Horded - Kingdom Gone Book 2, page 12
Tal rifled through the pockets he knew. He tossed the small ones behind him in rapid fire, and used the larger ones to increase his lead, dashing as far as he dared from one bit of the membrane to another. He used the narrow cliff, but when he looked back to see how his enemy fared, Rulak’s men kept their feet, failed to plummet and only clicked their fury and continued to gain on him.
He led them through the thick woods, along the very rim of the Shadow Mountains and even into a pocket at the bottom of a pond. That one slowed them down, but stalled his progress as well. He dragged himself ashore, dripping and stinking, only to have an enemy hand burst through the surface inches from his legs. He rolled aside, snatched at the wall and shifted to the first brook again, then back to the meadow. He’d run out of ideas.
His chest heaved, and he breathed like fire in his lungs. Rulak’s men still came behind him, still popped through each pocket just as he flashed out of it. They had his scent now. They’d follow him until he tired, and then they’d have him easily.
He ducked back into the mundane meadow then back through onto a forest path he’d almost forgotten. He’d used it with Torg last fall, had shot a young pig just outside the pocket. Backtracking, he popped into the meadow again. A slope, a twist of smoke in the distance. This was entirely the human’s fault.
Humans. He hesitated a second and saw three of Rulak’s men emerge. They grinned and reached for him. He shifted to the well pocket and across again, to a place with another well, one shaped like a crescent, one whose pocket was so small that the gobelins rushing after him actually bumped against his back as he shifted away.
They wouldn’t fit inside it. That pocket could barely hold him and Torg without one of them stumbling into the humans’ courtyard. Tal flashed back, retracing his flight and praying at least one of Rulak’s men would suffer the same fate he had, that one of them would burst out into a town full of humans. Humans who had a few reasons to despise their kind of late.
He danced across three more pockets, back into his original well camp and waited, crouched beside the stone well itself, for the enemy to find him. They didn’t come. Whether they’d stumbled into town or not, none of them tailed him this time. He caught his breath and kept his eyes glued to the membrane.
They hadn’t followed. He stood and circled the well, still nervous. He couldn’t lead them straight to the horde camp. That would earn him far worse than poor favor. Still, they couldn’t cling to his trail for this long. They’d have lost him by now. It should be safe.
He sat again and watched the wall. It should be. Then again, the thistledown pocket should have been empty. The gargoyle should have been waiting, alone, to lead him to the castle. His horde. Him. Somehow, Rulak’s horde had won that honor, or else they meant to steal it. Either way, his options had narrowed today. There’d be no tracking the Guardian now.
Tal had lost whatever the creature’s bow had meant, and now, there’d be no redemption for him. No way to help Torg and his tir talus. He’d go home to his own failure, to a horde that thought him a fool and a brother who would have his woman to keep him occupied.
No matter how long he chewed on that, he still couldn’t swallow it. It left him out on his own. It left him, for the first time in his life, completely alone.
Chapter Eighteen
The wound on Torg’s chest had sealed evenly. It still needed to heal, and he’d have to limit his moving about until it did, but the salve Tal had scrounged up worked wonders on gobelin flesh. Maera wished it worked on her nerves as well. The longer she spent in Torg’s company, alone with him, the more she felt like hiding behind the nearest tree.
He looked at her oddly. He touched her more than was necessary, taking any opportunity to place his hand on hers or brush his arm against her side, her hair or her face. His eyes darkened and flashed amber when he spoke, and Maera could only think of how many days it had been since she’d had a proper bath.
Her hair already hung in more strings than she’d have liked. She couldn’t smell very pleasant, not after the stress and sleeping on the ground in a pile of fur. There was grime under her fingernails, and she had no comb, no rags and no clean clothing to her name.
She leaned away from him and pressed the last bandage into place. Cleaned and replaced, salved again, and now he only needed to hold still. It didn’t seem likely if she stayed inside the tent.
“Rest some more.” She pulled the furs back over his chest. “Don’t move so much.”
“Will you stay?” He tried to sit up again, completely ignoring her orders.
“You won’t stop moving!”
He dropped back into the furs and held perfectly still. He even held his breath. His eyes widened and flared with mischief.
“I need to…” What could she need to do? It wasn’t her camp. She had nothing here at all that was hers. “I need to clean up.”
Maera slipped from the tent before he could protest. She stepped away quickly, over the nearest log to where she’d left the rest of their breakfast. Torg had eaten all of his, but both her and Tal’s dishes still had gruel in them. It wouldn’t hurt to clean up, in particular if she stayed here for any length of time. She’d need to make herself useful, to show that she could do her part even when there were no injuries to tend to.
She carried the dishes to the pocket edge, careful to keep away from the line Tal had drawn. She couldn’t cross it, had learned as much when she’d awoken alone inside one back in Westwood. When old Hadja’s poison had worn off, fourteen-year-old Maera had found herself trapped in Old Space, and though it looked like she might walk forever, any attempt to go beyond the pocket boundary had only shifted her to one side or the other along the invisible wall.
It had also made her intensely nauseas, a feeling she didn’t care to enjoy again.
So now she dumped the remaining gruel into the weeds near to the pocket’s edge, but not that near. She used a broad leaf to wipe the bowls and cup clean, and then surveyed the things Tal had ordered around them. A plump skin bag produced water, and she used it sparingly to rinse the dishes clean. Then she set them atop the log to dry. She sat herself on the other one with her back to the tent and faced out across the gobelin campsites.
The women again. They gathered in huddled groups around low fires. As the morning had waned, the male gobelins vanished to tasks outside the pocket, leaving their female counterparts in charge of camp. And these women knew that they were in charge.
Each group worked at a specific job. Some cut and prepared meat. Others worked hides or spun on long, spiked spindles with fat whorls at the end. Only a few of them cooked over the stout, iron pots. Many of them sewed, and all of them chattered like ornery green magpies.
Not one gobelin woman sat idle, though, and that told her enough. She examined their campsite, certain she would not be welcome in any other. Tal had prodded a small fire to life in a shallow divot between the logs, but it had faded to coal in his absence. Maera started there, rearranging the embers and nursing the flames back to life with the aid of a pile of dried moss and a few twigs she found stacked at the edge of camp. She could keep it going for him, but that hardly occupied any time at all.
She needed a bigger diversion and thought about asking Torg, but his breathing had settled again. She’d do better to leave him be. When he slept, their secret rhythm faded into a soft background noise. It helped her to think when it quieted, and she needed to think, now, about what it might mean, about what she wanted to do next and about what would happen if this Sol buta found her less than worthy at tending him.
Maybe that was her answer too. They could be the gobelin healers. No wonder they’d withheld their medicines from Tal. She’d stumbled into another test, but then, someone had traded him for the salve. For thistledown, he’d said. Did he have any more?
She hesitated to search through the bags, but tested a few from the outside, feeling the contents and trying to guess which one might be soft enough to hold fibers. Maera’s mother had taught her to spin, and though she didn’t have a spindle, she could do a reasonable, if slow, job of it with just her hands and her thigh. The thread might not even be usable, but trying would keep her hands busy, would let her look busy.
One of the pouches felt soft, but she found only clothes inside of it. Another one, a much smaller one, also squished to her touch, and she opened this too. Inside was a wad of fluff much smaller than she’d imagined. Still, it had a fine, downy texture and a trace of sparkle to it. Dust. The pocket shimmered with it too, but the stuff inside the bag seemed formed from magic.
She didn’t have to be told it was valuable. Thistledown. No wonder the healer had coughed up some salve, maybe even at the risk of getting into trouble herself. Maera closed the bag and retied the leather thong. She wouldn’t waste anything that precious on her clumsy spinning attempts, but there had to be something she could work with.
She turned back to the fire and jumped in alarm. A gobelin woman stood beside the camp. She watched Maera through wide eyes, and though her expression remained flat, her clothes and her manner were familiar. Maera had made a point of memorizing them. Now, the one woman she’d hoped to win a measure of friendliness from had caught her rooting through things that did not belong to her. Her cheeks warmed at the thought.
“I was looking for something to spin,” she stammered it out and immediately felt like a child. Caught sneaking, ashamed of herself.
“You should not let them bring the food.” The gobelin spoke so fast and low that her words were difficult to catch. “It looks bad for you.”
“I don’t understand.” Maera eased closer, but the woman clicked and backed up a step to match her.
She darted a nervous look over her shoulder and continued without making eye contact again. “They will cook soon. Bringing the food is a thing for the woman to do.”
The gobelin clicked and backed another step. She’d been given advice, for whatever reason, and judging from the woman’s mood, it went against the rules to offer any. Maera didn’t move again, but she answered softly, whispered so that only the woman and possibly Torg were close enough to hear. “Thank you.”
She thought she heard a grunt as the gobelin walked away. She thought, maybe, the woman had decided to help her out. Of course, it could also be bad advice. It could be another test. She bit her lip and watched the woman march around the fires, taking a long circuit that would lead her to the campsite farthest from the big blaze.
The Sol buta.
Why would a member of the healer’s group help her? Perhaps Tal’s thistledown trade had been with this woman. She’d have to ask him when he returned. Then she could get his advice on the food thing as well.
The morning’s gruel still sat heavily in her stomach, but she could smell food again already. The pocket air carried hints of meat and boiling spices. If they ate again before Torg’s brother returned, she’d have to act without the benefit of his guidance. She’d have to decide if she could trust her gobelin advisor or not.
She snorted and moved to the nearest log to sit. For that matter, did she trust Tal? Who could say if he would tell her the truth or not? His own fate might be tied to hers. She chewed her lip and tried to sort it out. He also might prefer his camp back, his brother back.
The line Tal had drawn in the dirt marked the end of her world now. At least in one direction. Should she take the woman’s advice and ignore the boundary on the other side? Cross the equally invisible wall that kept her separate from the rest of the horde?
Maera took a deep breath and stared out at the hostile camps. She’d have to decide one way or the other. If Tal didn’t get back before supper, she’d have to do it on her own. The dishes still waited atop the other log. Torg snored now, less softly than he had before. She watched the camp carefully, looked for a pattern to the gobelins’ activities and prayed that Tal would creep back into the pocket before dinner was served.
Chapter Nineteen
He didn’t come back. The scent of what they cooked was overpowering now, and though the other men trickled back into their campgrounds, Tal remained absent. Maera watched the women gather dishes. She saw them march to the cooking camps and return with their group’s meal. Maybe she could cook something in her own fire.
Maybe she didn’t really have to go out there.
Except she did. Ever since her sly gobelin had offered the advice, Maera had observed carefully. Each camp sent a woman up to one of the central fires to fetch food. The few that sent men had no women in them at all. Bachelor camps like the one she’d invaded. Now one of her bachelors was missing, and the other one was just beginning to stir.
He’d be hungry and possibly mobile after another sleep under the salve’s ministration. Mobile Torg scared her almost as much as the gobelin horde on the other side of their logs. Which one would be less dangerous to her personally?
She squinted out across the activities and spotted a group of women with their hair lose. The Sol buta were marching to the cooking pots. They carried two bowls each, and the rest of the horde moved out of their way, parting like a green sea before them.
Maera stood up. She’d arranged the dishes into a neat stack, bowls on bottom and cup perched, upside down on top. Torg’s snore cut out and he rolled onto his side. She picked up her wooden cargo and stared out again at the full gobelin horde in action. They were only eating, only going about their daily events as if no human hid among them. Even the nasty or curious looks had slowed down as they grew used to her presence.
She wasn’t interesting any longer. She could probably just walk right up and hold out their bowls.
“Tir talus?” He called from the tent.
Maera hugged the bowls close to her chest and looped one finger through the second mug. Tal had managed to carry all of it, and she’d worked in an inn long enough to show him how it was done. She balanced the tower of tableware and strode forth into the main camp.
The horde fell instantly silent. Every last gobelin stopped moving, stopped talking, froze and slowly turned to watch her. They hadn’t forgotten the human in their midst after all. They’d just assured themselves that she was safely kept, well within the limits of her own confines.
Now she was loose, and every gobelin eye fixed on the outsider. The pocket echoed with their sudden attention. Only the fires crackled in comment.
Maera swallowed and took another step. The nearest gobelin, a fat man no taller than Jaymi, occupied the campsite to one side of theirs. He flinched when she moved. Oddly, it gave her the strength to step again. She lifted her chin and marched forward, not to the nearest cooking pot, but to the farthest. She proceeded directly to the one where the Sol buta waited.
It was old Gutra who would be her judge in this, and if she meant to survive the daring, Maera figured, it was Gutra who must see her do it.
Besides, after the first camp failed to attack her, she felt an odd surge of pride. Each camp she passed hissed and clicked behind her back, and each one lent her the courage to keep moving. They fell away like a gauntlet, returning to activity once she’d left them alone. Maera marched on, past the huge bonfire and around, until she faced the whole of the frozen Sol Buta across a round clearing.
One squat gobelin sat at the cooking fire. A cauldron bubbled in her care, and her eyes danced from the human interloper to the matriarch, Gutra, and back, over and over. Gutra’s upper lip twitched. Her eyes flashed, but she didn’t move, nor did she make an expression that Maera could read.
They didn’t do anything. They just stared at her and waited, and all her collected pride and impetus wavered. She felt the heat of the fire. Her hands and forehead grew damp. The Sol buta waited for her to do something, to finish what she’d started and make a statement that they knew more about than she did.
What would it mean?
It was too late to wonder. She felt that, the wrongness of hesitating. Going back was out now too. That would be running, losing something. Her future teetered on that moment, and the only way to go was forward.
She stepped to the pot and held out her bowls. The gobelin cook flinched and tossed a questioning glance to Gutra. Maera’s eyes went there as well. She saw the matriarch’s curt nod. She also saw the woman behind her, the one who’d told Maera, in secret, to get the food. That mouth smiled, barely but clearly. At least one of the Sol buta approved of her bravery.
The cook grunted and swung her huge ladle. Two bowls and a mug of stew. The gobelin scooped and Maera shuffled dishes, scrambled and lined them up along her forearm. She held a mug in each hand, just like she would have done at the inn. Her method earned another grunt from the cook, another glance to the Sol buta but no comment. She filled the second mug from a clay pitcher, and then looked up at Maera, making eye contact for the first time.
The gobelin’s eyes burned yellow, but her lips twitched ever so slightly in amusement. One round eye winked like lightning, and the cook turned back to her pot.
Gutra stepped in from the opposite side. She thrust out her own bowls and glared across at Maera. Time to go, that look said, you’ve pushed things far enough.
Maera stood as tall as her trembling would allow without risk of spilling. She turned slowly, partly to make a point of her own, and partly to avoid tumbling their supper to the ground. Her return trip was slower, and the responses from the camps she passed milder, lackluster. The rebellion had passed, and now they either ignored her or pretended to.
She carried the meal into camp and couldn’t deny the shiver of relief when she finally stepped across that barrier that meant she was back inside friendly territory, back where they’d put her in the first place. She didn’t care to test that boundary again until she had to. Breakfast tomorrow, most likely.
