Kinsley wasn’t to be defeated. “A bargain, then? Allow us to keep our lives today, and we’ll return the favor the next time you pass through our woods.”
“Now that is the sort of agreement I can appreciate,” said the priest. “But let us go a step further, shall we? You allow these good traveling companions of mine to depart in peace and in full possession of all they bear with them, and in exchange, I’ll give you your lives.”
Kinsley looked at once relieved and uncertain. “The Hand will be angry if we return empty-handed. It’s not only about the goods. We were told a certain nobleman travels in your caravan under the guise of a commoner. Rideon believes such a person would bring in a tidy ransom.”
“I have been in the company of these folk since Black Cliffs. I can assure you none of them are any person of importance, traveling under pretense. Each is as humble as he appears. As an Honored One, you know my word is beyond question.”
Kinsley hesitated, but even he knew priests didn’t lie. “Very well, I’ll tell the Hand you’ve sworn it for truth,” the outlaw said. “You and your companions are free to go as you please.”
There was no gripping of hands to seal the agreement. The priest simply turned his back on us and began helping the travelers reload their belongings. Many of them had already taken the opportunity to flee off down the road, and those who remained gathered their scattered possessions with a haste that said they were just glad to be leaving with their lives. I believed they would have abandoned their belongings right there on the road if not for the priest’s organization. I half expected some of the outlaws to break the truce and attack the priest as soon as he was off his guard, but they didn’t. Kinsley, Brig, and a handful of others who conveniently found themselves able to stand again busied themselves with checking our injured.
Brig came over to inspect my head injury, and not until I felt his hands trembling as they fingered the lump where the priest’s sword hilt had struck me did I realize how anxious he’d been for me. Awkward at his concern, I assured him I was well enough, although my head continued to throb so that I wasn’t entirely sure of the truth to my words. Brig glared daggers at the priest’s back but made no irrational move toward him, and I was thankful for that as I didn’t feel up to defending him just now.
He ordered me not to walk about until I regained my color, so I sat and concentrated on nothing but slowing the waves of dizziness pulsing over me. I was so distracted that I didn’t immediately notice when someone sank to the ground beside me.
“Mind if I join you for a moment to catch my breath?” asked the priest, as casually as if we had not been trying to kill one another mere moments before.
I eyed him warily. “Won’t your friends leave without you? They seem in a rush to be on their way.”
“I can catch up,” he said carelessly.
Out of the corner of one eye, I watched as he rested his sword across his knee and dragged a gray sleeve across his sweaty face. This was my first chance to study the man as more than a blur of motion and without the distraction of keeping out of his sword’s reach. He looked weary, covered in dust and spattered with the blood of my comrades. Beneath the grime was a strong broad face with a long jaw and a nose as straight as it was wide. I was unsurprised no previous combatants had ever been able to get past his wide sweep to mar the clean proportions of his face.
Unable to resist my curiosity, I probed at the man’s mind with a thin thread of magic. I didn’t know him well enough to form a good connection, but for just a moment I brushed against his consciousness. And then I lost the link as he started, whirling to seize me roughly by the jaw and glare piercingly into my eyes. Startled as much by the knowing in his expression as by the abrupt action, I jerked the tendril of magic into myself again. Or tried to. But suddenly, it was being wrested from my grip and flung back at me with shocking force. The jar to my senses was almost a physical one, and I gasped as if a heavy weight had slammed into me.
“Serves you right for prying where you don’t belong,” said the priest, putting a steadying hand on my shoulder, despite the harsh words. “Hold on a moment and take deep breaths until the weakness passes. Perhaps I was rougher than I intended to be.”
“I don’t understand. What did you do to me?” I asked. “I’ve never felt anything like that.”
“You intruded where you had no right. I scooped you up and threw you back into yourself,” he said. “Until you think you’re strong enough to out-magic me, keep your grubby little mind out of my head.”
“My mind isn’t grubby,” I said. “And I couldn’t be less interested in what goes on in yours.”
“If you say so.”
He turned his shoulder to me and appeared content to forget my presence. But his words were sinking in, and looking at him askance, I realized that for the first time in years I was in the presence of another magicker. I couldn’t let the opportunity pass. Not when I had so many questions. But did I trust this peculiar stranger enough to ask them?
As I debated within myself, I saw the priest’s lips quirk upward in a faint smile.
“You’re reading my thoughts,” I accused. “Surely what you said about intruding on other people’s minds goes both ways, my lord.”
He looked startled. “Why do you call me that?”
“You’re not the only one who knows things,” I said smugly. “You told Kinsley that none of your companions was a nobleman traveling in disguise, but you said nothing of yourself. You see, I’m accustomed to the cunning ways dishonest priests can twist their words. There are a thousand ways to lie without uttering an untruth. But then, I suppose you aren’t a real Honored anyway, are you? Everyone knows priests of the Light take a vow against violence. Who ever heard of one carrying a blade and not hesitating to use it?”
He smiled. “I assure you, my young friend, the priest in me is every bit as real as the warrior, and the nobleman’s blood is just another piece of the whole. I gave up my title and inheritance long ago to become one of the Blades of Justice. It’s the only priestly order permitting violence—but always for a righteous cause. I’ve now retired from that life as well, and these days I travel through the land on nothing more urgent than my whims.”
He glanced around and lowered his voice. “I hope I can trust you to keep the secret of my identity to yourself. I don’t think either of us wants to stir up more trouble with your comrades.”
I had questions, not the least of which was why he would give up a comfortable inheritance to join an order of warrior priests.
But he evaded further questions by saying, “As for your other accusation, I was not prying into your thoughts. You were throwing them at me. You must train yourself to keep your feelings guarded in the presence of those with the talent for sensing them. It’s not good, walking around, crying out your thoughts and emotions to everyone within hearing distance.”
I shrugged. “I can’t prevent myself thinking. The mind runs free as it pleases, whether given permission or not.”
He said, “There’s a discipline I could teach you, if you like. Someone should. I cannot imagine how your parents neglected such basic instruction.”
“My parents are dead,” I said stiffly. “Killed in the Praetor’s cleansings.”
“I’m sorry to hear it,” he said. “The province lost many magickers during those years, but the worst of those times are over now. And the thinning of our numbers only makes it all the more imperative those of us remaining teach our younglings what they need to know to survive with their abilities.”
“My magic and I have gotten along just fine up to now,” I said. “Anyway, assuming I needed help, you’re scarcely the tutor I would choose for myself.”
“We can’t always be particular about what we learn or where. You may never receive such an offer again, and I know that would disappoint you. I can feel the thirst for knowledge burning within you. You’re just waiting to be talked into it.”
“You’re reading my mind again,” I said, draw
ing back.
“Your thoughts are not words to be read off a page,” he corrected. “Following emotions is a subtle thing, like catching a whisper or a scent carried on the breeze. You don’t need to see the source to be aware of the resulting effect. Anyway, think on my offer. There is much I could teach you, given a few months, if you chose to come with me.”
“That’s impossible. My entire life is in Dimmingwood. I could no more leave my friends or the forest than I could abandon a part of myself. It’s not that I don’t want to…”
“I know. But what you want more is to be him,” he said.
“Him? Him who?”
“This Red Hand everybody speaks of.”
I wasn’t sure how to respond to that, but he gave me no opportunity to do so.
“Never mind,” he said. “If you should reconsider, you can find me at the Temple of Light in Selbius on the first day of Middlefest. If you miss me there, inquire among the river people for Hadrian. I am known to them.”
He left me with much to think over. Our bedraggled band returned to Red Rock, empty-handed but for the dead and injured we carried with us. At first, Rideon and the rest of the band were disinclined to believe we had suffered such damage at the hands of a lone swordsman dressed in priest’s robes. But no one could deny the proof of the corpses we buried that day. Another wounded man died before the day was out.
These losses only furthered my confusion. I didn’t know what to make of Hadrian’s offer. The knowledge he promised filled me with a frightening excitement even as I wondered if it would be traitorous to seek out the company of a man who had slaughtered my fellows. I trailed Javen the rest of the day, helping him care for the wounded, but my mind was scarcely on the task.
As I worked, I heard a lot of talk about the gray-clad priest, some of it angry, some reluctantly admiring. All the while I bathed bloody cuts and held slashed sections of skin together for Javen to stitch up, I kept thinking of new questions to ask Hadrian if we met again.
Chapter XI
DURING THE FOLLOWING WEEKS, TRAVELERS and traders flocked to Selbius from the surrounding countryside, intent on arriving early before the Middlefest celebrations. Those who passed through Dimming left the shadowed wood significantly poorer than they had entered it.
There was a constant flow of comings and goings about both our camps during that time. To my disappointment, I was largely left out of the activity. Brig’s fears, seemingly confirmed by my mishap with the priest, had again become a deterrent. I was also kept busy with the menial tasks around camp the others no longer had time for. That I couldn’t blame on Brig, although I was certain if there was a way he could have increased my workload to keep me at Red Rock more, he would have.
These were my thoughts one afternoon in midspring as I stalked through the cool forest shadows with Terrac. I led us here in hopes of hunting down one of the sly hedge rabbits that loved to nibble among the thickets of hopeberries. Our band had feasted on thin potato porridge for three consecutive days, and I meant to have meat for supper tonight of it took me all day to hunt it down.
Terrac, unfortunately, didn’t share my determination. He crashed carelessly through the bushes, heedless of the noise he made as he collected bright berries to be later mashed into inks for his scribbling. Whatever game was in the area was probably fleeing his noise even now, but I stifled my rising irritation. No point in taking my frustrations out on him.
“I don’t think there’s any game here, Terrac,” I said. “I’m going to try over near Dancing Creek, all right? Maybe you should wait for me here. Just keep on with what you’re doing.”
In place of response, Terrac gave a startled cry. He had moved on ahead of me, and a high wall of brambles concealed him from my view.
“Terrac? What is it?” I asked.
No answer.
I moved after him, concerned he might have stepped on a venomous snake or happened upon an angry bear. Dragging my hunting knife free of my belt in case I was called on to defend us, I charged into the bramble bush, ignoring the sharp thorns snagging at my skin and clothes as I wrestled my way through to Terrac.
He was on his knees bent over the form of an unconscious man lying in a shallow pool of blood. The stranger lay with his belly to the earth, the toes of his boots pushed into the dirt, his hands formed into claws, gripping tightly at a clump of weeds as though he had tried to drag himself farther before surrendering to his weakness. I dropped to one knee at his side, and together Terrac and I turned him over.
His face was so battered and covered in blood that it took me a moment to note the distinctive scar lining his brow to the hairline and a narrow shock of white hair growing in that spot. It was this which helped me identify him as Garad from Molehill, one of our men. I didn’t know him well, for he hadn’t been up to Red Rock much, but I vaguely remembered him as a quiet man who used to chat with Brig.
“He lives,” Terrac told me quietly.
Pressing my ear over the man’s heart, I listened to the faint, uneven rhythm. As we watched, his eyelids suddenly flew open and he glared around him wildly.
“Garad, it’s all right.” I hastened to soothe him. “We’re no enemies. You know us.”
He fastened his gaze on me, and I thought there was confused recognition in his eyes before a convulsion of pain distorted his features.
Unthinkingly, I summoned my magic and directed it toward the suffering man, attempting to convey a sense of calm or comfort to his mind. Friends were here. There was no fear, no pain. I knew it was hopeless the moment I touched him. I could feel his life flickering like a guttering candle between existence and oblivion, and I didn’t think my calming suggestions were reaching him. He was too deeply steeped in his suffering. Still, I felt his reason fighting determinedly to the forefront.
He drew a ragged breath, and I expected him to scream out his pain, but he didn’t. Somehow he held the torment back enough to grate out his message. “Fists…t…tell the Hand it was Resid and the Fists. T…tried to fight back, but they knew we were coming. Warn… the others…”
I left Terrac to memorize the message because I could listen with only half my mind. Most of my attention focused on the inward struggle to find and unravel the threads of Garad’s pain, and it wasn’t working. His emotions were tangled and confused, and I couldn’t insinuate my thoughts into them. I tried another tactic, tracing the pain to its source and wrapping my mind around it. I couldn’t smother the force, but I could hold the worst of it back from his consciousness.
It was then the pain slammed into me. I was stunned as I took its strength into myself. Consumed by the agony that was now mine, I toppled backward to the ground. I gritted my teeth and arched my back.
“Ilan! Ilan, what is it?” I heard Terrac shout, but his voice filtered to me from a great distance, and I couldn’t concentrate enough to form an answer. There was too much pain to leave space for anything else.
“Get help!” I grated.
Terrac looked desperate. “I can’t! I don’t know my way back to camp without you!”
I was scarcely aware of his words because I was blacking out. The instant my consciousness began to slip, I lost my hold on the pain. The agony flowed from me as if a dam had burst and reverted to its natural course, pouring back into the prone figure beside me. Garad cried out as it coursed through his body again, but selfish relief washed over me. I was terribly weakened, and I sucked in air as if I couldn’t get enough of it, every fiber of me acutely aware of how wonderful it was to be free of the pain.
I grasped Terrac’s wrist to stop his hopeless yelling for help. “Be quiet and help me up,” I said wearily.
He looked confused. “You’re all right now? But what happened to you?”
“Never mind. I’ll explain later. Just help me sit up.”
He assisted me, and in a moment I was sitting upright. Beside us, the injured outlaw screamed again. I had no time to collect my strength as, staggered by weakness, I drew myself to my feet.
“What are you doing?” Terrac asked, steadying me.
“One of us has to fetch help. You don’t know the way, so that leaves me.”
“Do you think you can get there without collapsing?”
“Of course,” I lied. “I have no choice.”
“Then bring Javen. And Rideon. This man’s just holding on long enough to get his message to the Hand.”
“I’ll be quick,” I promised. I’d run myself to death if I had to.
Dredging up what energy I could, I pushed my way back toward Red Rock as speedily as my weak legs would carry me. Terrac, I quickly realized, could have run circles around me just now. But of course, his circles wouldn’t have been in the right direction.
I dragged myself onward until I reached camp. There I discovered Javen wasn’t to be found, and I could waste no time looking for him. As soon as I could gather breath, I explained the situation to a handful of the outlaws. Someone hunted down Rideon, and we left the camp with a dozen or so of the band following my lead.
Garad was dead when we arrived. Terrac had drawn his eyes closed, but it did little to lend him an appearance of peace. His face was distorted in a snarl of agony, his mouth open in a frozen cry, and I felt a selfish sense of relief I had been too far away to witness the end.
Rideon dropped to a knee at the dead man’s side, asking Terrac, “Did he say anything more of what befell him?”
Expression drawn, Terrac glanced toward me and said, “His pain was too great to say much. He ranted through his screams, but I couldn’t make sense of most of it. He and several others were on an errand near Tinker’s Path when they were attacked, ambushed by a troop of Fists who knew enough to be sure where to lie in wait. An outlaw of yours, one called Resid, betrayed them. There were no other survivors.”
“I know that location.” One of our men spoke up. “Heard some of them earlier planning a trip to the traveler’s way huts. If you pop in there quick enough, you can scrounge around for supplies the travelers have left behind for the next folk what stops by.”
FIERCE: Sixteen Authors of Fantasy Page 221
