Arrows of Promise (Kingmakers Book 2) (11 page)

“A top of the morning to ye, McKay, Liam.” These two men had
come in the day before yesterday and she had gained an instant good impression
of them. They were solid, salt of the earth people, who were respectful and
enjoyed working. While waiting on Ash to get to the mines, they had pitched in
and helped people build their houses the past two days. “Have ye had
breakfast?”

“We have, Miss Riana, thank you.” McKay scratched at his
beard before fanning his face with a palm. “Already warming up this morning.
Ash, we marked the places we think it best to dig, as you asked.”

“Ropes, shovels, buckets, and pulleys are already standing
by as well,” Liam pitched in. “I have word from my brother that more are coming
over and I expect them in the next hour or two. After you get the main shafts
in, we can take it from there.”

Oh? So Ash wasn’t expected to do the bulk of the mining
himself? Well, that was a blessed relief.

Ash put both hands to his knees and pushed himself to his
feet slowly, like an eighty-year-old man creaking upwards. “That sounds fine.
Thank you, gentlemen. Let’s get to it, then.” As if just realizing, he turned
to Riana. “What are you doing today?”

“Hunting potatoes. I have more hunters coming over today as
well that need to be shown which areas be theirs.”

“Ah. Good hunting, then.” With a brief smile, there and
gone, he turned and went off with the men.

Riana watched him go with worry tightening her mouth. Come
tomorrow, no matter what, she was forcing him to rest. Even if she had to sit
on him. He was so exhausted, he wouldn’t be able to put up much of a fight. And
she had a feeling that if he just sat still for more than ten seconds, he’d
pass out.

They truly needed more magicians. She was going to drive
this point home with Edvard the next time she talked to the man.

Still worried, but not knowing what else to do, she went to
her own work.

The new hunters arrived, so she set about showing them the
virgin areas to set traps and ambushes. So far, they were bringing in a good
amount of game per day. There were three dedicated butchers who took it all and
preserved it, prepping it for storage. It took only an hour to show them the
ropes and then she went back to potato hunting.

Riana had a system in place between her and the younger
children. She’d put the plants she found into coarse sacks. The children would
come to the dump sites she’d marked and take them to the fields before planting
them as she’d taught. They were promised five coppers for every sack they
planted, which, for a child, was good money. Riana had thought of this system
in part to save her back from having to haul all of this back and forth, but
also to give a little extra income to the families moving in here. What with
the shortage of coins, what she actually gave them was a voucher. The children
were using what they earned to buy things from Estole—blankets, food, building
materials, and the like. She had eight of them under her charge and she had to
admit she was becoming fond of the scamps. They were such cheerful, hardworking
youngsters. It was hard not to like them.

At noon, she stopped and ate the bread and cheese she’d
packed. Fortified, she grabbed the two sacks she had and hauled them to the
drop off point. She found Helmi already waiting there, her hair done up in a
braid around her head, wearing her brother’s pants. As usual. At eleven, the
girl was as tall as any boy her age, just as strong, and had the view point
that anything a boy could do, she could do. Riana had yet to see her fail at
anything. So far, Helmi was in the lead for the most earned.

“Helmi, here be two.”

The girl reached out and took both sacks from her. It was a
bit of a strain for her to handle both at once, but she tossed one over her
shoulder, the other she tucked under her arm, and gave Riana a game smile.
“I’ll get them planted quick. Miss Riana, these potato things, you sure they
good for eatin’?”

“Eh, they be that. Fine eating. When they be big enough to
harvest, I will show ye how to cook ’em.”

Helmi looked a little doubtful still, but it earned her good
money now to plant them, so she wasn’t arguing this too much. “Momma told me to
tell you that we have eight rows planted.”

“Lovenanty!” Riana exclaimed in true surprise. “I have no’
gathered that much.”

“No,” Helmi agreed with a gap-toothed grin. “But the hunters
bring us some to plant, and now that we know what you’re looking for, we’re
finding them on our own. You owe us
lots
of money, Miss Riana.”

“Cernunnos smile on ye, lass, but ye be an enterprising
sort.” Riana was astounded at how quickly they had leapt into the work and
weren’t depending on her every direction. “Eight rows, ye say? Well, now, if
that be the truth, then—” She stopped dead when she realized that the faint
presence of Ash in the back of her head had gone abruptly out.

Helmi asked in worry, “Miss Riana? You look like someone
just smacked you in the back of the head.”

Grabbing the girl’s arm, she commanded urgently, “Get me two
strong men and send them to the mines. Then tell the next boat that comes to
wait.”

Alarmed, the girl demanded, “What happened?”

“Ash be down. I can barely feel him. Fast and snell, girl,
move!” Turning on a heel, she took off in a dead run, or as fast as she could
move in this virgin forest. Behind her, she heard Helmi drop the sacks of
potatoes and run the opposite direction, toward the settlement.

Riana’s blood thrummed in her ears, her heart screaming in
panic. She and Ash hadn’t quite gotten to the level where they could tell where
the other was at all times—they could just feel strong emotions—and she cursed
the fact that she couldn’t find him through their connection. She’d known that
he was going to put mines in today, but hadn’t thought to ask him
which
mines.
There were three possible locations, some of them far flung from the
settlement, and she didn’t know which one to try first.

Heavens, Helmi wouldn’t know which one either! Snarling to
herself, she promised that she would make sure things became more clearly
marked later, so they wouldn’t be in this situation in future emergencies. But
for now, she had to just try the nearest one to her and hope that was it. If
not, she’d go to the next.

Stumbling into the first location, she saw equipment stacked
up and ready to go, but no people or overturned earth. Cursing aloud, she
whirled and headed southwest, going for the second place. Even as she ran, she
searched for Ash’s presence over and over. She could still feel him, but it was
reed thin, and it made her feel as if his life were teetering on the edge of a
cliff.

She knew she was headed to the right place even before it
became visible. It was the smell of overturned earth and smoke that told her
people were close. She rounded a large tree trunk and skidded to a halt in the
manmade clearing. For a split second, she took in the situation.

Three men were lying on the ground, each of them with a cold
cloth on his head. Only one, McKay, was still standing, and he was tending to
the three of them. Ash was one of them, looking unnaturally still. At her
entrance, McKay looked up, and reading the panic on her face well enough,
hastily assured her, “He’s fine, Miss Riana. Just fine. We hit a bad pocket of
air while tunneling through and it made these three pass out. But they’ll be
back on their feet in a few minutes. Just need some clean air in their lungs,
is all.”

As if to prove his point, Liam groaned and lifted a hand to
his head.

“See? Just a few more minutes and the rest will wake up as
well.” McKay knelt next to Liam and put a hand on his shoulder. “Deep breaths,
man.”

Was it really just that? Not convinced, she knelt down next
to Ash and put a hand against his cheek. He felt cold, and fine tremors
vibrated under her hand. He was shivering hard. This wasn’t a matter of hitting
a bad pocket of air and needing to get his wind back. This was something else
entirely. What, she wasn’t quite sure, but it was no doubt weeks of not
sleeping or eating enough catching up with him.

Braun, the third man, stirred and sat up, wincing as he did
so. “That was a bad pocket of air. We mark that?”

“Marked,” McKay assured him. “I’ll get it vented so we can
work down there a few days from now.”

“Ye will be doing so without Ash,” she informed them firmly.
“McKay, help me. We need to get him to the mainland.”

McKay opened his mouth, ready to protest, then took a second
look at Ash. “He should be waking up by now…” he trailed off uncertainly before
kneeling at Ash’s side and putting an ear to his lungs. Frowning, he sat back
up. “His lungs sound clear. Why isn’t he waking up?”

“Oh, I can think of many a reason,” she growled unhappily.
“McKay, help me. He needs to get to Estole.”

“Right,” the man agreed, catching on to her urgency. “You
two fine here? Good, good. I think we’re done for the day, so go on home until
we know we can work here again. Miss Riana, if you can get his feet, I’ll take
the torso.”

Between the two of them, they got Ash off the ground and
headed for the settlement docks. Halfway there, two men from the settlement
came running up, Helmi’s father being one of them. They took over, slinging Ash
between them, which Riana was thankful for as she didn’t have the strength to
cart the man the whole distance. She walked alongside most of the way, then
when they were close enough, ran ahead to the docks.

Helmi, bless her, had a hand on the ferryman’s sleeve and
was holding on to him with determination. The ferryman—Mark? Marcus?—stood
there with an aggravated expression on his face and was saying to the child, “I
can’t stand here all day, I have a schedule to keep. Whatever emergency this
is, can’t it hold for an hour so I can return and get the next shipment
over—ah, Miss Riana, what is this about?”

“Ash has fallen.”

For a split second, it didn’t connect with him, and then the
ferryman’s eyes bugged out of his head. “Wizard Fallbright has fallen?!”

“I need to get him to Estole. NOW.”

Fortunately for the man’s future health, he saw her point
immediately, and leapt back into his boat and started clearing space. Riana
followed him in, helping, and by the time they had a clear spot to lay Ash in,
the other two men labored up, huffing and puffing. Under her direction, Ash was
settled into the bottom of the boat. She crawled in next to him, his head in
her lap, and she threw her cloak over him, as his shaking had gotten worse.

To the ones still standing on the dock, she commanded, “Go
on working, do no’ stop. If ye have questions, send a message on to me at the
castle. I do no’ think we be back in the next week.”

“See to him,” McKay urged her. “We’ll handle things here.”

Good man.

The ferryman put the boat into motion, his small crew of
rowers propelling the boat across the channel with admirable speed. Still, it
was not fast enough to suit Riana. She was so used to magic, and being able to
talk to people at will, that the sudden lack of it grated on her. She
desperately wanted to contact someone from Estole and get help set up for them
so that they had it ready when she arrived with Ash. But there was no way for
her to do it.

They pulled up at Estole’s docks with a jarring bump and the
rowers leapt out to tie the boat firmly up. Then they reached down without her
asking and hefted Ash into their arms.

“The castle, Miss Riana?” a man she didn’t know asked.

“Aye,” she confirmed, right behind them. She debated between
running ahead and getting help set up or staying right next to Ash. Her
instincts were torn, uncertain which would be the best course of action. In a
split second, her mind flashed with a segment of conversation, something that
her father had mentioned to her in passing. Ashlynn had emergency callers
throughout the city; that’s how the guards contacted her if something went
wrong.

Whirling to the nearest man, she demanded, “Where be the
nearest caller?”

“Sheriff Fallbright’s posts, you mean? Dead ahead, on the corner
of the third street.”

Riana didn’t hesitate. She bolted into a sprint, leather
boots scraping on the wood of the docks, and ruthlessly shoved people out of
her way. It took far longer than it should have, but she finally spotted it,
standing next to a lamppost—three wavy lines embedded in gold. Riana wasn’t
quite sure how these worked, but every time that she had seen Ash or Ashlynn
work them, they’d always touched them first. Not knowing what else to try, she
put three fingers against the gold and spoke clearly, “Ashlynn.”

It took a second, long enough to make her doubt it had
worked, and then Ashlynn’s voice came through clearly. “
Riana?”
she
asked, clearly startled.

“Ashlynn. Ash be unconscious. He be barely breathing.”

There was a moment as this sank in and then Ashlynn turned
the air blue with curses. “
I knew that fool was overworking himself! Riana,
where are you?”

“The docks.”

“I’m on the opposite end of the city. Can you get him to
the castle?”

“Aye, I have men helping me carry him there.”

“Then go. I’ll meet you there.”
The connection
abruptly ended.

Riana turned, stepped five feet into the street, and looked
hard toward the docks. While she had been speaking to Ashlynn, the men had made
good progress, and almost caught up with her. She waited for them to come
abreast of her, then she stepped in alongside of them, peering anxiously at
Ash’s face. He still showed no signs of waking up, but it was clear his sleep
was not a peaceful one, not from the tight expression on his face and the
twitchy, jerky motions he made.

A dark-haired guardsman jogged up to them. “Miss Riana?”

It took her a minute to recognize him and put face to name. Rich.
She’d trained him in archery near daily until being reassigned to help build
the settlement. “Sadler. We need to get Ash to the castle.”