Myth and Storm, page 21
Kai chased after him, swinging his branch for the back of the man’s knees a moment too late.
The man thrust his sword for Drew’s gut.
Drew screamed, cracking his stone onto the man’s shoulder, knocking his arm out of its socket.
The man stumbled forward as Kai’s branch hit his legs, but neither blow seemed to have caused him any pain as he arced his sword, ready to slice through Drew’s hip.
A glint of red shone on the blade.
The rock fell from Drew’s hands as he lurched away, too slow to avoid the attack.
“Drew!” Kai’s scream drowned out Drew’s cry of pain. Kai raised his stick, bashing the man on the head.
Not even flinching at the blow to his skull, the man rounded on Kai, glee filling his eyes as he giggled again.
“What are you?” Kai leapt back as the man swung for his gut. “Are you a demon?”
The man spun his sword in a wide arc, as though hoping to slice Kai from the bottom up.
“Is it magic?” Kai cracked his branch down on the blade, which slashed through the wood, sending the tip flying into the air. “Is there some magic in these mountains that’s infested your mind?”
The joy disappeared from the man’s eyes.
“If it’s wild magic that’s taken hold, you could have a chance to break free.” Kai dove sideways, gasping as the man’s blade nicked his shoulder. “Put down your sword and let me help. Take me to whatever it is that did this to you. I’ve seen wild magic do strange things before.” He blocked a blow from above, shielding his eyes as shards of wood rained down on him. “I am not your enemy!”
A tree branch smacked into Kai’s spine, blocking his escape as the man pulled his sword back, ready to plunge it through Kai’s heart.
I’m sorry. I’ve failed.
A crack, like lightning had split a tree in two, drove into Kai’s ears.
The man froze, the tip of his sword mere inches from Kai’s heart. He turned, as though looking for the source of the sound.
Kai slammed what remained of his weapon against the back of the man’s neck.
The man took two steps forward before falling to his knees.
Kai shifted his weight, rearing back to attack again, but a strange light stopped him.
Shimmering a pale blue, the glow that drifted up from the man somehow seemed cold―born of a place men weren’t meant to survive. The light grew as it brightened, pulling away from the man as though trying to rip him apart.
The man screamed. His sword fell from his hand.
He began to shake as the pitch of his pain swelled to a horrible, inhuman shriek. He tipped his head back, giving a final vengeful death cry to the sky before toppling forward and falling silent.
He landed on the ground at the girl’s feet.
She stared down at him without any fear or pity on her face.
“What was”―Kai swallowed the sour that had somehow risen to his throat―“what under the chivving stars was that?”
The girl didn’t answer.
A gasp of pain pulled Kai’s attention away from the fallen man.
Drew sank down, leaning against a tree, one hand held to his side, the other pressing on his hip.
“Drew.” Kai darted forward, grabbing the man’s sword before running to Drew. “How bad is it?” Kai set the sword down and pulled off his blanket-made bag.
“Bad enough I’d be thankful for that cacting awful Pameranian liquor.” Drew lifted his hand away from his side, letting Kai peel up his blood-soaked shirt.
A four-inch gash sliced through Drew’s flank.
“There are worse places to be stabbed.” Kai kept his voice light, desperate to hide his panic. “We’ll wrap it up. You’ll be fine in a few days.”
Dirt marked the edges of the wound. The sword had been filthy when it had gone in.
We’ll clean the cut. Cauterize. Liquor.
I can’t help him. Not here. I’ve nothing to help him with.
“Let me see your hip.” Kai unfastened Drew’s belt.
“He got the muscle.” Drew winced as Kai shifted his pants down. “I don’t think I’ll be fit to trek through the mountains anymore.”
“Then I’ll carry you.”
The sword had sliced through too much flesh. The white of Drew’s hipbone broke through the red of the blood.
“Kai, I know you’re a stubborn bastard, but we have to be realistic. We don’t even know how far from Ilbrea―”
“I’ll build a litter and drag you if I have to, so don’t make one chivving mention of you not continuing on this godsforsaken chivving journey with me.”
“Kai.” Drew gripped his hand.
“How do you know Lord Karron?” The girl stood over them, holding the sword Kai had cast aside.
“What?” Kai shifted, planting himself between the girl and Drew, still keeping Drew’s hand clasped firmly in his.
“How do you know Lord Karron?” the girl repeated.
“This is not the time,” Kai said.
“Drew is dying.” The girl peered around Kai to Drew. “Probably not today. But he’s right, you’ll have to leave him behind. Without help, wounds like that will kill him far before we reach the northern edge of the mountain range.”
“I’ll keep him alive.” Pain pressed on the front of Kai’s throat. “I’ll carry―”
“There’s nothing you could do to help him,” the girl said. “But I can.”
“Then do it,” Kai said. “I’ll pay you. I’ll―”
“How do you know Lord Karron?” the girl said.
“I’m his ward!” Kai shouted. “I’m his chivving ward. He took me in when I was young and raised me. He will give you gold if you save Drew. I swear on my life, Lord Karron will pay you.”
“Do you know Adrial?” The girl took a step closer to them, leveling the sword at Kai’s throat as she studied his face.
“Adrial?” Kai tightened his grip on Drew’s hand. “Adrial Ayres? Yes, I know him. Adrial is as good as a brother to me. Lord Karron raised us both.”
“You’re so different from him.”
“Adrial’s always been a better man than me. The only fool who doesn’t know that is him. Drew is a better man than me, too. If you have some awful grudge against Lord Karron’s wards, fine. Kill me if you have to. But help Drew.”
The girl tossed the sword up into the air.
Kai dove sideways, bracing his body over Drew’s, but the blade didn’t tumble back down to the ground. It hovered twelve feet in the air as though it had been placed on a shelf far out of reach of naughty children.
“Adrial Ayres helped me once,” the girl said. “A lifetime ago. He saved someone I loved very much. It would be wrong of me not to help Adrial’s brother. Move.”
Kai eased himself to Drew’s other side, trying to keep both the sword and the girl in his sight.
“You’re from Ilara then?” Kai asked.
“Keep breathing.” The girl touched Drew’s flank. “The pain will be better if you keep breathing.”
Drew gasped as the girl trailed her fingers along his side. “What are you doing to me?”
“I told you to breathe.” The girl narrowed her eyes, frowning at Drew’s wound as the bleeding began to slow.
“What is this? What’s happening?” Drew moved as though trying to stand.
Kai pressed on Drew’s shoulders, pinning him in place. “Sorry. He’s never been healed by a sorcerer before.”
“No. No sorcerers.” Drew fought against Kai’s grip.
“She’s not from the Sorcerers Tower,” Kai said. “The Lady Sorcerer wouldn’t waste precious magic having one of her people wandering through the mountains.”
Drew moaned as the skin on his side began to knit back together.
“Is that why you left Ilbrea?” Kai asked. “You didn’t want to join the Sorcerers Guild?”
“I’m saving your friend. That doesn’t mean I have to answer your questions.” The girl trailed her fingers across the place where Drew’s wound had been. “I’m not the best at healing. Someone else will need to see to him, but it should hold for now.”
“Where can we find someone else to help him?” Kai asked.
“You’ll have to look for someone outside these mountains,” the girl said.
“If you’re the only sorcerer in these mountains, what magic possessed that man?” Kai asked.
“I told you at the Tiller’s Tree.” The girl leaned low, her face close to Drew’s hip as she pressed against the wound.
Drew screamed, gripping Kai’s arm hard enough to bruise.
“Keep breathing. This is the worst of it, just keep breathing,” Kai said. “So, whatever wild magic is in these mountains drifted down to mess with the minds of the men at the Tiller’s Tree and drove the demon of a man that attacked us so mad he didn’t notice when I hit him over the head.”
“How do you know about wild magic?” The girl furrowed her brow as newly made sinew covered the white of Drew’s hipbone.
Drew tipped his head back and screamed.
“The same way I ended up Lord Karron’s ward.” Kai gripped Drew’s shoulders. “I’ve lived more in this world than anyone has a right to.”
“Then why are you so desperate to get back to Ilara?” She pulled her hands away from the unhealed skin on Drew’s hip and looked up to Kai. “Tell me. Or I won’t finish my work.”
“Kai, I’m not worth―”
“We were serving on a Guilded ship. There was a sorcerer onboard. She took control of the ship and forced us to sail into the southern storms. Most of our crew died. The survivors boarded a Pameranian ship. They should have reached Ilara by now.” Kai swallowed past the ache in his throat. “The Sorcerers Guild knows what happened. I don’t think any of the survivors from our crew will make it into Ilara alive. We’re trying to get back to make sure the truth of the Sorcerers Guild’s treachery doesn’t die with the rest of our crew.”
“You’re going to stand against the Sorcerers Guild?” The girl sat back on her heels.
“We don’t have a choice,” Kai said. “They’re destroying the Sailors Guild. Give the Sorcerers Guild enough time, and they’ll destroy us all.”
She looked up to the sword hovering in the air.
“You can’t tell me you have any love for the Sorcerers Guild,” Kai said.
“None.”
“Then help us,” Kai begged. “Heal Drew. Lead us to the northern edge of the mountains.”
“No.” The girl looked back to them. “Letting you walk back to Ilara so the Lady Demon can slaughter you is a waste of a Karron who wants to stand against the Sorcerers.” She pressed her fingers to Drew’s wound.
He bit his lips together, trying to stifle his scream of pain.
Kai watched the wound heal, holding his breath until both the spell and the screaming had stopped.
Drew fell forward, resting his head against Kai’s shoulder as his breath shuddered in his lungs.
“You’re all right.” Kai wrapped his arms around Drew, waiting for his breathing to even out before looking back to the girl. “If going north is a waste of a wayward Karron, what would you do with me?”
“There are people I’d like you to meet.” She stood and brushed her skirt off. “They may very well kill you, but if not, you’ll be making a more powerful ally than even a king could wish for.”
Kai eyed the sword still floating in the air. “I suppose we don’t have much choice in this.”
“None at all.” The girl grinned. “You’ll do as I say, or you’ll die. Sometimes the gods do try and make up for all the damage they’ve caused.”
28
Mara
“You really could make this so much easier on yourselves.” Mara tightened the knot at her waist. “A few ice axes, and you wouldn’t be stuck hauling us back out.” She looked from the crevasse that had swallowed half the street to the pack of guards assigned to follow her and Tham that day.
The eldest of the guards was the same as always, but he’d been given yet another fresh batch of underlings. Whether the old ones had begged their way into other assignments or been deemed unworthy of trotting along at Mara’s and Tham’s heels as they ventured into every crack she could find in Isfol, she didn’t really know. She couldn’t bring herself to care much, either.
“You should leave some of your party up here.” Mara checked the knot at Tham’s waist. “As grateful as I am to have been allowed to commandeer rope, without ice axes, there’s a good chance of us being stuck at the bottom of this crevasse.”
“Then perhaps you shouldn’t go into it,” the eldest guard said.
Mara knelt, checking to be sure the cuffs of the pants she’d borrowed from Tham were tightly tucked into her boots. “If I don’t go down, how will I know what’s at the bottom?”
“Ice,” the eldest said. “There’s ice at the bottom.”
“I didn’t know you had a sense of humor.” Mara glanced up at the guard. “And while you’re probably right, you seem to have underestimated my need to press every limit imposed upon me. My dearest friend calls it a vice. But, if I hadn’t tried wearing pants out of our room, I wouldn’t know if the Princess would have me whipped for wearing Tham’s clothes. If I hadn’t refused to give back your light, I wouldn’t know if I’d be beaten for cheek. If I hadn’t acquired such a fine rope from the stables―”
“You wouldn’t know if you’d be arrested for theft.” The eldest’s scowl didn’t falter. “Stomp on your luck too often, and eventually it will crack.”
“And I’m sure if it were up to you, my luck would have shattered long ago.” Mara yanked on the end of her rope, testing its hold on the tree she’d anchored it to.
She hadn’t chosen the tree nearest the crevasse. The slice in the street had been growing far too quickly to allow such a risk to be taken. The ravine had only been a crack in the road when Mara had first found it, too small for even a cat to slip into. In the three days since, the gap had grown wide enough for guards to have been stationed around the area to warn people away from the street.
Now, the nearest tree’s roots were visible through the clear blue of the ice, making it a poor choice for anchoring the ropes Mara, Tham, and whatever guards dared to follow them would be using to lower themselves into the darkness.
Instead, Mara had chosen a tree more than ten feet away, right beside a house with a pale yellow and blue tapestry hanging out front.
A woman sat in the window nearest the tree, glowering at Mara.
Mara offered the woman a sympathetic smile and a nod.
“If I were charged with following someone who kept insisting on testing their limits while sliding into every hole in the ground they could find, I know I would have stopped letting me out of my room days ago.” Mara turned back to her guards. “Which means it must be the Princess herself who’s ordered you to indulge my explorations.”
None of the guards spoke.
“I’m sorry you’ve been charged with trotting along behind the mad Ilbreans,” Mara said. “And perhaps the next desperate message you send to Her Highness begging for your torment to end will be answered with her locking us in our room. In the meantime, my terms remain the same. I will gladly become a well-behaved charge as soon as you take me to see Kegan.”
The guards stayed silent.
“Then I hope none of you are afraid of heights,” Mara said.
“One of our party is ill.” Tham stepped toward the guards. “Our visiting him only makes him scream. Another is locked in a cell. Alone. Abandoned. We’ve asked every day to see him. And you refuse. Should you ever be in our position, I hope those who call you their guests will find mercy in their hearts.”
“Come, Tham.” Mara backed up to the edge of the crevasse. “Perhaps Kegan is being held in a cell below this part of the city.”
She leaned back, testing the rope one final time before stepping over the edge.
Keeping her pace slow, she lowered herself step by step into the darkness. Tham stayed a few feet above her, silhouetted by the unrelenting blue glow of Isfol.
“How long until they follow us?” Mara asked once they’d gone thirty feet into the darkness.
“I’m not sure they know how,” Tham said.
A naïve corner of Mara’s heart had a moment of hope as she dreamt of freedom.
“They’ve been herding us toward this part of the city,” Mara said, taking the risk of speaking freely, hoping that for once they might not be overheard. “They started guiding us this way―”
“Right after you found the first tunnel and dared to climb into it.”
“It’s good to know I haven’t become too paranoid.” Mara swallowed past the knot in her throat. “I’ve missed properly speaking to you, without them listening all the time.”
“I love you, Mara.”
“I love you, too. There’s no one I’d rather rappel into a trap with than you.”
The low rumble of Tham’s laugh acted like a salve, soothing the anger in Mara’s chest.
“We have to find a way out of here before we both go mad,” Mara said. “And this is not the path to freedom.”
“We’ll find a way.”
Mara’s toe touched solid ground.
She lowered both feet, testing the ice before daring to let go of her rope and reach for her light.
Her fingers fumbled, trying to find the right angle to strike the flint against the stone. It took three hits for the wick to catch.
Tham reached the ground beside her as the flame flickered to life, offering them a poor view of the bottom of the crevasse.
The passage they’d reached was fifteen feet wide. The jagged ice that covered the ground had been crushed along the center of the tunnel, as though something large had forced its way past.
“We’ve definitely been herded this way.” Mara looked toward the light high above as she untied the knots around her waist. “I despise being corralled and spied on.”
Tham untied his own rope before kneeling to study the ice. “If something heavy enough to flatten the ground traveled through this tunnel, there must be an easier path we could have taken to get down here.”
