A soft chuckle emanated from the mouth of the cave. It echoed from the walls and sent a shiver crawling up Ky’s spine. He reached for his sling and grimaced at the pain. Dried blood had adhered his jacket to his chest. It tore away when he moved, started the cuts bleeding afresh.
“No mistake, young cub.” Obasi shuffled into the entrance with the slow, careful steps of a man in pain. He did not venture beyond the square of daylight, but lowered himself to the ground there and deliberately folded his gaunt limbs into a knot. Tilted his head back and blinked up at him. “The lioness has found her teeth.”
“Slack.” It wasn’t so much a statement as it was a curse. There were lines you just didn’t cross. Slack should know that. Fueled by the anger, he palmed a sling-bullet from his belt and fitted it in the pouch of his sling. “Which way did they go?” He started toward the cave mouth. Didn’t really expect an answer. Wasn’t going to wait for one.
“The little ones did not wish to leave.”
That brought him to a halt, muscles tense and prickling.
“They begged to stay, but she would not hear of it. Promised to lead them in the true way of the Underground. Not even their tears could sway her.”
His fist clenched the slings strap so tightly the leather creaked. “Which way?”
“So now you will hunt her.”
“Yes!”
His shout sounded desperate, even to him. There was a long pause before Obasi spoke again. “She will fight you. You know this. She has discovered the strength of her claws. Believes herself to be strong. Believes you to be weak.”
Ky twisted to face the Saari head on and tried not to show how much that simple movement left him dizzied. Blood loss and exhaustion. Not a good combination. He needed bandages first, then a chance to collapse into his bedroll, and then a few minutes to think. Just to think. But Slack hadn’t left him a choice. “I proved her wrong once. I can do it again.”
“And what of the others?” This in a flat voice, devoid of emotion and free of the fever pitch that had threatened instability when they had talked before. In fact, Ky had the unsettling feeling that Obasi just might be steadier than him at the moment. “What of your friend? Leadership is not a responsibility that can be abandoned lightly. Would you forsake the many for the sake of the few?”
The Saari seized his gaze, wouldn’t let him break away. But it was all too much. He was shaking in an effort to hold back the sea of panic, fear, and . . . rage. He spun and slammed his fist into the cave wall. Pulled back, nursing his bloodied knuckles.
What a foolish, Dizzier thing to do.
“I didn’t . . . didn’t find my friend.” It was a poor excuse for abandoning the others, and he knew it, just as he knew Obasi was in the right. They were all his responsibility. Not just Paddy. All twenty slaves and eleven runners. He had made a mess of this mission from the start, but he couldn’t forsake them now, not after bringing them this far. And he couldn’t demand their help to hunt down Slack. Odds were half of them wouldn’t even listen.
It was their safety he had to look out for now, and with the fortress fallen, that meant getting as far away as possible. Somehow, in the chaos following the blast of Birdie’s song, no soldiers had followed them. Then. No telling how many could be on their trail now.
“Oi, Ky.” Gull poked his head into the cave. “What do we do now? Ain’t you got a plan, or something like a plan . . . or anythin’ at all?” He spoke in a harsh whisper, but his voice rebounded off the rock so it sounded much louder. Ky could picture all the runners lining up outside, waiting for an answer. His answer.
Obasi had closed his eyes and bowed his head. Looked to be asleep.
Right. First step: food.
He pulled himself up straight. Didn’t let an ounce of fear bleed through his voice. Because this was what leadership was about—not privilege, but responsibility and being answerable for the outcome. He could have done without that part. “There’s food left in the supply bags. Pass it around. Tell everyone to snatch a few hours of sleep.” After traveling so far to and from the valley, they needed sleep if they hoped to cover any distance on this next leg of their journey. “We leave at dark.”
“Leavin’?” Gull’s voice skipped a beat. “Where we going?”
That was the question, wasn’t it? He left it hanging, because he didn’t have an answer yet. But he sure was going to need one soon. The silence stretched until it became awkward, and then Gull muttered a “right-o” and left. Obasi moved on too, leaving him on his own.
Hiding in the cave.
He blew out a heavy breath. He needed to go out there. Needed to show them that everything wasn’t falling apart. Didn’t matter if they were fooled or not; at least he could try to fool himself. He started toward the cave mouth and came face to face with Birdie in the entrance, where light and shadow mingled. The shadow obscured her face, but when she lifted her eyes, the light hit them and honed them to a razor sharpness that made him want to flinch.
The memory of Gundhrold’s last dive obscured his vision. All he could see was the griffin plummeting straight into the jaws of those monsters.
She spoke first. “It isn’t safe here. You should all leave.”
The words caught him off guard. It wasn’t what he had expected to hear from her. He nodded and had to swallow twice before he could trust his voice. “I know. We’re leaving at dark.” He shuffled his weight, uncomfortable. The girl had eyes like a full moon. Large, luminous, and no less haunting. “Not sure where we’ll go . . . yet.”
He would have died before admitting it to anyone else, but something in her voice demanded the truth. Dull and blunt as a slingstone.
And . . . she had said you, not we.
“Frey tells me that several bands of dwarves escaped the fall of the fortress and scattered over the mountains. The Khelari now hunt them.” A part of his brain logged the name—Frey—even as the rest of it registered disgust at the news. Was that the strange beast she had ridden from the valley? “You should leave soon before they expand their search in this direction. If they haven’t already.”
Again, you.
He shook his head, recalling his scattered thoughts. “Aren’t you coming too?”
She dipped her head, and the shadow of her hair swallowed her eyes, but not before he caught the flash of pain—or was it anger? Without another word, she slipped from the cave.
•••
Darkness gathered sooner than expected with a heavy bank of cloud that settled over the mountains in the late afternoon. From his seat at the cave mouth, Ky watched the thick mass rolling in, heard the patter of a light rain drumming across the treetops before it reached the clearing, watched as the line hit and tiny rivulets dashed away, carrying the runoff back into the woods and down to the creek. A fine spray ricocheted off the ground and misted his face. He blinked the droplets away. Soon enough, true night would come, and then he would have to roust the Underground out into the damp and force them to march again.
For now, they slept in the cave behind him, the rhythmic sound of their breathing mingling with the thrumming of the rain. At any other time, Ky might have found the sound peaceful. Might have let it lull him to sleep too. But now it only served to increase the rapid pulse of his thoughts and the need to anticipate, to plan, to lead.
He stripped off the hide jacket and set about cleaning and bandaging the claw wounds on his chest. The sting of rain-cooled air brushing across the jagged marks made him catch his breath. The bleeding had long since stopped, but the wounds were nasty things. With any luck, bandaging would ward off infection. He’d seen enough soured wounds to be cautious.
“The young cub cannot find sleep?”
Ky jerked his head up at the rumbling voice and couldn’t help wincing at the pain that lanced through his chest. The Saari stood at his elbow, broad shoulders stooped to avoid the ceiling. Knotted hair draped his face, masking his eyes and giving him the look of a wild man. Odd that he hadn’t heard him approaching. The rain m
ust have drowned out his footsteps. That or Ky’s street instincts were getting rusty.
“Or . . .” A tilt of the head. “Mayhap sleep cannot find the young cub?”
“There’s work to be done before we leave.” More than anything else, he needed a plan and a destination. He didn’t have time for riddles.
“Work? Ah yes, I see.” Was that a tinge of mockery? Ky bristled at the sound of it, but Obasi just sat with a sigh, folding his long limbs beneath him. “Heavy lies the weight of leadership. Not something one should aspire to. In the desert we have a saying: ‘Chasak nahn tum vanri isk sildir, ov mahtems tum gholdri isk kozen.’ Or in your tongue, ‘Better poverty and peace as a nahn than power and pressure as a mahtem.”
Migdon would have liked that one. The dwarf had had a knack for pulling out just the right sort of odd, pithy saying to match the occasion. Thinking about him brought a lump to Ky’s throat. He reached for a scrap of bandaging and started to wind it around his chest, gritting his teeth as he worked. “Well, I sure didn’t aspire to anything. But here I am, and since I am, I aim to do the best I can.”
No response.
Ky glanced up from his bandaging and caught Obasi staring at him with a strange expression on his scarred face. It sent a prickle of fear down his spine. The man had begun to seem less unhinged recently, but there was no telling what horrors the Khelari had done to him. Or what might set him off again.
His hand itched for his sling. “Is . . . something wrong?”
The Saari pointed a long finger at him. No, not at him. At the bandage he was still wrapping around his chest. “Chimera?”
He swallowed. “Yeah?”
“You faced the beast and yet lived?” Obasi exhaled a long breath that whistled between his teeth. The fever light had claimed his eyes again. Now Ky really wanted his sling. “So . . . the young cub has teeth as well.” He nodded his head as if he had just reached some conclusion. “Good. Good.”
“Look, it was really Gundhrold—”
But Obasi didn’t give him time to finish. He shot to his feet with an agility that belied his injuries and abruptly exited the cave, shrugging aside Ky’s questions as he sloshed out a few feet beyond the entrance and spun around. Eyes closed, he lifted his face to the sky. Droplets spattered across his forehead and coursed down the hollow lines of his face to pool in his scruffy beard. He shook his head, water spraying from the shaggy ends of his hair, and his face cracked into a broad smile. “The rain. It is good.”
Ky forced his mouth to close and shook his head. Unhinged. That was the best explanation for it. He tied off the bandaging with a solid knot and shrugged his way back into his hide jacket. His knapsack lay near to hand with a bedroll and a portion of their remaining food supplies. The rest had been parceled out among the other runners. It was almost time to leave. All that remained was to awaken the Underground.
And decide upon a destination.
One hand on the wall for leverage, Ky pushed up to his feet and slung the knapsack over one shoulder, but Obasi stood in his way. Scowling, the Saari bent forward until mere inches separated their faces. “Bring them to safety, lionheart, and I will tell you all you wish to know about the slave camps. This is your mission, and aiding you—that will be mine.” His voice hardened. “It is time that Nah Obasi lived once more.”
The offer was so unexpected, Ky didn’t know what to say. He just stood there with his mouth gaping, staring up into the bright-blue eyes of the Saari warrior. “Uh, sure . . . I think . . .” At the end of the day, wasn’t this what he had wanted? The means to accomplish his mission and free the slaves. Maybe even track down Paddy.
But after his failure last night, did he even have the right to ask any such thing of the runners again? His head told him no, but his gut said maybe.
Since when had his gut been optimistic?
“Oi, Ky.” Gull shuffled up, veering wide of Obasi and the puddle that had collected around his feet. Stifling a yawn, he stretched both shoulders until the joints popped and then shook his arms out. “About time to leave, ain’t it? Want me to wake the others?”
Ky gave a curt nod. “Get them up. It’s time to move out.”
Getting them up was easier said than done. Gull’s whistle brought the runners scurrying quickly enough, but the others were slow to move. Even slower to venture into the drizzle. After ten minutes of fidgeting and shivering and stamping about in the mud as he waited, Ky couldn’t blame them. Four runners flanked him, holding sputtering torches that yielded little light. In the gloom, individuals melted into a hazy, shifting mass. He finally gave up trying to count, figuring it was safe to assume that any who weren’t present didn’t plan on joining.
No sense in delaying.
He hitched the knapsack higher on his shoulders. “Let’s go.”
Mud splattered the back of his legs as Frey dashed up and came to a skidding halt at his side with Birdie on his back. The sight of her caught him off guard, broke through the fog of pain and weariness. He had looked for her. Hadn’t expected her to come. Her head tilted toward the sky, and she had a faraway look in her eyes. It was that look she got whenever she was so focused on listening to the melody that she seemed to lose sight of this world altogether.
She ran a hand along the odd creature’s neck, smoothing the wild tufts of its mane, and surveyed the clearing. “I will lead the way.” Melody hummed in her voice. He felt the strength of it coursing through his veins. Burning away the chill. Chasing away the fear. From the gasps of wonder, he knew that the others felt it too.
Without another word, she rode off into the night.
All eyes turned to him.
Oh, hang it all. It riled him that she would demand this now, in front of everyone. No discussion. No planning. No teamwork. But after everything that had happened, he owed it to her. He owed her. And the grand sum and total of his plan consisted of walking as far as they could get from the Khelari as fast as possible. So he swallowed his pride, clapped Gull on the shoulder, and jerked his chin toward the runners, beckoning them to follow.
“Let’s go.”
And they came, plodding along at his heels as he followed Birdie and the beast into the dampness of the night. After a time, he fell to the back and now and then dispatched one of the runners to trail behind and listen for noise of pursuit. And each time, they reported nothing. Marching in the rain was miserable, but it had its advantage. Nothing like rain to remove a scent and wipe away tracks. Even the Takhran’s hounds would be hard pressed to follow a trail that no longer existed.
“Oi, Ky.” Gull’s terse whisper startled Ky. The boy had just left for his third scouting trip and had come back with an arrow nocked to his bow. Ky reached for his sling, but Gull prodded him onward. “Keep walkin’. We ain’t alone.”
Ky palmed a sling-bullet from his pouch and loaded his sling. “What do you mean?”
Gull nodded toward the woods alongside. “See for yourself.”
Cautiously, Ky peered past him, trying to look as casual as possible. Through the trees and drizzling rain, he caught glimpses of movement. Little more than shadows that shifted and darted through all the wrong places. Straining his eyes slowly brought them into focus—here the long, lean figure of a petra, there the flopping ears of a dune rabbit. A rock wolf crouching at the base of a tree. A pair of birds perched in opposing branches. A burrow cat slinking along the crest of a boulder.
“You see it?” Gull’s voice cracked.
“I see it.”
Didn’t mean he understood it.
“So, what do we do?” Gull ran a finger along the fletching of his arrow, and the rustling it made sounded obscenely loud to Ky here in the woods, in the dead of night with potential enemies on all sides. “Reckon they’re spies for the Khelari? Do we attack?”
“Shh!” Ky shushed him with a hiss. This went beyond coincidence. Beyond imagination. Beyond anything he had ever heard of in any legend or fireside tale. Every sort of woodland creature imaginable was scattered throughou
t the woods alongside their path. All heading in the same direction. All keeping pace with them and yet seemingly unconcerned with them.
Or at least, unconcerned with any of them except for her.
He skipped his gaze from the wild creatures in the shadows up the winding line to where Birdie headed up their exodus. Times like these, he wondered how well he really knew her. Such a strange mixture of waif and warrior, weakness and strength, girl and legend. She sat erect on the strange beast’s back, head cocked forward and a little to the side.
Listening.
“Oi.” Gull dodged in front of him, forcing his attention. “We in danger?”
“No.” Decision made, he unloaded his sling and then reached past Gull and neatly un-nocked the arrow from his string and deposited it in the boy’s nearly empty quiver. “Save your arrows. We’re not in danger. Not now, at least.” That earned him a skeptical look, one that demanded explanation. “They’re not after us. They’re here because of her.”
19
On through the night and into the pale lush of dawn, Birdie pursued the Song. It advanced before her, a strong and purposeful tide that beckoned her on beyond weariness, beyond despair, to a promise of hope and rest. Not once did she look back. Heels clasped around the saif’s ribs, hands pressed against his withers, she sought to urge him forward, but her urging went unheeded. Frey yielded to her guidance when it came to their path, but mindful of those that followed, he persisted in maintaining an even-keeled pace that even a two-legs could match.
He was kinder than she. The thought shamed her, though it did nothing to ease the longing that impelled her forward. Only through their melodies was she aware of those stumbling gamely on behind her, and it was at once a strangely distant and personal knowledge. She was their hope. It was she they followed, but Ky drove them on. His melody was a fierce and glowering force at the back of the line. Commanding obedience, daring defiance, warding off attack. Stern, his notes sounded. Rigid. But with a tremulous thread concealed within—a hint of fear and sorrow.
Song of Leira Page 22
