her arm out of his grip. “You have nothing to put me here last night.” Calder’s eyes burned with rage and Rox knew she had him. He had no proof.
“Let her go, Calder. We have to plan our course into the desert.”
Calder shot her one last glare, a clear warning that he’d be watching her more carefully, and turned to his fellow lead, joining him at a map laid across the ground. “We have a few injured from last night and we have to send a party of at least twelve back to the Core with the bounty. We can’t attack the Great Market like this.”
Calder scanned the map. “We send a party of our healthiest back to the Core while we continue toward the Market. We’ll stop nearby, somewhere inconspicuous, and let the injured heal while we wait for the party from the Core to return.”
“The closest village is here. A small town called Oasis.”
Calder nodded. “Then we go to Oasis.”
Part Two
Bonding
Chapter One
Jacquin tossed in bed, turning to stare at the ceiling of her wagon, her hands clasped behind her head. She couldn’t sleep. There was something in the air, something still and tense, like the calm before a storm.
She’d felt a steadily-climbing sense of uneasiness the last few days. Khalisa had presented Jacquin’s information about the changling in the desert, but next to nothing had been done in the Tribe or in Oasis to strengthen defenses. No one else had seen a changling and, despite the merchant’s stories, most still believed they were extinct. No one believed her. Her warnings were the ramblings of a lying seer.
Jacquin ran a hand over her bare stomach, the pull she’d felt the night she’d met the changling had never quite dissipated. She felt it tugging at her navel, like a silver chain guiding her past Oasis’ walls deep into the desert. She’d taken to shutting herself in her wagon, even avoiding dancing for the last few days to ensure she wasn’t drawn back over the walls. More than once she’d found herself wandering to the city gates before she realized where she was going.
She closed her eyes and the visions ran through the back of her mind, gentler than the others, but constant. Pine needles and ice, stalagmites made of rainbows and clawed fingers slashing through skin wove an unintelligible tapestry seen through eyes, filtered through languages and rooted in experiences that weren’t quite human. Changling visions.
Jacquin had never had a vision from another species before. Something was changing, not just in Jacquin but in all magic in Oasis. Jacquin wished there was another legitimate seer closer than the Great Market who could shed light on her predicament.
A trembling thud pounded along the top of her wagon like a sudden rainstorm. Jacquin arched a single brow as she sat up, staring at the ceiling of her wagon. After a long moment of silence another staggered beat rapped across her roof and Jacquin could make out the distinct strike of footsteps. Someone was running along the top of her wagon.
In the distance a shriek pierced the air, shattering the silence. Jacquin leapt out of bed, throwing aside her quilt as she bolted out the front door, her skirt whipping and tangling around her legs. She only paused long enough to grab a slender, sharp knife from her desk.
The night had erupted in chaos. Hundreds of changlings flooded over the lower city walls, racing across the wagons’ rooftops, leaping from home to home throwing open doors and rushing into the main town. The moon cast pale blue shadows across the changlings’ cat-like fur, their small, slender frames and wickedly curved claws. Each carried a glass weapon – razor-sharp daggers and swords, glass arrows fletched with feathers from the icy northern regions of Aggar. Their eyes, bright and glowing like their Eitteh ancestors, burned with all-consuming rage as they berserked.
Jacquin stood frozen at the sight. Her head swam, emotions and visions from humans and changlings alike warred in her mind, creating a sharp, searing ache just behind her eyes.
She heard another cry and spun around as a member of her Tribe, a young man named Starin who had been one of Jacquin’s fire dancers for years, doubled over, a long glass arrow in his stomach. Jacquin had forseen his death nearly a monarc ago. Every vision she’d had, every death she’d forseen for the last few monarcs raced through her thoughts. Glass weapons. Shadowy invaders. She’d been seeing this attack.
Jacquin raced toward the dancers’ circle, searching for her friends, but the town was a swirling confusion of changlings, Tribe and desertmen. The sand was muddy with blood, the air thick with shrieks of pain and grief. Jacquin couldn’t focus on the people around her, couldn’t make out anyone she knew in the chaos.
“Down!”
Jacquin threw herself to the ground as a crossbow bolt embedded itself in a sleek, grey changling who had been about to gore a desert woman behind Jacquin.
Jacquin looked up as a small woman dressed in leather with short, blond curls reloaded her bow and shot another changling, this time saving a sword dancer from Khalisa’s troupe from being stabbed.
Jacquin locked onto the woman, the only still thing in the vortex of battle. There was an intensity in her eyes Jacquin had never seen before, an intense focus as clear and sharp as Jacquin was confused. She moved as gracefully as the changlings, her travel leathers hugging her body in a way that outlined her muscles, showcasing even the smallest movement. Jacquin wondered if she was a dancer.
The woman walked to Jacquin and extended a gloved hand, helping her to her feet. Her grip was strong and confident. “You should hide,” she recommended, her eyes flitting back and forth, continually assessing the battle. Jacquin grabbed her shoulder, using her strength for support as her head swam once again.
The woman grabbed Jacquin around the waist, pulling her close and twisting her to the side as a changling attacked, its claws extended like curved knives. With a flick of her wrist, the woman sent a crossbow bolt between the changling’s eyes, dropping it mid-strike.
Jacquin gasped, holding tighter to the shorter woman’s shoulder, shocked back to her senses by the direct threat. The woman released her, loading her bow again. “Get somewhere covered, out of the way.”
Jacquin took a deep breath, shaking off the debilitating visions, her ebony hair rippling across her back with the movement. “I’ll be fine,” Jacquin assured her. “This is my home.”
The woman looked her over quickly, assessing her physic, the way she held her knife. After a long moment she nodded. “Fine.”
The woman lingered a moment longer, her eyes dancing over Jacquin once more, then she disappeared back into the battle. Jacquin let out a breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding.
“Jacquin!” The desperate scream split the night air, cutting through the sounds of the raid. Jacquin spun around. Khalisa.
Jacquin raced through the market, her nerves on edge as she dodged debris and fleeing friends. She held her dagger tight in her hand, ready to defend herself, but no changling charged her.
She raced toward Khalisa’s wagon, rounding the corner to see two changlings circle her sister, knives at the ready. Jacquin leapt into the fray, her knife flying, stabbing one in the stomach then the other in the throat. Khalisa grabbed her arm as the changlings fell, bleeding out into the desert sand.
“What do we do?”
Jacquin bent and grabbed a solid glass short sword from one of the dead changling’s hands. The weight was perfectly balanced. “Stay in your wagon. Bar the door. I’ll keep you safe.”
“You’re not a fighter, Jaci!”
“I’m more of a fighter than you are. Please.”
“Jaci…”
Jacquin pushed her sister into her wagon, shutting the door behind her and holding it closed as Khalisa fought to escape. After a long moment Khalisa finally relented and locked the door. “I won’t leave you,” Jacquin swore through the wood and crouched into a fighting stance before Khalisa’s home.
Changlings continued to stream past, but none of them even glanc
ed at her. She tensed, holding her knife tighter. Something was going on. Why weren’t they attacking her? Still, she wouldn’t question it if it kept Khalisa safe.
A sharp hiss of pain caught Jacquin’s attention and she turned to the noise. Her breath caught in her throat. Her heart froze. A silver-cloaked figure, identical to the protector in her visions, fought a mob of changlings nearby. A changling grabbed what Jacquin could now see clearly was a woman by the throat and threw her to the ground, knocking her hood aside. Jacquin watched in rapt attention as the woman fought back, leaping to her feet and dodging two swords at once. Jacquin had never seen her guardian without her hood. The woman’s features were instantly etched into memory: her short, asymmetrical hair a shocking pale silver, her features sharp and elegant. Jacquin could make out a ropey, muscular frame beneath her loose travel clothes, her skill with the sword exceptional in one no older than fifteen tenmoons.
The woman stabbed one of her attackers and dodged another when she locked eyes with Jacquin. She paused for a moment, almost as if in recognition, the distraction long enough for one of her changling attackers to cut a long gash down her back, slicing through cloak and shirt.
The woman screamed, falling to her knees from the wound and Jacquin charged forward. She attacked in a series or kicks and twists, a deadly whirlwind of grace and ferocity. Each attack was a blend of movement and basic swordplay, her motions unique and unpredictable, like a freestyled dance.
The woman struggled to her feet, clenching her jaw against her pain and easing her back against Jacquin’s. They fought back-to-back, dodging and thrusting in time, moving as if they’d fought together for years. There was something about the way the woman moved, the way she fought back against her own pain to survive, the way her body fit with Jacquin’s no matter what angle they met that was instantly familiar. Within minutes Jacquin was convinced that her guardian in her dreams hadn’t been a manifestation of her mind: she had been a vision.
With their skills combined, Jacquin and the figure quickly dispatched the small band of changlings, their feline bodies lying in a crumpled heap on the desert floor. In the distance, Jacquin could finally hear the heavy stomp of Oasis guards. They must be overtaking the changling bandits.
The woman in silver collapsed to the ground, her energy vanishing with her adrenaline as the immediate threat was resolved. Jacquin wrapped her arms beneath the woman’s shoulders and pulled her back to her feet. The woman clung to her waist, using her for support as Jacquin dragged her to Khalisa’s wagon.
Jacquin pounded on the door and Khalisa instantly pulled her inside, locking the door behind them. The woman’s sword clattered to the floor of the wagon as she went limp in Jacquin’s arms.
Jacquin laid the woman face-down on Khalisa’s bed, peeling away the dirty, damaged cloak and cutting away the back of her shirt. “She’s hurt.” Jacquin’s voice was heavy with grief and desperation. Every moment of peace she’d felt because of her protector’s presence, every deadly vision her protector had guided her out of ran through her mind. The woman was no stranger. She was Jacquin’s dearest friend.
Khalisa grabbed a wet rag and began cleaning the woman’s wounds. The woman drifted in and out of unconsciousness, waking just long enough to panic and try to escape before passing out again from the wild movements. The scent of her blood filled the wagon, sharp and metallic as it ran down her back every time she tried to stand.
Jacquin crouched over the bedmat, angling herself to be at eye level with her guardian as she woke again and fought to stand.
Jacquin grabbed her shoulders, her face twisted with concern and fear. “You need to stop fighting. You’ll bleed to death.”
The woman paused as she saw Jacquin, looking deep into Jacquin’s eyes. Once again Jacquin felt the woman recognized her. “Who are you?” The woman’s voice was rich and deep, husky with pain. Jacquin’s heart jumped. Her guardian had never spoken before.
“Jacquin n’Huitaca of the Dey Sorormin Tribe. Who are you?”
Khalisa paused her cleaning in surprise. “You don’t know her?”
The woman fought to stand again and failed. Jacquin’s face fell, her lips falling into a hard, straight line. “I saved your life. At least tell me your name.”
The woman hesitated. “Adrian,” she finally admitted.
Khalisa glanced over Adrian at her sister. Jacquin reached out and took Adrian’s shoulders as she nodded and Khalisa poured a bottle of brandy over Adrian’s back. Adrian screamed in pain as the alcohol worked to disinfect her wounds. Jacquin leapt up and held Adrian’s shoulders down as Khalisa pinned her hips. Adrian arched, too strong for Jacquin to pin, grabbed Jacquin around the waist and tackled her to the floor. The motion pulled at Adrian’s wound and she shouted in pain, tears streaming down her face as she passed out, her head falling on Jacquin’s waist.
Jacquin felt every muscle in her body spasm and tremble. She was hypersensitive to the weight of Adrian’s limp form draped across her waist. The places where Adrian’s face and shoulders, bare from struggling in a destroyed shirt, pressed against Jacquin’s stomach burned. Jacquin clenched and unclenched her fists, her arms aching and stinging.
Khalisa eased Adrian off her sister and back to the floor. “Did she hurt you?“
“No,” Jacquin assured her, her voice soft and breathless.
“Then here.” Khalisa handed Jacquin her wet rag, now stained with Adrian’s blood. She rushed to her desk, pulling out a sewing needle and holding it over a candle.
Jacquin turned her attention to Adrian, mopping up the fresh blood that had welled from her wound. She ran her fingers lightly over Adrian’s bare skin, soft and warm despite her injury. The lines of her shoulder blades rose sharply from her back, the lines of muscle and bone betraying a hard life of constant travel. Jacquin’s hands found Adrian’s hair and she marveled at how soft it was despite its metallic appearance. Jacquin had never seen hair so strikingly silver on someone so young. She wondered if it was magic or more common in people from the north.
“Hold her down. She might wake,” Khalisa ordered as she knelt beside Adrian, sterilized needle in hand.
Jacquin looked down at Adrian and couldn’t find the desire to pin her. Instead, she moved out of Khalisa’s way and positioned Adrian’s head comfortably on her lap. She soothed the woman with gentle strokes through her hair and over her shoulders as Khalisa stitched her wound closed, the white thread quickly turning scarlet with blood.
Adrian began to stir against Jacquin and she instinctually bent and kissed the top of Adrian’s head. Khalisa paused, looking up at her sister in surprise and Jacquin’s breath caught in her lungs in surprise.
“You sure you don’t know her?” Khalisa questioned.
Jacquin shook her head. “I don’t know.”
Adrian stirred again and Khalisa quickly finished her stitching, tying a knot at Adrian’s hip to secure the sutures. Adrian grunted in pain and tried pressing off the floor. Jacquin shushed her, petting her hair and shoulders like a sick child. “Don’t move. You’ll pull a stitch.”
Adrian slowly grabbed Jacquin’s knees, assessing her surroundings while forcing herself to remain calm. She looked up, meeting Jacquin’s eyes with her hazel ones, the color of her irises seeming to swim and flash in time with Adrian’s exhaustion.
Adrian’s face twisted in confusion and pain, her silver-white brows knitting over wide eyes. “You helped me?”
“You fought for our Tribe.”
A calm seemed to settle between Adrian and Jacquin, a familiarity and comfort that blocked out the rest of the world and encircled them in peace. Jacquin moved to brush her fingers through Adrian’s hair again and Adrian caught her hand, entwining their fingers. Her grip was solid, protective. Jacquin’s heart trembled in her chest.
Suddenly, Adrian winced as if she’d torn a stitch, but her wound remained sealed. She pulled her hand violently away from Jacquin’s and struggled to get away. Jacquin felt a sharp ache as Adrian broke away from her
, leaping to her feet in concern.
“You have to stay still!”
Adrian struggled to her feet, her face twisted with too many emotions for Jacquin to comprehend. Khalisa reached out to her and Adrian pushed her away and threw open the wagon door, letting the scents and sounds of battle flood the wagon again.
“Adrian!” Jacquin shouted, the woman’s name tearing from her throat.
Adrian hesitated a moment in the doorway, every muscle in her body tense, sand brushing past her from the desert beyond. Instead of turning back, Adrian charged back into Oasis, fleeing into the chaos of battle.
Jacquin ran out after her, but Adrian had already disappeared. The pathways of the Tribe were littered with bodies, the scent of death and corpses frying in the desert sun was overwhelming. Jacquin refused to linger over the bodies of her Tribe. She didn’t know who had died, but she knew she had grown up with every one of them, had shared warm summer days dancing with them, cold winter nights curled with them beside a fire. If she let herself see them now, she’d be overcome with grief.
The fighting had died down. There were more wounded being carried to healers than warriors battling changlings. Oasis guards in their burnt orange uniforms charged through the settlement, rounding up surviving marauders.
A loud bang boomed through the air, shaking the ground hard enough to knock Jacquin to her knees. A glowing, swirling dome rose high over the walls of Oasis, sealing the entire town beneath a protective force field. Jacquin looked around in shock and spotted dozens of mages standing atop the town walls, their arms raised high into the air. Jacquin felt a deep ache in her chest as if she’d been suddenly cut off from the rest of the world.
Jacquin reached out for an Oasis guard, his skin dark enough to betray a blood connection to the Tribe. “What’s going on?”
“Another band of changlings was spotted on the horizon. We’ve sealed Oasis. Nothing can get in or out. Return home. We’ll find the rest of the changlings. When we’re sure the town and our perimeter outside the force field are safe, we’ll lift the spell.”
Sands of Aggar: Amazons of Aggar Book 3 Page 8