“I’ll find you later.”
Rissla’s eyes narrowed. “You,” she said, pointing at Droë. “You’re not welcome here. Find another village. These grounds are ours. You’re not to hunt in my demesne. Do you understand?”
Droë didn’t answer straight away. Rissla bared her teeth again.
“Do you understand?” she repeated, biting off each syllable.
“I understand your words,” Droë said, knowing she was being reckless. “I’m not simple.”
Rissla stalked back in her direction. “But you will not obey? Do you challenge me?”
“I do not challenge you. But neither do I recognize your authority to keep me from hunting here.”
The girl smiled again, a cruel, knowing smile. “You are a stupid child. You have made an enemy tonight, one for whom you are no match.” She whirled away, her hair whipping around her face. “Come along.”
The others fell in step behind her.
Droë watched her go, her hands trembling.
“That wasn’t smart,” the boy said.
“You think I should have given in to her?” she demanded, glaring at him sidelong. “You think I should allow myself to go hungry while I’m here?”
“I didn’t say that. But you could have acquiesced and then hunted here anyway. Now it won’t matter what you do. She hates you and she won’t allow you a moment’s rest.”
He was right, and she was a dolt.
“Well, that’s just fine with me,” Droë said, rather than admit as much. She stomped off in the opposite direction from that taken by Rissla and the other Tirribin.
The boy walked with her.
“I’m Taibid,” he said.
“I’m Droë.” She had come searching for friends, but now that she seemed to have found one she wished he would leave her alone.
“Did you really come here from Safsi?”
She nodded, turning down a new lane that led away from the wharf, toward the hills that loomed over the town.
“Why?”
Her throat tightened and her eyes stung. Because I was lonely. I’m always lonely. “Does it matter?” she asked, blinking away the tears before they could fall.
“I didn’t mean to—”
She halted, forcing Taibid to do the same. “You should probably leave me,” she said. “I can tell that she cares for you and sees you as … well, as someone who shouldn’t be my friend.”
He lifted an eyebrow. “So you’ll hunt where she tells you not to, but you’ll refuse an offer of friendship on the chance that she won’t approve?”
Put that way, it did sound foolish. She eyed the lane they were on, followed it with her gaze into the uplands. “Am I likely to find anyone abroad in the streets this late?”
He considered the road as well. “Not this way. The wharf is the best place for hunting.”
“That’s where Rissla went.”
Taibid shrugged.
“So where should I go? I don’t know this town.”
“Aside from the wharf, the market is best, but that’s only during the day. At night you just have to roam the streets until you find someone.”
“That’s not very helpful.”
“No,” he said. “I don’t suppose it is.”
She turned again at the next corner, angling away from the hills, back toward the center of the town. Taibid remained with her, but said nothing. Droë didn’t speak either and they walked together in uneasy silence. Yet she was thankful for his presence beside her. Awkward though it was, she preferred it to being on her own.
After perhaps a quarter bell, she caught the scent of human years nearby. Not as young as she would have liked, but certainly better than nothing. She and Taibid shared a glance and a smile. At Tirribin speed, with the care honed over countless years of predation, they approached the next cross street in tandem, eager to spot their prey.
As they stepped onto the next lane, they spotted the human—a burly man of perhaps thirty years. He stumbled through shadows in their direction, muttering to himself. Even at this distance, Droë smelled spirit on his breath.
Not her ideal prey, but she prepared to rush him and take his years. Before she could, he fell, as if knocked down from behind.
A form scrambled over him, latched on to the back of his neck. Another Tirribin. The man cried out, flailed. The Tirribin began to feed, a faint, pale green glow suffusing her body and covering the human as well.
As she ate, the Tirribin raised her eyes and peered at Droë, malice and pleasure in the gaze.
Rissla.
They watched her for a fivecount.
“We should leave,” Taibid said.
They turned, but other Tirribin stood in their path.
“You’re to remain here until she’s finished,” one of them said.
Droë and Taibid shared another look.
Rissla took her time with the man and then straightened, her feeding glow fading. The human lay at her feet, withered, his eyes and cheeks sunken as if he had been dead for days.
“That was lovely,” she said, sighing the words. “He didn’t look like much, but he had more years than one might have thought. You really ought to have had some.”
“Why are you doing this?” Taibid asked her. “She hasn’t done anything—”
“You will cease immediately to have anything to do with her,” the Tirribin said, “or you will be outcast for ten centuries. I swear it.”
“You can’t cast me out.” The words were confident, but though Droë had known Taibid for only this one night, she recognized doubt in his voice.
“No? How certain are you?”
He didn’t answer, but sent a quick glance Droë’s way. She knew he would choose Rissla and the others. Why wouldn’t he? Who was she but a stranger who, in a matter of a bell or two, had thrown his life into turmoil?
Taibid lingered a moment longer, then crossed the distance between Rissla and Droë to stand with the older girl. Their friends still loomed at Droë’s back.
“It seems to me that you were hunting where I told you not to,” Rissla said, even more confident now that Taibid stood with her. “Isn’t that so, little one?”
Droë looked at Taibid, but he avoided her gaze. She would have no help from him. “You were at the wharf,” she said. “I kept my distance from you and your friends. This town has plenty of humans. You wouldn’t have suffered for any years that I took.”
Rissla prodded the dead man with her toe. “But I would have. Had you succeeded in disobeying me, I would have been denied this one’s years.”
Her gaze flicked past Droë to those behind her. All the warning Droë had. Hands grabbed for her.
Droë twisted away, dove to the cobblestone lane, rolled. They lunged for her, fingers like iron, teeth clacking. They were stronger than she, but she was fast. She always had been.
She squirmed away a second time, leaped to her feet. Her breath came in gasps. They closed in on her. At the last instant, she remembered Rissla, on whom she had turned her back. She heard a footfall just behind her, spun, dropped, rolled again. Rissla let out a snarl.
Droë darted at speed through a gap between Rissla and her companions. She swerved as the quickest among them darted after her and fled along the lane. At the first corner, she turned to head away from the shoreline. The other Tirribin followed, neither gaining on her nor losing ground. She knew Rissla would be with them, wondered if Taibid was as well.
She didn’t have time to think on it. They pursued her and she ran. Rissla and her friends knew the town better than Droë did. Would they cut her off? Surround her? Did they intend to kill her or merely scare her off? She had gone much of the day without feeding and wasn’t sure how long she could run at Tirribin speed before her body failed her.
She took one side lane after another until she couldn’t say with certainty where she was or even which direction she would have to turn to find water. Fear drove her on.
Eventually, she realized they no longer followed. Sh
e slowed, breathless, sweating like an overworked human. She listened for the others, for any indication that they still hunted for her. Nothing. Probably they had returned to the wharf to hunt and to laugh at her. The child-Tirribin whom they had chased off.
This time, she couldn’t stop her tears. She swiped at them, angry with herself for allowing them to hurt her feelings, and for caring that Taibin had chosen Rissla over her.
More than anything she wanted to feed. Then she would leave. There were other towns and villages, other places where a Tirribin might find prey. But it had grown late, and these streets had gone silent. She sensed no humans in the lanes. A dog or two. And cats. But she refused to lower herself to such a feeding. Their years were not as satisfying. No, she would find a human come the morning.
She entered a narrow dirt byway between two buildings, lay on the damp ground, and curled into a tight ball. In time, sleep took her.
Droë slumbered longer than she had intended, waking to bright daylight and bustling streets at either end of her alley. Like all of her kind, she preferred to hunt at night, but her stomach growled and, despite her rest, she felt weak, sluggish.
She stood, crept to the end of the lane, moving with care, keeping out of sight.
“Sleep well, little one?”
She stiffened, already too familiar with that voice.
“Don’t bother running. You won’t get far.”
Droë turned. Rissla stood closer than she had expected. She couldn’t stop herself from taking a step back. “So you’re going to kill me now?” she asked. Somehow she kept her tone level.
“No.”
Droë blinked. “You’re not?”
The Tirribin shook her head. “There’s no fun in that.”
“I’ll feed this morning and leave the village. You have my word. I have no intention …” She trailed off. Rissla was shaking her head.
“I don’t think that sounds like fun either.”
Cold dread crawled down Droë’s spine like a drop of ice water. “Then what?”
“A game,” Rissla said, a smile splitting her flawless face. “We won’t allow you to leave, but neither will we allow you to feed. That, at least, is our intention. You can try to do either, or both. If you win, you’ll have your meal and live to hunt another day. Or you’ll leave this place and need never worry about us again. If we win, you’ll die.”
“Why are you doing this to me?” Droë asked, throwing her arms wide. “What did I do to offend you so?”
“You came here without seeking my permission. You chose to hunt without seeking my permission.” Her voice rose. “You tried to steal Taibid from me without seeking my permission. So now, you will have nothing, not even your life, without my permission.”
“I had only just arrived when you found me! If you had told me I needed your permission—”
“You should have known. Let that be a lesson to you, little one. A lesson you probably won’t live long enough to put to use. When you come to a new port, a new village, your first task should be to seek out the dominant Tirribin and ask leave to hunt and live.”
A number of replies leapt to Droë’s mind, not least among them that she didn’t appreciate being called “little one.” She gave voice to none of them.
“The game begins now. I hope you’ll be more clever than you’ve been thus far. If not, this promises to be rather boring.”
Rissla turned her back on Droë, almost daring her to attack.
She didn’t. She ran.
She thought her best hope would be escape. There had to be a dozen paths that led out of the town. Rissla and her friends couldn’t possibly guard all of them, could they?
It didn’t take her long to find that they could. The first lane she followed appeared to curve into the highlands, past copses and fields. She wasn’t able to follow it far, however. One of Rissla’s friends stood in her way. Two more stood in the grass on either side of the road. All three of them smirked at her.
Droë turned back, followed another lane in a different direction. Rissla’s Tirribin guarded that one as well.
She struck out in a third direction, this time eschewing roads for brush and thickets. Before she could cover much distance, Tirribin closed on her from both sides, forcing her to turn back yet again. On her way back to the village, she encountered Rissla.
“You’re following me,” Droë said.
The Tirribin hiked her shoulder, her calm unnerving. “You don’t make it difficult. So predictable. I hope you prove more of a challenge before this is over.”
“Do you truly have nothing better to do than torment me?”
Rissla sauntered closer. Droë tried not to flinch away.
“You still don’t understand, do you? This has nothing to do with tormenting you, although that does make it more fun. It has everything to do with my authority in this town. You claim to know how to hunt, and I’ll grant that you’re quicker than some Tirribin I’ve known, but you have much to learn about what it means to be an Ancient.”
“I’m sorry,” Droë said. “I didn’t mean—If you just allow me to leave, you’ll never see me again. And no one will ever hear of any of this.”
“I’ve already told you,” Rissla said, turning and starting away. “It’s too late for that.”
Droë stared after her, despair flooding her heart. After a time, she could no longer see the other Tirribin, but she knew Rissla hadn’t gone far. In all likelihood, she was near enough to mark Droë’s every movement.
Yet, what could she do but try to survive?
Droë didn’t fear individual humans, but in numbers they could be dangerous. She preferred to prey on single ones, and always by dark, when she was least likely to be seen. But as her hunger deepened, caution seemed a luxury she couldn’t afford.
She skirted the town’s marketplace, hoping to isolate a meal. In moments, however, she found herself in the company of Rissla and two of her friends. She retreated, cursing the other Tirribin, her hands shaking with rage.
So it went throughout that day and into the night. She couldn’t leave. They wouldn’t allow her to feed. At last, giving in to the hollow ache in her belly, she turned to hunting animals. But Rissla and the others wouldn’t allow her even this consolation. They kept her from dogs and horses and cats. They did allow her to take a rat. Or perhaps they didn’t see, or care. What she took from the creature couldn’t be measured in years. A turn, perhaps two. Such a meager reward was hardly worth the effort. It did nothing to sate her need.
After repeated frustration in the lanes of the town, Droë managed to sleep, waking to a gray dawn and a chill fog. Usually the vagaries of climate did not touch her. A Shonla mist could make her shiver, but she thought nothing of wearing tatters through the worst of Trevynisle winters. This morning’s cold, though, seeped into her bones. She felt like a husk. Tirribin were not meant to go so long without feeding. She could barely stand, much less move at Tirribin speed.
Still, she roused herself and crept through the streets, following a wide path around the marketplace, toward the wharf. They might not expect that. She would have preferred to run, to use all the powers she usually possessed, but she was so weakened she had to rely on guile rather than swiftness.
It wasn’t enough. Rissla awaited her at the waterfront. Taibid stood with her.
They exchanged not a word. Droë spotted her and halted. Rissla flashed a savage grin. Taibid stared, his expression unreadable, his arms crossed over his chest. After a fivecount, Droë pivoted and set out in a new direction. She might as well have sat down and remained where she was. She had no more success, either hunting or exiting the town, than she had the day before. She grew more desperate with each passing bell. Thwarted for what felt like the hundredth time as she tried to leave the town along a footpath into the hills, she screamed her frustration, tears coursing over her cheeks, her throat growing raw. By nightfall, her thoughts were as muddied as a river in flood. Hunger gnawed at her.
The next day was wo
rse still. She spent it in a daze, stumbling through the streets until she was too faint to hunt. She took refuge behind a bank of rundown wooden houses near the marketplace.
She no longer recalled when she had fed last. She, a creature of time, had lost track of the days and bells. She didn’t even remember who her last meal had been. A sailor, she thought. Yes. It came back to her, as if through the same fog that still hazed the town. He had been young, ripe with years. The recollection brought with it another gut-wrenching pang.
“Droë.”
She lifted her head. Even that took effort. Taibid stood over her. Panic gripped her. She quailed, pressing herself to the wood at her back, staring past him, looking for Rissla.
“She’s not here. I came to help you.”
Droë wasn’t sure she believed him.
“Can you walk?”
“Do you know how long it’s been since I ate?”
“A long time, I know.”
He tried to pull her up. Droë’s legs wobbled and she collapsed back to the ground.
“How long?”
“What?” he asked.
“How long? I’m asking. I can’t remember anymore.”
“It doesn’t matter. We need to get you away from here.”
“How? She’ll find me. She always does.”
“Not this time.” He smiled. “I gave them a riddle—Rissla and the others. They’ll be distracted for a bell or two at least.”
Fresh tears leaked from her eyes. “You’re sure?”
A riddle. If only she had thought of that. She even knew one. A good one. All Tirribin kept one in mind for occasions of this sort. No Tirribin could resist the lure of a fine riddle, and once presented with one, no Tirribin could leave it, even for a moment. She might have saved herself, if only she had thought to do so. Perhaps Rissla was right and she was still a child.
“It’s the best one I know,” Taibid said. “It once held me for an entire day. I wound up nearly as hungry as you are now.”
“I doubt that.”
He helped her up again and supported her as they made their way from the town into the farmland to the west. There, he left her for a time, returning to her near dusk, leading her to a prone form lying in a field. An old man, who bled from a messy wound to his head.
Guilds & Glaives Page 22
