Grudging (21 page)

The four Northerners with drawn weapons toiled up the slope, directly at him. Two more followed close behind. Letting the bow drop, he pulled his sword and took a step back. An arrow skittered across the mud among the Northerners' legs but hit nothing. Ramiro stumbled backward, drawing them closer to the woods. His fellow archer improved with a second shot that took one of the rear guards in a thigh, but more Northerners zeroed in on him standing at the top of the slope. He made a fitting target in his shining armor as the first rays of the morning sun lit the sky.

He straightened his helmet and gripped his sword in both hands, then turned his back and ran into the forest. The Northerners shouted in glee and pursued. As planned, Suero let the first two run past.

Ramiro sought some distance from the ambush spot, then turned to face his pursuers, putting his back against a tree. His armor made him slower and clumsier than the enemy. Three came at him, not the two they'd planned. A mistake or a calculated move on Suero's part? He could see that the villagers had now burst from their cover, heavy oak staves finding skulls and the softer flesh of the trailing group of enemies. With Salvador's sword, Suero skewered a Northerner through the back.

Ramiro turned to his own problems as the three rushed upon him. All of them were shorter, wiry men, wearing only mismatched mail. Ramiro parried a sword strike aimed for his neck. Another blow struck harmlessly against his armor, but thrust him back against the tree. The Northerners spread out around him. His short cavalry sword seemed to put him at a disadvantage.

In reality, it allowed him to be faster.

He waded forward, leaving the safety of cover at his back. His sword struck out like a snake, sinking deep into the stomach of the man in front of him. At the same time, Ramiro snapped his left elbow up and out. Metal connected with the jaw of the opponent, just as Gomez had taught him. The Northerner's eyes rolled up into his head. He folded.

Not that Ramiro had time to watch—­he caught it all out of the corner of his eye even as he brought up a knee to push the body off his sword. He tried not to look at the blood on his gauntlets or feel the resistance as flesh parted and his weapon came free. A strike came at Ramiro's face, the vulnerable part of his defense. He ducked, and it clanged on his helmet, making his head ring. For a moment, he saw two of everything.

The village men had ceased bashing skulls, finishing off any who continued to move with their wide hunting knives. They faded back into the bushes as more Northerners scrambled up the slope. Ramiro panted. Where had Suero gone? Were they in the bushes to reset the ambush, or had they abandoned him?

He would have to worry about it later. His last opponent grappled with him, trying to pin him in place until more companions arrived, making it impossible for either of them to use swords. The Northerner brought up a knife to penetrate the chinks of his armor. Ramiro caught his wrist. The oncoming enemy jumped the dead bodies of their fellow soldiers and rushed through the ambush spot.

“Son of a bitch,” Ramiro cursed.
Betrayed
. Well, Suero had gotten what he wanted: his ­people free and a sword to boot.

Curiously, what struck him most about the moment was that the Northerner smelled of onions. It was as if his nose knew death was at hand, and wanted to make the most of these last few seconds. The knife inched closer to Ramiro's neck. He couldn't get enough space to use his sword. Couldn't reach his knife.

But then he remembered his armor.

Dropping his sword, he raised his arm high, smashing his metal-­encased elbow on the Northerner's helm. Once, twice, a third time, and he was free.

He scurried to his feet, picking up his sword as he ran away from the Northerners. Ramiro crashed into the brush with four more in pursuit. His breath came in gusts. All the Northerners had to do was overwhelm him, put him on the ground, and they'd be free to hack him apart at their leisure. He couldn't allow them to close if he wanted to survive.

He dodged around a tree and heard them cutting the distance. There was no way to outrun them.

“Salvador.” He'd be with his brother again soon.

 

CHAPTER 23

C
laire had sat back on her heels, tucked into a buttonbush on the edge of the clearing. The village burned. The place she'd wanted to visit for as long as she could remember consumed in fire at the orders of a man in a white robe. A mosquito had buzzed her ear, and she had flinched, waving distractedly at the insect.

Men without beards had the peasants of the village to sit in the field in a group, under guard. The invaders were all dressed in the same black-­and-­yellow clothing. Soldiers, but not from the cities. And certainly not from the village. The men who had flung torches and laughed could only be the enemy Teresa and the murderer were so set against.

“They told the truth,” she had whispered

She'd wondered if it hadn't been some invented story to get her cooperation though for what she couldn't imagine unless it was something dishonest.

There were so many children down below, crying, holding on to adults. Children shouldn't be treated like this. Her hand had drifted to the hilt of the knife stolen from the murderer, but there had been nothing for her to do. Even if she had gotten close enough, she hadn't the skill of her mother.

She wasn't good enough.

Below her, swords had come out, and the soldiers had killed mules. The poor animals' braying had cut straight to her heart. Claire had spun around and crawled deeper into the buttonbush. Mules. Blood. Bodies all over the village. Her mother. So much killing. She had vomited up the cattail root scavenged on the way here, gagging and sobbing, until she had straightened and wiped her mouth.

Why was there so much killing? Her mother would say it was because men were evil. Maybe her mother was right. Maybe that was the reason.

She should never have come here. But where else was she to go? The murderer was between her and home. She had no idea how to find the grandmother she'd seen once in her life. Her desire to leave home and test her magic seemed childish and naïve now.

Tears blinded her. She huddled into a ball, thrusting her fingers in her ears to keep out the sounds from the village, and rocked. Maybe seeking adventure and wanting to meet ­people wasn't such a good idea. She just wanted to go home—­for none of this to have ever happened. To go back to being protected by her mother.

For long moments, she sat like that as gradually a buttonbush flower came into focus. She stared at the white globular ball, counting each individual stamen. By the time the count got to thirty, her eyes were dry, and her stomach had settled.

A bad tasted filled her dry mouth. The moisture in the roots she'd dug out of the mud had helped, as had the few berries she'd found, but she needed clean water. Time to make a decision. She couldn't stay here.

She brushed off her hands and straightened her clothing. The only place she wanted to go was home. Nobody better try to stop her. She'd keep a sharp lookout for the murderer and simply avoid him until he gave up and left. It should have been her decision in the first place.

Screams came from the direction of the village.

Her heart jumped into her chest, and she froze. Did she want to see what new horror was happening? Maybe it was best to give it a quick glance to be sure no one saw her, then get out of here.

This decided, she backed from the bush. The scene had changed. Soldiers and villagers were running around like a kicked anthill. An arrow zinged from nowhere and caught a black-­and-­yellow-­clad man straight in the chest as he reached for a fleeing child. The figure in white waved uselessly with a white stick, but the crowd stampeded right past him. He touched an older boy with his stick, and the boy dropped into the mud and didn't move again.

Claire blinked.
By the Song?

Soldiers ran by her hiding place, headed up a muddy slope. At the top stood a figure all in metal. She gaped. The murderer?

How did he get here? She thought he was across the lake, blockading her home. What in the world was he doing?

The answer came in an instant. However he got here, he was doing what she'd been afraid to try.

A soldier near the village shouted, pointing in her direction.

A second soldier stood within touching distance, having crept up on her. Her heart gave a great leap, and her legs moved of their own accord. She fled into the trees with her breathing suddenly too loud in her ears.

The noise of fighting, metal upon metal, came from her left, where the murderer had vanished. Were they coming? Were they close? She veered the other way and kept going, too afraid to glance around and see if anyone was behind her.

She tripped and sprawled against a tree, falling hard enough to feel the sting of a cut on her chin, then she hugged the tree, waiting for a hand to grab her or a sword to slash her into oblivion. Instead, water dripped on her shoulder from the moss hanging above her head. She turned ever so slowly to discover she was alone.

Had that soldier really been pointing at her?

The more she thought about it, the more likely it became he'd been pointing at the murderer. What would he want with her anyway? From what she'd heard of this army, he wouldn't know she was a Woman of the Song.

The murderer had taken on all those soldiers by himself, when all she'd done was hide in a bush—­and now against a tree. Why had he done it? She dabbed at blood oozing from her chin. Didn't he know he would be killed?

“How strange.” Puzzled, she tugged at her braid. For some reason the idea of the murderer being killed made her sad. He'd kidnapped her. If he hadn't killed her mother, then he'd helped with it. A little burn in her chest suggested she didn't believe that. Suggested Teresa had been truthful when she said her mother's death was an accident.

The little burn of guilt grew as she realized she should have done more to help the villagers. At least the murderer had shot a few arrows, risking himself to help others. Couldn't she have caused just as effective a distraction? Of course, she wasn't encased in armor and hadn't a shiny, sharp sword either. But she had proved herself smarter than the murderer by escaping him. She could have done something.

Her mother would say to mind her own business. That it wasn't her responsibility. But she'd heard so much about the village: girls her age who wore their hair up, children who hid and giggled behind barrels. She had the Song, and they didn't.

And yet the way home was clear. With the murderer here and too busy to hunt her, she could go home. She hesitated, the indecision gnawing at her.

Even in the growing daylight, the glow of the burning village still showed through the foliage. She hadn't gotten very far in her headlong flight. Sounds of vegetation crashing and breaking came from her left. Her throat felt tight, but she produced a quiet hum that would help conceal her as she pushed off from the tree and moved left, still undecided on what to do. The murderer had gone that way, but home was that direction, too.

“Look away.

Nothing to see.

Nothing important.

Nothing worth investigating.

More important things to do.

Look away.”

The crashing noise got closer as she moved to get ahead of it. She'd searched for enough wandering goats to have practice judging distance by sound.

Except wandering goats don't carry sharp swords. Wandering goats don't try to kill you.

Light-­headedness began to make her vision spin. The mossy dead tree she tried to step over spun in circles, and so did her raised foot. She was breathing too fast. Her heart raced like she'd run three miles. Her mother's instructions on control surfaced, and she made a conscious effort to breathe as normal. She pictured herself stalking Dolly. Safe in her own woods, moving to cut off her favorite goat. Pushing aside a harmless raspberry vine. Going around a bit of swampy ground. Dolly would never stab or trample her.

She imagined the goat on two legs, waving a sword and wearing armor, and she giggled, but the dizziness receded as she calmed.
Breathe in and out. Slow and easy.
She skirted along a thick oak and into the concealing branches of a big willow. Dolly didn't have spirited brown eyes or a smudge of a beard along a square jaw.

She froze and forgot to sing.

Where had that thought come from?

One of the crashing noises changed direction and came right at her. As she looked up, something emerged from the hanging branches of the willow tree and smashed into her. She clung to it to avoid falling.

Spirited brown eyes stared down at her in amazement. “What are you doing here?” Before she could answer, he said, “Get behind me,” and hands pitched her around, causing her to stumble.

By the time she regained her balance, what seemed like a million soldiers emerged from the willow. The murderer stood between her and them. He blocked the sword thrust of the first man while stepping into it. The knife in his other hand slid smoothly under the soldier's armpit and up into his chest.

Claire shrieked and covered her mouth with her hands.

Three more followed right in the footsteps of the first soldier. She was going to die. They both would die. She seized on the first defensive song she'd ever been taught.

“Sting

Hornets

Wasps

Bees

Pain

Swarming

Sting”

Weapons fell unheeded to the ground. The men began beating at the empty air, dancing and hopping in place to escape the nonexistent attack. She should run for all she was worth. Run home and never look back. Leave the murderer to distract them while she got away. Except the murderer had saved the villagers. Had put himself between her and danger. Now he jumped and waved his arms just like the others.

She must be out of her mind, but she couldn't leave like this.

Holding the song, she dodged his swinging arms to get close enough to grab his shoulder and shake him. When he didn't respond, she stood on tiptoes to make her face as level with his as she could and tugged at him with both hands.

His face scrunched in confusion, and then sense flooded into it. “What?” He took in the squirming soldiers and put his hands over his ears. “Will they stay like this until we get away?”

Claire shook her head and kept singing. The magic reached farther than she'd expected when she'd used it against Teresa and the murderer, but it would fade with distance. The soldiers would recover and give chase. Either they risked it or took the soldiers out permanently. She didn't know about the murderer, but she didn't want them after her again.

She drew her stolen dagger and held it tightly, then pointed at the murderer's weapons on the ground, then at the soldiers. By continuing the Song and manipulating their minds, she would be as guilty of killing them as if she held the sword.

But the murderer didn't pick up his weapons. He moved to the closest man and launched his fist into the back of the man's head. Metal crunched against flesh. The man hit the ground and didn't even twitch. He repeated the procedure twice more, and she quit singing to stand in a hollow silence. The murderer was even stronger than she'd thought.

“Are they dead?” she asked, wringing her hands. Belatedly, she considered the small knife, then put it away. It wouldn't be much use against him.

Haunted eyes came up to find hers. “Hopefully not. Does it matter?”

“Yes,” she hissed, affronted.

“I believe you.” He looked around and gathered his weapons. “We should go before more come.”

Fear tightened her dry throat. She stepped toward the willow. “Are you making me or asking me?” The hornet song wouldn't work on him again. Probably no Song would while he was expecting it.

He froze in the middle of straightening as if considering. “Asking.”

“Then . . . then no gags?”

“No magic?” he asked. “Truce?”

“Truce.”