The Gathering Storm (53 page)

She was only a Lion. The prince would sacrifice her rather than lose Bulkezu.

Tears turned to ice on her cheek. She could no longer feel her lips or her fingers or her toes. How could she have been so stupid? If she hadn’t panicked, if she had kept her head and asked for help, she wouldn’t lie here at his mercy.

If Blessing hadn’t run away.

The loathing and rage hit with as much force as the storm:
I hate her, the spoiled brat. I don’t care if she’s dead!

“Anna! Anna! You let her go, you ugly monster!”

Shouts broke the stalemate.

“Catch her!”

“Stay back, Your Highness!”

“She got my knife!”

“Grab her, you fool!”

The spear’s haft slapped against her head as Bulkezu twirled it, getting a better grip to meet a new attack. There was a scuffle, roars of anger from the soldiers, and a body hit Anna across the chest so hard that the wind was knocked out of her. The weight of that small body caused the chains to bite
into her shoulder blades. She coughed out a mewling cry of pain as her vision hazed. Blood dribbled down around her ear, freezing. Her eye would not open.

Blessing had tried to rescue her.

Shouts reached her faintly, a distant swarm of movement felt more than heard. Bulkezu straddled both Anna and the second body as he braced for a new attack. When he laughed, high-pitched and gleeful, the sound cut across the screaming pitch of the wind.

“Free me, prince of dogs,” cried Bulkezu triumphantly. “Or I kill her.”

Blessing whimpered in pain.

Prince Sanglant’s voice reached her over the buffeting wind, a ringing tenor that easily pierced the clamor of battle. Anger and thwarted frustration made him sound hoarse—but then, he always sounded like that.

“Let her go free, and I’ll let you go free when we reach the hunting grounds of the griffins.”

Bulkezu laughed again. “To be hunted down by my own tribe?”

“Very well,” shouted Sanglant. “I’ll throw down my weapons and trade myself for her—”

“Your daughter is a far more valuable hostage than you would be. Free me, or I kill her. But I will take her with me, so that you will keep my tribe from hunting me.”

Why had Blessing charged in against a foe she could not hope to defeat? Now she was unconscious, wounded, and Bulkezu’s prisoner.

“Take me as your hostage and my soldiers will see that your tribe does not hunt you. I can make no bargain with my daughter’s life—”

The wind roared, obliterating the sound of the prince’s voice as a wave of white swept over them. She could no longer see Bulkezu through frozen eyes and the howling white fog of the blizzard.

This was the end.

Something smooth and silken brushed her lips.

The stinging blast of the snow and ice faded under an entirely unexpected surge of warm wind. White flower petals swirled over her like a cloud of butterflies. Ice melted on her
face, making runnels down her cheek as petals tickled her mouth and eyes. This was no natural wind—

Sorcery!

The soldiers cried out in alarm and surprise at the shower of petals and the shock of the wind’s abrupt change.

“Hai!” Bulkezu shouted. A weight hit him, throwing him off her. Within the streaming petals two men fought—Sanglant and Bulkezu—wrestling and rolling. The chains writhed around her, scraping over her legs, burning her arms. Snow that had been caught beneath chains sprayed and scattered.

“Get the princess!” cried Matto.

“Anna! Anna!” Thiemo yelled, running toward her.

She was trapped in a tangle of spitting, biting iron. She got to her knees, but a hand grabbed her ankle and jerked her hard so she fell forward while being dragged backward. Iron ripped up the skin on her cheek. She screamed. Bulkezu threw her on top of Blessing’s prone body. Anna’s swollen eye was crammed into the slush, a muck of snow and petals and mud that covered the ground, but she could see the awful scene unfolding a hand’s breadth from her face.

Bulkezu grabbed Blessing’s hair and twisted the princess’ head back. A knife blade pressed against the vulnerable skin at her throat. The prince cursed violently but helplessly.

Bulkezu laughed that giggling, mad chuckle that would, surely, sour milk and curdle eggs in the nest; she hadn’t heard it for months. She began to weep.

The soldiers beyond had gone deadly silent as petals spun down.

“Now we are both trapped,” said Bulkezu. “Only a Kerayit witchwoman or her mistress can raise a wind like this.” He laughed again. “Free me. I am still fast enough to kill the girl and strong enough to kill her even if you wound me first. My freedom. Or your daughter’s life.”

A crowd of men gathered around them, holding back as if a fence caught them up short. The blade biting into Blessing’s skin raised a trickle of blood although the girl remained limp.

Was she already dead?

Beyond, the camp had dissolved into chaos: horses trumpeting
in fright, men shouting and cursing, a thin voice wailing in agony.

A horn call rising in strength: the call to arms.

Petals streamed everywhere as the warm wind drowned them. “My lord prince! Come quickly!”

“My lord! My lord! An army approaches!”

“We’ve been ambushed!”

“Horsemen, my lord prince!”

“So be it.” Sanglant’s was not a voice that hid emotion often, but she could not tell if fury, frustration, fear, or cold raging bitterness ruled him now.

“Your sister, Princess Sapientia, my lord—”

“Not now, Breschius. Captain Fulk, I want spears to the fore, braced to face down a cavalry charge.”

“Yes, my lord prince.”

An object hit Anna hard on the head, slid down her nose, and fell into snow and petals. It was a key.

“Let the hunt begin, Bulkezu. If you harm her, you will suffer tenfold what she suffered.”

Bulkezu’s weight shifted painfully on her back as he grabbed the key off the ground. The knife pricked Blessing under the jaw as he shifted. Chains clattered down. He took hold of the back of Blessing’s tunic and hoisted her up, holding her tight with the knife still at her throat.

“If you want her to live, girl,” he said to Anna without looking down at her, “then you will accompany us because I cannot be bothered to care for her.”

Blessing had risked her own life. Anna could do no less.

She pushed up to her feet, swaying and dizzy. Blood stippled the churned snow and muck and stained the iron links of the chain. Men scattered around them, running to the boundary of the camp with weapons in hand. Grooms fought down maddened horses as petals drifted in clouds through the air. Mud spattered everywhere as the warm wind melted snow, as feet ground moisture into grass and dirt.

Anna staggered after Bulkezu through the clamor and chaos. No one heeded them, although perhaps it only seemed so because she could not see very well. He had no trouble keeping Blessing held tight with one arm while brandishing
the spear with the other; he had remained strong even after months of captivity.

Men formed up around the perimeter, tense but ready, their spears and shields a fragile line of defense.

“Let him through! Let him through!” shouted Matto ahead of them. “God curse you! Make a way through for him, or he’ll kill them both!”

Bulkezu carried the princess past the line of men formed up along the outer perimeter of the camp. He paused long enough to sling the girl over his back, a shield against arrows, and plunged forward up the slope with knife and spear in hand, silent but breathing hard. Snow turned to sludge under his feet as a last few petals spun down around them. In the east, light rose as dawn threatened.

Blessing woke at last, kicking at the backs of his knees.

“Quiet, worm!”

The iron edge of his voice subdued her.

He will kill us
, thought Anna, too stunned to weep. Was it better to struggle and die fighting or to follow quietly in the hope they might escape?

Though he labored, he did not slow. They crested the hill as the rim of the sun splintered the horizon. In a broad valley below, a river meandered through towering grass that shimmered like gold. The lowland ended abruptly at the foot of steep crags jutting up along the eastern horizon. A petal brushed her cheek; another settled on Blessing’s upturned rump. Wind carried the scent of grass and of spring. Snow melted into dirty mounds, the icy remains of winter; spring had swept in.

On its wings, off to both left and right, an army of mounted men approached with bows and spears held ready. They weren’t Quman—they didn’t wear wings—but there was something misshapen about them nevertheless that Anna could not discern with one swollen eye and her back and arms on fire with pain.

Bulkezu had seen the soldiers, too, had heard the thunder of their approach across the ground.

“Witches!” He spat on the ground before forging down a slope made slippery by melting snow and the sheen of fresh mud churned up under his footsteps. He stumbled once,
swearing as he fell to one knee, but his grip on the girl did not falter. He was unbelievably strong. His hands were chains, as unyielding as iron. He had tucked the knife into a boot where Blessing could not reach it, but Anna wondered if she herself could grab for it. Yet he still carried the spear. If he killed her, then Blessing would be at his mercy.

As they descended the slope, the grass rose from knee-high at the crest to thigh-high as the ground leveled off. The pale sea cut off her view of everything except the ragged summits of the crags. He waded into this ocean, the grass reaching his waist, his chest, and soon higher than a horse’s head.

She had heard that the griffins roamed in the lands where the grass grew as tall as houses.

Maybe that was how she would die: Bulkezu would stake her out and use her as a lure for the griffin he meant to kill so he could build himself new wings. Grass stung her face, whipping against her, focusing her thoughts as she jolted along.

I will not die. I will not let Blessing die
.

There had to be a way to escape. He said nothing, just trudged at a steady pace.

“Please,” Blessing said at last. “If you put me down, I’ll walk.”

He stopped, dropped her, and waited without speaking, breathing hard, while the princess winced and, cautiously, pushed up to stand.

“Anna?” she croaked.

“I am here, Your Highness.” Her shoulders throbbed; her eye ached and her cheek stung. She saw the sky as patches of blue and white, clear sky and clouds, glimpsed through the waving stalks above her. It was impossible to know what direction they walked in; she could no longer see even the eastern crags. Only the trail Bulkezu had left, beaten down by his weight, betrayed their path, and even so the grass was springing back up behind them.

Soon they would be utterly lost.

“Go.” He poked Blessing with the spear.

The two captives led the way, walking side by side. It was exhausting work trampling the grass, pushing through with arms raised. Vegetal dust matted her hair and formed a layer
of grit on her lips. Soon she was sweating although it was warm only in contrast to the killing cold they had survived.

Twice she veered sideways, thinking to lead them back around in a circle in the direction of camp, but he poked Blessing each time hard enough to make the girl cry out, so Anna had to fall back in line. He was herding them like beasts in the direction he wanted them to go.

Once Blessing tried to outrun him, hoping his long captivity would make him slow, but he caught up, slammed her across the back with the haft of his spear, and waited silently as she groaned and struggled back to her feet with Anna’s help.

He, too, seemed exhausted, but there was in his expression a look of such cold determination that Anna knew he would never falter. His gaze met hers. He had beautiful eyes; even his face, scarred as it was, remained handsome—if one could admire such swarthy features. But he measured her as a man measures his horses, wondering which is healthiest and which he might need to kill for food on a hard journey.

“Come, Your Highness,” she said.

Wincing, weeping silently, Blessing took Anna’s hand and went without a word.

In time, the sun rose above the grass and tracked across the sky. She was sweating in earnest, dressed in her winter clothing, but dared take nothing off. If this warm spell was only a sorcerous spell, how soon would winter blast back in to kill them? For how long could a witch alter the weather? How far did the spell’s reach extend? They might easily walk right out of this warm cocoon into the blizzard. Surely a weather witch, no matter how powerful, could not wipe away a storm of such power. Yet there was nothing she could do about that. She staggered on, concentrating on each single step as the only thing that mattered in the world. Blessing did not speak, only trudged.

As long as they kept moving, he would not kill them.

A high scream pierced the heavens, an eerie cry that lingered on and on and chilled her to the heart.

“Go!” said Bulkezu, although she had speeded up at the cry.

Was
he
frightened?

Almost she turned to examine his expression, but she dared not. It was wounded animals that were most likely to maul you. The cry rose again, off to the left this time, not behind them, echoed by a second voice to the right.

“We’re being hunted,” whispered Blessing, squeezing her hand.

Bulkezu jabbed her with the haft. “Go! Go!”

She heard the murmur of running water just before the ground broke away precipitously and she slid and stumbled down a steep, short slope. Breaking out of the thick grass, she rolled on the gravelly shore of a river not more than a strong man’s spear toss across, nothing like as deep and wide as the Veser River at Gent. East across the river, visible from this shore because of the lay of the ground, clouds roiled over the crags. A veil sheeted down from the cloud cover. She smelled the chill scent of streaming snow. The blizzard did indeed still churn above the mountains, reaching north and south like gigantic arms to encircle them where they rested in the heart of a spell. The sun shone above as merrily as it might on any fine spring day.