by Guy Antibes
“How did you know what to do?” Sara said. “You had to have plans to the palace.”
“Linssa gave them to me. You have to take her with you,” Meldey said.
‘Withus.” Sara couldn’t bear to leave Meldey behind.
“How long has it been?”
“Three days,” Willa said. “And we followed all of the instructions in your note.”
“Good. Jinsi will contact Linssa and plan… our, “ Meldey put an emphasis on the ‘our’, “escape from Okalla. Linssa will have to do some escaping on her own. She’s been guarded for some time. Her husband suspects her of treason and with good reason since she’s been an agent of Parthy since she returned many years ago from her stay in Parth.” Meldey’s voice weakened as she talked.
“That’s enough for now,” Willa said. “You take some more soup and we’ll get Jinsi back to look at your wound.”
“Halberd. In Belonnia, They are ceremonial weapons, but, unfortunately, they still work,” Meldey said as she closed her eyes. Her breathing became heavy and regular.
“Sleep will do her good.” Willa turned to Sara. “And I think you as well.”
~
Two days later, Sara could walk around the house and Meldey seemed to perk up as well, although her wound kept her bedridden and she looked a bit feverish. The three ambulatory women sat in the first level of the basement.
“When can we leave?” Lily fidgeted in her chair. “I can’t stand cornered down in this windowless basement. It’s been nearly a week.”
“You ask me that five times a day, Lily. You’re an intelligent woman, aren’t you? Do you think we can leave while Meldey is still recovering,” Willa said.
Lily peered at Willa with pleading eyes. “Yes. Yes! I’m not one to be cooped up like chickens or pigs or rats in a dungeon.”
“Perhaps we can spend a little time outside. Like walking around in the fresh air. Who’s to stop us?”
“I am.” A pair of feet with thickish ankles began to descend the steep stairs from above. Linssa Pockmakle soon made it to the bottom. “We will all leave just before night. I have arranged a large cart of garbage to stop at this house. It has a compartment with room for four of us.”
“Five,” Sara said. “There are five of us.”
“Meldey will have to take her chances. She wasn’t counted on to survive,” Linssa said, sitting on the only remaining seat, a stool. “Once we are out of the city, we can walk and make our way to the sea and sail to Parthy. It’s not far.”
“No,” Sara said. “It’s three days to the coast and the sea is not safe. We came in a Belonnian vessel and I’m sure the captain knew the identity of the Emperor. By now, they will know our descriptions and be on the lookout for all of us. No, I wouldn’t trust any vessel to take us to Parthy.” Besides, Sara wouldn’t let Meldey to fend for herself, not in her condition, to do otherwise would be abandonment.
“But you must, my dear, it’s the only way.”
“I’m going through the mountains. I know it’s winter, but the Eastern Mountains are much smaller than the ones that protect Shattuk Downs.”
“The Emperor has troops stationed along the major passes,” Linssa said.
Sara shook her head. “It’s shorter to the mountains than it is to the sea and there’ll be just as many soldiers, maybe more, patrolling the roads. They won’t expect us to flee over land. You can take the sea passage—I won’t.”
“I’ll go with you, Linssa. The two of us can make it,” Lily said. “I have to get out of here and two might actually be easier than four.”
Linssa gave Sara a hard look. “You’re a hard-headed girl, but I wish you luck. Do you have the tattoo kit that Meldey gave you?”
Willa looked hard at Linssa. “How did you know about those?”
The Belonnian snorted. “Who do you think procured them? Lily will need a tattoo and I need to modify mine. You’ll need the book to get to where you’re going. I have my own.”
Six hours later, Jinsi poked her head down from the main level of her house. “The cart is here.”
Linssa stood as Lily gave Sara and Willa a hug. “We’ll get together again when we reach Parth,” Lily said. She brightened up. “I’ll see you at the house.” She gave Sara one last wave and headed up the stairs.
Willa squinted at them, with as hard an expression as Sara had ever seen on the woman, as the two left and the trap door shut. “We won’t see either of them again.”
Sara couldn’t help but sigh. “I’m afraid you’re right. The Emperor’s troops will be combing the road to the sea. Perhaps with the faked travel documents and with the modified tattoos they might make it.”
“We can only pray to the One God that they will.” Willa closed her eyes and muttered with her lips.
“I didn’t know you practiced the religion,” Sara said.
Willa gave Sara a half-smile. “It doesn’t hurt to try. I’ll check on our patient.”
~
Meldey now could sit up to take her broth. After another two days, the bleeding had stopped from her wound and her color looked better. Jinsi nearly fell into the lower basement. “I just received word. Lily and Linssa were caught half a day from the sea. You’ll have to leave immediately.”
“We have to assume they will talk. Belonnians know how to extract information,” Meldey said.
Sara nodded in agreement. She’d been interrogated before and the worst of the bruises still decorated her body. “Tattoos.”
Willa used the ink on Sara’s wrist and cleaned off Meldey’s tattoo and put on another. While Sara put on Willa’s, Meldey examined the pass the prison matron had used to get into the Emperor’s presence.
“We can only hope this will get us out of the city.”
Sara had already memorized the street map of Okalla that would lead them east, away from the sea. From there they would head west towards the mountains, changing tattoos as they moved from province to province, according to the tattoo book. They weren’t ready yet. Meldey could do little more than sit up and hobble around.
“The cart has stopped around the corner,” Jinsi said. You can’t take many of your possessions. Hurry.”
Sara checked her knife and helped Meldey strap her own armaments on. Willa put clothes into old carpetbags for all of them. Jinsi had gone to the Black Market and bought used commoner clothes. The guns and ammunition lay wrapped in commoner underclothes at the bottom of Sara’s bag. Once they left the city, she would move them to the top.
Getting out of the city frightened Sara. She didn’t want to be tortured again, but she refused to stay any longer in Okalla. The ugliness with the assayer at her father’s mine a year and a half ago no longer bothered her as she had learned only too well to set unpleasantness aside and she vowed she would this time. Hans or Miller never appeared in any of her dreams
“Let’s go,” Willa said as she helped Meldey to her feet and up the ladder-like stair.
Jinsi’s husband stood at the top with a box of tools to secure the trapdoor shut. “The best of luck ladies. Make sure you people send us word of your arrival.” He shook his head. “Don’t end up like Linssa and Lily.”
Sara didn’t really care about Linssa, but she dreaded thinking about Lily. If only she hadn’t been so anxious to leave, Sara might have stood a chance of persuading her to stay. However, Lily made her own decisions. Sara couldn’t help dropping a tear or two as she thought of what Lily faced, if she wasn’t dead already. The thought chilled her. She well knew what Belonnians were capable of.
Meldey barely made it up to the main floor before she had to sit for a few minutes. The rooms were garish in the Okalla fashion, but age had muted the colors. Sara couldn’t wait to leave this city.
“I’ll get the cart,” Sara said. She stepped outside and spied the cart barely around the corner facing the cross street.
“Jinsi?” the man said.
Sara nodded and the man jumped from the cart and walked away from the corner in the opposite direct
ion. He didn’t look back. The street was one of the smaller roads in the capital. The houses all sported black paint and black wrought iron facings, but most of these were simple vertical bars.
She maneuvered the cart in front of Jinsi’s house as Willa and Jinsi’s husband helped Meldey to the back of the cart, settling her into a nest of blankets. Willa sat in the back with Meldey and Sara sat on the driver’s seat alone. The husband merely nodded and said ‘Luck’ in Belonnian and retreated back inside.
Sara had never felt so alone, even with the other two women in the back. Willa handed the pass to Sara and they were off.
~
Leaving the city didn’t present a problem. The sun told Sara that it was late afternoon and as they proceeded towards the Northwestern Gate, the traffic increased. Cart’s just like hers filled the road. Most were traders on their way home from the markets.
Their tattoos would be like most of those leaving the city. As they approached the gate, guards inspected all of the carts and Sara could see those in line pushing up their sleeves.
“Tattoos,” the guard said. Sara could hear the weariness in his voice. All three of the women complied.
“Why were you in Okalla?” he said. He might have said it a thousand times already.
“Missa took ill at market five days ago. We stayed at her sister’s house while she mended. Now we’re taking her to Vissing, our village. Here is our pass.” Sara said, handing him the white card. “Missa’s sister works in the palace.”
The guard opened the carpetbags and not seeing anything interesting closed them and waved them on. He took an apple from the bag of food that Jinsi had left and waved them on, giving the pass back to Sara.
“He didn’t find anything worth stealing,” Willa said in Parthian.
“Silence, you will wake Missa,” Sara said in Belonnian, mimicking Jinsi’s more common accent as best as she could. “He did take an apple, you will notice. I would have given him one hundred apples. Now stay quiet.”
Willa reddened. “Of course,” she said in her version of Belonnian.
Sara didn’t see anyone in hearing distance, but she had to remind Willa not to speak Parthian. They were in enemy territory and any slip-up would get them in the same cell that probably held Linssa and Lily.
~
Three more days to the mountains. They slept by the side of the road. Meldey rested on a pile of blankets. Willa remained in the cart, giving warmth to their patient. Sara’s was too tall to comfortably sleep in the cart, so she took an extra blanket and slept underneath. Supper had been cold and she was the only one capable of unhitching the horse and hobbling it for the night.
They had taken refuge in a small wood that bordered two farms. Sara didn’t think it too much shelter as the bare branches of the coming winter afforded them little privacy.
A false dawn woke Sara. Willa and she helped Meldey attend to her morning duties. The assassin hardly talked and plainly the rough road bothered her.
“What I wouldn’t give for a cup of hot tea,” Willa said in Parthian. She said it so quietly that Sara barely heard her remarks.
“Soon enough. We take what deprivations chance gives us. We’ve been through it before.”
“That was different. We were surrounded by able-bodied men to protect us on our Shattuk Downs campaign,” Willa said clutching a blanket around her.
Willa’s complaining surprised her. “Patience,” Sara said, feeling a little smug at the counsel.
“I’m worried.” Willa looked at Meldey, who had fallen asleep. Meldey’s condition rattled her companion. It bothered Sara as well and she didn’t want to dig a friend’s grave in the Eastern Mountains.
She patted Willa’s hand. “I’m concerned, too, but there is little we can do. The sooner we cross into Parthy, the better for us all. Let’s get the guns loaded and accessible.”
Sara shivered in the cold. All of them wore a blanket like a shawl over their clothes. Once the guns were loaded and wrapped in a single piece of underclothes, they ate a cold breakfast of apples and carrots, taking a drink from their water jug.
Meldey ate a few bites and took a few sips of water. At least she had something in her, but she soon fell back to sleep. They set off in the gloom of pre-dawn. The ruts in the road had frozen overnight, making the cart judder and sway as they rode over the rough dirt road. Sara heard Meldey moan a few times. Sara wondered if she’d last the four days it would take to get to the mountains and over them.
They approached a village. The inhabitants were stringing paper lanterns and busy cleaning the streets as the sun emerged from hiding.
“It’s Winters Rise,” Sara said. “I completely forgot.”
“Me, too,” Willa said in Belonnian.
“Oh to be in Stonebridge,” Sara might have been spending the day with Klark instead of slowly making her way west to an uncertain freedom.
The road would take them directly through a village, as Sara couldn’t remember any road around. This must be Vissing and it looked like a bigger version of the other villages they stayed at on their trip to Okalla. Once they passed Vissing, they would re-do their tattoos.
As they made their way through the town, Sara listened to a lot of back and forth chatter. These people didn’t sound very distressed and, indeed, all were excited about Winter’s Rise. Sara didn’t know how the Belonnians celebrated the start of the new year.
A young guard stopped them as they passed through the small market square. “Tattoos.”
Sara unrolled the cuff of her sleeve, as did Willa. Meldey slept in the back. “Where to? You don’t live here.”
“My cousin fell ill at our farm towards Okalla. She lives in Oska.” Sara moved her head towards the road out of the village. “We want to get her home before Winter’s Rise is over.” Sara smiled. “Lots of food and boys there.”
The guard grinned and took her wrist. “Lots of boys here. Stay the night. I will make sure you enjoy tarrying in Vissing.”
“I certainly would, but for my cousin. She isn’t feeling well at all. I fear it may be her last Rise.”
The guard pursed his lips. “I fear it may be your last Rise.” His grip strengthened. “Get down, please.”
“Sakka, leave that girl alone.” A woman walked over to the cart. “You know better than to harass strangers in the village. The Council is enraged enough by your evil presence.” Sakka’s hand grabbed onto Sara’s wrist.
“She might be a fugitive. We are on the lookout for a young woman.”
“One woman turned into three? I’ve seen the dispatch. A tall young woman. I see a tall young woman and a sick woman and a mother? Older cousin?”
“She helps on our farm,” Sara said. “My cousin is very sick.”
Meldey moaned. “Where am I?” Those were Parthian words.
“Come down from there!” he said, still grasping her hand.
Sara leaned over and pulled her knife out and drew it across the top of Sakka’s hand. He let go. She was ready to jump down from the cart and fight for her life.
Sara’s eyes flashed, “I won’t have my virtue questioned by the likes of you. Now my cousin speaks gibberish while our stay here only brings on more delirium.”
Sakka wrapped a handkerchief around his bleeding hand. He tried to pull out his sword. “Trouble, Martta?” A large man put his hand on Sakka’s.
“Our only guard has been accosting women again. He needs to be taught a lesson,” Martta said. “I think a day or two in his own jail might do him a world of good.”
“It has before, my love.” The man punched Sakka in the head, rendering him unconscious and dragged him away. “Winter’s Rise will be so much better. Thank you for the excuse to rid ourselves of his presence for a day or two. If, by chance, youwere responsible in any way for taking our beloved Emperor’s life, we all thank you. Wait a moment.”
Sara wondered if she should bolt away, but no one seemed to be bothered by one of the villagers dragging away the village guard. Martta could bring
the entire village down on them, so Sara waited, still afraid of what might happen. Willa had put her hand in their sack of clothes, undoubtedly clutching a gun as Meldey slept through it all.
The woman carried a pot with towels wrapped around it along with a bag. “Breakfast stew for Winter’s Rise. It’s hot and will last you three all day long. Thank you for the excuse you gave my husband of throttling the little weasel who wants to rule our lives. Good luck and now begone!” Martta grinned.
“Thank you. I won’t forget what you’ve done.”
“Think of it as a Winter’s Rise present.”
Sara snapped the reins and the cart ambled out of town. The sun had cleared the horizon and as they left, she felt the warmth of its rays on her back. The sun didn’t compare to the warmth she felt by the good wishes of Martta, the woman in Vissing.
~~~
Chapter Sixteen
A Tragic Morning
A few hours later, Sara turned off into a little glade. “Tattoos.”
“I’m more interested in food. I hope what that woman gave us is still hot. What is breakfast stew?” Willa said.
Sara didn’t know. “I’ll bet it’s good.” She opened the pot. Dumplings filled the top and she could smell savory chicken. She didn’t hesitate to pull a tin plate and a long wooden spoon out of the bag. “It is.”
The two women ate in silence. Once Sara had eaten her fill, she shook Meldey. “You must eat this. It’s delicious.”
Meldey opened her eyes. “I’m not hungry.” Her voice came out as a croak.
“You must eat.” Willa said in her most imperious voice. It worked for a few spoonfuls of the liquid. Meldey wouldn’t eat any solid food except for a piece of dumpling smothered in the sauce. She fell asleep again.
Meldey had to make it—she had to. “Check her wound,” Willa said.
Sara unwound the blanket and saw a bloom of red on Meldey’s dress. “Oh no. It’s seeping.”