You have a large gash on your scalp. Should I rub this in your hair? Basilard was almost comical, trying to sign and point at her head with clumps of the healing salve dangling from his fingers. It won’t turn your hair white or make it fall out, will it?
Ashara almost snorted, amused that he had saved this injury for last out of concern for her hair.
“No,” she said. “None of the ingredients are harsh.”
Still, he hesitated. It will make a mess.
Feeling less weak now, she managed a smile. “A mess of my hair? More so than the blood already crusted in it? And however many twigs and leaves are sticking out of it?”
Basilard matched her smile, making her realize how seldom she had seen the expression from him. He usually carried a glumness about him. Sort of a noble, I-am-doing-a-greater-duty-and-I-have-accepted-that-I-must-do-it glumness, but a glumness all the same.
Only three leaves, he signed.
“Three? That’s it? I thought I knocked my head against more branches on the way down.”
The humor faded from his face, and she wished she hadn’t resorted to sarcasm. She should have found something lighter to say. He clearly wanted to make her feel better.
Basilard lifted her head slightly to apply the salve, and she gritted her teeth against the initial sting.
There isn’t much left, he signed. But I think I saw the potion you mentioned.
“Good. After I drink it, could you help me over to that tree?” She twitched a finger toward a stout hemlock farther down the river. “I may be able to use its energy.”
I cannot tell if you have a spine injury, Basilard signed. You should not be moved until a healer can come.
“Oh, and when will that be?” They were a full day’s walk from his people, and she hadn’t seen anyone except Kendorians in the area.
I will send some of my hunters to find someone. The young priest with us may have some skills. His jaw tightened. Or I will find that shaman and force him to heal you.
“That’s not in his repertoire,” she said with a sigh. “I’ve met him before.”
You did not mention that. Basilard had found her potion, and he unstoppered it, then lifted her head gently so she could drink.
“No, I have lots of secrets.” Ashara gazed past his shoulder at the hemlock. “I miss the days when I simply gathered herbs in the forest and brought home a few snared rabbits for dinner. Everything was much simpler then.”
Youth usually is. Basilard glanced back at the tree. It will help you heal?
“Sort of. I can draw on its energy to make my body’s systems work faster and more efficiently.”
Basilard studied her face for a moment, and she worried he would know that was a skill of a night stalker. She mentally braced herself for the accusation. There was not much point in denying it now. If he had found her because of the message she had sent, he already knew that she had more powers than she had admitted to before.
“Basilard,” Sicarius called down.
He stood at the precipice, a dagger in his hand, fresh blood on the blade. He must have found some Kendorians lurking up there, or perhaps he had finished off a dying man who had been left. From the hard way he always stared at her, Ashara wondered if he would have finished her off if he had been the one to chance across her, and Basilard had not been around.
“They were not trying to hide their tracks.” Sicarius pointed along the cliff in the direction Mahliki had run. “They have a lead of several hours.”
From the way he looked down, Ashara guessed he expected Basilard to join him.
Go, Basilard signed. I will catch up with you.
“Retrieving the president’s daughter should be our priority.”
Yes, it should. And Sicarius would need help to deal with the shaman.
“Go with him,” Ashara said. “I understand.”
I will follow you when Amaranthe and the others catch up and can care for Ashara, he told Sicarius. Basilard’s hand gestures were firm, not inviting argument from either of them.
Sicarius stared down at him, his thoughts unguessable, but his face cool and hard. As always. Then, between one eye blink and the next, he was gone.
“Do you consider him a friend?” Ashara asked. Maybe she shouldn’t assume that Basilard would condemn a night stalker when he was walking around with an assassin, one who had to have killed far more people than she ever had.
We are not enemies now. Something in Basilard’s face implied they might have been once. He is a dependable ally, if you can get him to care whether you live or die, but if not for Amaranthe, I doubt I would spend time with him.
“Ah.”
She should have known. Basilard’s morals would not allow him to claim an assassin as a friend. She closed her eyes as he slid his arms under her shoulders and legs, cradling her to his chest as he carried her to the tree. His tenderness made her lament that he would not likely claim a night stalker as a friend—or anything else, either.
“Basilard,” came a call from farther down the river. Ashara couldn’t see the speaker, but recognized Maldynado’s voice, and by the time Basilard reached the hemlock—he was being very careful carrying her—Maldynado came into view, along with Amaranthe, Jomrik, and several of the Mangdorian hunters. “What’re you doing?”
Basilard eased Ashara down and rested her so that her shoulders propped against the base of the hemlock. He signed to Maldynado, She wanted to lie next to the tree.
“Yeah? If I was that banged up, I’d want to lie in a hospital. Or maybe a pub. Preferably with a beautiful woman sponging my wounds and cleaning my aching body.”
“A beautiful woman such as Yara?” Amaranthe asked.
“Uhm, yes. Of course that’s who I was thinking of. Though she’s not known for gently sponging men. Or doing anything gently. I’m not entirely positive I’d want her to be my nursemaid.”
Basilard had been gentle, Ashara thought, then was immediately glad she had not voiced the words. Maldynado would mock him, and Basilard would wonder what she meant by the comment.
I need to catch up with Sicarius, Basilard signed. He is on the shaman’s trail. Will you watch Ashara, Amaranthe? Until we’ve got the shaman and we’re… done? From the grim expression on his face, he didn’t know how he would achieve that doneness in a way that left him alive.
Ashara wished she could comfort him, but Tladik would not be easy to kill, even with a skilled assassin helping.
• • • • •
Basilard, Jomrik, and the hunters jogged along the trail of churned mud and snapped branches for over an hour before catching up with Sicarius. Even then, it was clear Sicarius had wanted them to catch up. He stepped out from behind a tree, raising a hand.
What is it? Basilard sniffed the air and peered through the forest ahead. They had entered a valley that had never seen a logger’s axe, with thick trees dripping moss from branches bigger around than his thigh. A flutter of nerves taunted his belly.
The unexpected.
Sicarius tended toward the blunt, rather than the dramatically vague, so Basilard waited, anticipating more of an explanation. But Sicarius waved his fingers for them to follow, then strode ahead, not bothering to hide as he picked a route over logs and around trees.
Basilard followed, growing aware of the silence of the forest around them as they continued up the valley. Nothing stirred in the leaf litter, and long minutes passed without a peep from the birds that must live in the branches. Had the Kendorians made so much noise that it had startled all of the creatures to silence? Basilard’s senses told him it might be more than that.
Shortly after, he spotted the first body.
The man lay sprawled among the shiny green leaves of creeping salal stretching along the valley floor, the dense undergrowth nearly hiding him from sight. Basilard pushed aside a few branches, revealing his face, including sightless eyes and an expression frozen in horror. His throat had been torn out, not by a blade but by long claws. The width between the gashe
s made Basilard think of grimbals since even a bear paw would not be so large, but a musky, earthy scent clung to the man, as well, an unwelcome one that he remembered all too well. Makarovi.
He licked his lips. He had hoped the shaman wouldn’t have access to any of them; he would have preferred never to see another one again.
“That’s one of their people, isn’t it?” Jomrik asked, scratching his stubbled jaw when he caught up and saw the corpse.
“Leyelchek,” Hykur said. The hunters had spread out, alert as they scanned the foliage all around, but the young priest stared down at the body. “Something is not right here.”
Jomrik shouldn’t have understood him, since he and Hykur were speaking in different languages, but the soldier frowned as if to point out the obviousness of the statement.
Aside from the dead man? Basilard looked for Sicarius while he signed the question, but did not spot him. Sicarius always disappeared as easily in the forest as a hunter who had been born among the trees. I believe a makarovi killed him.
“Hm,” Hykur said.
You do not think so? Basilard pointed at the dead man and touched his nose.
“Yes, I smell it.” Hykur stood. “I’m just not certain… Something isn’t right,” he repeated.
Basilard waited to see if he could explain further, but Hykur only shrugged. If the Kendorian shaman had been calling animals to attack again, Basilard could not feel too bad if the plan had misfired and some of his own people had been killed. It meant one less Kendorian that he and his allies would have to deal with to get Mahliki back.
He headed in the direction he had last seen Sicarius going. His step faltered when he spotted a second body, this one crumpled against the base of a tree, the man’s gut torn open and entrails spilled everywhere. Basilard swallowed, taking back his earlier thought. He wouldn’t wish such a death on anyone; it was not the soldiers’ fault they had been sent along to work with a shaman.
The disemboweled man would not have died immediately from the gut wounds, but his throat had also been slit. A move of mercy? One that had been perpetrated by his comrades? Or had Sicarius done it? Basilard had never associated him with mercy, but he wasn’t cruel, either. He might have put the man out of his misery, especially if the Kendorian had asked for it.
“There’s another one,” Hykur said quietly, his eyes haunted as he gazed between the trees.
Two more, Basilard signed, spotting the first and then a second. One was a woman this time. He’d seen a few among the soldiers, in addition to Major Diratha, so he wasn’t surprised, but for some reason, it always bothered him more seeing women killed. Especially in such a vile fashion. These soldiers had also been slain by an animal—a makarovi.
After spotting a few tracks, the oversized bear-like paw prints of a makarovi, Basilard walked around, trying to figure out where the creature had come from—and where it had gone.
“The grimbals aren’t still around, are they?” Jomrik eyed the nearest body. “This doesn’t look like it happened that long ago.”
It wasn’t a grimbal, Basilard signed. And I think there was only one. His inspection revealed only the prints of one creature, one that had an out-turned digit with a missing claw that didn’t sink into the ground the way its other ones did.
Jomrik stared at his raised finger. “One? One did all of this?”
Makarovi are… formidable.
“I think I see their camp,” Hykur called softly. He had jogged ahead.
Hykur jerked to a stop, reaching for his dagger, and Basilard tensed, but it was only Sicarius walking into view. He pointed and said something to the priest. Basilard hurried to catch up. By the time he did, he wished he had hung back. At least ten more bodies lay in a small meadow dotted by boulders. Blood spattered one of those boulders, so much that it was as if someone had thrown a bucket of dark red paint against the rock.
The air smelled of butchered meat. Basilard had seen death often enough, especially in the last few years, but his belly roiled with queasiness. Trying not to inhale through his nose, he took several deep breaths to calm his stomach.
“They’re all Kendorians,” Jomrik said, this time addressing Sicarius. “What in their ancestors’ wildest nightmares happened?”
“They were attacked,” Sicarius said. Neither the sight nor smell of carnage ever seemed to bother him.
“These the deductive skills that got you the job working for intelligence?” The way Jomrik snapped at Sicarius surprised Basilard, until he noticed the distressed expression on the corporal’s face. He was probably sick and struggling for control of his stomach—and his fear—too.
Sicarius ignored the barb. “Makarovi. I’ve only seen one so far.” He pointed to a track in a mud puddle in the grass, then looked to Basilard.
Basilard nodded in agreement.
“It didn’t stop to feed on the females,” Sicarius noted, bending to touch something dark on the ground.
“Feed on?” Jomrik asked. “What do you mean?”
Sicarius’s fingers came away with black powder on them. One of the soldiers must have spilled some in his hurry to load a musket, a musket that wouldn’t have done much against the shaggy fur and thick hide of a makarovi.
“They prefer the taste of female organs and will target women above all other prey,” Sicarius said. “It’s why our people worked so assiduously to drive them out of our land in centuries past.”
We worked hard to do that, too, Basilard signed. There shouldn’t be any this far south, but we’ve already seen that the shaman can draw creatures to him from far away.
“But why draw one here to attack his own people?” Sicarius asked.
Maybe it got away from him, Basilard suggested. Or he controlled it for a while and then grew too tired. It might have been more resistant to the mental sciences than usual.
Sicarius gazed around at the carnage. “It seems like he would have found the mental reserves to fight it off when it started doing this.”
Basilard spread his hands. He didn’t have an answer. He looked to Hykur, wondering if he might have some ideas, but the young priest was clenching a twine and wood talisman that hung around his neck and shaking his head slowly as he stared around the clearing. If he had any ideas, he wasn’t sharing them.
“Female organs,” Jomrik said slowly, his lips curling with horror. He seemed to still be recovering from the revelation. Then a new horror dawned in his eyes. “That means it might go out of its way to chase Mahliki?”
Sicarius did not say anything, but his face appeared grimmer than usual. “I will search for her tracks.”
I’ll look too. Basilard ran around the perimeter of the meadow, moving as quickly as he could without risking missing signs. He hated the thought of returning to Starcrest and having to explain that his daughter had died horribly at the claws of a monster from his homeland. More than that, he would mourn Mahliki’s loss as a person, one who had learned his language almost overnight and who had never been anything but friendly to him.
He halted, spotting an old trail bearing fresh tracks. He crouched, tracing the outline of a boot with his finger. As tall as Mahliki was, she did not have smaller feet than her captors, but he recognized the make of Turgonian footwear, the sole harder than that of the moccasins the Kendorians wore. Normally, finding a sign that she had been alive only a few hours earlier would have heartened him, but he could tell from the distance between the prints that she had been running when she had made them. Deep claw marks promised the makarovi had also come down this trail, heading in the same direction as Mahliki. In spots, its big tracks trod right over hers.
Basilard waved for the others, signing that they had to hurry.
Chapter 20
“Are you sure you don’t want us to carry you?” Maldynado asked. “Or make a litter and drag you along? You look like a walking corpse.”
Ashara felt like a walking corpse. One with a limp and a back that throbbed in pain with every step. Basilard had splinted her broken fingers b
efore climbing up after Sicarius, but there wasn’t much to do about the broken ribs out here. She had regained some strength from her salve and from the tree—she had focused most of the borrowed energy into fusing cracked vertebrae—but it would take days, if not weeks, before she healed fully. If she ever did. Given the way she had landed, she was lucky she could walk at all. The concerned glances Amaranthe and Maldynado kept sending her way made her wonder if she should take them up on the offer to be carried. But the ground was uneven and tangled with undergrowth, and they weren’t following a trail. Being toted across it wouldn’t be much more comfortable than walking. She would probably get dropped every time someone tripped over a root.
“Your eye is so puffy, I can barely see it.” Maldynado squinted at her face from the side. “The cut is bleeding again, and you’re limping.”
“Thanks for the list of deficiencies. I did fall off a cliff, you know.”
“You shouldn’t do that in the future. It’s not a recommended method of avoiding a shaman’s wrath.”
“I didn’t know there were recommended methods.”
“Bribery, pleading, and hurling explosives can work,” Amaranthe said. “Not all at the same time, mind you, but they’re human beings. Sometimes, it makes more sense to talk to them than run around dodging their firepower.”
“Since you’re an expert, maybe you should be helping the others deal with him instead of escorting me.”
A grimace crossed Amaranthe’s face, though she hid it quickly, and Ashara realized that was exactly what she would have preferred to be doing. But she said, “Sicarius, Basilard, and the others can handle him. Besides, you don’t know where you’re going.”
“We’re heading toward the highway.” After the wild run, it had taken Ashara a while to find her bearings, especially with clouds hiding the sun, but she recognized the peaks surrounding them and could tell which direction they were walking.
“Yes, but you don’t know where our lorry is parked, and our driver doesn’t know who you are. He might decide you’re with the rest of the Kendorians and that he should shoot you.”