Motioning for them to stay put, Ky belly-crawled to Eirnin and tapped his shoulder.
Eirnin lifted his head with a grimace, glaring daggers at Obasi’s broad back, but he still muttered an answer to Ky’s unspoken question. “Watchtower. Thirty paces to our left. Another step and they would have seen us.”
And this was why they had brought him along. Turned out Dacheren was located in the worst place of all: right under the Takhran’s nose in one of the many little valleys that jutted off of Mount Eiphyr. According to Eirnin, the entire mountain was dotted with watchtowers, and a whole ring of them surrounded the slave camp. In exchange for his freedom, the man had agreed to guide them through it, with Obasi’s threat of dismemberment if he failed to keep his word. Ky hoped Birdie wouldn’t mind, but she had chosen to go gallivanting off with the army instead of keeping her promise to help rescue the slaves.
He wriggled up to peer over the bush. Sure enough, the thin moon cast just enough light to reveal the shape of the watch station a little below them and to their left. It was a large wooden cylinder with a conical roof, built atop a tripod fashioned from massive zoar logs.
He dropped back down. “There’s no light inside.”
“Of course not.” Eirnin hissed. “Come now, do you think the Khelari are idiots? Scouts can see more at night when their eyes are adjusted to the dark. There are sure to be two guards and as many ravens. If they spot us, the alarm will reach Serrin Vroi in no time.”
Obasi snorted. “You should have led us another way.”
“There is no other way. It is the same all over this side of the mountain. We will have to move slowly past the tower. Two at a time. Next pair doesn’t move until the first pair reaches that stand of trees beyond. Shelter until all are in the trees, and then move on from there.”
“You sure this is wise, Ky?” Gull echoed the doubt in his mind. “What if it’s a trap?”
“Not worth it.” Eirnin drawled. “My life was forfeit the moment your Songkeeper took me captive.” Saved his life, more like, from what Ky had heard of the story. “Sticking with you lot buys me more time, and whatever they may say, time is a precious thing.”
Trap or not, Ky had decided before setting out that this mission was worth the risk. Worth any risk. Chickening out now made no sense. “Let’s go.”
With a grunt, Obasi hauled up on the chain, almost choking Eirnin as he scrambled for his crutches and tried to get his feet under him.
Enough.
Ky yanked the chain from his hand. “Don’t be a fool, man. You’ll get all of us caught.” The Saari turned on him, head thrust back, chin jutting in challenge. Wild hair stood out around his head like a mane. It gave him an uncanny resemblance to a lion. Ky bent to retrieve Eirnin’s crutches and shoved them into his hands. “He comes with me.”
Together, they started out across the open space. It was slow going that required dozens of pauses to allow for Eirnin’s hobble as they ducked in and out of the shadows. The thump-crunch of the crutches grated on his nerves. He felt a fool holding the chain and leading a man around on a collar like a hound on a leash. But somehow they made it past the tower without alarm and plunged into the stand of trees.
Eirnin fetched up against a tree trunk and lowered himself to the ground, and Ky gladly dropped the chain. It wasn’t like the man could run away. He crouched at the edge of the stand, watching as the raiders snuck up in pairs. With each crackling leaf, he expected a raven call or shouted challenge, but the watchtower remained silent.
Dawn tinged the eastern sky pink before they were all clustered beneath the trees, thickening the cramped space with stifled breaths and the stink of sweat and the rapid pulse of adrenaline pumping through their veins. The crossing had taken longer that Ky expected. He pushed through the huddled mass to Eirnin’s side. “How much farther?”
The man’s face looked gray in the pale light, drawn with pain and weariness. “We are here.”
With Gull’s aid, Ky managed to leverage the man to his feet. Together, they pressed on to the far side of the stand of trees, with Obasi behind them, and then Eirnin motioned them down again. They left the rest of the raiders there. Just a quick reconnaissance mission to scout the area, search for weak spots, and then fall back briefly to plan the assault. Eirnin led them at a crawl up the long, heather-clad slope that broke before them, dragging his crutches behind him. It looked painful. But Ky didn’t have time to dwell upon that. Long before they reached the edge overlooking the valley below, he could hear the noise of the slave camp: the ragged clatter of tool striking metal and rock, the snap of a whip, voices crying out in pain.
The whump-thump of ryree powder catching flame halted him in his tracks. He dropped flat, cheek pressed to the dirt, until the rumble of an explosion far beneath the ground shivered into stillness again. A breeze wafted out of the valley, bringing with it the thick cinnamon scent of ryree powder and something else—something less sweet, something that stuck in your craw and wormed its way down your throat to your stomach.
The stench of rot and death.
Eirnin halted on the crest of the slope and swept a hand down to encompass the view. “There you have it.” He sucked in a ragged breath. “Dacheren.”
Beyond the crest, the earth dropped away into a wide basin, ringed about on all sides by towering hills. Gaping holes gouged the sides of the basin, tunnels that bored into the heart of the earth. Even at this unearthly hour, slaves teemed before the tunnels, bent beneath baskets of rock and earth that they emptied in mounds. Others sifted through the mounds, shuffling rock and dirt into other baskets that still more slaves carted to a second ring of mounds behind the first. Fires burned in enormous fire pits, casting a garish, smoke-ridden glow over the operation.
But Ky’s gaze was drawn inward, past the diggings and fire pits to a ring of cages at the center of the camp, all packed so densely that the slaves slept standing up, slumped against one another, arms and legs protruding from the sides like the shattered limbs of a tree. Beside the cages, two large canvas-covered carts stood hitched to four horse teams. A dozen slavekeepers approached the carts in pairs, limp forms slung between them. The lead pair dumped their burden on the ground beside one of the carts and slung back the canvas.
It was piled high with bodies. Only . . . Ky’s stomach squirmed at the ripple of movement. They weren’t dead. The slavekeepers tossed their six slaves onto the carts and lashed the canvas down again and strolled away in conversation. As if it were the most natural thing in the world. As if they were not the truest monsters in the Takhran’s service.
“Those too weak to work are carted away.”
Aghast, Ky turned to Eirnin and saw none of the horror he felt reflected in the man’s eyes. “Where do they take them?”
“To the Pit.”
Just the sound of it made his skin crawl. He had gleaned enough from what had befallen Birdie and Amos to realize that the atrocities of the slave camps were nothing compared to the Pit, and now those wretched folk were being carted there, half dead. He gritted his teeth and allowed himself a moment to imagine sinking a sling-bullet into the skull of every slavekeeper present.
“Hounds.” Gull tapped his arm, drawing his gaze to the sides of the basin. Stationed every few hundred feet or so, slavekeepers and hounds formed a ring about halfway down the slope. A watchtower like the one they had snuck past overlooked the bowl directly opposite their location, and a second loomed a little farther to their right. Seemed like a lot of guards for slaves so weak and ill treated.
“So, what’s the plan?”
“Not dying.”
A whip cracked, saving him from the need to form a better answer. Near one of the tunnels, a slavekeeper pounced on a small limp form sprawled in the dirt. Looked like a child. A girl. The whip snapped again, and Ky cursed the slavekeeper between his teeth. Turned back to Gull and opened his mouth to give the order—any order. But a high-pitched shriek yanked him back to the scene. A pale-haired boy barreled toward the slavekeep
er with uneven, loping strides.
Syd?
The air drained from Ky’s lungs. He shot up to his knees, straining to see. The slavekeeper lashed out with a backhand that cut off the boy’s scream and knocked him flat beside the girl. Wispy brown hair concealed her face, but Ky recognized her. He lunged forward.
Obasi yanked him back, held him flat with his weight bearing down on his chest. “Fool! Now you would get us caught?”
He thrashed against Obasi’s hands, skull grinding into the earth as he bucked and twisted. Barely registered Gull’s face peering over the Saari’s shoulder. “Let me up. I got to go!”
“Ky, what is it? What’s wrong?”
Obasi’s hand settled over his mouth. He choked out the words around the grit driven in by the man’s lean fingers. “It’s Meli. They’ve got Meli!”
•••
“Let him go.”
The Saari warrior cast a withering look at Gull and then reluctantly pulled back. His knees jabbed into Ky’s chest as he rose, driving the last gasp of air from his lungs. Wheezing, Ky shot into a crouch and rounded on Eirnin. The man reached for his crutches, but Ky got there first. Stamped a foot down on them, pinning the crutches to the ground.
“You knew about this, didn’t you?”
Eirnin raised his hands, like he was trying to fend off a wild beast. “No, I swear . . .”
“My friends are down there.”
“But . . . wasn’t that the point of all this? Thought you wanted to find your friend.”
“Not them.” Ky’s voice shook. Quavered like a worn bowstring. But he didn’t care. “They weren’t supposed to be here.” He seized the front of Eirnin’s robe and tried to haul him to his feet, but the man weighed a good bit more than he did. “They were supposed to be somewhere safe. Not captured by your kind and left to rot here.”
“I swear, I knew nothing. Nothing at—” Eirnin’s voice cut out suddenly. His mouth gaped, and shock widened his eyes. He sagged forward into Ky, and the point of the bolt protruding from his chest scraped down Ky’s arm.
Hounds bayed. A horn blared in the basin.
Eirnin collapsed, his weight forcing Ky backward to the ground. A second bolt whipped past above Ky’s head. It would have struck him if he’d still been standing. No time for shock. No time to be stunned. He crawled free of the man’s weight, and then Gull seized his arm and dragged him back down the slope.
“Come on. We have to go!”
“What?” Ky tore free of his grip.
“We’ve been spotted. We’ve lost the element of surprise. We need to leave!”
“No.” He swung back toward the basin, momentarily latching eyes with Obasi as he did so. The Saari warrior crouched on the rim, eyes aflame with anger. It matched the fury burning in Ky’s chest. Meli was down there. Syd too. And no telling how many other runners. No way in Al Tachaad, Dacheren, or the Pit itself was he going to walk away from them. He yanked the sling from his waist and slid a sling-bullet into the pouch. “Pass the word: scatter strike. Move fast and hit hard. We attack.”
32
With a speed born of long practice, the raiders burst from the trees, surged up the slope, and then scattered along the rim of the bowl before sweeping down into the basin. They shrieked as they came, like hawks on the wing. And the fierce beauty of the sound set the battle fury loose in Ky’s chest. He held his ground as they raced past, painted faces lifted to the sky, hawk feathers streaming from their shoulder blades. He took out the first two slavekeepers and hounds that started up the slope. Sling-bullets slammed into helms and skulls and sent all four sprawling. The snap and hiss of his sling eased the thundering panic that had taken over at the sight of Meli. Adrenaline roared through him.
Loading on the run, he took off down the slope. Sometimes a fellow couldn’t honor all his promises. Sometimes all the odds in the world were stacked against him. Maybe finding and saving Paddy was beyond his grasp, but protecting Meli was one promise that he aimed to keep.
The first screams hit his ears.
He slammed to a halt. Drawn weapons flashed in the hands of the slavekeepers in the basin, but instead of attacking the raiders hurtling down the slope, they fell upon the slaves. And these slavekeepers did not carry the whips and clubs that he had seen before. Steel sliced through flesh and bone, felling the slaves where they stood, pinning those in the cages to the earth. It was massacre. Cold-blooded slaughter to prevent them from being freed.
But why . . . Why?
Even as the question screamed through his mind, the answer hurtled in after it. Migdon had warned him once how the Takhran dealt with those who interfered with his plans. Warned him, and he had been too bullishly stubborn to listen. He drove forward, slinging faster and harder than he had ever slung before. His heart thudded with each ground-swallowing stride.
A slavekeeper fell. The hound behind dodged his shot, and its teeth tore into his arm. He spun away. His second shot broke its skull. To his left, a raider went down, shot in the leg. And then another, with a bolt to the neck. The body fell in his path.
He leapt over it and kept on running.
Kept on slinging.
While death scythed through the camp, and he was helpless to stop it.
•••
His lass was gone.
Traipsed off into the deep places of the earth, carrying with her the last shreds of light in this horrible nightmare that had consumed his life. Amos dug his nails into his scalp, but the images that flitted across his vision, the voices that bludgeoned his ears, they could not be ignored. Huddled on a rock, torch dead and cold at his feet, alone in the haunting silence of the well, he rocked slightly. Back and forth. Back and forth. Worthless movement, but it was the only way to ease the relentless drive to break and run.
The Takhran had crushed him, like one crushed a pesky nightmoth between thumb and forefinger. He had split him open, torn him apart, smothered him with the inescapable knowledge of every gaping failure, and then plucked out every scrap of courage, everything he had ever hoped or believed, everything that made him Hawkness—everything that made him Amos—and scattered it to the winds.
Left him an empty husk.
Amos licked his bloodless lips and wished again that the pain would end, that darkness would claim his body as well as his mind. He had tried to force it once, sought to cast himself from the cliff overlooking the Pit, but the Khelari had been too swift and the chains too tight for him to succeed. But now, he was free. There were no Khelari to hold him back. And yet he couldn’t bring himself to it.
The creak of the rope caught his ear. Someone descended into the well shaft. A minute later, booted feet scuffed across rock. The sharp snap of flint on steel rang out and then the flutter of a torch. Instinctively, his hand moved toward his side, toward the space on his belt that had housed his dirk. But there was no dirk now, and while he could not bring himself to end his life, he saw little reason to defend it.
He did not turn around.
“Hawkness.” Nisus’s voice steadied the rapid beating of his heart. But there was another step, a lighter step with him. Not Jirkar—it was much too graceful for that. “Sym is with me. We have come to get you. The Songkeeper is in danger. She will need your help.”
That started his heart racing again, pulse hammering in his temple until it felt like someone had clamped a vise around his head. But no . . . Birdie had marched alone into the dark. He had no concept of the time that had passed since then, save for the dead torch and the gnawing in the hollow of his stomach. But Nisus had come through the well shaft. He could not have seen Birdie since she left him.
The dwarf stepped nearer. “This is it, Hawkness. This is the battle we have been fighting for since the beginning. Things are drawing to a close, just like Artair said they would.”
Again with Artair. Amos bit his tongue to halt the tide of curses. It would make no difference. The dwarf persisted in dredging through the past for proof for his misplaced belief in Artair, like one sea
rching a bog for a drowned man. Way he saw it, a man worth believing in wouldn’t have gotten himself drowned in the first place. There was nothing Artair could do to save them. Nothing anyone could do.
And certainly not him.
Sooner Nisus acknowledged that, the better.
The dwarf shook his head, chuckling ruefully to himself. “Jirkar told me not to come. He leads the others to Dacheren with the Caran and Sa Itera, to join with the Saari under Matlal Quahtli to take Serrin Vroi. That’s where I should be. And yet here I am.”
“Why are ye here?”
“Because we need you, Hawkness. The little Songkeeper needs you.” Bitterness tinged his voice. “Or would you abandon her too, like you abandoned Artair?”
Amos jerked his head up and stared the dwarf in the eyes, finally allowing every ounce of the rage and pain and horror seething inside to bleed through onto his face. Nisus blanched. And he hated it, even while a twisted part of him took satisfaction in it, because at last Nisus was seeing clearly. Seeing him clearly.
Sym shouldered past the dwarf and leveled her gaze at him, undaunted. The torch flared in her hand. She too had ventured into the depths . . . but she had come out again.
The hollow that the Pit had carved within him gaped wider and deeper before her stare. He broke away and snapped back to Nisus, ready to squelch any last hope the fool might have for him. “D’ ye know why I’m free? The Takhran released me. He saw the wreck an’ ruin that he had made, knew that he had broken me, an’ reveled in it. So, no, there’s naught left o’ Hawkness now. Naught that can help the Songkeeper. ’Tis best I stay away from her.”
“Best for her or best for you?” Sym’s voice was hard. Without pity.
Song of Leira Page 34