Of Elan.
Bitterness swelled in his heart and Drake spun his staff harder, tossing it up and away, willing his memories to follow. When the burning staff fell, he caught it easily and the crowd’s awestruck noises fell on deaf ears. His memories remained firmly fixed in place.
Their group wound through the streets with efficiency, and Drake was grateful for Leal, because their speed was mostly her doing. She had no qualms about ordering folks out of her path, either with a sharp word or with a threatening wave of her burning staff. Those that she swept aside laughed and clapped in delight, either too drunk or too dazzled by the fire-dancers to think Leal's actions anything other than a performance.
Drake's attention split between his whirling staff and his surroundings, perhaps more on the latter than the former than was wise, but he kept his movements simple. Again and again he tensed, thinking he heard an angry shout or the tread of familiar boots, but none came. The mages and Assembly folks drew closer to the gates and his stomach knotted tighter with each step. His mind whirled more than his staff. If, somehow, the sentinels had realized an escape had occurred, how long would it take them to assemble a squad or six, then reach the gates? No doubt a few squads could muscle their way through a crowd, but they would have a difficult time without causing enough of a stir to alert him.
Nothing for it, Drake thought, watching the tracers of fire. Just keep going – and pray.
***
When Eris spotted the inner gates that would open onto the bridge, she released a shaking breath. So close. Despite the fear hammering within her heart, the sentinels had not made an appearance. Perhaps this escape would be–
She cut off hope before it had a chance to grow.
Still clutching her hand, Gid quickened his pace a fraction. Eris shot a glance around them, meeting a few of the other mages' eyes in turn before looking to their escorts, who had done a fair job of not only clearing the way ahead, but keeping all attention off of the mages. Or perhaps Eris did not look as conspicuous as she felt. As she walked, she caught the gazes of many people, but there was no glimmer of recognition in any of their eyes when they looked at her. Much the opposite. No one here knew she was a mage. With good reason, she supposed, but she had a foolish, irrational desire for things to be otherwise. Why should she not walk the street as a mage, without fear of capture – or worse?
Stop woolgathering, she told herself firmly. Focus on getting out of this city; then you can whine to Gid about your daydreams.
The city's inner gates were flung open to allow a stream of people to pass onto the bridge over the churning river. By now, the guards on duty made no secret of their inebriation and openly chugged ale and wine. When Eris heard the now-familiar tenor of exclamations, she knew they’d caught sight of the fire-dancers. Leal paused before the guards to better display her skill, thus allowing the mages a chance to slip by unnoticed. Eris held her breath again as Adrie, Cai, Marcen, and the others hurried through the open gates onto the bridge, faces downcast, shoulders set. She caught Gid's eye and they exchanged a nervous glance before they, too, slipped out of the inner gates and onto the bridge.
Just a few steps away from the crowd, the burning staffs, and the close quarters of the city-proper, the chill in the air seemed to gain strength. Where the cold had once been an annoying aside to the night, now it slithered beneath her layers of clothing to steal her breath. She pressed close to Gid, as much for warmth as for reassurance.
Even with Leal’s burning staff, it was so dark out here. While the city had been alive with merrymaking, the bridge was more sedate. Those who traversed the bridge were on their way to something else, either the city or their camp outside the walls, and no one seemed inclined to linger in the cold. What guards were stationed here were clustered around the torches that rested every ten or so paces along the bridge wall. The shadows ahead of Eris flickered as Drake stepped behind her and Gid, onto the bridge, still engaged in his performance.
“Are they going to keep it up the entire way?” Gid murmured.
“I imagine so,” Eris whispered in reply.
They both glanced back to see Drake whirling his burning staff with ease, beaming at the guards, who clapped like delighted children. “Thank the stars for Drake,” Gid said. “I admit, I had my doubts that he could manage this.”
Eris gripped her husband’s hand. “We’re not free, yet.”
Gid sucked in a breath but nodded once. “It's odd being sober when everyone else is in their cups.”
“Better for us,” Eris replied, peering ahead at the outer gates at the end of the bridge, where Cai and Adrie were passing through, after the rest of the mages. The guards there were drinking too, but did not seem as excitable as their comrades closer to the city. Probably displeased about this particular posting.
Gid sighed. “Aye. I'm a bit jealous, though. A shot of good whiskey would soothe my nerves and warm my belly.”
“Later,” Eris said, squeezing his hand. “We'll have all the whiskey you want. And I'm sure I can find a few other ways to warm you.”
Despite the bitter cold and the open sky, the world seemed to press close around them, but Gid's smile still shone, somehow. More of his particular kind of magic, she supposed. She smiled back as they reached the threshold at the outer gates.
Behind them, Drake shouted, “Run!”
***
Drake swore as sentinels shouldered through the gate guards who'd been watching the fire-dancers' display. They appeared so suddenly that Drake nearly dropped his weapon in surprise. Nearly. He spun the staff close to the nearest sentinels, a fellow with pale eyes cast in firelight, and a tall, sturdy woman with a bearing of command. At least two squads accompanied them.
Heart racing, Drake shouted over his shoulder, “Run!”
No time to see if Gid and Eris had heard his call. No time for anything but the incipient fight and another few words tossed to Leal. “Help them,” he called, before turning all of his attention on the sentinels.
There wasn't much room on the bridge, and Drake was a burly fellow who took up the majority of it with his bulk and his whirling staff. Thank Tor that Leal and the others had been a few paces ahead of him, though Drake was not sure he could keep so many sentinels at bay for long. The nearest, the pale-eyed fellow with a captain's sigil on his shoulder, drew both daggers and faced Drake with his mouth set in grim determination. The woman, the commander, drew her sword.
“Stand aside,” she said. “We have no quarrel with you.”
How wrong she was. Not for the first time, Drake longed for the burn of hematite in his veins, for that rush of power and strength. But he'd given that up three years ago. Now, he gathered what magic he could, pulling it to him like a child gathering beach sand to build a castle, and shifted his staff’s tip close to his mouth. He took another deep breath and focused on the burning end, then blew. Hard.
Fire bloomed, propelled into a roaring flame that made all of the sentinels skid to a halt. Drake used their surprise to his advantage and jabbed his staff forward, hoping to knock the commander's sword free. Perhaps he wouldn't walk away from this fight, but he owed it to Tobin—no, to all his fellow mages—to at least try.
Tobin. Drake shoved aside the inconvenient swell of regret, fighting to focus on the moment. As he'd figured, his trick wasn't enough to hold off the sentinels for long, but their shock was enough to spur the lot of them back several paces. The officers recovered first, and lunged for him with their gleaming blades. Well, good. If he went down defending other mages, so much the better.
His path ahead sharpened into crystal-clarity. He was both a mage and sentinel. Thus it was his duty to protect his kindred. He struck again, ensuring he had both officers’ attentions, and shouted, “Not so fast without your precious hematite, are you?”
The commander’s eyes widened beneath her helmet but she reacted quicker than Drake had anticipated. “Thief,” she snarled. “Renegade!”
“I’ll give you the first,” Drake shot back, whirling out of the way of her sword. “But the second’s up for debate.”
“Cobalt,” the commander cried. “The fire-dancer’s the mage who stole our hematite!”
The captain did not hesitate. “Thom – take your squad after the other mages. Vesper, go with them.”
Immediately, a group of the sentinels broke away, barreling past Drake and down the bridge, toward Gid and his wife. No! But Drake had no time to think, for the captain and commander bore down on him again.
Ea's balls, but the officers were strong and fast. Even with his staff’s reach, Drake was outmatched against these two. The commander knew it too, for a fevered gleam appeared in her eyes and she drove her sword at him with renewed ferocity. Drake used every ounce of his speed in a desperate attempt to avoid being hit. He ducked away from one strike, but miscalculated the next and received what would be a nasty gash on his shoulder once the thrill of battle wore off. But he was lucky—or the gods were with him—and he parried the third.
Only to meet the captain’s daggers. Drake’s ironwood spear stopped the blades from lodging in his heart, but the impact rattled his jaw. Drake gritted his teeth and reciprocated with a jab at the captain's side, at an exposed bit of tunic beneath the leather armor. By now, the wrappings and pitch around the spear’s end had come undone, but bits of tar still clung to the point. Drake was satisfied to feel the spear connect with something solid, and see the accompanying streak of black on the captain's tunic. No blood, though.
I've lost my touch, Drake thought wryly, then shifted to avoid the captain's retaliating strike.
Their battle had led them down the bridge, closer to the outer gates. Drake realized belatedly that he’d allowed the sentinels to drive him, but that didn’t matter. He had no plans to walk away from this fight. If the One willed, he and Elan would meet again in their next lives.
Only seconds had passed since the sentinels had first appeared. Drake had lost all track of time. It was difficult to make out what was happening at the outer gates, perhaps ten horse lengths away, but he saw people struggling, all cast silver in Seren's light. As Drake and his foes drew closer, he saw Eris and Gideon pressed within a ring of sentinels and city guards.
One of the guards ripped off his helmet, revealing a scarred forehead. He drew his sword and shouted something; Gid replied. No sign of the other mages – hopefully they had already passed through the outer gates. Drake thought he spotted Leal, but couldn’t tell for certain. The sentinel commander bellowed another challenge, drawing Drake’s attention. He raised his spear in time to prevent her sword from slicing him in two—thank Ea for ironwood—and shoved her back, hard. She was strong, yes, but he was stronger. The commander stumbled and Drake swept his staff at the captain’s boots, just enough to throw the sod off-balance.
While his opponents recovered, Drake found a spare second to look over at the outer gates again. Eris must have said something, for the scarred city guard glared at her, then backhanded her across her cheek, hard enough to shove her into the bridge's railing. Her pack went flying as she glanced off of the stones before collapsing to the ground, stunned. Gid shouted again, hands clenched with rage and magic, but the guard only tightened his grip on his sword.
Then, to Drake's horror, the guard lunged for Eris, picking her up as if she weighed no more than a loaf of old bread, and flung her over the side, to the roaring river. Gideon shoved past the sentinels to reach for her, but he grasped only empty air.
“No!” Gid's cry melded with Drake's – and the sentinel commander's.
“You fool!” the commander shouted as she ran up, Drake apparently forgotten. “What do you think–”
But the guard ignored her and grabbed Gid's shoulder with his free hand, whirling the mage around to face him, eyes dark and cold as the sky. “Remember my face, moon-blood,” he spat. “It's the last one you'll ever see.”
And he ran his blade through Gideon's heart.
***
She fell.
The river churned below, thick and cold and hungry, and for an instant, Eris thought of the goddess Nox, whom the pious said would guide their souls to the next life. There were no gods, of course, and even if there were, would they bother with a mage's soul?
The thought flashed through her mind quicker than a stuttered heartbeat. Instinct kicked in and Eris took a single deep breath, ignoring the river below and the dark sky above. She concentrated. Thank the stars, shifting was easier now than it had ever been. Her body shrank, her bones lightened. Just when she felt the river's mist, she flung her arms wide and cast her wings upon the winter wind. Two, three, four beats of those wings sent her back to the bridge, back to...
She crested the bridge in time to see that sodding guard pull his sword out of her husband. Gideon fell forward, hands clutching his chest, where a sickening, dark stain spread upon his coat.
No!
Eris screamed, but the sound emerged as a crow-cry; a meager, shrill call that did nothing to echo the pain in her heart. The city guard she'd recognized from her and Gideon’s last foray out of the bastion loomed over Gid, sword in hand, a look of smug satisfaction on his scarred face – the scars that Gid had given. Cold fury filled her from the inside out and she fell again, this time with purpose. The guard shrieked and flung his hands up to shield his eyes, but he was too late. Eris clawed at his nose, his mouth, his eyes, her heart beating furiously against the grief that threatened to overwhelm every fiber of her being. Fragile human skin gave way to her talons; the rust-red scent of blood mingled with that of the river. She screamed and struck the dreg again and again and again.
A strong hand batted her away, flinging her fragile crow body into the wind. A quick, instinctive flap of her wings righted her in time to see a cadre of sentinels surround Drake, swords drawn. Drake looked up at her, and then raised his hands in surrender. The hemies fell upon him and his staff clattered to the flagstones, the flames extinguished.
But Drake didn’t matter right now. Only Gideon mattered. Her husband lay upon the threshold of the gates in a pool of his own blood, sightless eyes fixed on the world beyond the city. Just a few steps more, and they'd have had their freedom. Eris could not help herself. She screamed again and launched herself into the night.
Thirty-Two
Milo stood at the outer edge of their camp, helmet tucked beneath one arm as he stared into the shadows. He was far enough away from the mage-fire not to feel its warmth, but it didn’t really matter. He didn't think he'd ever be warm again. When no one had been looking, he'd downed the flask's remaining contents, but even the liquor had burned out and left him cold.
Ruthless.
He deserved to be sent to the mines.
“Milo.” He tensed at the sergeant's voice, took a breath, and turned to see Stonewall standing a few paces away. “My turn for watch,” Stonewall said.
“Yes, ser,” Milo replied, bowing once. “It's been quiet.”
Nodding, Stonewall stepped closer, tilting his head. “Did Beacon give you some thalo for your cheek?”
The scratches from the thrall still burned a little, but the mender had said the pain would pass. The thalo had already done wonders. Milo nodded but said nothing.
Stonewall seemed to hesitate, then removed his helmet and met Milo's gaze. “Look, about the mines…”
Milo's cheeks burned, though whether it was from the wind or his wound, he didn't know or care. “It's all right, ser.”
“It's not.”
Milo shook his head. Strange, how calm he was now, when by all rights he should be begging the sergeant not to punish him. “You were right. I’m not fit for duty. I’ll do as you order.” He squared his shoulders. “Just… please don’t send Flint away, too. She deserves better.”
“So do you.” Stonewall took a deep breath. “I don’t want to send you away, Mi. I shouldn’t even have made that threat if I didn’t intend to carry it out. I was scared and upse
t, and took it out on you. I didn't mean to.”
This gave Milo pause. “You were scared, weren't you?”
“I'm not sure I'm not now,” the sergeant admitted. “But that doesn't matter. What matters is I treated you unfairly. It’s not… right that I punish you for the same mistakes I’ve made. Running off alone,” he added at Milo’s curious look.
Milo looked at his boots. “I hadn’t thought of it that way.”
“Guess I still have a lot to learn about being in charge.”
Something unfolded in Milo’s heart; he thought it might be relief, but he couldn’t say for sure. He didn’t feel any better. “I never meant for Mage Halcyon to get hurt. I just wanted to help the villagers.”
“I know.” Stonewall’s voice turned warm. “Ea’s tits, I hate to discipline you, but I must. I’ll think of something else, though.” He sighed. “Guess you’ll be shoveling shit until you’re a cinder.”
“It’s all right,” Milo said again, this time adding a faint smile to show it really was. “I’ll do as you say. I promise.”
Stonewall ducked his head, then regarded him. “You made a mistake, but you’re a good man, Milo. Don’t let anyone—even me—make you think otherwise.” Milo's eyes stung, so he fumbled for his helmet, hoping to shove it on before he started bawling. As he did, a strong hand clasped his shoulder; he looked up to see true regret on Stonewall’s face. “I'm sorry, Mi.”
How to reply? In the end, Milo only nodded and said, “Me too.”
***
Kali searched for sleep within the shadows of the tent. She found only restlessness. It was not for lack of comfort; though the cut at her neck throbbed, she had a good meal in her belly and Sadira had rested enough so that her natural warmth made the tent quite pleasant. A glow outside the canvas let Kali know that the mage-made fire still burned merrily. If she listened close, she could hear the faint wheezes and snores of sleeping sentinels, though she had no doubt at least one stood guard. Her knee didn’t even hurt that badly. Some of the stiffness had returned, but the discomfort was bearable.
Catalyst Moon: Breach (Catalyst Moon Saga Book 2) Page 37
