Piper Prince

by Amber Argyle

  Larkin’s mouth fell open. “I’m not leaving you behind. Garrot will kill you.”

  “No,” Nesha said. “West has fallen for your lies, you see. He lured me here under the pretense that you were sick. I came to find the guards already dead. He bound, gagged, and hid me in your place, where I will be found in the morning.”

  “What if Garrot doesn’t believe you?”

  Nesha wrapped the cloak around Larkin’s shoulders. “I have wronged you so deeply, sister. Will you not allow me to make it up to you?”

  Larkin looked at this woman, the best friend of her youth. She wished they could go back to that—to the joy and innocence of their childhood. But even with all the risks Nesha was taking … it didn’t erase the damage she’d already done.

  “If you don’t go,” Nesha said, “there will be no one to warn your prince or his people.”

  Larkin’s mouth hardened into a thin line. Nesha nodded once and glanced down at the cut, filthy ropes lying at Larkin’s feet. “Do you have any fresh ones?”

  West produced some from a trunk and bound her hands. She winced as he pulled them tight. “Sorry, miss, but they have to be tight enough to be believable. Wouldn’t hurt if you took some of the tonic too, to make it look like I drugged you first.”

  She shook her head. “It might hurt the baby.”

  He grunted and tied her to the stake that had been pounded into the ground.

  Larkin stared down at her sister, helpless and alone. “How can I leave you?”

  “Despite all he has done, Garrot has never harmed me,” Nesha said. “Has never shown me the slightest unkindness. He loves me.” She turned away, shame coloring her cheeks.

  “You still love him,” Larkin whispered.

  “Love doesn’t just go away because someone has done wrong, Larkin. You of all people should know that.”

  West gagged her.

  “I hope you’re right,” Larkin whispered.

  West peeked out the tent. “Stay behind me. Keep your head down.”

  Larkin pulled up the cowl. “Where are we going?”

  “To free your friend.”

  West slipped out. Larkin shot one look back at her sister, who gave a solemn nod, before slipping into the dark after him. She was grateful for the cowl to hide her face and the cloak that hid her smooth belly.

  “How do you intend to free Tam?”

  “He has two guards. We’ll have to kill them both, quickly and quietly.”

  Larkin had killed before, but it had always been in a fair fight, never an ambush. And even then, she’d been haunted by nightmares. Her steps faltered.

  As if sensing her hesitation, West reached back and tugged her forward. “If you can’t do this, we’ll have to leave him behind.”

  Which meant Tam would face Garrot’s wrath alone. She had a feeling he would not survive, no matter what the druid had promised Denan. She took a deep breath and nodded.

  West hurried on. “Keep your head down and your cowl up. I’ll get us in the tent and the men to turn to the prisoner. When I say ‘filthy pipers,’ we strike as one. Go for an instant kill so he doesn’t make any noise. I’ll pass any noise off as the prisoner protesting.”

  Filthy pipers. Strike. Kill. She sent up a prayer to the ancestors that she wouldn’t mess it up. The tent was about half a mile from her own. West paused before the flap and shot her a look over his shoulder. She nodded.

  “Miss Nesha to see the prisoner on behalf of Garrot.”

  “West? Is that you?” An older man with white hair pulled back the tent flap. Larkin felt the man’s gaze slide over her. She kept her gaze fixed on her hands. He clapped West on the shoulder. “Boy, I haven’t seen you since I boarded with your family last winter. How is your mother? Still making that apple pie?”

  “Hanover?” West slid a look to her, his expression defeated. This man meant something to West. But she wasn’t leaving without Tam.

  “Sir,” she murmured. “I would like to see the prisoner now.”

  Hanover bowed. “Of course, miss.” He backed into the tent.

  West grabbed her shoulder and whispered, “Hanover is my friend, Larkin. I can’t—”

  “Get him in a choke hold. Something. We’ll tie him up.”

  “It’s too risky.”

  “I’ll flare my shield.” She pushed into the tent and instantly locked eyes with Tam.

  There were two guards, Hanover included. The second stood, his brow furrowed. It was the man who’d tried to spit on her the other day. He looked her over. “That’s not—”

  She stepped in front of West. “Down,” she commanded.

  Tam flattened himself as she flared her shield, throwing the guards back a step—she dared not use more lest she shake the tent. Then she was running toward Spitter.

  She held her sword inches above his throat. “Don’t move.”

  To her right, Tam locked his arms around Hanover’s neck as he bucked and fought.

  “Don’t hurt him.” West drew his own sword and glared at Tam.

  Larkin’s sword jerked as Spitter grabbed it with his bare hands and wrenched it to the side. It cut straight through his fingers, which rained to the floor. He stared at his ruined hands and opened his mouth to scream. She shoved her sword into his throat. His lips opened and closed, gaping like a fish. She wrenched her gaze from him.

  “Tam, don’t kill that one!” she hissed.

  “Just putting him to bed, gentle as his mama,” Tam said.

  West shifted on his feet. “Garrot will kill him for failing. Larkin, he’s my friend.”

  Larkin felt the man struggling on the other end of her sword like a fish on a line. Her skin crawled, and her gorge rose. She forced herself to face him, to shove her sword deeper, into his spine. He dropped, and his legs flailed against hers even though he was dead.

  She let her magic fade as she turned to face Hanover. “I am Princess Larkin of the Alamant. I give you a choice, Hanover. Come with us or die.”

  Hanover pulled at Tam’s arm, but his hold was unbreakable.

  “Hanover, if the druids have their way, all of the Idelmarch will be lost,” West said. “How many times have you told me the druids shouldn’t run the kingdom and the army? Can you trust me, old friend?”

  Hanover stared at West, his eyes bugging. He gave a slight nod.

  Tam hesitated. “If you betray us, you’ll die for it. As will many hundreds more.”

  Hanover nodded again, which she took to mean he wouldn’t betray them.

  Tam eased his hold. The man gasped in a breath. Then another. When he didn’t scream, Tam released him. Hanover backed away and stared at West. “What would make you betray your own, boy?”

  Larkin flared her sword and touched the edge carefully to Tam’s bonds. They frayed, loosening so he could shake them off. Color immediately returned to his nails.

  “Garrot has made an alliance with—” West’s voice choked off. He looked at Larkin in confusion.

  “You can’t say it,” Larkin said. “He has to see it for himself.”

  “What?” Hanover asked.

  “Evil incarnate,” Larkin answered. “Garrot has made a deal with evil incarnate.”

  “Why—” Hanover began.

  “Power,” she said. “Do you swear to assist us, to not give us away?”

  He cut a glance at West, who nodded. “Very well,” Hanover said.

  Larkin turned to West. “Is this tent watched?”

  Hanover rubbed his throat. “Yes.”

  West bent down to the dead man and began stripping his armor. Mouth in a grim line, Tam helped. He splashed water from a nearby bowl onto the breastplate.

  Trying to help, Larkin grabbed one of the straps and jerked back from the sticky blood—the blood of another man she’d killed. She could still feel him wriggling at the end of her sword, his legs thrashing against hers as his body had fought death.

  She ran her fingertips down her skirt repeatedly. Get it off get it off get it off.

&
nbsp; Tam splashed the corner of a blanket and held it out to her. “It was him or us, Larkin.”

  She scrubbed every trace from her skin and made no move to help with the straps again. “If we want to reach Denan before Garrot, we need horses.”

  “I hate horses,” Tam muttered as he hauled the man’s armor on.

  “The druids keep the herd not far from here,” West said.

  “You’ll never make it past the sentinels,” Hanover said.

  “We will if we tell them we’re escorting Miss Nesha to the safety of Landra,” Tam said.

  “They’d never believe such a small group would risk the forest,” Hanover said.

  “They would if she was in need of a midwife,” West said. He and Nesha must have already figured this out. “Besides,” he continued, “the druids are aligned with the—” His mouth worked, coming up empty.

  “You can’t say it,” Larkin said. “Not in front of Hanover.”

  “Say what?” Hanover asked.

  “The curse binds our tongues,” Tam said.

  “The druids are aligned with the shadow,” West said.

  The four of them studied each other. One by one, the men all turned to her.

  “It’s the best plan we have,” she said.

  Hanover bent down and began shoving blankets in a satchel. “They’ll never believe you’re going anywhere without supplies.”

  West handed one of the blankets to Larkin with a meaningful look at her stomach. She stuffed the blanket under her shirt, praying it stayed put, praying West and Hanover wouldn’t betray her. West’s bandaged hand dripped blood.

  “How’s your hand?” Larkin asked West.

  “Ask me again when the healer’s medicine wears off,” West answered.

  Tam tied the dead man’s sword around his waist. “Let’s go.”

  They spread out around Larkin, Tam on one side, Hanover the other, West in the lead. She kept her cowl up, grateful that the dye in her hair hadn’t completely washed out. They left the tent and crossed the mostly abandoned encampment, though a few men glanced at them as they passed.

  A soldier approached as they reached the rope corral. “What’s your business?”

  “We’re to escort Miss Nesha back to Landra,” West answered.

  “Papers?”

  Papers? What papers? Larkin wondered.

  “Anyone who could sign any papers has gone on to the battle,” Hanover said.

  Larkin could feel the soldier’s gaze on her. “Without papers, I’m afraid—”

  “Miss Nesha has need of a midwife.” Tam gave her a pointed look. “Her time has come. Early.”

  Growing up with a midwife for a mother, she knew how squeamish men became about such things. She hunched over and moaned. “My waters have broken.”

  The man frowned. “Surely the healers—”

  “They tried,” Larkin panted. “The baby needs turned. They don’t know how to do it.”

  “A ride through the forest at night is no—”

  Hoping beyond hope the man had never seen her sister up close, Larkin marched to him. “I may not live through this night, soldier, but my babe still might. If I can get to a midwife who can save him.” She let her voice waver. “Please.”

  He looked from her to the men with her. Finally, he growled. “I knew it was a bad idea to let women march with us. Especially pregnant women.” He lowered one side of the rope.

  “Your fastest mounts,” Tam said, already pushing the bridle into the mouth of a muscled gelding.

  “That one’s lame,” the man said. He pointed out four horses. “Those are the best I have left.”

  Larkin leaned against a tree to “rest” while the men saddled the horses and the soldier cleared their departure with the sentries. Holding the blanket firmly to keep it from slipping, Larkin mounted a black gelding. The four of them rode from the encampment. Larkin looked back once, toward the tent where she’d left her sister bound hand to foot.

  She sent up a silent prayer to their ancestors, specifically to Eiryss, to watch over her and protect her from Garrot.

  East of the encampment, Larkin’s group paused to look over the two armies maneuvering into position. There were no signs of the mulgars on the other side of the river. Yet.

  “How will they cross the river?” Larkin asked.

  “I don’t know,” Tam replied. “But they mean to do it.”

  “The battle is scheduled to begin at dawn tomorrow,” West said.

  Larkin was certain it would really begin tonight. She stood in the stirrups. “We have to warn our friends.”

  Tam grabbed her hand. “They’re already surrounded.”

  “We have to do something.”

  Hanover surveyed the battlefield. “Their only hope is reinforcements. If another army could come down the river and hit the mulgars’ eastern flank, they could circle around their rear and trap them.”

  “King Netrish’s men?” Larkin asked Tam.

  Tam shook his head. “He can’t risk leaving the city defenseless.”

  “If Denan’s army falls,” Larkin said, “it won’t matter if the Alamant is defenseless. The druids won’t be deterred by the lake. And when the Alamant is in the druids’ hands …” The wraiths wouldn’t be far behind.

  “How far is the Alamant?” Larkin asked.

  “About a day’s ride,” Tam said.

  “Let’s go,” Larkin said.

  “Go where?” Hanover asked.

  “We have to muster what’s left of the Alamant’s forces,” Larkin said.

  “Stay close,” Tam said. “We’ll take the old road.”

  Larkin nudged the horse into a trot, her throat choked with memories of Bane teaching her to ride in the fields behind his house. She ducked branches and circumvented brush and boulders until they reached the broken old road.

  They pushed the horses hard, each stride bringing them closer to the Alamant. The animals were near spent, their ears drooping, their mouths hanging open, when they reached the edge of the lake just before nightfall.

  A quarter mile distant, trees had grown in sheets that fused to create one continuous wall. The lower boughs formed arches that wove into a parapet shaded by smaller branches, all of which were covered in thorns and bright yellow leaves.

  “What is it made of?” West pointed to the wall.

  “Trees. The whole city is made of trees growing out of the lake.”

  “Ancestors,” Hanover gasped.

  “What kind of tree grows out of a lake?” West asked.

  “Sacred trees,” Larkin answered.

  Tam lifted his pipes to his lips and let out a shrill, piercing note that instantly silenced all sounds of the forest. Atop the massive barrier wall, soldiers moved. Lights flashed, telescope lenses reflecting the dying light. Within moments, a few boats were swung out over the water and lowered slowly.

  When the boats were halfway to them, Tam cupped his hands over his mouth. “I must speak with the king!”

  One of the men in the closest boat stood and hollered back, “Why?”

  “He’s about to be overrun by shadows!” Tam called back.

  The man relayed the message to the wall, and a couple of men scrambled to action.

  “Will the king help us?” Larkin asked.

  “He has to,” Tam murmured. He motioned them all off the horses and started removing their tack.

  “What are you doing?” Hanover asked.

  “We’ve no use for them,” Tam said. “The wraiths would just kill them come nightfall.”

  The pipers rowed toward them until their boats reached the docks where Larkin’s group stood. The dark-featured man who had called out to them climbed out and clasped hands with Tam. “Good to see you, Tam.”

  “You too, Wott.”

  Wott bowed to her. “Princess Larkin, glad to see you’ve returned to us.” He eyed Hanover and West. “Idelmarchians?” His sigils flared.

  “They helped Princess Larkin and me escape in exchange for sanctuary,�
� Tam said.

  “Can they be trusted?” Wott asked.

  “We’re not fools,” Hanover said. West hung back, his gaze split between the boats filled with pipers and the wall beyond them.

  “Let’s hope not.” Wott turned to Tam. “Come. The king will have been sent for.”

  Wott helped Larkin into his boat. The rest of the men piled in after her. The boat moved back across the lake. Beneath them, fish glimmered with flashing lights. Larkin could see the scarred place where she’d taken her sword to the wall when she’d escaped with Bane. She found herself gripping the edge of the boat, her knuckles turning white.

  Wine-red tentacles bloomed beneath her, revealing a razor-sharp beak aimed right for her. She screamed as the tentacles snapped toward her and wrapped around her legs. Her scream cut off as it yanked her under. More tentacles wrapped her up in a too-tight embrace. She writhed, trying to pull her arms free. The tentacles twisted her around. She came face-to-beak with a creature that glowed red, its flesh textured like velvet, its shining eyes fixed on her as it shifted her toward its open serrated maw.

  “Larkin?”

  She started and found West’s hand on her shoulder, his expression concerned.

  “Are you all right?”

  “She’s probably just remembering the time she learned never to go into the water at night,” Tam said, his voice light.

  She punched his arm as he chuckled. She looked up as they passed beneath the barrier, waiting for the shimmer of magic. There wasn’t one. She waited until they were on the other side, then peered back in shock.

  “The barrier,” Tam asked. “What happened?”

  Wott glanced sidelong at her. “It’s failing.”

  Larkin had used her magical sword to stab into the barrier, had seen the gleaming threads part. Her stomach tightened to lead.

  “Larkin?” Tam leaned close, his expression concerned.

  “Tam, I did this.”

  He glanced to the wall, then back at her. “If your sword could break the barrier, then so could Garrot’s.”

  But Garrot hadn’t broken the barrier. She had. Did everyone know? Did they blame her?

  At the first tree, they docked, climbed the winding stairs to the canopy, and crossed the bridges linking one tree to the next. A quarter of the way to the king’s tree, Netrish came into view. Denan’s father, Arbor Mytin, hustled beside him. And behind the Arbor was Larkin’s mother and Sela.