by Aldrea Alien
Sulin eyed the other man’s dagger, his brow furrowing. Could he place who it had belonged to? “You should not have that,” he growled, his coastal accent—a slightly deeper one to Tracker’s, now he heard the pair together—thickened with each word.
Tracker grinned. “Are you going to take it from me?” The way he spoke, the hushed threatening note rolling through the words, sent an altogether too pleasant shiver down Dylan’s back.
“Stop.” Dylan pulled himself free of Nestria’s grip and planted himself between the two elves. “No one is stabbing anybody.” He pushed a palm against the hound’s chest, trying to force the man back. “Track, please. Sheath it.”
The hound frowned at him, clearly unwilling to relinquish his hold on the dagger. His gaze darted from Dylan’s face to the others standing behind Sulin. Finally, he yielded to Dylan’s touch and returned the blade to its sheath.
“Do you even know what that man is?” Nestria snapped before raising her voice towards Tracker. “How many lives did your blade take, murderer?”
“Track wasn’t at the tower,” Dylan replied before the hound could. He could see it in their eyes that they wouldn’t have believed Tracker, but maybe they’d listen to him.
“Is that what he told you?” Sulin growled, his accent thickening further. Those dark eyes narrowed, promising murder if he even suspected Tracker was about to close. “You cannot trust a word he says.”
“I know because he was with me.” Dylan ran the sentence through his head and, as his cheeks heated, amended, “I mean… he’s been a part of my group. The one I’ve been travelling to the capital with well before the attack happened. He didn’t get there until everything was over.”
Sulin’s gaze flicked in Dylan’s direction. The arm that brandished his dagger wavered. He lowered the weapon, but kept the blade bared.
“Even if he wasn’t there,” Nestria said around Sulin’s arm. “His kind were.”
“And yet you escaped them,” Tracker pointed out, earning Nestria’s baleful glare. “Via the drainage conduit at the back of the gardens, yes? You left quite the mess behind. But I do wonder, such a display would have alerted your attackers. I find it hard to believe you were not followed.”
“I do not believe we ever said otherwise,” the alchemist snapped before directing his attention to Dylan. “Henrie herded us down there when the mercenaries came and blew through the bars whilst Ness and Tillie tried to hold them back. We got through as many as we could before Ness had to collapse the tunnel.” He glanced at Tracker, his mouth stretching in a humourless smile. “That seems to stop you bastards.”
“It would.” The hound matched the other elven man’s expression. “Nothing stops a man in his tracks like the threat of a ton of rock through his skull.”
“I will be certain to keep that in mind for the next time your kind come after us.”
“Why wait?” Nestria snarled. “We should treat him like they do to us. Everyone’s guilty.” She snatched the dagger from Sulin’s hand. “Everyone dies.” Nestria whipped back her hand and sent the weapon spinning towards the hound. A pulse vibrated through the air, hastening its course.
Dylan sent a countering pulse after the dagger, knocking it off course. He spun on his old friend. “What are you—?”
The dagger swooped through the air, swinging wide to aim for the hound’s back.
“Behind you!” he warned Tracker, sending out another pulse, this time directing it at Nestria.
She deflected the blast in an easy move that, at any other time, he would’ve been proud to see her perform so effortlessly.
He glanced over his shoulder as the hound threw himself to one side.
Like a magpie protecting its nest, the dagger swooped and swung about.
“Stay put,” Dylan shouted, slamming a dense shield around the hound.
Tracker froze in place.
The dagger slammed into the shield. It sheared through the barrier, stopping with the blade embedded an inch thick. The touch sent shards of pain rippling through Dylan’s body. It tore a cry from his throat.
“Dylan?” Tracker called out, his voice thick with worry.
Through the twinkling lights all but blinding his vision, Dylan spied Tracker near the edge of his shield. “Don’t move!” he cried. If the hound stepped beyond that flickering barrier, he’d be dead within moments.
Tracker obeyed. Although the man was quick to manoeuvre himself out of the dagger’s direct path and stay within the shield, he continued to stare at the blade still hovering above him. His gaze flicked to Dylan, questioning and just a touch fearful.
Dylan focused his magic, drawing on the pain to hit Nestria with a more refined pulse of air that sent her flying. The agony ripping through him dulled to a constant ache drilling into his brain. That would have to do until he could remove the shield or the dagger.
He whirled on Sulin as the man charged forward. Sparks flared to life between his fingers. “Stay back!” Dylan warned, raising his hand. He’d never sparred with the alchemist, he wasn’t even sure if Sulin could form a shield. He didn’t want to find out.
“What are you doing?” Nestria snapped as she clambered to her feet. “Why, in the name of the Seven Sisters, would you protect that thing?”
“Because I l—” He caught the word before it could leap from his tongue. That would be a bad thing to confess right now. And, for all his friends knew, Tracker had only gone as far as a kiss. Taking a steadying breath, he continued on in a far more even tone, “Because I know he’s done nothing wrong.”
“So you would attack us in his stead?” Sulin pressed. “Your own people?” The alchemist continued to hedge around Dylan, trying to get between him and Tracker.
Dylan followed him step for step. He didn’t know what Sulin planned, but he wasn’t about to give the man an opportunity to show him. “I’m certainly not going to stand here and let you kill him.”
“You didn’t see what they did,” Nestria said. “Didn’t see them slaughter—”
“I saw enough!” he snapped back. “And you know what else I have seen since they leashed me? I have watched people die by magic I couldn’t stop.” The memories of the ambush came flooding back. The smell of burning flesh, the inhuman screams of the dying. “I have killed far too many people who made foolish choices.” Bandits, men and women both desperate and greedy. Dead by his hand. “I don’t want to spill any more blood, but if you try to harm him again, I will do everything in my power to stop you.”
“What’s gotten into you?” she asked, her voice soft and pleading. “You were never like this.”
“More like who got into him,” Sulin muttered, sneering at Tracker. Before Dylan could object, the alchemist had hooked him by the crook of his arm and dragged him to one side. “That is what this is about, yes?” he said, his voice pitched low. “You are protecting him because you have let him do quite a bit more than kiss you.”
Immediate heat took Dylan’s cheeks. Panic tightened his chest, making it harder to think. His shield wobbled for a moment, letting the dagger hit the ground with a wet thud before he managed to strengthen the barrier. At least that got rid of the gnawing pain burrowing into the back of his skull. “I—” How could Sulin know? Surely, he couldn’t guess such a thing from a single kiss. “What makes you think…?” Dylan managed to squeak before falling into a fit of coughing.
Sulin’s brows rose. “So you are sleeping with him?”
“I-it’s not like that,” he stammered. “I— We— It just kind of… happened.”
The alchemist threw up his hand. “Happened?” he echoed, one brow attempting to lift further. “And how does that just ‘happen’? You two were naked together and you—what?—fell on him? Repeatedly?”
At Dylan’s back, he caught Tracker’s poor attempt at concealing his laughter behind clearing his throat. There was a nervous edge to that sound. He couldn’t have faced more than a single spellster at a time during his travels.
Dylan swallow
ed. His face was afire and his throat squeezed almost too tight to breathe. He glanced at the people still lingering in the shadows. His guardian was amongst them. Had she heard? There wasn’t much she could do to punish him, but the thought still knotted his gut.
“That’s a bit presumptuous, don’t you think?” Dylan finally managed, trying to affect a casual air. “He could’ve fallen on me.”
Sulin screwed up his nose. “Do not be so daft,” he scoffed. “He must be a good half-foot shorter than you.” He shook his head. “I can barely believe it as it stands. Of all the people you could have come across, you choose to sleep with that?”
Indignance seared its way through his embarrassment. “He is not a that. And even if I hadn’t slept with him, it wouldn’t mean I’d stand aside and let him die.” He pointed a finger at Tracker. “That man has risked his life to keep me safe, to escort me to—”
Wintervale. Where the hounds were raised and trained. Where the very person who’d been responsible for the tower slaughter likely lived.
Nestria gasped. “You slept with him?” Those light brown eyes widened in horror as she grabbed Sulin’s arm. “That’s not really true, is it?” she asked of their friend before facing Dylan once more. “You’re not interested in men. You’ve never been interested. What did you do to him?” That question was shot over his shoulder at the hound.
“Could you be a little more specific, dear woman?” Tracker replied. “We have done quite a number of things.”
In an instant, the shock on Nestria’s face hardened to rage. Screaming, she tore past Dylan to snatch up the fallen dagger. She stabbed at the shield still containing Tracker, putting all her weight behind each strike.
Dylan doubled over, clutching at his head. He stumbled forward. Strong hands grabbed him, keeping him from collapsing. Track? He turned his head, almost afraid to see what had become of the hound.
His shield still held, even if it did allow part of the dagger to slip through. Tracker stood in its centre, jerking back whenever Nestria struck. The shimmering barrier reformed after each slice and this seemed to enrage her all the more.
“Ness!” Sulin cried out, the word clanging in Dylan’s ears. The alchemist’s grip tightened around Dylan’s shoulders, keeping him upright. “Stop it! You are hurting Dylan!”
The dagger dropped from her fingers. It hit the ground blade first, sinking deep into the damp soil. She stepped back, tears leaving trails down her face.
Dylan gingerly walked to the shield. “Track, please don’t goad her again.”
Tracker grimaced apologetically. “Perhaps it would be better if I left altogether. I can take the wood we have gathered back to camp and let the others know you are here.”
“Others?” Sulin asked. “More hounds?”
Dylan shook his head. “Just travelling companions I picked up before Track found me. And you don’t have to leave,” he said over his shoulder to the hound whilst maintaining eye contact with the apparently more rational one of his friends. “You’ve done nothing wrong.”
“Still, it would be better if I did, yes? My presence is not exactly helping matters.”
“Yes,” Nestria snarled. “Leave. And don’t bother waiting for him. He’s coming with us.”
Tracker narrowed his eyes at her. “That would be Dylan’s decision to make, yes?”
“There’s nothing to decide,” she retorted, her back straightening in what seemed to be an effort to make herself taller. “He’s amongst friends now. He doesn’t need you.”
Tracker stared at her far longer than Dylan thought he really needed. “I see,” the hound eventually murmured. “I shall return to our camp, then. Will I be granted safe passage?” The question seemed to be directed at Nestria even as the man turned to Dylan, with one brow arched querulously. “Or shall he need to exert himself further?”
“You step out of there and I’ll kill you,” Nestria replied, a little too calmly for Dylan’s liking.
With a great deal of focus, Dylan extended the shield until it pressed against the undergrowth. “Go,” he muttered through clenched teeth. “Quickly.”
Tracker wasted no time and soon Dylan was able to drop the shield. Strength seemed to drain from his very soul as the hound’s silhouette disappeared through the undergrowth.
Great. The one time he might need the man here and he couldn’t ask Tracker to stay. “I’m leaving for Wintervale.” He fumbled in the pouch as he turned back to the duo, his hand closing on the twisted pieces of infitialis. “Sulin, you learnt to make collars, right?” Maybe if the man could leash Dylan here, then he wouldn’t need to explain himself once they reached the capital. They could even escort Katarina back to Dvärghem beforehand.
Sulin shrugged. “If you are asking if I can make one, then of course. But I would need enough dog metal on me and we did not exactly bring some along.”
Dylan placed the broken collar into the man’s hands. “Can you reuse this?”
The alchemist eyed the pieces, twisting them this way and that. The purple sheen turned strange colours in the firelight, taking on a rainbow huge in some places and a sooty grey in others. “Is this your old collar? What happened to it?”
“I was hoping you could tell me. There was this ruin and an explosion… An ambush. My scouting party…” Dylan shook his head, trying to clear the images of the dying from his mind. “I tried to use magic without sanction and…” He recalled unbearable heat and the screaming of people burning to death. But after? “I don’t know.” There’d been… Pain? Dylan rubbed at his throat. He seemed to recall screaming before everything went dark. “I guess it was too much for it.”
Sulin shook his head. “If the metal is worked correctly, it should nullify everything. Like the hounds. That you could even attempt to use magic means the metal is flawed.” He turned the pieces over, studying them anew. “All the links are fused. It must have put out an incredible amount of heat.” His gaze slid from the collar to Dylan. “I can scarcely believe you are not dead.”
Dylan pulled the neck of his robe down, tipping his head back to display the scar on his throat. “I likely almost did die.”
Nestria gave a squeak of surprise. She slithered around Sulin to clutch at him, her fingers sliding along his bare neck. “You haven’t scarred since you started healer training.”
“I cannot use this,” Sulin said, thrusting the mangled pieces into Dylan’s hands. “If I try, you risk the collar exploding again. I doubt you will survive the second blast.”
“Then I guess it’s on to Wintervale.” He’d meant what he said to Tracker. It would be selfish to do otherwise. That the hounds had attacked the tower and reduced the available spellsters to a mere handful only made his choice more right. He could be the only one trained for battle that was left to counter the magic of the Udynea Empire and if the empire chose to attack now…
Well, children, even if they were strong in power, couldn’t face down the likes of what he clashed with back at the army’s main camp and win. It was a miracle Dylan had. Of the others? Sulin didn’t have the strength and, whilst he wasn’t sure about the extent of Launtil’s power, Nestria didn’t have enough experience fighting against a deadly opponent. They would do better leaving Demarn as fast as they could manage.
“You don’t have to go.”
Dylan glanced over the elves’ heads at the sound of his guardian’s voice, tears pricking his eyes. Never had he realised how much he’d missed the sound of it until now. He watched in silence as Tricia rounded the campfire, the small figure of Launtil at her side. “You were right, Mother. I should’ve thrown the brawl.”
His guardian smiled, her cheeks growing fat, but it never reached her eyes. “No.” She caressed his cheek. “I was wrong. But you don’t have to go to Wintervale. Come with us.”
“I can’t. I just…” He wanted to but… “Track.” All it would take for the hounds to be set on his trail was for one of the others to slip up and mention a spellster had been with them. They’d searc
h for him until he was either dead or in enemy lands. Tracker would know how to avoid them.
His gaze slid to where the children cringed under the shadows of the nearby trees. So few. “I can’t leave him.” And he couldn’t force a hound’s presence onto those still frightened of them.
“Then allow me to offer a bit of advice before you go,” Tricia said.
He turned, wondering what his guardian could possibly have left to tell him.
“Do your heart a favour and stop whatever it is you’re doing with the hound.”
Dylan took a deep breath. He’d expected the warning, but not the calmness in which it was said. “You don’t seem all that surprised.” Not like Nestria.
The dark scar on her cheek danced as she gave a contemptuous little smile. “Have you forgotten who raised you, child? I’ve always known.”
“You have?” he squeaked. All these years, he thought he’d been so careful with his night-time indiscretions, but she knew. “You never said anything.”
“Should I have? I don’t recall you ever doing anything to give me cause.” She frowned. “But in this case, I caught you and that hound—” The way she spoke the word, she might as well have been speaking of something unsavoury. “—getting rather close whilst on the inn balcony back in Riverton.”
“You… did?” There hadn’t been many people on the streets by then. To think his guardian had stood nearby and he hadn’t spotted her.
“I thought I’d raised you better than this.” Tricia shook her head. “Allowing yourself to be preyed on by one of them.”
Dylan fought the pull of a smile tugging at his lips. If that was the truth, then the ‘preying’ had been mutual. “Actually, I…” His smile grew. “I think it’s more than that. I think he… genuinely cares.” About me. Maybe the man felt something even deeper.
The way he looks at you… Marin’s words tumbled through his mind, mingling with the hound’s recent query. What were they? The very thought left a little glow of warmth fluttering in his stomach. “He—”
