by Barb Hendee
The flicker of a hand ax tumbling through the air pulled Wynn's gaze skyward. She never saw where it came from, but she called out, "Captain… behind her!"
Captain Stasi charged into the stream halfway between a closing rider and the woman. He stretched upward with his shield. The ax, thrown from somewhere upslope, passed above the shield's edge and it struck the woman square in the back.
The young mother lurched, torso arching as she clutched the infant to her chest. Both boys cried out as she toppled facedown into the water, the infant trapped beneath her. Blood spread through her split sweater from the ax head embedded deep in her upper back.
Stasis voice rang out over the shouts of his men. "Let fly!"
Wynn cowered down beneath the thrum of bowstrings and arrows hissing through the air.
Magiere ran for the tree line with falchion and mace gripped in her hands. She passed another downed horse, still kicking. A deep gash had lamed one foreleg. Saddle strap split in two, a long wound opened the skin along its side to expose its rib cage. The animal's thrashing soaked its belly and the grass beneath it with dark red that steamed in the cold air.
The sight brought her a sickening hope. Leesil was still alive out here-somewhere.
Not far off, the dying mount's rider lay facedown. He didn't move, and Magiere hurried on.
Ahead in the distance, two soldiers dressed in motley clothes and armor crouched low on the ground. The tall unmatted grass nearer the trees made it impossible to see what they were doing, and Magiere's fear rose as she ran toward them.
They stood, lifting two bound refugees to their feet. Both captives were the full-grown men who'd been knocked down instead of killed.
Another rider cantered his mount out of the trees to the far right. Unlike the others, he was dressed as a fit officer in a black tabard over a gray quilted hauberk. A flash of white pulled Magiere's attention back toward the two motley soldiers.
Leesil lunged out of the tall grass, both of his winged punching blades unsheathed.
Their forward ends were shaped like flattened steel spades with elongated tips and sharpened edges. At their bases were crosswise oval openings, allowing the weapons to be gripped by their backsides for punching. A gradual wing curved back from the outside edge of each blade head and was the full length of his forearm, ending at his elbow.
He rushed the soldiers with their captives.
"Behind you!" shouted the officer, and he kicked his horse into a gallop, but the warning came too late for his men.
Leesil never broke stride. He drove his right blade tip into the first soldier's side and ripped the blade backward as he passed.
The man screeched as his side tore open. He grabbed his wound, and his hands turned instantly red as he crumpled. His shrieks filled the air, but all Magiere saw was the frantic jerk and whip of the grass where he'd fallen.
The second man shoved his captive away and swung with his mace.
Leesil caught the weapon's haft on his raised left blade. The blade's wing slammed against his forearm before the mace slid away along the arc. He punched his right blade up below the man's jaw.
The soldier's neck and face split open. Blood splashed out as the blade exited at the back of his jaw. He dropped without a sound not far from his dying companion.
The mounted officer had nearly closed in on Leesil.
Magiere switched her falchion into her left hand, shifting the mace into her right. She threw the mace as Leesil dropped one punching blade and a stiletto appeared in his hand. He whirled with his arm cocked to throw, but Magiere's mace found its target first.
The mace's haft cracked against the officer's forearm, and he veered his mount. When Leesil threw his stiletto, the man was ready. He blocked with a raised shortsword, and the stiletto clanged away into the grass.
A second stiletto appeared in Leesil's hand. Magiere closed in, falchion ready.
The officer's attention shifted quickly between them, and then he glanced across the field toward the distant stream. He scowled with a hiss of breath at whatever he saw and jerked the reins. His mount wheeled, and he kicked it into a gallop toward the trees, abandoning what was left of his men.
Magiere trotted up to Leesil, aware of her pounding heart. She tried to speak but couldn't between panting breaths. His hands and arms were covered in blood. Spatters marked the front of his hauberk and the right side of his face. It streaked his long hair, as if he'd run through a red rain.
Leesil slashed the bonds of the two captive men, and both immediately ran in the direction of the border stream. After sheathing the stiletto, he picked up his fallen winged blade then crouched to snatch up a horse mace. He studied it with narrow eyes, squeezing its haft until his knuckles whitened.
He was quiet, and Magiere pushed aside a chill that ran through her at the sight of him. When she reached out to check him for wounds, he backed away with only the barest glance at the blood on his arms.
"None of it's mine," he said, and turned across the field at a run for the border stream.
Magiere followed, close and silent.
Wynn lifted her head where she crouched. The woman priest thrashed through the stream after the dead mother's body floating off on the current. The one boy still clung to his mother's skirt and would not let go. Dragged along, he wailed between gulps of water filling his mouth while his little brother stood numbly silent on the far shore. The instant the priest blocked the body and flipped it over, a rider charged over the far slope. Captain Stasi splashed along the stream's far shore, directly in the horses path.
Wynn ran downslope.
A Stravinan pikeman rushed into the stream as she hit the cold water herself. Her feet and calves numbed except for the painful ache that shot into her bones. The pikeman pushed on after his captain as Wynn snatched the boy clinging to his mother's body.
"Indurare'a Iulian!" growled the priest as she turned frantically about in the stream, searching for something.
It was a language Wynn had never heard, but when she glanced at the overturned body, she understood. The mother's dead eyes stared up at the gray sky. Her arms floated at her sides, and the empty wool blanket clung to one. The infant was gone.
Wynn heaved the boy up as she trudged two steps toward the Stravinan side of the stream. She shoved him toward the shore. A horse's panicked whinny sounded behind her, and she turned. She caught a glimpse of the priest wading for the shore with something wrapped in the woman's arms. Wynn hoped fervently that it was the infant.
A pikeman's lance sliced a horse's neck as he tried to strike its rider. The spear head glanced off the rider's shield, and he struck down with his mace. The lance shaft snapped as the horse lunged forward. Captain Stasi was still in its path, and directly below him at the water's edge stood the other little boy watching his mother drift downstream.
The captain swung his shield, and its edge smashed hard against the horse's long head. The animal veered, and its footing gave on the steep slope, still wet from the morning's rain. Hindquarters pivoted sideways, slamming into the pikeman and flattening him as the animal toppled. The rider pitched forward, straight at the captain. On impact, both fell backward into the stream, and Wynn lost sight of them in the splash of flailing bodies.
And the little boy just stood there.
Wynn surged through the water. At midstream, the scuffle of a horse's hooves made her look up for an instant. Another rider crested the slope. An arrow protruded from his shoulder, yet he drove his mount downward. Wynn focused on the boy.
Each waterlogged step took too long, no matter how hard she worked her numb legs. When she reached out, the boy did not look at her. His eyes were as blank as his dead mother's. Wynn grabbed him by one arm as she heard a loud whoosh in the air. She looked up.
Wynn saw the mace, and the world slowed to silence as she watched it arcing toward her from the sky. Everything lurched back to full speed as something else slammed into her waist.
Her breath rushed out at the impact, and h
er vision wrenched into a frantic blur as she was thrown backward. Water splashed up around and over her, as her head and shoulders smacked against bare wet earth.
Blank sky was all Wynn saw. She lay half-out on the Stravina side of the stream, submerged from the waist down. Gasping for air, she pawed at her own head and face, but felt no wound, only the dull ache in her skull from falling. The mace had missed her.
Beside her lay the boy, looking back to the stream. His eyes suddenly widened in terror. He scrambled away, screaming as if something in the stream were more terrifying than watching his mother die.
Wynn rolled over to look. It climbed out of the water, feral eyes glimmering like crystals.
Chap shook himself and a cascade of droplets rained down upon Wynn. He had knocked her out of the mace's path. He padded quickly to her side, head swinging as he studied her. He was matted and wet, yet his face was still soaked in blood. His jowls wrinkled around half-open jaws, exposing teeth and fangs as he sniffed her.
Wynn stiffened.
Chap's face was that of a wolf fresh from a kill. He turned and splashed back through the stream under the sound of clattering steel and thrashing men and mounts.
A rider tried to flee upslope on foot until an arrow struck him in the thigh. He stumbled, grabbing the protruding shaft, and Chap fell upon him. The man went down with the dog at his throat. His scream broke and was lost in the waning clamor of the battle.
Wynn shrank back, turning away. The boy crawled up the wet bank on all fours. She climbed to her feet and hoisted him by the waist.
Chap's stained face and teeth mingled with the memory of a single leaf-wing in Wynn's numbed mind. She ran for the city gate without looking back.
* * *
Leesil stopped to look down upon the border stream. He heard Magi ere right behind him.
Bodies of men and horses lay from one shore to the other, but only three of the Stravinan pikemen were down. One lay crushed beneath a toppled horse that finally went limp, and a young male priest knelt to close the dead man's eyes. The other two wounded border guards were hoisted to their feet by their comrades and supported as they hobbled toward the city gate. The tall captain oversaw the return of his men, his white tabard soaked and grimed, but otherwise he appeared unwounded.
Downstream, a young woman's corpse drifted away on the sluggish current with her slack face toward the clouded sky.
Leesil felt all the years since he'd fled his first life-son and slave, spy and assassin. He smothered that pain until he felt coldly numb inside. It was an old habit of survival now revived once again.
The snort of a horse called his attention.
One rider with a lamed leg heaved himself across a kneeling horse and jerked the reins to make the mount get up. The horse slipped again and again before its hooves dug into the wet embankment. It clambered to the slope top with the rider hunched over in the saddle.
Leesil pulled both winged blades and took two quick steps. Magiere moved into his path and braced her palm against his chest.
"No more!" she whispered harshly. "Enough."
He stared at her sweat-marked pale face and black hair. He breathed twice before true recognition settled through the need to finish the last of his task.
Whatever must be done, no witnesses-the first rule taught by mother and father. For the lives of each other, they'd smothered themselves cold inside… kept themselves secret and safe at any price.
"How am I to watch over you…" Magiere began, and her smooth brow wrinkled with an anger that would've hidden her fear from anyone but him. "How… if you throw yourself into the path of anyone who'd want you dead? No more. You don't leave my side again!"
She hesitated as she lifted her hand from his chest. Leesil saw her white palm and fingers smeared with blood from his hauberk.
His stomach lurched. There was blood on her… from him.
"Leesil?" Magiere whispered, and her furrowed brow smoothed.
She looked at him with worry in her dark eyes, as if he were in danger and didn't see it for himself. He felt the spattered blood mixed with his own sweat beginning to dry into his skin and hair.
And he'd put it on her.
Magiere took a slow step toward him.
Leesil backed away. He jogged quickly down the slope, stepped into the stream, and waded toward the Stravinan side. He heard Magiere splash into the water close behind him.
How could he have brought her here, after all she had to bear from her own past?
He wanted to stop in the cold stream swirling around his legs, sink down, and let the icy water wash over him. Let it crush this sudden anguish out of him. But it would not help. For all the water he might pour over his flesh, or wine he swallowed to deaden his nightmares, there had always been blood on him. He could bear that.
But not on Magiere.
Leesil quickened his stride upslope toward the city. This was his homecoming, in the only way it could ever be.
CHAPTER TWO
Chane reined in his horse on a forested knoll and peered from the deep shadow of his cowl to the snow-patched field below. The sun dipped low behind the clouded horizon. The trees and his voluminous cloak shielded him from the light of dusk, but he still felt its prickle upon his skin. When he opened his senses wide, the scent of blood carried to him on the stiff breeze.
Across the distance to the Stravinan border, he saw the remains of a small battle. Leesil, Magiere, and Chap trudged through the aftermath toward the city. And there was Wynn, waiting within the open gates as her companions entered.
Chane's anxious worry faded upon seeing her; then the city gates swung closed in the dusk.
Welstiel pulled up his horse beside Chane's mount. "What happened here?"
Chane shook his head in silence.
When they'd first met, Welstiel had meticulous grooming habits. In his early forties by appearance, he was of medium height and build with dark brown hair marked by stark white patches at his temples. Now uncombed locks hung in lank strands down his brow from under his own cowl. His fine wool cloak was faded and snagged from the many days of sleeping outside in a makeshift tent concealed with scavenged foliage. Welstiel had changed much in the passing moons, but then so had Chane.
His own red-brown hair, nearly reaching his shoulders, hung limp around his face. He pulled at the wool scarf around his neck. Though he'd not seen his own reflection in a long while, he felt what was hidden there, and rubbed at the ridge of a scar encircling his throat. Less than a moon before, Magiere had severed his head. A ghost of that pain still haunted him. No matter how much he fed and focused his will, the mark remained branded on his pale undead flesh.
Welstiel had brought him back from this second death.
Chane's scheming companion had yet to say how. Was it an arcane secret of Welstiel's conjuration, the magics of the spirit side of existence? Or was it a little-known aspect of the Noble Dead that only Welstiel had uncovered… somewhere?
Welstiel's chestnut filly pawed the earth in the cold winter air. They had purchased new mounts a few nights past. Both struck Chane as too young, not nearly broken in, but at least they were swift.
"What now?" he asked, and immediately scowled at the sound of his own voice. He nearly had to shout just to make himself heard, and all that came out was a hoarse rasp of air. Where his neck was scarred, his voice was forever altered.
"Magiere will enter the Warlands," Welstiel responded. "We should know her general plans for the coming days. Have your new familiar find her whereabouts and see what you can learn."
Chane's conjuring skill had refined since he'd risen as a Noble Dead. Creation and control of familiars was becoming a particular expertise. He experienced the world through their senses and commanded their actions to a limited degree.
Upon the rump of his horse beneath a draped deerskin was a square lump the width and height of his forearm. He jerked the covering aside to expose a small wooden cage tied to the back of his saddle. A red-breasted robin squatted insi
de the bars. Chane opened the cage door to let the bird hop onto his wrist, then turned back around. Out of habit, he grasped the tiny brass urn hanging around his neck with his free hand.
Closing his eyes, Chane focused his will until the robin's image materialized in his thoughts. Its head cocked sideways in Chane's mind, with one black avian eye staring back at him. He sent it commands woven into images.
Half-dead and half-elf-black hair with red sparks and white hair that glimmered, the two side by side.
Find in stone and cut wood-the city below, through the trees and across the open field.
Silent, watch and listen-a glimpse of a pale woman's face next to the deep tan of a man with amber eyes.
The robin thrashed its wings and lifted into the air.
Rushing wind over feathers and the ground falling away filled Chane's awareness as his mind clung to the bird's senses. In his early days, these secondhand sensations had been disorienting, then exhilarating. Now he found no delight in them.
The robin crossed the stream and glided over the city walls. Torches were being lit by patrols upon the ramparts. Below were the rooftops of the city, the shapes of buildings barely defined by the light of oil lanterns hanging in the intersections of its roadways. Nearest the city wall was a tall building with a line of figures moving toward a glowing opening at one end.
The robin dove downward, and Chane watched fatigued Stravinan border guards trudging along the side road. Some assisted their wounded comrades as they walked. Peasants in tattered and soaked clothing were among them, as well as several figures in pale blue tabards over cowled robes. All headed for a tall timber barracks, its lower half a mortared foundation of basalt stone. Orange-yellow light spilled from an open door at the far right end, but there was no sign of Wynn or her companions.
A flash of white passed by a window just left of the main door. Chane made the robin double back to light upon the foundation stone meeting the window's ledge. Looking both ways through the pane, he glimpsed a wood archway to the left. Someone in a studded leather hauberk disappeared through it before Chane could discern who it was. The robin fluttered into the air, and returned to land on a sill at the barrack's end farthest from the door.
