Sooty ignored them.
Kayla had expected to reach a town by now, or have found some sign she was in Therston, but she hadn’t seen another person since they’d left the village.
She needed to find a place to camp, but her feet kept moving even though she’d passed more than one suitable clearing.
Rane thought Soren was being tortured, and while he was in Jasper’s power, she could not rest.
Without any warning, Sooty stopped on the path, her ears twisting, her nose lifting. She started forward again, half-crouched, and a frisson of fear brushed up Kayla’s arms. Her heart beat faster, and she saw her hands were already glowing purple-green in readiness.
The wild magic spheres drew nearer.
She moved forward cautiously, and stepped into a wide clearing. Sooty bounded across to a cart standing to one side, sniffing the corners. There were a few logs placed around an old fireplace, and bags lying on the ground. Abandoned in haste.
Kayla’s gaze swept the camp, nervous and ready to flee, but there was no one there.
The night had finally caught up with them, and the sky was in its last deep indigo before it turned black. Here and there, she saw the flicker of wild magic between the trees.
She crouched beside the bags. They were travel packs—full of food, water, clothing and blankets for the road.
Rane had left her more than half the food, but if she rescued Soren, he would need as much as he could get. Clothes, too.
She had a deep sense of unease about this place, as if the people in it had been swallowed up by a dark nothingness.
They weren’t coming back.
Her fingers brushed rope, and she lifted up a piece of it, knotted on one side, cut straight and clean on the other. There had been a captive here.
She shivered. Whoever these people had been, they would not miss their supplies.
Sooty sniffed at a log to one side, pawing it a few times. Her ears moved ceaselessly, her body tense. As uneasy here as Kayla.
When Kayla had taken what she could carry from the bags, she hefted her saddle pack over her shoulder.
“Let’s go.” She was vibrating with an urgency to be gone, her movements jerky.
Sooty looked across at her, then west, and a low growl rumbled from deep in her chest. Fear pricked down Kayla’s spine at the sound.
She forced herself to move, crouched down beside the cat. “What it is?”
She heard the voice a moment later, a man calling out.
Another voice responded, and someone stepped into the clearing.
“They aren’t here. They’d have come all the way to the stronghold if they’d gotten this far. Wait…” The stranger saw the bags and then Sooty and her almost at the same time, and jerked back.
Sooty growled again, long, low and ending in a hiss.
The second man joined him, a knife in his hand.
“Good evening.” Kayla rose from her crouch and inclined her head. Behind the men, on the path they’d used, two spheres of wild magic rose up. “Can you tell me the way to Jasper of Therston?” Her fingers threaded themselves through the raised fur on Sooty’s neck.
“What do you want with Jasper?” The first man leaned forward, peering at her in gloom.
“Private business.” She flicked back her hair. “You know the way?”
“Aye, we know the way.” The second man stepped forward, staring at her boldly. He smiled. “Come with us and we’ll take you there.”
“Thank you.” She did not feel afraid any more. The sight of the spheres steadied her. Made her remember she was not helpless, even though she suspected they meant to do her harm. They did not realize wild magic hovered at their backs, latent with menace.
She put her hands behind her, lest they betray her with a glimmer of light. “Come, Sooty.”
Sooty rose to her full height and walked beside her towards the men, still growling faintly at the back of her throat. It occurred to Kayla the men had not realized the size of her before. She was as black as the night, and hard to distinguish from the shadows.
She saw their cocky anticipation turn to fear.
The first man said nothing. He spun back the way they’d come and ran, letting out a shriek at the sight of the wild magic. He ran around it, and it let him pass. The second stumbled back a few steps. “No harm meant.” His voice rose high. He spun back to the path and followed his companion, moaning as he passed the wild magic.
They were the first people she’d seen since leaving the village, and the way they’d said Jasper’s name made her think they knew him.
Perhaps they were his men.
She rubbed Sooty under the chin, her fingers sparkling with excitement. “Let’s follow them.”
* * *
Jasper was a man with something to hide. Or something to protect. His stronghold was worthy of the name, a strange mix of fort and old castle.
As the big gates swung closed on the two men, Kayla moved back between the trees, her heart sinking. At least ten men had stood up on the ramparts, bows lifted, as the running men approached. She would need to find another way in, the front was too well-guarded.
Behind her, the string of wild magic spread out. When one spun close, her hands sparkled bright and hot. It calmed her. Helped her to think.
She pushed up her sleeve. New spheres from her spells this morning on Sooty and Gert spiralled up her inner arm like a stream of bubbles twisting through the water.
Sooty butted her hip and she dropped her sleeve back in place. Time was wasting.
She kept moving, working her way through the dense undergrowth until she was behind the compound. It was right at the edge of the forest, and Jasper had had all greenery beaten back at least twenty feet from the fence. To get to it, she would have to step into the open.
The ramparts were empty here. Silent.
She could create a diversion, but she did not want anyone to suspect trouble. She would rather sneak in undetected. And out the same way.
She slid her pack under a bush, taking only the golden apple. If Soren was badly injured, she would need it to heal him. She jammed it into her trouser pocket, felt the weight of it pulling at her belt.
“I want you to stay, puss.” Kayla rubbed the cat between her ears. “You’ll be hard to hide.”
Sooty lifted her head, and Kayla scratched her under her chin. “Stay. Wait for me here.”
She lay on the ground and crawled forward, using her hips, elbows and feet. It felt as if she was exposed for minutes, the muscles in her back tensing, expecting the sharp pain of an arrow at any moment.
But nothing.
No alarm sounded, and at last she reached the rough wood of the perimeter fence. She leant against it, trapping her hands between her body and the wall, and thought of a narrow opening, just wide enough for her to crawl through.
It was harder than it had been before, and she realized she was just outside of the forest here, that using wild magic was an effort.
She wriggled her way back to the treeline, and approached one of the spheres, and a part of it separated, came to her, and she cradled it in her hands for a moment, before putting it in her other pocket.
By the time she had crawled back to the fence again, she was sweating.
She thought again of a small opening, one hand in her pocket, and the flare was muted, light leaking from either side of her body, and there was suddenly an opening where her feet pressed against the fence.
She knelt, stuck her head through, and checked there was no one waiting for her on the other side.
After a beat, she lowered herself to the ground and wiggled through, rose to a crouch in the darkness.
She was in.
Her elation was tempered by the utter silence. It unnerved her. She would prefer to hear some noise in the distance—the quiet made her imagine a thousand eyes on her.
In front of her, a high, long building ran close to the fence, stone walls rising three floors. She looked back and up, saw a wooden platform
ran the length of the fence she’d just come through, high enough to bring a man shoulder-height with the top. Wooden ladders were propped against it for access. There were no guards standing watch or walking the boards, there was nothing but a strong stench of burnt wood and tar.
She crept forward and pressed up against the building, felt the rough crumble of sandstone against her fingers.
The feeling of eyes on her was still strong. She moved, quick as she dared, along the wall until she reached the end of the building. Steeled herself to look around the corner.
She hesitated.
It didn’t make sense for Jasper to place fewer guards at the back than the front—coming in had been too easy. And the deep, unnatural silence made her so nervous her fingers sparked. She slipped them into her pockets, her left hand tingling in its little sphere of wild magic, her right hand pressed hard against the golden apple.
It saved her.
A bolt, shot from above, from the guards’ walk of the stockade wall, slammed into her from behind.
She felt the blow, the pain as it pierced her, and the immediate counter of the apple, her body torn and mended in a moment.
The bolt dropped from her shoulder to her feet, and she tried to run, stumbling, her legs weak, her heart pounding so loud she was deafened by it. Her fingers gripped the apple, and with every step, she felt a new surge of energy.
“You missed!”
The words were shrieked from somewhere above her head. There was a thud and someone cried out.
Kayla ducked around the corner of the building, crouching low. Her breath came in pants. They had been there all along. Some spell had been at work to stop her seeing them.
Men were running towards her across a large open space from the main gate, these ones visible, but she had the sense none saw her, and to make sure they did not, she wished herself invisible. A glow escaped her pocket, but so quick, and so close to the ground, the men who glanced her way did not break their stride. She had the feeling the wild magic she’d brought with her had just used itself up.
She smelled sawdust, and guessed she was facing a training area for Jasper’s knights. On the far side stood the castle tower she’d seen from the forest, at the center of the stronghold. She stood and ran, straight into the open, forcing herself to trust her spell would keep her unseen.
She heard the thunder of invisible boots on wood, saw the glow of torches being lit with invisible hands all along the guards’ walk. With every step she steeled herself for her own magic to fail, for someone to see her and raise the cry. To notice the soft sand and wood shavings she threw up as she sprinted.
At last she was in the deep shadows of the tower. It stank of smoke. Her fingers came away from its wall gritty with soot. The whole tower had been burned.
She remembered what Rane had told her. This was Soren’s handiwork.
A shout rang out, and men turned the corner, running back across the training ring. They spread out and slowed as they found nothing.
“Look for blood,” one called out. “There was a hit.”
Kayla clutched the apple more tightly, her pulse jumping at the sight of so many men intent on finding her. Intent on doing her harm.
She felt like a princess, suddenly, not a witch. Certainly not a hero.
But Soren De’Villier was already in harm’s way. And he had no one else until Rane had faced an even bigger threat than Jasper. And if Rane could take on Eric alone, she could handle this. She had to.
She stayed close to the tower wall and moved fast as she could away from them, following the tower’s circular base.
The entrance to the stronghold loomed ahead, huge gates secure. To her left, another large building rose up, and she guessed it was Jasper’s main residence. It had a more refined look than the rest of the stronghold, the double doors made of carved wood and some of the windows elegantly arched.
A cobbled drive led up to it.
“There is no one here!” The shout was almost in her ear, and Kayla dropped to the floor, her legs collapsing under her in shock.
A man shimmered into visibility, an elbow’s nudge away, his head turned over his shoulder.
Another man appeared a little way away and walked over to join him.
Biting back a whimper, Kayla saw it was Jasper himself, and she lifted up into a crouch.
“What do you think happened to him?” Jasper’s voice was edged with fear, and his hands clenched and unclenched on his belt.
The man who’d shouted said nothing, and a look passed between them.
Up on the guards’ walk, there were suddenly twenty men, but one made for the nearest ladder, his movements labored. “Did you find her?” His voice was hoarse, querulous.
“Her?” Jasper looked up, his body tense. “I thought it was De’Villier.” He spoke as if to a child.
“It was a woman.” There was a snap of temper in the statement. “I saw her for a brief moment before she was hit…” The man reached the top of the ladder and in the orange glow of the torchlight, Kayla could see more than half his face was burnt and twisted. His shoulder twitched in an uncontrolled spasm.
There was a silence between Jasper and his man.
“Did you see a woman?” Jasper asked eventually, his voice low.
His lieutenant shook his head. “I saw a shadow moving, I’ll give him that. Whether it was a man, a woman, or something strange from that god-forsaken forest, I don’t know. The two men who went to find Travis said they met a woman and a monster in the forest. It might be her.”
“Stop whispering. I’m injured, not stupid.” The man swung down onto the ladder, his body jerking with each painful step.
“Keep looking for someone, or something. No sleeping on duty tonight.” Jasper spoke fast, to get in everything before the man reached the ground. “I’ll take my brother inside. And if it is De’Villier, for heaven sake don’t kill him. We need him alive.”
His lieutenant lifted his hand in salute.
Jasper started forward, broke his stride and turned. “Check Soren. If it was De’Villier, that’s the first place he’ll head.”
The man nodded, and stepped back onto Kayla’s foot, then spun on his heel, grinding her toes into the ground. He frowned, looked down to see what he was standing on.
Kayla bit her hand to stop herself crying out, refusing to even breathe.
The man continued on, and Kayla hopped her first few steps after him until she got her fingers in her pocket for the apple to do its work.
She would have taken the crushed toes, apple or no, because at last, someone was leading her to what she’d come for.
It was time to stop being a princess.
Chapter Twenty-three
Water dripped from the green slime coating the ceiling and echoed strangely in the passage. It drowned out any noise Kayla made as she followed Jasper’s man ever downward and she was grateful for it.
He walked fast, forcing her to skip around puddles slippery with fungus and lengthen her stride to stay within sight of his torchlight.
Whatever damage the fire had done to the above-ground part of the tower, the tunnel under it was untouched. The walls were streaked bright green, orange and purple with lichen, and the air was heavy with the musty smell of stale water and spores.
The passage twisted in a wide spiral. Jasper’s man slowed at the turn ahead, and Kayla heard a sound, a creak of hinges and the squeak of metal rubbing metal.
He lifted the torch higher, and Kayla trailed after him, keeping close to the wall and as far back into the darkness as she could.
They came suddenly and without warning into a large room, rough enough to be a natural cave.
As she stepped into the chamber, Kayla felt a strange sense of being stripped, as if she’d lost something. Her hand went to the apple, but it was in her pocket, and still she could not shake the feeling that something had been taken from her.
There was another clink of metal, and Jasper’s man strode forward, torch high.
Kayla realized Jasper had narrowed Soren’s life to a choice between excruciating pain in his arms and shoulders, or his feet.
“Finally remembered to feed me, did you?” His voice was hoarse, cracked, and he did not look up. His features were a knife stab to her gut. So like Rane, but so gaunt, so beaten down, she could barely look at him.
“No. Just checking up on you.”
“Haven’t gone anywhere.” He wracked out a cough, and Kayla realized he was trying to laugh.
“When last was someone down here?” Jasper’s man moved the torch closer to Soren, peering at him.
“Can’t remember.” It came out as a whisper.
The man cursed under his breath, jamming the torch into a stand in the center of the room. A bucket with a cup hooked to the rim stood next to it, and he scooped out some water, and walked over to Soren.
As the cup touched his lips, Soren lifted his head, his eyes dark in his pale face. He swallowed, his throat working as if he were trying to deal with a piece of steak rather than a few sips of water.
“Your friend is quiet,” he said, looking straight at Kayla.
She froze, her heart jumping in shock. How could he see her? She looked down, stared in horror at her hands. How could she see them? As she leapt for the safety of the shadows, her own shadow stretched, then shrank against the cave wall.
“Friend?” The man turned, looking towards the entrance, and Kayla kept very still. After a moment, he turned back to Soren. “What friend?”
“Thought I saw…” Soren shook his head as if to clear it, then moved forward eagerly for another sip of water.
He gulped it down, but when he lifted his eyes, he searched for her, his gaze moving from the wall where he’d seen her shadow to the corners of the room.
She recalled the sense of loss as she’d come into the room, wondered if Nuen had cast a spell across the entrance, blocking her ability to call magic.
That she’d felt it, felt naked without it, made her go still inside. The wild magic was already becoming part of her. Unconsciously, her fingers went to her wrist, stroked up her inner arm.
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