Blades Of Destiny (Crown Service Book 4)

by Terah Edun

  Then, before Sara could speak, they all turned to see Reben pop out of a field and head straight for them, panting in exertion as she went.

  “Slow down,” Ezekiel said. “Take a breath.”

  With her hands on her knees as she leaned over, their littlest scout looked wiped out.

  Karn abruptly thrust a water pouch under her nose. “Here—drink.”

  She didn’t hesitate to do exactly as he said.

  When Reben had slaked her thirst, she jumped right in. “It was the Kades,” she said around gulps of air. “I found one of the uniforms on the dead men and scouted a trail his companions left behind. They’re a mile or two off—no more.”

  Sara, Isabelle, Karn, Marx, and Ezekiel all looked at each other at the same time.

  Then Marx broke into a satisfied grin. “How about we hunt us down some Kades?”

  Sara didn’t see any possible downsides to this. They’d been looking for some Kades, and now they’d found them. What was more, instead of a harebrained mission to hunt down two wayward mages, she now had a clear and simple plan of action to present to her cohort and her field commander if asked.

  They’d just make this detour, separate more heads from necks, capture the lamed Gabriel, and, in the process, bring the head of the snake to Barthis at their original meetup point for supplies.

  She couldn’t have planned it better herself, and the look on the field commander’s face when she rode up at dawn with the Illusions Mage slung over her saddle would be just too good to pass up. She might not have Nissa yet, but one out of the two outlaws certainly wasn’t bad.

  Mind made up, Sara nodded and said, “Let’s get ready to move out.”

  23

  It didn’t take them long to gather the cohort and prepare to ride out. There were no more than a few bruises and scrapes in the whole collective, thanks to their preemptive attack. Even the smaller weapons wagon, with its feisty pony, had managed to wait out the fray by simply staying in the middle of the road as Sara’s people crossed back and forth to take the fight to their opponents.

  Most importantly, its cargo was undisturbed.

  Satisfied, Sara mounted back up and they set off.

  It was still dark as a cave as they rode along the trail behind Reben’s mare. She turned only once, and it was to correct what she thought was the trail angling off. But they were soon back on the main road.

  As Sara rode, she thought about what a pleasure it would be to come down hard on Gabriel’s head with a well-deserved punch. Not enough to incapacitate him immediately, just enough to give him a pounding headache, which he totally deserved.

  As they kept riding, she wondered if they were being led to the ambush that Ezekiel had mentioned before, the one at the cutoff pass, but it was clear as daylight to her that Reben was leading them around the bridge.

  Sara kicked Balefire’s sides to urge him to catch up to Reben ahead.

  When she’d reached the scout’s side, Sara asked, “Where are they holed up?”

  Reben pointed to a ridge off to the side of the main road. “Just over that rise.”

  Without wasting a second, Sara signaled for four riders to dismount and follow her.

  She was stealthily creeping through the brush to get to the top with Ezekiel at her elbow, and three others bringing up the rear, when she got down on her hands and knees and then slid to her belly to keep from attracting any more attention.

  It wasn’t as awkward a movement as it could have been, for the simple fact that she had her sword strapped to her back and only her knives to the side. So as everyone else lowered themselves beside her in a row, some with more difficulty than others, she signaled that they should move forward. And ever so slowly and silently, they crept to the top of the ridge and, with her heart beating wildly, Sara peaked over the ridge.

  She didn’t even need a spyglass like the one Ezekiel possessed—she could see with her naked eye that they were in the right place.

  Six guards milled around a medium-sized opening in the hillside. In their center was a bright auburn head of hair she recognized well—it was Gabriel, the Illusions Mage. She’d bet her life on it.

  Taking a quick survey of their movements, she noted that Gabriel and one other person were bent over a large rock they were using as a makeshift table with a large map spread out before them. The guards were nervously pacing the perimeter of a wide, vegetation-less patch of dirt that stood in front of the opening behind them.

  Encircling them all on three sides was nothing but open fields and a path that cut through the fields to take them back to the main road. Behind them was a sheer rock face that had to be twenty feet high. It was limestone, and the fact that it ended in a sheer front suggested that the hills to either side of the opening had serve as a quarry of some sort. Perhaps for building materials. Either way, it meant that the Kades had trapped themselves in a position that she would gladly take advantage of.

  Smiling, Sara concocted a plan and, with tense whispers once they were back down the ridge, they ran through it.

  Minutes later, she had her people spread out in a U pattern with a double layer of the guards from the Imperial Armed Forces in the center to take the brunt of the offensive. They were going to choke off the Kades and get behind them to close in a circle before they could escape down that little hidey-hole of a shaft built into the quarry core behind them.

  She crept as silently as she could, crouched low to avoid detection in an amusing mockery of the same poses the Kades had taken not hours before.

  Now she had the surprise of a lifetime in store for them, and they had no idea.

  As she curved in from the left at the head of her group, Sara kept her eyes on the guards who were warily eying the perimeter as they moved in unison. They hadn’t seen any of her group yet, and that was a good thing.

  Now that they had cut off access to the main road, her part in this was to make sure that none of the Kades made it into their escape hole.

  She swallowed tightly as she glanced over at Karn, who was hidden by the tall grass in front of him and was leading the frontal assault. It was most likely that the Kades would see him first and move to engage, which was why she’d doubled his ranks in preparation.

  Everything else was pretty simple. The rest of their group were spread out in an arc of people, same as she was, each one assigned to pick off a Kade guard as they all sought to bring down the man who stood in the center.

  Letting out her breath in a low hum, Sara loosened her limbs to prepare to jump out with the fierceness of the warrior she was.

  Just before she made the signal to swarm the unsuspecting Kades, Sara thought about what Barthis and Lady Chatteris would think of this maneuver. They’d probably tell her she was being impulsive and to stick to the plan—meet up for supplies and backup and then signal for their regiments to come to her aid when she had the others cornered.

  Unfortunately for them, it was too late for that, and she wasn’t going to let this opportunity pass her by. Not after she had gone through so much heartache and torture from the Kades. These were her bounty, and she’d bring them in her way. Besides, it wouldn’t do to back out now; she’d already agreed to Chatteris’s demands. She just hadn’t agreed on the how. But Sara was nothing if not her own brand of stubborn, and her conscience was telling her that the only way past this was through it. If they wanted Gabriel so badly, well, he had already practically told her where and when to grab him.

  So she was going to do that.

  And she was taking this lot with her to do it.

  Besides, maybe it was time for the field commander and blood of the crown to learn a thing or two from her.

  She yelled, “Go!” and swept forward into the fray.

  None of her soldiers hesitated, allowing her to concentrate on the first Kade guard, who immediately met her blade for blade. His swords swung in the air as he brought them down to cave in her head.

  She quickly ducked and swept out a leg to trip him up and bring him d
own on her own blade, held straight up.

  Too late, she heard Isabelle curse loudly, and she didn’t sound happy—at all. Sara immediately realized why, as mid-movement, instead of her outstretched leg connecting with the shins of her opponent and sweeping his foot out from underneath him, there was nothing.

  No flesh.

  No muscle.

  No bone.

  Nothing. Just air.

  And, off balance without the ballast needed to keep herself moving, she fell flat on her bum.

  The illusion in front of her disappeared at that same moment, and instead of two blades coming down on her head, she saw absolutely no one.

  Then cruel, mocking laughter echoed over the open field as, one by one, the Kades her cohort had been rushing toward to surprise and kill disappeared into thin air.

  And she realized, as they all did, that they had been duped.

  A scream of rage ripped from her throat as she stood in a tangle of weapons and legs.

  Furious, she looked around and located the laugh. It was coming from the path into the quarry, and she didn’t stop to think, just acted, and was in motion before her feet even hit the ground.

  “Sara, wait!” she heard someone shout at her.

  But she couldn’t—he was getting away, and this was the last time she’d let this bastard mock her. So she followed him into the hole at a dead run. Not the smartest move, but she was confident she could take him hand to hand.

  She just had to get her hands around his scrawny neck first.

  As she ran into the hole that was no wider than a man with broad shoulders, she felt her fury grow unchecked. The laughter from Gabriel was now echoing and bouncing on the gray quarry walls around her, and she couldn’t stop—she had to get to him. She ran, sword arm outstretched as she tried not to bang the weapon on the close walls. A time or two her feet slipped on green moss on the quarry floor, but in front of her it was always open, so she didn’t stop.

  She heard feet rush in behind her as, one by one, her cohort followed her down the path, trying to catch up but failing. All she could see was Gabriel’s face waiting for her at the end. All she could hear was Gabriel laughing in her ears. She wasn’t even sure quite what she would do when she caught him—slit his throat, most likely.

  One dead Kade wouldn’t matter, as long as she had the other one in hand.

  Which she would.

  She had to. They needed this information, and in her opinion, as she ran along that slippery path and began to go downhill instead of straight, Nissa was a better target than Gabriel anyway. His powers made him too deceptive, too easy for him to dupe those around him, and this was the last time she’d allow him to do that to her.

  As her breaths became shallower and the temperature in the quarry walls began to grow colder, Sara was beginning to fill a bit uneasy. But she kept moving forward because she had no choice. It wasn’t like they could all back out one by one; they were in this now.

  She just had to focus on the end goal—Gabriel’s head on a pike and Nissa, the only Kade ever captured in the field of battle, back in chains.

  Sara had once felt empathy for the woman, especially after what Barthis had done to her, whipping her like a dog before her betters. But after seeing the death and destruction the Kades had callously wrought on the Imperial Armed Forces in retribution, Sara had to say her sympathies no longer lay with her.

  No, she would use this Kade, these Kades, to get the information the empress so desperately sought. Information she also wanted to know. For instance, the names of the Council of Mages were kept secret for a reason. No one besides those in the Madrassa, and potentially the ruling court, knew who they were. But even if they had their names, who was to say who they were really, and why had they attacked the empire of Algardis?

  She, Sara Fairchild, would find out.

  Nervous sweat started beading on her brow as Gabriel’s mocking laughter stopped and she saw an opening in the shaft ahead. Trying to keep her balance, she slowly crept down with her sword still outstretched and her other hand on the cool wall of the quarry side to keep her balance.

  Even so, small rocks were dislodged beneath her feet and tumbled down the path with a lot of noise, announcing her presence as loudly as if she had shouted.

  Wincing, Sara knew there was no way they weren’t aware of her presence now, but on the other hand, Gabriel had to have known she wouldn’t let him off the hook without pursuing.

  Too late, Sara realized that perhaps that had been his plan all along.

  Desperately trying to at least give her cohort some warning, she turned and whispered over her shoulder just as she jumped out of the opening in the shaft and into God knew where.

  “Everyone be on alert!” she told them.

  Heart pounding and blood rushing in her ears, she knew that there was no way that she could be any more alert than she already was.

  That was for sure.

  24

  As Sara’s feet thumped onto the ground after dropping one, no, two feet down, she was surprised to feel nothing but smooth stone beneath her boots. Not rocks, not gravel, and nothing to remind her of the path she had just traversed.

  Grip tight on her sword, she called out behind her, “Careful—there’s a steep drop.”

  Sure-footed thumps behind her let her know her people had found the drop, and it was as little trouble for them as it’d been for her.

  Grinding her teeth, Sara muttered, “Gabriel, Gabriel, now where would you be hiding?”

  She didn’t see anything except empty space and stark walls of stone rising all around her. It was like an entire field of stone had been scooped up out of this hole and left nothing but smooth walls and a floor in its wake. After testing the limestone with her sword, she grimaced as the tap of her foot echoed and bounced off the walls all around.

  The echo made it quite clear that if there had been anything to hide behind, sound alone would have given them away as intruders. Still, at least she could say they weren’t immediately confronted.

  Taking a breath of the air that felt cold, almost frosty, Sara thought of all the scenarios that could entail. Gabriel disappearing down a tunnel and her following like a fox chasing a wild rabbit into its tunnel had not been on the list when she’d accepted this assignment. But what was done was done.

  Now she just waited for them all to regroup, and her people were performing admirably, skillfully, and quietly, following their leader down into who knew where to capture the most notorious leader of the Kades any of them had ever come across.

  As the last members of her cohort dropped into the same pit she was in, and Sara eased up on her defensive position, she told them. “Spread out. Find him.”

  As they all did in an uneven line, Sara began to advance. That was when she heard the sound of clapping hands straight ahead, and the laughter that would mock her even in her dreams.

  Before she could say a word, it was as if an invisible wall dropped in front of her. The air itself seemed to buckle for a moment, and instead of staring into emptiness, she was no more than ten feet away from Gabriel.

  Gabriel—and behind him, over two hundred soldiers tightly packed in lines behind a row of twenty fierce men. She counted at least ten soldiers behind everyone that was facing her, and no less than five stumped dragons looking down on her small cohort like they were their one and only meal for the week.

  Sara couldn’t say anything as a furious ball of ire got lodged in her throat, but she didn’t have to. Instead, she raised her sword hand, making her threat very clear.

  Gabriel only smiled, and then she heard a weak “Sara?” from behind her.

  Tense and hesitant, Sara looked behind her to see what it was her team had spotted—only to find them all with blades to their necks, and in the case of Karn, at least five spears pointed directly at his heart.

  Blinking, she sourly noted more of Gabriel’s forces pouring out like spiders from the same path she had used to get here.

  She sucked her t
eeth and looked back at the Illusions Mage. He smiled at her and raised an eyebrow, as if to ask, “What will you do now?”

  She had no choice. She could fight them all, but she had the feeling—not the surety, but the feeling—that she would lose. And she had no doubt that all of her cohort would be slaughtered before she could flash her sword and kill even a half-dozen of those who stood before her.

  So she dropped her best weapon with a clattering thud.

  And then she slowly pulled her knifes out of their sheathes and did the same.

  Only when she was weaponless and on her knees did ten of Gabriel’s men, alongside two mages, approach her at the snap of his fingers.

  They soon began trussing her up, and as Gabriel slowly walked toward her, she had only hate for him.

  He just looked on with a bit of a smirk, and well he should. He had truly snared her in a brilliant trap, and she, like the hunted rabbit, had fallen right into it.

  “Seems you’ve been looking for us,” Gabriel said with a self-satisfied air as he walked up to her.

  Sara just continued glaring at him as she tested the tight ropes that bound her hands to feet, and found them so strong that even she couldn’t ease their grip once they had latched on.

  He apparently noted her twisting hands, as he nodded to his men to start doing the same to the most powerful of Sara’s group behind them.

  “That would be our binding magic,” Gabriel said. “Rather nice, isn’t it?”

  Sara didn’t know what to say, what she wanted to accuse him of first—being a deceptive mastermind or an outright bastard.

  So she settled on a question that encompassed all of that.

  “What is the hell is this?” Sara asked as she lunged up a bit and was rapidly forced back down on her knees with the insistent pulls of three Kade guards behind her.

  Gabriel wasn’t fazed. He just smiled. “Don’t you get it? You were looking for us. Hunting fish in the barrel, I believe you call it, but all along, we were hunting you.”