At a whispered alert, Josiah slapped his hand onto Sar’s back. An instant later, Master Ferin shouted, “Now!”
Sar and the other familiars sent tendrils of the Mother’s power shooting between the trees. Josiah felt the increased strain as Sar seized first one Ramunnan, then another. Together they raced toward their captives to ease the effort required to hold them. Dark figures scattered in every direction. Sar trapped three more escapees before they reached the cluster of Ramunnans.
The wizards shoved their captives into a tight knot. A few bound them with thick strands of golden light. Josiah and several others pelted down the road in pursuit of those who’d evaded the first rush.
A cluster of Ramunnans abandoned the shelter of the forest for the greater speed of the road. Josiah’s breath burned in his lungs as he ran. Sar sent a filament of golden light after their quarry, but it fell short. Josiah gasped as his familiar drew deeply on his energy, then breathed easier as Sar abandoned the attempt.
The Ramunnans were tiring, too. Josiah put on a new burst of speed and the distance closed. Maybe he should send Sar galloping ahead. The donkey wouldn’t be able to use the Mother’s power without him, but he could crash into the Ramunnans or otherwise slow them so Josiah and the rest could catch up.
Before he could convey the idea to Sar, the Ramunnans passed an oblong shape just off the right side of the road. One paused and hurled a torch in an arc of orange fire. He fled as Josiah neared what he realized was a wagon filled with barrels. Flames from the fallen torch licked the wood of the bed and lapped at the barrel staves.
Josiah skidded to a halt. “Run!” he yelled, as the flames spread. He collided with two of the other wizards, and they sprawled to the ground. Sar scrambled to him and thrust his head down. Josiah grabbed his mane and tried to haul himself up, but he knew it would be too late.
Sar flung out a wall of golden light as the first barrel exploded. Josiah felt a deep wrench when the Mother’s power met the force of the blast, shoving the hot gasses up and to either side. The other familiars grasped what he was doing and sent more golden light to push the waves of destruction back as barrel after barrel burst.
Suddenly it was over. Josiah’s ears rang. He untangled himself from the other wizards, who seemed just as dazed as he was. One clutched a rabbit to his chest, while the other wrapped her arms around a goat and panted.
Josiah didn’t know the man’s name—he thought he might be from the Mother’s Hall in Thedan—but he recognized the girl. “Are you all right, Kalti?” He could barely hear his own voice. “What about Amia?”
Her mouth moved, but Josiah couldn’t make out her words. Sar sent a trickle of glowing warmth into his ears, and suddenly his hearing was back. “—in the Mother’s name was that?”
He climbed stiffly to his feet and held out his hand. She grabbed it and scrambled up. Kalti appeared unharmed, as did the wizard from Thedan who echoed her question.
Josiah stared at the scattered burning fragments of wood and metal that were all that was left of the wagon. “Once we got the blasting powder mill working, it started making too much powder to be stored there. Or in any one place. So we loaded it in barrels and put them on wagons. We sent them down the road toward Elathir, spreading them out so if one accidentally ignited, it wouldn’t set the others off.”
Kalti scowled. “Brilliant.” She took a few quick steps down the road, her fists clenched. “We’ll never catch them now.”
“Some of the mounted fighters will go after them,” the other wizard said. He stroked his familiar between its eyes. “I didn’t know the Mother’s power could do that.”
“Neither did I.” Josiah closed his eyes and remembered what it had felt and looked like when the golden light had repelled the explosion. “I suppose it was only air, after all. Moving very fast and hard. And shards of wood and metal. The Mother’s power could move it, change its direction, just like when we push wind into sails or move rain around.”
“But much faster.” The wizard shuddered. “If your familiar hadn’t been so quick to react, we’d all be dead.”
“Sar and I have a lot of experience with blasting powder.”
His eyes widened. “You must be Josiah.”
Josiah was saved from further embarrassment by the arrival of more wizards, accompanied by foot fighters and a handful of mounted ones. He waved urgently down the road. “Some of them got away.”
“Don’t worry,” one of the mounted fighters assured him. “We’ll catch them.” She and several others threaded their horses through the gathering crowd, breaking into a gallop once they were clear.
Tension drained out of Josiah. The fugitives would never be able to evade pursuit for the full two-day journey to Elathir.
A commotion stirred the crowd as Tobi plowed through and bounded up to Josiah. He ruffled her head. “Tell Elkan I’m fine.”
Josiah knew she’d complied by the relief on Elkan’s face as he pushed through the crowd. “What happened?”
Josiah poured out the story as they walked back toward Korisan. By the time they reached the prisoner’s shed, where the pursuers were gathering with the recaptured Ramunnans, the sun had risen. Josiah tagged along as Elkan pieced together the full story from a dozen reports.
The Ramunnans sullenly refused to answer any questions, but a window showed them stealthily building the hidden gap while they were constructing their shelter. The night within the sparkling circle was too dark to reveal much, and the Ramunnans had done everything in disciplined silence, but between what was visible and the evidence all too clear in the dawn light, it was clear what had happened. The guards had been slain one by one with makeshift weapons constructed from wood, nails, and bits of broken saw blades, and their bodies dragged into the shed. Less than fifty of the three hundred prisoners had remained inside when the escape attempt was interrupted.
Elkan watched grimly as the last of the guards’ bodies was carried toward Korisan’s cemetery. He consulted the list Master Edniel handed him.
She indicated several names. “All the Ramunnans are accounted for except these five. I sent more mounted fighters to reinforce the ones who pursued them.”
“Are you sure you don’t want me to send some wizards as well?”
“Only if they’re not back by midday.” She patted his arm. “Which they will be. The Ramunnans can’t evade them long on foot.”
Elkan sighed and nodded, handing the list back. Edniel strode off.
When she was out of earshot, Elkan put his arm around Josiah’s shoulders. “I’d scold you for being awake in the middle of the night, but if you hadn’t, they’d have gotten clean away and we’d have three hundred more fighters to face when we attack Elathir.”
Josiah shivered. “If those five make it to Elathir, they’ll tell Commander Benarre about our weapons.”
“That would be unfortunate, but I don’t think it will make much difference. We’re strong enough to defeat the Armada even if we can’t surprise them.” He squeezed Josiah’s shoulders tighter, then released them. His voice went gruff. “I don’t blame you for wanting to spend as much time with Ledah as you can. But you need to sleep. There will be plenty of time for sex after Tevenar is ours again.”
Josiah’s face flushed hot. “Yes, sir.”
He didn’t intend to change anything, and he suspected Elkan knew it. But his master only nodded. “Tell me more about how Sar deflected the blast. We might need his technique during the battle.”
* * *
Tenorran’s foot caught on a root and he stumbled. Hessarran didn’t slow; the rope that ran from the commander’s belt to Tenorran’s wrists yanked tight and sent him pitching forward. His face plowed into the dirt.
Hessarran cursed and jerked him to his feet. “Keep running, you worthless traitor,” he snarled. “I’ll kill you before I let you get captured again.”
Tenorran shook his head and forced his legs to carry him after Hessarran. The others ran close behind, occasionally prodding him w
ith one of the spears they’d taken from the guards. Blood from a gash on his forehead dripped into his eyes. He tried to wipe his face on his shoulder but only succeeded in grinding dirt and bits of leaves deeper into his abraded cheek.
So far they’d evaded their pursuers by sticking to the thickest part of the woods and hiding whenever the mounted searchers swept by. Tenorran thought they should head farther into the forest, but he dared not say so. Hessarran and the other four were certain that if they ventured too far from the road they’d lose their way. It wouldn’t do Benarre and the rest in Elathir any good if they wandered lost for weeks. The Tevenarans planned to attack in a matter of days.
Hessarran steered them out of the trees and onto the dirt track. For a long time their pounding feet made the only sound in the hushed woods. But even Hessarran couldn’t keep running without a break forever. When a side path branched toward the river, he slowed and veered onto it. They skidded down a steep bluff. At the bottom an eddy swirled off the deep, swift river, with a flat patch of sand where they could throw themselves to the ground and drink. Tenorran sucked great swallows of water into his parched throat.
Hessarran was the first to rise to his knees. He scanned the riverbank, but everywhere else the land fell steeply to the water, leaving nowhere they could force their way downstream. He scowled at the river. Tenorran supposed Hessarran, like most men of the Armada, had never learned to swim. He briefly considered offering to swim across. It would be much easier to get through to Elathir on the far bank. But Hessarran would never trust him not to go back to the Tevenarans.
The others climbed to their feet and Tenorran reluctantly followed. Hessarran led them back to the road and they resumed running. It was nearly noon and the heat was increasing. As long as the road remained in the shade of the trees it was bearable. But after a few miles it swerved and ran along the top of the bluff, with only knee-deep grass and occasional bushes on one side and the sun glaring off the river on the other. Tenorran feared they’d succumb to heat stroke before the Tevenarans caught them.
Distant hoofbeats sounded behind them. Hessarran cursed and looked wildly around. Open meadows stretched to their left, waving fields of wheat beyond. The closest cover was several miles ahead, where the forest veered back to the river’s edge. Tenorran knew with a sinking heart they’d never reach it before the riders overtook them.
Hessarran stilled. “All right. We fight them.” He drew a guard’s long knife from his belt and slashed the rope that bound him to Tenorran. “Sorry you won’t get your trial before the Matriarch, traitor, but I’m not risking you stabbing us in the back.”
Before Tenorran registered what he meant, Hessarran seized his belt and the back of his tunic and heaved him off the bluff into the river.
He retained just enough presence of mind to snatch a deep breath before his body smacked hard into the water. The impact shook him, but he clamped his throat closed and refused to exhale. Long summer days frolicking in the ocean, dunking and being dunked by his companions, had taught him to trust that a lungful of air would eventually float him to the surface.
Finally, when the urge to breathe was nearly irresistible, he felt the water give around him as his back emerged into the air. He kicked to bring his head up and gasped. He let his face submerge again and worked to free his hands from their bonds while the current carried him downriver.
Hessarran had pulled the knots tight, and water swelling the ropes didn’t help. But eventually, after many pauses to raise his head and snatch a breath, he loosened a loop enough to writhe one hand free. He struck out for the opposite shore. Similar bluffs rose on that side, but eventually a curve provided a small rocky beach where he staggered out.
Tenorran collapsed on the coarse sand and panted. At length he sat up and looked back, but the place where Hessarran had thrown him in was out of sight around several bends. He couldn’t hear any sounds of combat, although he didn’t know if that meant he was too far away or that the fight was over. Only the rush of the water, the rustle of the breeze, and the calls of oblivious birds met his ears.
He found a broken rock with a sharp edge and sawed at the rope on his wrist while he thought about what to do. If he continued to Elathir, nearly certain death awaited him. Even if Benarre believed he was telling the truth about the Tevenarans having the Secret, he’d react the same way Hessarran had to the fact that Tenorran remained alive. As a Secrets officer who’d failed to carry out his final duty he deserved to be executed, no matter how valuable the information he brought. The best he could hope for would be the same deal he’d struck with Hessarran, to be held until he could be turned over to the Matriarch.
But he had no desire to return to the Tevenarans. They’d treated him decently, even kindly, for the most part, but they weren’t foolish enough to trust him again, not after he’d lied to them about the weapons and tried to murder their leader’s apprentice. They wouldn’t kill him, but they’d put him back in a cell until they could turn him over to Benarre. So it would come to the same thing in the end, except that Benarre would be surprised by the Tevenarans’ weapons.
His only other option was to flee. Avoid both the Tevenarans and his own people for as long as he could. It should be easy to find food and shelter in abandoned farmhouses. If he kept moving he could remain alive and free for weeks, months, even years.
The thought appealed to the part of him that craved survival. But at the same time it horrified him. Did he really want to live out his life in self-imposed exile? If the Tevenarans won and sent the Armada back to Ramunna, he would never be able to go home. Even if the Ramunnans won, there would never come a time when he could turn himself in and hope to escape judgement. He could try to disguise his accent and pose as a native Tevenaran in some isolated village, but sooner or later he’d be discovered. The only way to stay alive would be to remain forever alone.
The last strands of rope broke. He shook it off his wrist and chafed the welts it left behind. He removed his sopping tunic and breeches, wrung them out, and dragged the damp cloth back onto his body. Still undecided, he searched until he found a place where he could climb the bluff with the help of a few saplings and exposed roots.
He stood at the top, unable to go any farther without making a choice. Downstream to Elathir? Upstream to Korisan? Or across country, to wherever he could hole up and hide?
Tenorran clenched his fists. Smash it, he wasn’t a traitor! He’d never betrayed Ramunna, no matter what his superiors believed. He wouldn’t start now. Benarre needed to know about the Tevenarans’ weapons so he would have the best chance to defeat them. As a loyal officer of the Armada, it was his duty to report the information he’d learned. What happened after that was irrelevant.
He took a deep breath and turned downstream, his heart and feet surprisingly light. He’d be able to tell his mother honestly that he’d always remained true to their country. If he died, either in the coming battle or because she still believed he deserved to be executed, at least he could hold fast to the knowledge that he’d done his utmost to serve Ramunna.
But of course he wanted to live. As his steps nibbled away the miles to Elathir, he turned his mind to tactics. He knew more about the Tevenarans, and particularly about the wizards, than anyone else in the Armada. If he presented Benarre with a viable strategy to defeat them, he might yet convince his mother to spare his life.
* * *
Benarre frowned. “Won’t that leave the ships with too little Secret to fight?”
Tenorran swallowed his impatience. He’d already answered what seemed like a thousand objections to the plan he’d hammered out during two days of walking. A few had been legitimate, and had identified problems he hadn’t thought of on his own, but they’d worked out practical solutions to all of those. The rest, like this one, had been based on ignorance, or incomplete understanding, or simple stupidity. Keeping his voice mild and reasonable, he said, “Every Armada ship carries enough Secret for dozens of battles. There’s plenty to implement my
plan, fight for days at the highest rate of fire, and have enough left for ten more battles before we reach home. Ask any of the other Secrets officers if you doubt me.”
He’d blundered, he realized with a sinking heart. The captains around the long table frowned and muttered as they glanced at his daggerless wrist. He shouldn’t have reminded them of his uncertain status. Although Benarre had seemed genuinely grateful for his report on the Tevenarans’ unexpected strength and had agreed to listen to his plan, he didn’t trust Tenorran enough to restore his rank and duties. He wasn’t exactly a prisoner, but he certainly wasn’t a Secrets officer any more.
Benarre cleared his throat to restore order. “I will. But for now, we’ll assume you’re correct. I still don’t like the idea of staking everything on a trap. Even if they do have a few weapons, I think we can defeat them in open combat without resorting to trickery.”
“We probably can,” Tenorran assured him. “My plan is only a last resort. If we win without using it, we’ll dismantle the preparations and nothing will be lost.”
Most of the captains nodded, looking mollified. Benarre tapped his fingers on the table. “You’re sure they won’t be able to stop it with their powers?”
“Not if we strike by surprise in the middle of the night. They won’t have time to react.”
Benarre nodded slowly. He looked around the table at the other captains. “I want to hear your opinions. Should we use Tenorran’s plan?”
One by one, they expressed their approval. Tenorran’s heart swelled. Benarre wasn’t bound to take their advice, but the overwhelming show of support confirmed that his idea was as sound as he’d thought.
Benarre listened carefully. When everyone had spoken, he was silent for a long moment, looking into the distance. Finally he nodded. “All right. I’ll have a crew start digging. If you’re correct that the Tevenarans won’t attack for another week, we’ll have plenty of time to get things in place.” He waved to the assembled captains. “You’re dismissed.”
The Wizards' War Page 42
