by Kyra Halland
“Ride, damn it!” Silas bellowed.
He sounded angrier than when he had yelled at her the day the rustlers came around – and scared, as well. The tight, sick feeling inside Lainie got even worse. She looked back at him; with Abenar at a full gallop, he twisted around in the saddle and shouted several Island words as he made a sharp gesture with his left arm. A high, wide shield of shimmering blue light, that must have cost a great deal of power, appeared between him and the pursuing mages –
And shattered under the onslaught of four blasts of magic hitting it all at once. In the next breath, a fifth blast arced over Silas’s head and landed between him and Lainie in a huge upheaval of rocks and dirt.
Mala’s terror spurred her ahead even faster, leaving Silas farther behind. The hunters were trying to separate her and Silas, Lainie realized. They were pushing her away from him; it was him they were after, not her. She had to get back to him and help him, but Mala was racing in a breakneck panic and it was all Lainie could do to hang on to the reins for her life.
Behind her, she heard Silas shout out more words in the Island language; more magical explosions followed, then gunfire. Desperately clinging to her terrified horse, Lainie dared another look back. Silas turned in his saddle as he raced ahead of the pursuing hunters and fired his gun. A hunter tumbled from his horse. Lainie reached out with her mage senses, trying to grab hold of power from one of the hunters, to take it or suppress it. A wall of power slammed her away, almost as though they had expected her to try that. The attack jarred her magical and physical senses; she collected herself just in time to veer Mala aside from a rough, rocky patch of ground that would have twisted the mare’s leg.
Yet another gunshot rang out. Lainie looked back again to see Silas sagging forward in the saddle. He twisted around and fired again, then his body jerked as another shot, and another, and yet another hit him in the back. He fell from the saddle to the ground, and Abenar ran on, riderless.
“Silas!” His name tore from Lainie in a painful scream. She beat her heels against Mala’s sides and pulled on the reins, desperately trying to turn around to get to him before the hunters did. A giant ball of magic crashed into the ground beside her and sent her and Mala tumbling. She hit the dirt painfully hard, and darkness exploded around her.
* * *
SLOWLY, LAINIE’S SENSES cleared. She was lying crumpled on the ground. Cautiously, she sat up; everything hurt, but nothing seemed to be broken. With a sudden stab of alarm, she looked around for Mala, fearing to find her horse fatally injured. The brown mare was a few measures away, working herself back to her feet. She didn’t appear to be seriously harmed, thank all the gods.
And Silas… Lainie spun around to see a cloud of dust to the south and east, growing smaller as the hunters headed back towards the Gap.
“No!” she sobbed out. The only reason they would be riding away was because they had finished what they came to do.
She crawled over to Mala. Hanging on to the stirrups and saddle, she dragged herself to her feet. Mala’s sides were heaving and frothy. The horse would never be able to catch up with the hunters; she was too exhausted to be ridden at all right now. Leading the mare by the reins, Lainie started walking back to where Silas had fallen, her legs cold and weak, her insides churning with fear of what she would find.
She stopped before a puddle of blood on the dirt and trampled grass. His hat lay nearby, abandoned. He was gone.
The last of Lainie’s strength left her. She dropped to her knees next to the blood. With numb, shaking hands, she picked up his hat and crushed it to her heart. “Oh, Silas.” Pain like nothing she had ever felt before swelled inside her till she thought it would tear her in half. “No!” Deep sobs wrenched her whole body, and she doubled over, crying, lost in a dark, boundless grief.
She wept until she had nothing left inside and her tears had run dry. Her hands still clutched Silas’s hat to her breast. Though an occasional silent sob still shuddered through her, she forced herself to sit up straight. She’d had her cry, and now it was time to face the situation.
The hunters had taken him. If he was dead, they would have taken his ring as proof of the kill so they could claim the bounty on him, and left his body. She couldn’t think of any reason why they would go to the trouble of taking a dead man all the way back to Granadaia. So, he had to be alive. And they must want him alive for some reason; else why bother carrying a wounded man back through the Gap? Why not just finish him off and take his ring?
So, that meant he was captive. And that he needed her help.
Abenar had come back while she was crying. He whuffled and nosed at her head, as though agreeing, He needs our help. Silas had put keeper charms on his horse, his hat, and his water bottles, to ensure that they never got lost. Once, only half in jest, he had threatened to put a keeper charm on Lainie as well, but they didn’t work on people. Lainie didn’t know over how far a distance keeper charms would work; would they fail if the charmed object and its owner were too far apart? Whether they did or not, she would make sure that his horse, his hat, and his water bottles, and she herself – on whom he had cast the most powerful spell of all, the spell of his love and devotion – were reunited with him.
“They can’t take you from me, baby,” she said. She looked at his blood, thickening and soaking into the ground. If she was going to go after those hunters and rescue him – and she would, all the way to Granadaia or even to the ends of the world if she had to – she was going to need help. The Wildings was her land; the magic of its life, its earth, was bred into her blood and bones, just as she and Silas were bound to each other’s hearts and souls. She was shaped to take and use the power that flowed through the ground just beneath her. The Sh’kimech were there as well, dark, powerful, and dangerous, but they claimed her as their Sister and bowed to her command.
She set her hand in the patch of blood, palm flat against the ground, and reached down into the earth, through warm amber then farther down to the cold, lightless realm of the Sh’kimech. I need your help, she told them. He’s mine, and they’ve taken him away from me. Help me get him back.
They stirred eagerly at her words. Sister. If he is yours, then he is ours too. We will bring him back. And destroy the ones who took him.
Yes, she promised.
She drew them in along with the warm, bright earth-power of the Wildings, filling herself with magic until she could hold no more. With her own power, she tamped down the Sh’kimech deep inside of her. Sleep until I need you, she told them. Then she wrapped the Wildings earth-power around them, shielding herself from their soul-chilling presence.
The day of the storm, the Wildings power had drained out of her when she wasn’t using it. Now she needed a way to bind it inside her until she was ready to use it. She looked at her hand, covered with blood and dirt mixed together in a thick mud. Silas had taught her that blood, like words, gestures, and written symbols, could be used to bind magic, though to use blood for this purpose was a deep and dire thing, to be done only when necessary, for spells and vows thus bound were unbreakable.
Now, she thought, it was necessary.
Joiner, Mender, Defender, Avenger, help me, she prayed. Whatever it takes, I will get him back safely, or avenge him if he’s dead. She reached inside her shirt and smeared Silas’s blood and Wildings soil onto her breast, over her heart, binding the power of the Wildings and the Sh’kimech within her and sealing her vow.
Renewed strength and determination filled her. She wiped the rest of the bloodied dirt from her hand on some grass nearby, then stood. Taking stock, she noted that Abenar’s saddlebags were undisturbed and Silas’s knapsack still hung from his saddle. So, in addition to her own things, she had all of Silas’s belongings and supplies and his half of their money. Tenderly, she rolled up Silas’s hat and tucked it into his knapsack.
She judged the horses still too tired to carry her. They could walk for now; the hunters’ horses would also get tired. As well, the sun would be setti
ng soon. But even if the hunters had remounts and could light their way through the dark with mage lights, Silas hadn’t gone down easily, and they had to be feeling the effects of the fight. Walking wouldn’t lose her too much ground, and it was better than pushing these good, brave horses to the point of uselessness or worse. They could walk longer into the night than tired, burdened men could ride.
She took Abenar and Mala by the reins. “Come on, let’s go find him.” Leading the horses, with the lowering sun behind them and their shadows lengthening across the valley ahead of them, she started walking south and east, towards the Gap and Granadaia.
THE END
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To the Gap
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Read on for a sneak preview of City of Mages,
Book 5 of Daughter of the Wildings!
City of Mages
Riding Mala at a gentle pace and with Abenar trailing along, Lainie arrived at the Gap late in the afternoon the day after Silas was captured. Even now, several days after the end of the annual cattle market, the cattle were still still heading into the Gap, one herd of a thousand head at a time, on their way to Granadaia. Looking at the number of cattle still waiting in the broad valley at the mouth of the pass, Lainie guessed it would take at least another two days for the rest of the cattle to enter the pass. She had no idea how long it would take for them to cross all the way through the Gap. Some tents still stood around the market grounds, where men were counting the cattle and making notes on pieces paper nailed to writing boards while cowhands watched over the herds.
There was no sign of the hunters who had taken Silas. Lainie had spent the seemingly endless night walking the horses until she just couldn't go any farther, then she had tried to rest for a short time. In her mind, over and over, she had seen Silas shot from the saddle; the awful memory had made sleep impossible, so as soon as she had regained enough strength, she was up and moving again. The horses seemed rested enough by then that by trading them off she was able to ride them back to the Gap. Now it looked like the long night of moving ahead with little rest hadn't allowed her to gain on Silas and his captors.
She rode over to the nearest of the men who were making notes. "Excuse me, mister?"
He gave her a quick glance, a disdainful look on his dark, sharp-featured face, then went back to his paper. "The hiring foreman is somewhere over there, but I believe they have enough crew already." He spoke in the crisp, clipped accents of an upper-class Granadaian, and a broad gold ring set with amber flashed on the forefinger of his right hand as he wrote. He was wearing the fanciest greenfoot suit Lainie had ever seen, modeled after the workclothes worn by cowhands but of fine materials and elegant cut, with shiny buttons and fancy, colorful top-stitching and embroidery. The crown of his green-dyed straw hat rose twice as high as any real cowhand's hat. Even the gun holstered at his hip was fancier than any real gun would be.
"I'm not looking to hire on," Lainie said. "Some bounty hunters shot my husband and took him." As she described what had happened, her heart started to race with panic and she thought she might start crying again. She still couldn't believe what had happened. She fought to get herself under control, and went on. "They were headed this way. Have you seen them?"
"Yes, we let them into the pass a few hours ago. Normally it's closed to traffic until all the cattle have gone through. Their business was urgent; they'd captured an escaped bondservant, and were in a hurry to return him to the owner of his contract."
"That wasn't a bondservant, that was my husband!"
"How unfortunate." He sounded like there was nothing in the world he could care less about.
Lainie wheeled Mala and Abenar around to follow the next bunch of cattle through the Gap, but the man ordered her, "Wait."
She looked around and saw that he had drawn the gun, and was aiming it her like he knew how to use it. It would to foolish to assume that he didn't.
"I told you," he said, "the pass is closed to traffic until all the cattle have gone through." He gave her a hard little smile. He was enjoying this.
Well. She wasn't just some Plain that someone like him could boss around. Lainie took her ring from her wedding finger and slid it onto her right forefinger, and let enough power flow to it to make it glow rose. "Listen to me. I'm a mage. So's my husband."
"Then he was taken by mage hunters, which means he's wanted by the Mage Council. And I am most certainly not going to get involved in a matter like that." He cocked the gun. "You can do whatever you want, get yourself captured as well, as long as you don't interfere with the passage of purchased cattle through the Gap."
"I thought guns were illegal in Granadaia."
"They are." His grin grew more predatory. "But we aren't in Granadaia."
Getting herself shot wasn't going to help Silas any. Lainie let out an angry breath and turned Mala away from the man. She didn't want to wait. She couldn't leave Silas with those men, hurt as he was, and she couldn't let him fall into the hands of the Mage Council. She had also heard that the highest parts of the pass were usually snowed in for the winter by mid-autumn. She didn't know how long it would take her to catch up with Silas and the men who had taken him, or how far she would have to go, and she didn't want to risk being trapped in Granadaia for the winter. Her guess was that she had a month and a half, or, at best, two, to get in, find and free Silas, and get out before the Gap got snowed in. She hoped it wouldn't take anywhere near that long, but it was best to plan for the worst.
She found a place out of the way, then dismounted and sat down. It had been a long, exhausting night and day for her and for the horses. She wasn't hungry, there was just a cold, aching lump where her stomach should be, but she knew she needed to keep her strength up. So she dug around in her saddlebags for some flatbread and dried fruit, and dutifully chewed on them. They turned to dust in her mouth and she had to wash them down with lots of water.
As she ate, she watched the hands drive the next group of cattle that would go through the Gap over to the road that led into the pass. That pinch-nosed sheepknocker had told her they weren't hiring any more hands to take the cattle through the Gap, but it looked like a lot of work, and anyway, what did someone who was such a greenfoot as to wear a suit like that know about cowhand work?
She stood, brushing off her hands on her pants. Leading both horses by the reins, she went over to one of the foremen who were supervising the hands.
"Excuse me, Mister?"
He turned to her. "What is it?" His weathered, mustached face was much more kindly than the greenfoot mage she had talked to. Lainie felt a bit more at ease; he was one of her people, no matter that she was a mage and he was a Plain.
"I need to get through the Gap, and I was wondering if you need any more hands to take the cattle through."
"We don't usually hire girls for this job. It's hard work."
"I worked the drive, as a cook and a trail hand. I've been doing ranch work all my life. Please, I need to get through the Gap, and the man over there said I can't until the cattle are through."
He glanced at the man in the fancy suit. "Much as I hate to agree with that greenfoot, he's right. What're you in such a hurry for?"
"Some bounty hunters took my husband. They shot him down from his horse and took him." Another rush of horror and grief made her eyes sting and her voice falter. "They were allowed through, because it was lawmen's business. But they took him wrongly, and I'm going after him."
"Saw those fellas. Sure looked like they were in a hurry. I was surprised they were allowed in; riding like that could stampede the cattle. In the Gap, that's deadly."
"Please. I don't even need to get paid. I just need to get through t
he Gap so I can help my husband."
He gave her a look up and down. "You do look like the kind of girl who knows what she's doing around stock. We can always use an extra hand who's good with cattle. Those your mounts?" He jerked his head towards the horses.
"Yes, sir. They're both mine."
"You in good health? The air gets thin at the top, and anyone with a weak heart or lungs won't make it over."
"Yes, sir."
"All right, then." He fished around in his pants pocket and came up with a handful of small pieces of paper and a worn-down pencil. Using his callused palm as a writing board, he scrawled something on a piece of paper. "Name?"
"Lainie Vendine." She put a name-slip charm on her name as she said it.
One bushy gray eyebrow went up. "That so."
Lainie cursed silently. He knew who she was. She should have known he would have heard the rumors about her and Silas, and that the name-slip charm might not work. Nothing to do now, though, but own up to it. "Yes, sir."
"Heard tell that you and that husband of yours are wizards, and that you saved the northern herd from a wizardly storm."
"That's right." She waited for his rejection, and braced herself against the very real chance she would have to fight her way out of there, never mind being allowed up into the Gap.
"Why would bounty hunters take a wizard?"
That he would bother asking questions took her by surprise. "They're mage hunters. He's in trouble with the Mage Council in Granadaia."
"Huh." Then, to Lainie's disbelief, he scrawled her name onto the paper and added his signature. "Any man who's run cross-wise to the gods-damned Mage Council is all right by me. Even if he is a wizard himself. Here." He handed the slip of paper to Lainie. "Go on. When you get through -- if you get through, and I want you to understand that every year we lose a handful of trail hands in the Gap --"
