Luke knelt down and whispered in the child’s ear, then smoothed her hair back from her sticky face and did something where he pretended to produce a dandelion from her ear. She beamed at him, and he smoothed her hair again.
“There,” he said. “You’re safe now. I’m Luke. You’re safe with us. Let’s go find your people.”
Serene looked significantly from Luke to the others. “You see,” she mouthed.
Elliot turned away with a loud sound of irritation. He was feeling exceedingly uncomfortable. This realization had come to him a time or three before, but the sight of Luke comforting a lost, lonely child made it hard to push away: that Luke actually was good and noble and kind and honest and true, that he was obviously a better and wiser choice for Serene than Elliot ever could be, and that Luke would never bully anyone.
He should probably say something nice to Luke once in a while. And right, absolutely, he would. The very next thing he said would be something nice. He could say something nice any time he liked.
“You may take the child in charge, as long as it isn’t for too long. If we still have her by nightfall we will have to make different arrangements. A Sunborn is a bit too valuable to waste on babysitting, ha ha,” said Captain Briarwind.
“Cadet Chaos-of-Battle and Cadet Schafer will help me, sir,” said Luke.
“Ahahaha, wait just a minute,” said Serene.
“Speak for yourself, you big traitor,” Elliot hissed.
“May I say, it’s an honor to have Michael Sunborn’s son in my troop,” Captain Briarwind continued.
To one side, Elliot could see Dale Wavechaser nodding earnestly.
Luke ducked his head and said, “Thanks.”
No, Elliot decided, on the other hand it was probably good for Luke to see how the other ninety-nine non-worshipped percentage of the population lived. Besides, he had other things on his mind as they resumed the march.
“A moment, I wish to speak to Luke in private,” Elliot said hastily to Serene, and fell back to the end of the procession, where Luke was walking with the child’s hand in his.
Elliot automatically came to the child’s other side, as he and Luke always walked with Serene in the centre. She lifted up her other hand for Elliot to take, which Elliot supposed was forbearing of her considering the patting incident. Elliot accepted her hand. It was, as he had feared, very sticky.
“Luke, Luke,” Elliot said urgently. “Will you look after mine and Serene’s children? I’m starting to have some real worries about Jasper and Smooth-Skin-Like-Finest-Porcelain’s well-being.”
“You’ve named your children,” said Luke, with extreme and offensive skepticism.
“Yes, one elven name and one human name. I wish to be fair.”
“You’ve named them Smooth Jazz?”
“Look, apparently I’ll be raising them, let me have my fun,” Elliot snapped. He had known about men’s place in the home in elven culture, but it had not really sunk in until this moment, and he was feeling agitated. He was pleased, however, to see that his many lectures on the subject of human music had been attended to. “I’m sure I will get the hang of it, but for the first while I might need some assistance. Will you do it or won’t you?”
“I might if they’re like Serene,” said Luke. “Not if they’re like you.” He grinned. “I’m not dealing with five-year-old you. You’re a brat.”
“I’m a delight,” argued Elliot, and when Serene hove into view he appealed to her. “Serene!” said Elliot. “Do you think I’m a brat?”
“You’re a bit of a minx,” said Serene. “But in an insouciantly charming way, I think.”
Elliot was so pleased by this compliment, he did not realize until too late that when Serene summoned Luke to the front of the group, Elliot was, so to speak, left holding the baby.
Elliot swore and then said, “No, I didn’t mean that. Don’t tell Luke I said that.”
The child eyed him. He felt she had a mistrusting gaze, the gaze of someone who would definitely rat him out to Luke at the first possible opportunity.
“Couldn’t we establish a bond in some way?” Elliot asked. “Can I bribe you?”
“Back, Schafer!” barked Dale. Hearing that tone from normally good-natured Dale, Elliot’s eyes snapped to the front of the line. The cadets had their weapons out: someone had seen some sign of a troll then.
Elliot stepped back and felt the child’s hand slip out of his. He looked for her and saw she was edging away, farther and farther, as if his alarm had been communicated to her through their linked hands. Except she was now at the very edge of the path, and Elliot saw pieces of earth falling away at her heels.
“Careful!” Elliot said, and realized he had spoken far too sharply. The child stumbled back another step, and Elliot saw the ground beneath her crumbling.
Elliot looked toward the others for Serene, for Luke, for help, but they were marching on and no one else was close enough to get here, and so Elliot swore again and dived for the child.
He meant to knock her away, knock her back to somewhere safe, but he couldn’t even manage that. Instead, as the ground fell sickeningly out from under them, Elliot curled around her, trying to protect her head, as rocks and earth and both of them went flying. Elliot heard someone shouting his name and was briefly annoyed—how was that going to help?—before everything went dark.
He woke up to a small finger poking him in the forehead. He moved, and a shooting pain went up his arm.
“Ow, I think my arm’s broken,” said Elliot. “Ow ow ow, the pain is excruciating, I hate stupid military camp, ow.” He remembered what Serene or Luke would have thought of first, and said belatedly: “Are you damaged, small child?”
“I’m not hurted,” said the child.
“Oh great, you can talk, that’s excellent!”
“Of course I can talk,” she sniffed. “I’m almost six!”
“Is that a normal age for people to talk at?” Elliot said. “I didn’t know. I think I was talking at that age, but to be honest with you, I’m extremely advanced, and I got on the talking train fast because I was in a hurry to reach cutting-repartee station.”
The child was silent.
“Um,” Elliot added. “Don’t—don’t worry. The other people in our group are highly trained experts in tracking and using pointed objects, and they will find and protect us.”
“Will the pretty one come?” asked the child.
“Undoubtedly!” said Elliot. “I’m glad you noticed her. She’s called Serene, and she is the most beautiful creature I ever beheld. She has ebony hair and porcelain skin, as I’m sure you observed. She is also an elf, and they have excellent eyesight and can track people by a single blade of crushed grass, and she is the best with a bow in the whole camp, including the teachers.”
“The boy,” the child said after a pause.
“Oh,” said Elliot. “Luke. Well, he’s okay too, I guess.”
He didn’t want to crush a child’s dreams.
“He looks like a prince,” she continued wistfully.
“Well,” said Elliot. “The monarchy are historically inbred.”
The child was silent again. Elliot was sure he was getting this very wrong.
“Luke will come,” he assured her after a moment. “I know he will. He always comes, and he always protects people. He won’t stop until you’re safe.”
There was a little content hum in answer, and Elliot felt slightly better. He sat up, in the darkness and the sliding shale, and was relieved to find that he could sit up. He stood up, swaying with the pain of his arm and the necessity of keeping hold of the child, and found he could do that too.
“According to my memory of the maps of the mines, we should emerge somewhere if we keep heading south,” he said. “Don’t worry, small child. I am extensively acquainted with the geography of this area. Can you walk with me?”
He had hold of her sleeve. She tugged it away and after a moment he felt her hand creep into his.
??
?How did your hand get even stickier in a rock fall?” Elliot asked. “Never mind, I don’t mean to criticize, it’s just a habit of mine.”
They walked, for what seemed like a long while, through the dark holes. Elliot kept being afraid more rocks would fall, or they would be met with a rock face or a space so small they would not be able to continue. He kept talking, despite his fears about oxygen, and tried not to show the fear that was choking him.
Instead of narrowing, the tunnel opened, light shining and rays reaching out to them, as if the sun were fixed directly onto the mountain like a badge. Elliot and the child stumbled out into it. The light still seemed bright, even when they were out of the mines. The green world below the mountain wavered in Elliot’s vision like a dream.
“Awesome,” said Elliot. “See, we didn’t need anyone at all. We’re safe as houses.”
That was when he saw the party of trolls coming up the mountain track toward them. They were big, seven feet tall, bigger than even Luke’s dad, and their skin was gray. Elliot saw the leader’s head jerk up, and he knew they had spotted him.
“Safe as houses that are currently on fire,” he amended to the child. “Run!”
He ran, and she ran with him, but the trolls picked up speed in response and Elliot knew they would catch up with him soon and did not know what to do. He forced the child, sobbing and stumbling, out in front of him so at least his body would be between her and them.
He glanced over his shoulder to see if they were gaining, and saw the first one fall.
He had an arrow in his throat.
Elliot stared and saw, so far ahead on the curving path that it was on another mountain entirely, a black fleck that must be Serene. He saw it moving toward him, faster than humans could move, and saw another troll fall. He knew she was running and firing arrows and never missing, all at the same time, all from so far away.
She shot every troll but one, and that troll thundered toward them, his shadow falling on them, and Elliot knew the creature was so close to them Serene might be afraid to shoot.
That one troll might as well have been all five. He could crush them just as easily. Elliot pressed the child against the crag, pressed himself against her so hard he heard her cry out in protest. He reached up a hand, and he said: “Stop, we’re no threat, she’s a local child,” and saw the troll frown, an expression of incomprehension on that unfamiliar face, and Elliot thought, if he could figure out some way to talk to him—
But then the troll raised his club, big as a tree, and the next moment Luke jumped, made one of his impossible leaps from an impossible point high above them, and landed crouched before the troll with his sword already drawn. The blade blazed in the sunlight, and so did his hair, and the child behind Elliot gave a glad cry as if recognizing a prince come to save her.
Luke caught the troll by surprise. He rushed at him, and ran him through. Through the belly, and when the troll fell to his knees Luke wrenched the blade out of his belly and drove the point home to his heart. The troll crumpled forward, a dead weight, and tumbled into the dust.
Luke pulled his sword free, leaned his face and his free arm against the rock, and was suddenly sick.
Elliot realised, after a stunned instant, that though Luke was past master at any number of instruments of death . . . he didn’t think that Luke had ever actually killed anyone before.
That was how all Luke could do, all he was celebrated and adored for, ended up: these dead bodies in the dry path before them.
Elliot grabbed the child’s hand tightly as Luke was gripping the hilt of his sword and went over to where Luke stood braced against the wall. He leaned against Luke, rested his cheek against Luke’s arm. He could feel Luke shaking.
“You saved her,” he said. “You did it. The child’s safe. They didn’t hurt her, because of you.” It probably didn’t matter much in comparison, but he figured it couldn’t hurt to add: “I’m safe too. You did everything you could.”
Luke took a deep shuddering breath. “Yeah?”
Elliot took a step back and nodded nervously and so vigorously his hair tumbled in his face, a blinding red tangle, and he had to shake it out. By the time he had, Luke was smiling faintly—Luke thought Elliot’s total inability to deal with his hair was really funny, which Elliot resented usually but was grateful for this once—and then Luke swiped a hand over his eyes. Elliot decided they would have a manly understanding that he’d never seen the tears gleaming in Luke’s eyes and would thus never have to discuss them.
“C’mon,” said Elliot. “Let’s go find Serene.”
Half of the troop had gone looking for Elliot and the child, and the other had found the nearest neighbouring village that would supply healing and shelter. Serene sat with him while the village medic bound up Elliot’s arm.
“Luke’s outside,” Serene said in a low voice. “Might you want to go out and say something to him? He’s a bit torn up.” She looked off into the distance. “Your first one’s the worst. It gets easier after that.”
Does it get easier? Elliot thought, looking at her still pale face. Or is it just that you shut doors in your own heart and never open them again for fear of what is behind them?
Serene had killed for him too. Serene was a child soldier, created in the same way Luke had been. The only difference was that Serene had killed before she ever met Elliot, had been damaged like that before he ever saw her. He remembered thinking that the grave, older air she had was beautiful, was something elvish and wonderful, and felt sick of himself. He wanted nothing more than to lift the sadness forever and see her smile, uncomplicated and happy, the child she should still be.
“Was someone with you for your first?” he asked.
Serene nodded. “My mother. She said—she said she was proud of me, and that I was brave.”
“Hey, you are brave,” said Elliot at last. “And I’m proud of you too. Always. Thanks for saving me.”
“Any time,” said Serene. He thought she might have liked to smile but found herself not able to do so. “Always.”
Elliot wanted to ask Serene to go out there. She’d obviously be better at comforting Luke and be the one he wanted to see, but he understood that he was the least hurt of the three of them, even if he did have a broken arm. He stood up, and stood looking for a moment at her profile, like that of a marble bust, all set perfect lines, and her gray eyes fixed on a private vision. He swept her dark hair off her face with his good hand, kissed her brow, and walked away. It wasn’t how he’d wanted their first kiss to go, but it had weirdly seemed like the right thing to do.
He walked outside and found Luke sitting on a low wall outside the tent, his bright head bowed. He looked up at Elliot’s approach.
“Hey, it’s you,” he said. “Are you—doing all right?”
“Fine,” said Elliot. “They say I’ll play the piano again. Well, they didn’t, they didn’t know what a piano was, but I’m going to be fine anyway.”
“That’s good,” said Luke.
“How about you?” asked Elliot.
“Oh, you know me,” said Luke. “Great. Always great. Why wouldn’t I be?”
“Sure,” said Elliot. “Absolutely, you should be. I’m certain it seemed like there was nothing else to do at the time.”
Luke’s face changed. “Seemed like?”
“Well, ideally we would have been able to reason with the trolls, and there would have been no bloodshed,” said Elliot, sinkingly conscious that he was saying the exact wrong thing but not sure what else to say, now they were talking about this.
“Oh yeah?” Luke demanded. “You think you’re so smart. Did it seem to you that those creatures were going to listen to reason?”
“Well, I mean, maybe,” said Elliot. “We’re never going to know now, are we?”
Luke was white under his tan. “Are you serious? I know what you think of me,” he said. “You’re always really clear on the subject. But is this the time to have a go at me?”
“That came out
wrong,” said Elliot. “Obviously, there were extenuating circumstances. There was the child—”
“You know what, Elliot?” Luke demanded. “Could you shut up for once in your life and leave me alone?”
He pushed himself off the wall and shoved past Elliot, fairly hard, on his injured side. Elliot went and leaned against the wall until the jolted pain in his arm subsided, and by then Luke was long gone.
Elliot blamed himself for trying. He was not a comforting type of person: it was stupid, like a hedgehog trying to be a hot-water bottle. Of course he was only going to make Luke more upset.
The village, which the child belonged to—her name turned out to be Aysha, and everyone asked silly questions like “you were trapped with her in a rockslide and never even found out her name?”—had a party to celebrate Luke saving one of their daughters. People made speeches and clapped, and the popularity of the Border guard received a significant boost.
Elliot mainly sat in the corner and sulked over his broken arm. Eventually Serene and Luke came to sit with him, and they were all pretty quiet together.
The incident with the trolls was, they were told, not a skirmish but merely an encounter.
However, the Border camp leaders assured them that there would soon be a real skirmish. It was discovered by the Border guard that the dwarves were occupying several rich mines on land that was rightfully the property of the elves. The elves, a territorial people, were outraged once they were informed and shown the documentation proving their ownership. The guards and the cadets from warrior training were set to ride out in the space of three sundowns.
Elliot supposed you could tell the difference between a skirmish and an encounter by counting the number of corpses. Apparently nobody but him thought it was at all suspicious that as soon as the humans had decided they wanted the land, this conflict between the elves and the dwarves had arisen. He bet some of the land would be granted to the Border humans by the elves as thanks for their aid in battle.