I dragged my wits together, realizing the others were clustered around me in the dark, wet foliage instead of taking advantage of our lead.
We all froze at the sound of a scream from above, and moments later, a riderless horse came stumbling down the path, its eyes showing white. Obviously, her rider had not anticipated how steep the path was and had trusted his own instincts over those of his horse. We heard him cursing foully and calling up to his comrades that he’d broken his leg.
“Let’s go while we can,” Miryum urged.
As we rode on, I tried to farseek Duria, but my mind was incapable of even locating him let alone of communicating. Fortunately, he linked with one of the coercers to guide us to the ambush point. We were perhaps twenty minutes away, and there was no need to ride fast now. Ironically, we had to make sure we left a good clear trail so that the soldierguards would not lose us in the dark.
The storm had faded away without my noticing it, and the rain had almost cleared, but we were soaked to the skin. The long, hard ride had kept us from feeling the cold, but with the slower pace, I could feel it beginning to gnaw at my bones. By the time we came to the narrow track leading into the cul-de-sac where the trap was to be sprung, my teeth were chattering so hard I could not speak.
The track opened up into a broad clearing surrounded by high walls of stone, and I knew we had reached our destination. Sliding from Gahltha’s back, I staggered.
By the time we were all sheltered under several clumps of trees down the far end of the canyon, the rain had ceased completely and the clouds began to fray and separate. The moon showed through their ragged edges, revealing the full extent of the cul-de-sac limned in silvery blue. Duria had been right in saying it was the perfect place for an ambush.
“Can you contact Duria?” I asked Miryum. “I used up all my energy delaying the soldierguards.”
“I’m afraid I have nothing left. I couldn’t coerce them if my life depended on it,” she admitted.
At her words, a terrible premonition smote at me, but before I could grasp what it might mean, the soldierguards arrived. They galloped wildly into the clearing, one after another, until there were dozens milling about.
“This is not Henry Druid’s camp!” a soldierguard cried.
One of the captains dismounted and drew a short, businesslike sword. Moonlight slid along its blade with liquid grace as he peered toward us. “No, but those seditioners are skulking in the trees. I daresay they hoped we’d give up before this.”
I expected Malik to announce himself then, but instead a peculiar awkward silence fell. On our part, it was an expectant silence, but on the part of the soldierguards, it was infused with puzzlement. They had caught sight of us now, and we were not behaving as penned prisoners ought. The soldierguards dismounted and came toward us slowly.
“Something doesn’t tally,” one of them muttered, peering into the shadows under the trees. “Look at them. Gypsy halfbreeds by their clothes and skin. Oldsters and women and children, mostly. These were not the armsmen who rescued Henry Druid.”
“This lot were set up as decoys, to draw us away so that the Druid and his men could vanish,” one of the captains snarled.
I wondered why Malik was holding his hand for so long.
Miryum must have felt the same, for without warning, she took several strides into the space before the horde of soldierguards and faced them boldly. Straaka followed smoothly as her shadow.
“Surrender your weapons, for you have ridden into a trap,” she said boldly.
The huge, bearded soldierguard captain holding the sword fairly goggled at her. Then his eyes slitted. “I do not think there is any trap,” he sneered. “The only thing you have led us to, woman, is your own death.” Without warning, he lifted a small crossbow and fired.
It would have taken Miryum in the head, but moving like a snake, Straaka twisted to place himself in front of the coercer, and the arrow took him deep in the chest. The Sadorian fell without a sound at her feet, and Miryum gaped down at him in disbelief. She knelt, seeming at once to forget where she was, but the rest of us watched in horror as the soldierguards nocked arrows and drew their knives and swords.
“Leave a couple alive. We’ll torture the Druid’s whereabouts out of them,” the bearded captain said.
Instinctively, I tried to coerce him to stop his men, but my Talent would not function. Taking a deep breath to steady myself, I stepped out into the open, ignoring Gahltha’s attempt to catch my arm in his teeth.
“Stop,” I commanded. “The woman spoke truthfully. We have led you deliberately into a trap. Even now, you are surrounded by rebels, but they will spare you if you do no further harm.”
Some of the soldierguards looked around uneasily, but the captain who had shot Straaka smiled scornfully. “Let your allies reveal themselves, if they exist,” he challenged.
Now we all looked up, Misfits and soldierguards alike, but there was nothing; not the slightest rustle or glimpse of light on skin to suggest there was anything above but wet foliage and stone.
Only then did I understand.
Malik was in place, listening even now. He and his rebel force. But they would no more move to save us than grow wings and fly.
Malik had sworn to do no hurt to the soldierguards, and none of the empaths had found a lie in his vow, because he had spoken the truth. He had never intended to murder the soldierguards.
It was us he meant to harm.
I understood clearly that this was no momentary impulse of treachery. It had been planned, perhaps even from the moment Malik suggested that Misfits act as bait. He knew from the Battlegames that our Talents were limited by our energy, and his plan had been designed to ensure any Misfit taking part would be drained before the ambush.
“Where are you, Malik? Show yourself!” Lina yelled, coming out to stand beside me, but her only answer was the mocking echo of her own voice. “I don’t understand,” she muttered. “The horses say the rebels are all there hidden above us. What are they waiting for?”
“They are waiting for the soldierguards to kill us,” I said, loudly enough for Malik and his men to hear my words and know that I understood their treachery. Strangely, I was not afraid, though death was all about us in the night and in the cold purposeful eyes of the soldierguards.
I lifted my hands to show that they were empty. “Do not kill us, for we are unarmed,” I said. I sensed the others behind me, coming from under the trees to show their empty hands.
One of the soldierguards lowered his bow a fraction. “They’re half of them little more than children,” he muttered. “I can’t kill unarmed children in cold blood.”
“They are foul demon spawn created by the loathsome experiments of Henry Druid,” the bearded captain warned. “Their faces are innocent and young precisely to sway you to pity. But behind these winsome guises, they are monsters. And do not think them weaponless either. Remember the demonish tricks they played to slow our horses under us, and look what happened to Tarick back there on the road. One of these ‘children’ struck him a mortal blow without even being close to him.”
The faces of the men around him hardened with revulsion, but even as they lifted their weapons, there was a flurry of movement. Before anyone could act, a mass of horses—both those of the Beastguild and the soldierguards’ own mounts—had made a fleshy barrier of themselves between us and the soldierguards. Gahltha had positioned himself directly in front of me, and I fought to push past him, but he stood resolute.
“Very well,” the soldierguard captain snarled. “If the beasts are possessed by these demons, then let them perish.”
“No!” Angina cried, wriggling through the line of horses to stand in front of his mount. “Please don’t hurt them. Give us a moment, and we’ll make them go.…”
But the captain barked a command to fire.
My heart leapt into my mouth, but Gahltha was not hit, nor the horses on either side of him. For a second, I thought perhaps the arrows had been shot
high to frighten us. Then I heard horses begin to scream, and Angina fell with dreamlike slowness. A coercer-knight who had also broken through the line of horses groaned and staggered with an arrow in her groin.
I stepped forward on rubbery legs, but Gahltha’s teeth closed painfully on my shoulder. “Do not expose yourself, ElspethInnle!” he sent urgently. He insisted with brutal clarity that far more would die than those gathered here if I were to perish.
Gahltha commanded the other horses to guard me with their lives, and I felt him gather himself to attack the soldierguard captain.
“No! No, Gahltha!” I screamed as he moved toward the soldierguards, and I flung myself after him, grasping onto his mane.
“Fire again!” the captain’s voice rang out.
I heard the thrum of bowstrings, preternaturally loud despite the keening of dying horses and the groans of Misfits, and knew that both Gahltha and I were too clear as targets to miss this time.
It seemed many minutes before the arrows struck. I saw Rushton’s face, grave and ardent, and Maruman’s dear, battered muzzle. Gahltha’s flank was warm against my belly, and I had the muddled thought that it was good to die so close to one I loved.
But I did not die. Instead, the soldierguards cried out in shock and pain. They were falling.
I gaped at the sight. A line of archers had entered the cul-de-sac, firing upon the soliderguards from behind.
But they were not rebels. They were gypsies, pureblood and halfbreed alike, and foremost among them was the tall Twentyfamilies prince whom I knew only as Swallow.
He nocked another arrow, training it on one of the captains.
“Don’t kill them!” I cried.
Swallow arched his brows. “As you wish,” he said in his rough velvet voice.
26
MALIK’S FACE WAS heavy with thwarted rage. Incredibly, he seemed oblivious to the sounds of suffering around us, blind to the fact that dozens of Misfits, soldierguards, and horses lay dead or injured. It was as if they did not exist to him.
“Is this what you wanted?” I whispered. “Does it please you to see children and innocent beasts lying in their lifeblood, as well as soldierguards who need not have died?”
“No one was killed by my men,” Malik mocked as his men rounded up uninjured soldierguards to rope their hands behind their backs.
“What happened this night arose because you planned to let the soldierguards slaughter us before you took them prisoner,” I said.
The rebel gave a hateful sliver of a smile; then his expression became cool and lofty. “Doubtless it looks that way to one with diminished mental capabilities, but it is merely that my people were longer in assuming position than we had calculated. Unfortunate, but—”
“You were in position when we arrived,” I snapped.
“You will tell your story, and I will tell mine. We will see which is believed,” he responded, actually sounding bored.
“You betrayed us.”
His eyes glittered. “One can only betray one’s own kind, Misfit,” he hissed. Then he said loudly, “I will take the soldierguards capable of walking with me to the lowlands. I leave the rest to your mercy, since it is your friends who injured them.” He cast a malevolent glance at Swallow, who had insisted on remaining at my side with a bared sword throughout the confrontation. The Twentyfamilies gypsy met the rebel’s gaze with wordless contempt.
Malik turned on his heel and strode away, and his men followed, prodding a line of bewildered-looking soldierguards to march. Distantly, I noted that a few rebels looked about in furtive shame as they trailed after their leader, but most ran their eyes over the carnage with as little expression as if the dead were fallen leaves at the end of summerdays. Malik’s hatred was contagious.
When they had gone, I felt paralyzed. Swallow touched my arm gently. “You are not hurt?”
“No … no,” I said, and my voice was surprisingly calm. He hesitated, then went to help his people with the wounded.
I heard the sound of running footsteps, and Miky burst from the path into the cul-de-sac. She stopped dead at the sight that met her eyes and at the moans and cries that rose on all sides from the darkness like some nightmarish chorus. Her face was white as paper in the moonlight.
Gevan and Duria were close behind her. They stopped as she had done, to stare about in disbelief.
“Elspeth, thank Lud you are not hurt,” the Coercer guildmaster said fervently. “Malik convinced us to move some way back with a handful of his men, in case any of the soldierguards tried to escape. It was Miky who sensed something was wrong, so we disabled the rebels. But we were too far away.…”
“If the gypsies had not come, you’d all be dead,” Duria said.
“Too many are dead because of my blindness,” I said.
Gevan gave a snort of fury. “Because of Malik’s treachery! But he will not get away with it. The other rebels will punish him.”
“That will not bring back the dead,” I said.
Swallow appeared out of the shadows, frowning. “Come, this is no time for talk. There are wounded who need attention. My people’s wagons are nearby, but the way into this pass is too narrow to admit them. We must carry out those who can be moved.”
“Who are you?” Gevan asked.
“I am known by many names, but you may call me Swallow.”
“You are the Twentyfamilies prince?”
“I am the king of the Twentyfamilies now, though we do not use such archaic terms. I am the D’rekta, and my people are at your disposal. But people and beasts suffer as we speak. Let us save our talk for the campfire.”
Gevan nodded decisively. “You are right. Duria and I will find out how many can be moved. We’ll need someone to show us the way to your wagons.” Swallow nodded and turned to speak with a gypsy hovering at his elbow.
I knew I should help, but I felt both weak and queerly indecisive. I walked through the clearing, feeling as if I were drifting rather than setting my feet on the ground. It was dark enough that bodies were merely crumpled shapes until I came close, and then, as in some nightmare, they seemed to form before my eyes to become someone I had known and loved. Many more than Angina and the coercer-knight had tried to shield the horses. At least a dozen horses lay dead, too, and the same number again were wounded, some mortally. One horse was screaming piteously in pain, and I saw that Lina was trying to staunch a bright red gush of blood from its neck.
I should have stopped, but my legs carried me past them to where Kella was bent over the recumbent body of Straaka. I kneeled and touched his ankle where his flesh showed above the boot. His skin felt soft and warm. I managed to raise a weak probe that told me Kella was operating internally on the Sadorian, encouraging nerve and muscle tissue to knit in such a way as to stem massive internal bleeding around his heart. But his life force ebbed dangerously low.
My vision blurred, and I realized that even this mildest form of probing was too much for my ravaged mind.
Kella continued to work, but after a little, she sat back with a sob and shook her head.
Miryum was kneeling beside us, an arrow she had taken in the soldierguards’ second volley protruding from her own shoulder, though she seemed oblivious to it. Her eyes were fixed on Kella. “He jumped in front of me,” she muttered.
“He saved your life,” Kella said gently; then she got to her feet and moved away to find another who needed her.
I rose, too, and the movement caught Miryum’s feverish gaze. “Elspeth,” she rasped. “He would not listen when I told him to stay back. He never listened.”
I did not know what to say. Eventually, Miryum’s eyes fell to Straaka’s body, and I followed Kella, who was now kneeling beside Angina. He looked so dreadfully young, and Miky was clinging to his hand, her face streaming with tears. I needed no probe to tell me Angina was near to death.
“Leave her to do what she can,” Swallow said, coming up beside me. “We need your help to carry one of the wounded.”
I le
t myself be led to where an enormous soldierguard lay, an arrow in his back. With a shock, I saw that it was the man who had shot Straaka—the bearded leader of the soldierguards. Seeing my reaction, Swallow said noncommittally, “He will die if he is left to lie here.”
I took a shuddering breath and shook my head. “We can’t carry him alone.”
“No,” Swallow said, and he waved his hand to summon two ragged halfbreeds. Aras came over, too, and between the five of us, we struggled to lift him. He gave a deep groan and then was silent. We were all panting hard and sweating by the time we were halfway down the trail from the cul-de-sac. Fortunately, more gypsies waited, and they took him from us. One of them was Swallow’s half sister, Iriny, but she did not notice me.
“The arrow has not gone deep enough to kill him,” Swallow told her.
“Maire will have a look at him. But here, do you want any of our herbalists down there?”
“One,” he answered. “The horses will have to be treated where they fell. Where is Darius?”
“He comes as fast as he can,” Iriny said with faint reproach.
Swallow nodded and bid Aras and me return with him to the clearing. By the time we reached it, rain fell again.
“Twenty-three horses dead and seventeen wounded. Ten people dead and the same number wounded,” Gevan said when all who could be moved had been taken to the gypsy rigs.
It was just on dawn, and those of us who remained in the clearing were clustered around a small fire. It had been built when the rain stopped, but the air was still clammy with damp, and drops fell steadily from the leaves all around us onto the sodden ground. Only three injured humans remained, too seriously hurt to be shifted, and all of the surviving horses. The dead had been covered with blankets.
Small makeshift canopies had been set up above the injured to keep them dry, and Kella and a gypsy herbalist were even now working on a soldierguard who had been arrowed in the stomach and in his hand. It was likely that the hand would have to be amputated. As I watched, Kella rose, moving away to examine a coercer-knight I had seen fall. There was little hope that she would survive, and I watched the healer settle a gentle hand on the girl and close her eyes as she drained away the girl’s pain.