by Ben Wolf
“I’m clearly missing something here. What’s the Rock Outpost?” Calum asked.
“When I said we wouldn’t last long, I didn’t mean that we should attack one of the King’s fortresses as a solution,” Axel said. “Are you crazy?”
“You want to do what?” Calum gawked at them both.
Axel held out his hand, palm up. Finally, they agreed on something. “Exactly my thoughts, Calum.”
“I do not desire to attack the outpost,” Magnus explained. “I want to raid it. An important distinction.”
“Not enough of a difference to make it a good idea.” Axel folded his arms and stared at the shrinking campfire. He might as well be one of the sticks he’d just thrown in. “Not even close.”
“It will be easy. Sneak in. Seize what we require. Get out.” Magnus nodded. “Simple.”
Axel laughed. “You’re nuts. You’re living in a dream world.”
“We will succeed,” Magnus said. “I already have it planned out. Originally, I intended to do it myself, but it will be even easier with three of us.”
“What do you mean, you already have it planned out?” Calum asked.
“I mean what I said.” Magnus looked at him. “When you found me at the quarry, that was my intended destination.”
Axel laughed again and stood up next to Calum. “You were gonna raid the Rock Outpost by yourself?”
“Absolutely.”
“There have to be at least twenty or thirty soldiers stationed there.” Axel hefted a log from the pile of sticks and wood they’d gathered for the fire. “You’d need an army.”
Magnus shook his head. “Only if I wanted to attack the place. Like I said, I just want to raid it.”
“Why even risk it?” Calum asked.
“They are in possession of some property that belongs to me. Some things that I hold very dear.” Magnus’s voice hardened. “And I want it back.”
“Pfft. Good luck with that.” Axel rolled his eyes and tossed the log into the center of the fire. Embers sprayed into the air toward the trees that hung over the camp and quickly cooled.
“Our only other option is to go back,” Magnus said. “And we all know what that means.”
Axel folded his arms. “I’m not risking my life just to help you get your stuff back.”
Magnus shot a glare at him but returned to his spot around the fire. “Like I said, it will be simple, and it will equip us for the journey ahead. If we encounter any soldiers, I will deal with them.”
“You’re gonna take on twenty or thirty trained soldiers on your own?” Axel folded his arms again and leaned back against the log behind him. “You had a hard time keeping a bunch of quarry workers at bay. If it weren’t for Calum and me watching your back, you would’ve—”
“There will not be twenty or thirty soldiers inside by the time we get there. The only hard part is actually getting inside without the rest realizing what we are doing,” Magnus said. “Which is where you two will come in handy.”
“Why would most of them be gone?” Calum asked.
Magnus grinned and eyed the pile of sticks next to the campfire. It was the first time Axel had ever seen a truly pleasant expression on his reptilian face.
He turned toward the forest. “Follow me. We have work to do before sunrise.”
Western Kanarah
A clang jolted Lilly awake, and someone snickered in the darkness behind her. She quickly shed Colm’s cloak from her shoulders and tried to get away from the sudden sound, but she tripped over something in front of her.
“Watch yourself!” Sharion hissed. She swatted at Lilly’s ankles and curled closer to Colm’s legs—and farther under his cloak. So much for preferring to be alone all night.
Bony fingers clasped around Lilly’s wrist. Colm gently pulled her close to him again, and she acquiesced. Back under his cloak, she found renewed warmth.
“Don’t mind them,” he told her. “They just want to bother you.”
Lilly rubbed her eyes. “I’m bothered.”
“We’ll be on the move for some time, now. Get some more rest if you can.”
“I don’t think that’s going to happen.”
“No?”
“I have to… relieve myself.” Lilly glanced around her jail-cell-on-wheels. “Am I supposed to do it here?”
Colm shook his head. “No. They don’t like changing out the hay. Just rap the bars a few times and ask. They’ll take you into the woods.”
Lilly nodded and began to stand up, but Colm grabbed her hand again.
“Do not be unaware,” he wheezed. “A bunch of men alone with a beautiful girl in the woods may forfeit their inhibitions.”
“But Roderick said—”
“That doesn’t mean his men won’t try. Men’s carnal desires often outweigh those of their purses.” Colm fixed his gaze on Lilly, stern as ever. “Do not be deceived, and do not let your guard down, even for an instant.”
Lilly swallowed the lump in her throat and nodded. She pounded on the bars.
Five minutes later, Luggs, Gammel, Adgar, and another slave trader shoved both Lilly and Sharion toward the woods. In the darkness, she stumbled over an exposed root—normally not an issue since she could just fly over entire forests when she’d had her cape—but she righted herself and continued forward.
“That’s far enough,” Gammel said. “Go on. Do it already.”
Lilly stared at him, her eyes wide. “Here? In front of you?”
Adgar chuckled, and Luggs nudged the other slave trader. She recognized him, not by his face but by the bandage wrapped around his thigh. The one she’d hit with her last arrow.
“Of course, here,” Luggs replied. “You don’t think we’d just letcha wander off in the dark, do you?”
Next to Lilly, Sharion hiked up her tattered dress and squatted near a bush. Lilly looked back at Gammel, who licked his lips.
“At least let me go on the other side of that tree?” she pleaded.
Gammel, Adgar, and the bandaged slave trader all shook their heads “no,” but Luggs nodded. “Let ‘er go, boys. She won’t get far even if she does run.”
Lilly didn’t waste time. She rounded the tree, relieved herself, and came back into view of the slave traders within less than a minute.
Except they weren’t there anymore.
She looked right and panned left for a moment, then turned back.
Luggs and the slave trader with the bandage stood behind her. Luggs shoved her to the ground and grinned, and his eyebrows arched down.
Colm’s warning ratcheted through Lilly’s memory. This couldn’t be happening.
But it was.
Lilly tried to stagger away, but Adgar and Gammel emerged from the brush behind her with Sharion, whom they thrust to the ground next to her.
“N-no—you can’t do this!” Lilly more begged than said.
“Better if you don’t resist ‘em,” Sharion muttered. “Just let ‘em do what they do. It’ll be over sooner.”
Lilly turned to her, horrified. She couldn’t be serious.
“Your friend has the right idea,” Luggs said. “Except that on a sweet little thing like you, I know I’m gonna take my time. Ain’t that right, boys?”
Their snickers chorused around her, and a deep sickness clenched in her gut. They’d ventured dozens of yards away from the wagons by now, and probably out of earshot, but she had to try. She wouldn’t just let them take her.
She sucked in a deep breath and let out a piercing shriek—only to have it cut short by Lugg’s hand to her mouth and his dagger to her throat.
“Not another peep, or your honor won’t be the only thing we take from you.” Luggs smelled like a trash heap up close, and brown spots dotted his yellowed teeth. “Besides, you shot poor Lorrence in his leg, here. Seems to me he oughta get somethin’ for his troubles, don’t you?”
Part of Lilly wanted to cry, and another part wanted to claw Luggs’s eyes out. With his dagger to her throat, she didn’t dare do eit
her.
“You hold her,” Adgar said. “Then I’ll hold her for you.”
Sharion moaned, but didn’t resist.
By the Overlord—this wasn’t happening. She never should have left home. Never should have disagreed with her parents. She should have just done what they’d asked.
Now it was too late.
Lorrence untied the cord that held his bloodstained trousers to his waist.
“Unless you wanna lose something dear to you, I suggest you cinch your pants back up, Lorrence.”
All four slave traders and Lilly turned toward the source of the voice. A towering muscular form stepped out from behind a tree. Even in the waning moonlight, Lilly recognized the silhouette of his spiky hair.
Roderick.
“All of you, step back.” When no one moved, Roderick added, “Now.”
Lorrence haphazardly retied his pants and limped toward Roderick. With indignation in his voice, he said, “She owes me for my leg, boss. It hurts, and I ain’t got nothin’ in return for my sufferin’.”
Roderick’s gaze shifted from Adgar to Gammel to Luggs, all within a matter of seconds. Each of them lowered his head, but Lorrence still approached.
“C’mon, boss,” Lorrence’s voice oozed. “I oughta at least get a taste for my trouble, don’tcha think?”
Roderick tilted his head, then he grabbed Lorrence by his throat and lifted him off of his feet with one hand. Lorrence gripped Roderick’s wrist and sputtered until a loud crack echoed off of the trees.
The sound sent a jolt through Lilly, and she gasped.
Lorrence slumped from Roderick’s grasp and tumbled to the ground in a heap. His right arm curled under his body at an awkward angle—but not nearly as awkward as the angle of his neck.
“Anyone else want to protest my decision?” Roderick glared at the other three men. “Anyone else want to try to have a ‘taste?’”
No one said a thing. Lilly didn’t know if she should breathe a sigh of relief or hold onto the air she’d sucked into her lungs. Roderick’s strength exceeded even that of General Balena—by a considerable amount, it seemed. The way he so effortlessly lifted Lorrence from his feet and dispatched him… he might as well be part Saurian.
How could Lilly ever hope to escape from someone like that?
“Good. Next person I catch going after this girl gets worse—much worse.” Roderick’s eyes narrowed. “Get them back into their wagon.”
Luggs pointed his dagger at Sharion. “What about her?”
Roderick stared steel at him. “What about her?”
“Can we at least… you know…”
Roderick’s eyes narrowed. “Be quick about it. We have a schedule to keep.”
Lilly’s mouth hung open. Roderick had saved her but still intended to let them have Sharion?
Not if she could do something about it.
She had no weapons, had no way to fight back against three grown men—plus Roderick—but she had to do something.
Was it futile? Yes, probably, but maybe all she had to do was buy Sharion time. Maybe Sharion would be lucky enough—and aware enough—to escape in the process.
Gammel and Adgar still stood near Sharion, the three of them bathed in moonlight. Luggs had maintained his position near her, and Roderick blocked off any hope of running back toward the wagons, but Lilly could run laterally with no problem. It wasn’t much of a plan, but maybe it would be enough.
With a roar, she pushed up to her feet and charged Luggs.
Lilly drove her shoulder into his hip so hard that she almost knocked her arm out of its socket and barely managed to keep her footing. Luggs yelled and slashed at her with his dagger, but she’d already started running toward the trees—and toward Gammel and Sharion.
Gammel held onto Sharion’s wrist, his eyes large and white like chicken eggs, as she jammed her left fist into his nose with a satisfying crack. Her hand smarted from the blow, but Gammel yelped and released Sharion.
Lilly had no time to help her up. Sharion was on her own now.
Lilly angled into the woods while Roderick barked orders to follow her.
She ran along the moonlit paths, this time more careful to watch her footing, even though it was even harder to see now in the dark. She leaped over fallen logs, ducked under low-hanging branches, and swerved through the trees. Her legs burned from the exertion, but a renewed chance at freedom tugged her heart forward.
A large, dark figure leaped at her from the forest to her right, and she skidded to a halt just in time to avoid his grasp. Adgar. She recognized his twiggish form and the stupid brown hat he always wore, the combination of which made him look like a scarecrow.
Her legs pumped against the hard ground, and she avoided his second grasp, but his jagged fingernails scraped her shoulder as she ran past.
Lilly had no idea how fast Adgar could run, but she had to assume he was faster than her. He stood even taller than Roderick, and his long legs meant long strides. She’d have to do something to lose him or he’d catch up.
Oh, to be able to fly again.
A low branch threatened to smack her as she ran. Perfect. Lilly charged straight for it, and Adgar’s heavy footfalls plodded just steps behind hers. With her arms up, she grabbed the branch, pushed it forward and upward, and then ducked under it. A split-second later she heard a loud smack, a grunt, and a slew of curses.
Lilly snuck a look back and saw Adgar clutching his forehead under the moonlight. He’d fallen behind but still pursued her. He wouldn’t fall for that again.
She’d slowed him down, but at the cost of some of her own speed. She caught a patch of flat ground and pounded against the dirt until she regained her full momentum.
Another slave trader, this one with a bow, jumped in front of her and took aim. Lilly skidded along the ground and dove to her left as he let the arrow fly.
He missed by several feet, and she tore through the woods away from him. Another arrow thudded into a tree to her right as she ran past. Had she been shooting instead, she wouldn’t have missed.
Another man appeared on her right, swinging a gleaming sword at her legs. Lilly somehow managed to hop over his swing and rolled end-over-end until she wound up back on her feet, still running.
She knew what they were trying to do. The slave traders had more or less turned her back toward the direction from which she’d come.
She wouldn’t let them divert her path. Lilly took a sharp right and cut deeper into the woods, bounding over rockier terrain. Her lungs strained, her feet hurt, and she was running out of tricks, but when she glanced behind her, no one followed.
Good. Maybe she’d escaped after all—an incredible bonus after only intending to distract the men from harming Sharion.
Brighter moonlight shone down on her, more than there should be in a forest. Lilly realized she’d reached a clearing. The night sky beckoned her forward and not much else—literally nothing else.
Lilly gasped and cut off her stride. She slid to a stop at the edge of a cliff that dropped several thousand feet and stretched in both directions as far as the moonlight allowed her to see. Her every impulse told her to leap into the void and take flight, but she forced her mind to remember that she didn’t have her cape.
In the basin below the cliff, she saw the Valley of the Tri-Lakes—a flat, gray expanse, devoid of any vegetation. In the distance one of the Tri-Lakes sparkled under the moonlight.
“Nowhere to run now, Angel.”
Lilly knew Roderick’s voice without even having to turn around. The way he said “Angel” churned her stomach. She faced him nonetheless with her fists clenched.
“You either come with us, or you take the plunge.” Roderick folded his arms at the head of the clearing while Luggs, Adgar, Gammel, and several other slave traders emerged from the dark woods behind him. All of them panted and wheezed, but Roderick showed no indication of strain except for a bit of perspiration that dotted his wide forehead. “What’ll it be?”
Lill
y stepped back and almost lost her footing on the edge, but she recovered before her instincts—to jump and fly away—kicked in.
She wished she could. She’d trade every moment from now until the end of time in obedience to her parents for her cape, even for five minutes.
But it was hopeless. No amount of wishing would secure aerosilk around her neck, and without it, she couldn’t escape these ruffians.
Roderick extended his hand. “Come on, Angel. It’s the only way.”
Lilly stole a glance down at the chasm behind her—lined with jagged rocks and much, much too far for her to fall and hope to survive. The rebellion in her chest wanted her to jump, but that same rebellion had gotten her in this predicament in the first place.
She bit her lip, raised her hands, and walked toward Roderick.
Eastern Kanarah
After a few hours of executing Magnus’s sprawling preparations for the raid still to come, Calum’s exhaustion finally caught up with him. Along with Axel and Magnus, he stole another few hours of sleep.
When they awoke, Axel gave Calum a spare shirt he’d packed. It fit him poorly—more like a tent than a shirt—but Calum was grateful for it all the same.
Then the three of them headed southeast through the forest away from the Snake Mountains, which Magnus had pointed out to them earlier. Calum hadn’t ever seen real mountains before, and the few glimpses he’d gotten of them through the forest canopy sent an exciting ripple of chills, wonder, and terror racing across his skin.
Perhaps one day—maybe even one day soon—he’d get to traverse those mountains. What kind of adventure awaited him along their rocky cliffs, among the people dwelling nearby? He couldn’t know for sure, but his heart told him to anticipate marvels he’d never known before.
About ten miles south of the quarry, near the edge of the tree line, sat the Rock Outpost, silhouetted against the still-rising sun. From so far away, Calum couldn’t distinguish it from one of Axel’s family storehouses, except it might’ve been larger, and it looked spikier, somehow.
