I felt the knife point scratch along my cheek just under my eye like the single claw of a kitten—a testing, teasing touch. I kept my eyes closed and thought of my quest. There was an unexpected peace in surrendering to the knowledge that I could not fulfill it. I had been willing to give up everything, including my life, but now it was time to die. I would try to keep silent when he hurt me. I could do no more.
I heard a thump and resisted the temptation to open my eyes, certain that was what Malik was waiting for. He meant my last sight to be of him. Instead, I pictured Maruman. I saw his battered body and his single bright eye, and I waited.
Then I heard the breathing of two people, though I held my own. One was heavy and regular and the other, fast and uneven. I opened my eyes to see Kevrik leaning over an unconscious Malik. He looked up at me and grinned. “I hit him hard enow to brain a bull, but he’s still breathing.”
“Oh, Kevrik,” I gasped. “I have never been so glad to see anyone!”
“Doubtless,” the armsman said wryly. He gently pulled me upright and grabbed Malik’s knife to cut the ropes about my wrists. I shook my head and asked him to untie them. “We will need the rope for him,” I croaked, nodding at the unconscious Malik.
Kevrik laid aside the knife and set about loosening the ropes, talking as he worked. “I’ve been following ye since he took ye from the camp. I thought he would nivver stop. Then when he did, I heard what he said, an’ I was afeard he’d stab ye afore I could get near enow to hit him with the rock. It was cursed ill luck that I dinna have my dagger.” He frowned over a stubborn knot. “I have nivver seen anyone look at any creature wi’ as much black hate as Malik looked at ye before he struck ye. An’ when it took me longer than I expected to fall far enough behind Vos an’ th’ others so I could turn back to th’ camp, I near went mad. I was sickened by what he had done to ye, but more sickened by the fact that others did nowt to stop him. Men I have laughed and drunk ale with and regarded as strong and courageous, all standin’ by and watching a man beat a bound maid.” He grimaced as if he had bitten into something foul.
“When I finally came within sight of Malik’s camp an’ saw ye’d nowt been kilt, I was so relieved that I dinna wonder why ye were nowt talking to me inside my head as ye said ye’d do in that dream ye put in my mind when I was unconscious outside the cells. When I did notice an’ wonder, I thought maybe ye’d been stunned. I was still ditherin’ like a ninnyhammer when the horses Vos an’ his men had ridden came gallopin’ hell fer leather along the road. It was only because I’d been looking at ye that I saw Malik grab ye. If I’d blinked, I would ha’e missed it. I just plunged after ye.”
The ropes loosened and fell away, and the armsman began to massage my wrists gently. I winced at the pain, but that pain was life, and incredulous joy swept through me. I had expected to die. I had prepared myself for it, and yet here I was, still alive. My quest had not relinquished me after all. Kevrik unhooked a water bladder from his belt, and I took it from him gratefully and drank. Then he took a long draft and restored it to his belt.
“What now?” he asked.
The welling delight I had felt a moment before faded as I thought of Gahltha and the horses. “I need to return to Malik’s camp. I was so sure I would be there to tell the horses what to do that I told them nothing save that they should stampede the camp and disarm as many men as they could. But even if they succeeded in that, how can horses keep humans prisoner?”
“It’s a long walk back,” Kevrik said. “The best or worst will have happened by now.”
I felt sick at the knowledge that he was right. “Do you think we are closer to the road or the old cloister?” I asked.
“The road,” Kevrik said decisively. “But it’s still a good long walk. More if ye mean to bring him.”
“I’m afraid we’ve no choice,” I said. I plucked at the demon band about my throat. “I wish I could get this off, because then I could farseek Zarak to come and help us.” Malik stirred and groaned. “Better tie him up well before he wakes. Then we’ll make a litter and drag him between us.”
“I can carry him some of the way,” Kevrik said as he tied the chieftain’s hands.
I fashioned bandage sandals for myself from strips of Malik’s shirt. Then I helped Kevrik get the rebel across his shoulders, grateful the armsman was almost as big as the chieftain. Even so, Kevrik staggered slightly under his burden before standing upright. We walked almost a half hour before Kevrik’s knees began to buckle. While he rested, I used the time to replenish the tattered bandage sandals. Then we constructed a rough litter. I did not look forward to pulling it, for my stomach hurt, and a fierce jabbing pain in my chest suggested that Malik had cracked one of my lower ribs. But worst was the weariness as my body fought to repair the damage and cope with the netted fatigue I had released. When we rested again after another bout of walking and dragging the litter, I had to fight the overpowering urge to just lie down and sleep.
When we headed off again, the moon had set and the forest darkened, making it harder to see our way. It was growing cold, too. This, as much as a desire to reach the road and find out what had been happening, kept us moving. As always when I was in physical discomfort, I found myself longing for absurd luxuries instead of simple necessities: a freshly made bed or a long soak in one of the hot springs in a mountain valley. I imagined eating a fresh-baked roll with butter melting into it as I sat in the battered chair that stood on my little turret-room balcony, Maruman lying on my lap.
Thinking of Maruman frightened me, because Gahltha had said the old cat intended to seek me out, but he had not done so. Hours had passed between the time the others had been taken from Noviny’s place and when the armsmen had returned for me—easily time enough for Maruman to have found his way to me. I feared less that he had been injured than that what happened had sent him into one of his fey wandering states.
I wondered if the blue-black night sky would ever lighten. It was impossible to believe that it had only been the previous evening when I had sat in the wagon on Noviny’s property, listening to the rain and brewing soup.
“How long until the sun rises?” I asked.
“Three hours maybe,” Kevrik panted, squinting up at the sky. The next time we stopped, I borrowed Malik’s knife and nearly cut my throat trying to pick the demon band’s lock so we could summon aid. Kevrik tried, too, but after only a minute he shook his head and said he had not the nerve for it. I must be patient and he would get a key for the band.
Malik muttered something in a slurred voice, and Kevrik and I exchanged an alarmed look. He was definitely waking. The highlander fetched a stone and gave the chieftain a solid knock on the head. By the time we went on again, the sky was lightening to a deep indigo. To pass the time and to take my mind off the horses, I asked Kevrik what happened after he had awoken outside the cell in Vos’s homestead.
The guard had awakened him, he said. The man remembered being hit by Kevrik, who had pretended to recall nothing and “noticed” that neither was now wearing a demon band. Kevrik remembered all that had happened between us, of course, but he also had a “memory” in which I told him how he had been knocked out and how I had decided to use this accident to make sure Vos did not regard him with suspicion. Kevrik then told the cell guard that the alarm bells they could hear must signal the capture of the Misfit who had tampered with their minds. Ironically, that had been the simple truth, and Kevrik had arrived just in time to do as I had asked: suggest to Vos that I be taken at once to Malik’s camp.
“You took a great risk, yet still I do not understand what you meant to achieve.”
“How else could I have made sure that I would be in the camp when the horses stampeded? I knew that we needed to overcome Malik and his men and take them prisoner as swiftly as possible so that someone could be sent to Sutrium to warn the Council of Chieftains about the invasion. Of course, I did not bargain on Malik grabbing me, but I daresay he did not bargain on you. How many of your men will stand wit
h us if they know the truth about Malik’s plan?”
“A good many of them,” Kevrik answered. “Once they are convinced it is not a trick. I would suggest letting Noviny speak to them. He is known as an honorable man.”
We walked very slowly now, for we were both weary, and my bandage sandals were wearing thin once more. Kevrik began to talk again, perhaps to distract himself from fatigue. He said that he had tried to saddle Gahltha to ride to Malik’s camp, thinking the black horse would want to go along. But Gahltha had backed away so determinedly that the armsman realized he had some other instruction.
“He was to release the other horses from the corral and deal with the armsmen who would try to stop them,” I said.
He nodded. “I realized as much when th’ black horse an’ th’ rest came past the tree where I was hidin’. I could tell they kenned I was there an’ on their side because your black horse came an’ butted his head against me.” He laughed softly at the memory. “Then th’ other horses came gallopin’ along the road an’ stampeded through the camp. Your black horse leapt out and the rest followed. No wonder Malik an’ his men stood there like dolts through it.”
We both fell silent, lacking the breath for anything but dragging. Then, at long last, just as the rising sun stained the sky with a pink and lemon glow, we saw the road.
Not until we had almost reached it did I notice the dead armsman lying in the middle of the road. From the queer horrible angle of his neck, he looked as if he had broken it when thrown from his horse. Sickened, I wondered how many men had died as a result of my commands.
We propped Malik against a sturdy tree, and Kevrik dragged the armsman’s body off the road, for it seemed disrespectful to leave it lying there. I was shocked to see him riffle through the man’s pockets, but then he held up a small gray key with a shout of triumph, and a moment later the demon band was unlocked.
I resisted the urge to hurl the loathsome thing into the trees and instead set it on the ground, knowing that sooner or later, someone was going to have to clean up the tainted material around Saithwold. Then I gave over thinking in the sheer joy of being able to send my mind spinning out. Having briefly experienced normality, I thought it such a wretched limited state that I wondered how Malik could value it so.
First I sought out Gahltha. He was still at Malik’s camp, and his welcome and relief were no less than mine at finding him safe. To my amazement, he said the horses were in control of Malik’s camp. The uninjured armsmen were penned up against the cliff edge, guarded by horses. Gahltha had sent Dovyn and a few horses back to Vos’s property, for the gray horse had a plan to ensure the humans there did not leave. They were too far away for him to beastspeak, Gahltha explained, but he was confident that Dovyn would manage, despite the fact that the men had weapons and a house to take refuge in. Indeed, he seemed surprised at how worried I had been. It occurred to me with some shame that, in imagining they would need a human captain, I had underestimated the horses almost as much as Malik had.
Predictably, Gahltha wanted to come and get me at once, but I insisted that I was safe and bade him stay to keep a close watch over his human prisoners. “We can’t risk any of them signaling the Herders; they might call off the invasion.”
“Is that not what you want?”
“It was, but now it seems we ought to let them land so we can take their ships, as Zarak suggested.”
During the laborious walk through the trees, I had done some thinking about Zarak’s idea of permitting the invasion so we could commandeer the ships. It would be a brilliant coup, allowing us not only a swift and unexpected way to reach the west coast, but also the means of bringing Dragon to the Red Land. To simply turn back the invaders would be a lesser victory, and the Faction warriors would be stronger when they invaded next. My only fear now, other than someone signaling the Herders, was that Malik might have planned to give some final signal to let the Faction know it was safe to land. The only way of learning would be to probe Malik. This would also allow us to learn the exact timing of the invasion. The thought of delving into Malik’s mind filled me with revulsion even as Kevrik removed the unconscious man’s demon band.
Withdrawing from Gahltha, I tried to farseek Zarak, but I realized he and the others must have set up camp close to the cloister’s tainted walls, for the probe would not locate. I sent my mind back to Gahltha, asking him to send a horse to let Zarak and the others know what had happened and to suggest they bring the wagon in the direction of Noviny’s property, where they would find Kevrik and me waiting by the roadside.
I farsought Dovyn, who sent that many of the thrown riders had walked back to the homestead by the time he and the other horses had returned. Dovyn said the humans believed that the horses had been forced to throw their riders. Instead of regarding them as enemies, they had begun herding them into the corral. Dovyn had expected this, and he had urged his equine warriors to allow themselves to be corralled, for Gahltha had shown them how to unlatch the gate and escape whenever they wished.
Nothing had happened for some time, and then several funaga-li came to saddle horses and ride off. The horses had thrown them as soon as they were out of sight of the homestead and returned at once, to the evident dismay of the humans, again allowing themselves to be caught. As Dovyn had surmised, the funaga-li were incapable of understanding that the horses acted under their own volition, and all of them had retreated into the house, clearly believing they were under siege by a human army. Soon the doors and windows of the homestead were bristling with armsmen who shot arrows out into the darkness all night long, though no one had approached. I could guess that Vos imagined an army of vicious Misfits surrounding his property and killing every rider he sent out.
Stifling laughter, I asked what had happened to the thrown humans, and Dovyn explained that dogs had been enlisted to keep watch over them. The two species did not normally cooperate in this way, but neither did they normally make war on funaga. The gray horse added that dogs were perfect guards, because their acute sense of smell allowed them to scent the intention of a captive funaga-li to attack or attempt escape. I guessed their human prisoners were far more unnerved at being attacked and guarded by a pack of dogs and horses than they would have been by a group of humans.
There had been no arrows fired since dawn, Dovyn sent, for the funaga-li had been able to see that there were no enemies creeping closer. Vos must be sadly puzzled about what was going on. He would have discovered by now that his prisoners had vanished, and he could have no idea how that had happened.
Dovyn also told me that the men at the blockade had fled at the sight of riderless horses galloping back from Malik’s camp.
I felt a touch on my arm and bade Dovyn farewell. When I opened my eyes, Kevrik nodded at Malik.
He looked unconscious, but if he was awake, I wanted to know it. I shaped a probe and had barely entered the black tumult of his mind when I was engulfed by a ghastly vision of torture, where I was the victim and Malik stood over me with bloodied hands. His eyes flew open.
“Get out of my mind,” Malik hissed through gritted teeth.
I withdrew, shaken to discover that he was mind-sensitive. It explained much, though not all. I wondered what he would say if I told him of Garth’s belief that this sensitivity was itself a minor Talent, which made him a Misfit, too.
“Check his ropes,” I told Kevrik calmly, holding Malik’s burning gaze. Then I said coldly and purposefully, “I have no wish to enter the cesspit of cruelty and violence that you call a mind, Malik, but I will do so if you speak another word that angers or offends me, or if you try to escape. I will enter it and wipe it clean. Do not doubt that I can do it.”
Malik seemed to teeter on the point of exploding; then abruptly all the tension melted out of him and his face grew calm. Watching this transformation, unease snaked through me, and I remembered his avowal that he had no need to plan an escape. To find out if he was referring to something other than the invasion, I would have to probe him. I d
ecided it could wait until I reached Vos’s homestead.
“You and your kind—” Malik began.
“Are here to stay,” I concluded savagely. “Now keep your mouth shut, for I meant my threat.” I turned my back on him. I was trembling slightly, but not out of fear. Malik’s relentless hatred had disturbed the black killing power deep inside me. I felt it stir, like someone sleeping, almost waking, and then settling back. It frightened me. The last time I had fully awakened that power, it had proven to have a dark will of its own, and I had a ghastly vision of myself coercing Malik to cut his throat or set himself on fire.
To distract myself, I tried farseeking Zarak again, and this time my probe located immediately. “Where are you?” I asked.
“We are coming to get ye just as Gahltha told me ye wanted. We have just turned onto th’ main road,” Zarak sent. “I suppose ye could nowt reach us before, because we were camped inside the cloister walls. It was empty as ye thought, though it looks as if something had been planned there, fer there is a great pile of earth an’ rock just inside the walls, an’ all manner of tools. To tell ye th’ truth, I regretted settin’ up inside, fer the cloister is a strange creepy place full of ghostly bumps and echoes. We were in the midst of breakin’ camp to move outside th’ walls fer tonight when Gahltha’s messenger galloped up. Is it true ye were Malik’s captive?”
I winced. “I will explain everything later,” I sent briskly. “Right now, Malik is my prisoner, and Malik’s men and Vos and his men are sieged by the horses. They have done brilliantly, but they need some human hands to deal with their prisoners. Ask Noviny to start thinking about who we can ask for help.”
“I’d like to know how the horses managed to get away from Vos and his men,” Zarak said, and then laughed. “I know! Ye’ll explain everything later. There is one other thing, Guildmistress,” Zarak said, and the tone of his voice was suddenly subdued. “You should know that Darius is worse.”
A chill ran through me. Yet how should we have achieved so much without any casualties? Did not life always demand its sacrifice? I sent to Zarak to ask Wenda about the most experienced healer in the region, determined to send for that person as soon as possible, but then I felt Kevrik’s hand on my arm again. I opened my eyes to see him looking with consternation toward Saithwold town. I followed his gaze and almost groaned aloud to see men on horses galloping toward us. They could only be armsmen who had been stationed at the main barricade or who were searching for me, and I cursed myself for lacking the wit to stay off the road and out of sight. Too late now to untie Malik and hide with him, for if we could see the riders, they could certainly see us.