Fifth Quarter (49 page)

If she didn't move, it wouldn't see her.

For the first time since she took up a blade for the goddess, Vree was up against greater patience than hers. The dead eyes stared unblinkingly toward her. And stared. And stared.

A tepid rivulet of sweat dribbled down from Vree's temple, across her cheek, along her jaw, to drip off the point of her chin. The night seemed impossibly quiet; her breathing dangerously loud.

"The eyes—they're not focused. It doesn't actually see us!" Bannon's nerve broke and Vree made no attempt to regain control as they scuttled, lizardlike, back to the bend in the canyon. When strong hands closed around her arm, she came closer to screaming than at any time in her life.

"Yes." As she sat on her heels, she wasn't sure which of them answered, decided it didn't matter. "But he's asleep."

"Kars…"

Senses stretched nearly to the breaking point picked the name out of a thousand tiny whispers of air. "I'm not going to kill the old man," she answered, half-turning to Gyhard. "I can't. He has his back against a rock, and there's one of them on it. He's in shadow and the prince is very close, so I don't want to risk a throw." Her fingers laced around each other, the trembling buried in the weave. "I'm going to go back…"

"Are you out of our mind!"

"… and wait until dawn. When he wakes up, he'll have to take a piss. I'll grab him then. When people think that death hides in the darkness, they're a lot more careless if they make it through the night."

Karlene made a sound very much like a sob. "That could almost be a song."

Vree wiped sweaty palms on her thighs and covered the motion with a shrug. "Sing it later. Gyhard, you'll have your chance to talk to Kars. You've got until dawn to find something to say," Bannon added scornfully.

She remembered the gentle, protective line of shoulder, arm, and hand. "Yeah. I'm sure. You just be ready to Sing if you're needed."

It seemed darker over by the rocks, the dead and living equally hidden by the night. She didn't want to go back there…

"Then don't go!"

… but the journey that had started in the governor's stronghold in Ghoti was coming to an end and what she wanted couldn't stop it. Vree was as certain of that as she'd ever been about anything.

If the prince is alive…

He was.

If we can free him…

They were about to find that out.

If Gyhard tries to jump to the prince…

Then they'd all be dead and it would be over.

"I don't want to be dead, Vree. And what if he
doesn't
try to jump to the prince?"

"Then you won't be dead. But you'll still be here." Bannon had become a constant, painful pressure against her—physically and emotionally. She was so tired of failing to sort out which was her and which was him. "Wouldn't death be better?"

"If I had this all to do over again…" He paused and in spite of herself, she turned to face him. His expression reminded her of the times Bannon had attempted to apologize for involving her in some recklessness. "If I had this all to do over," he repeated, very softly, "I'd arrange the defenses of Ghoti so that the Sixth Army would only have to send its
second best
assassins."

Vree stared at him for a moment, then pressed the heels of both hands against her mouth to keep from roaring with laughter. When she finally regained control, she rubbed the tears from her eyes and found him watching her, smiling just a little, sharing the joke.

The moment stretched, lengthened.

The silence pulled Karlene around, dragged her attention away from the nearby prince. She'd never heard it speak so loudly.

Then Vree, almost deafened by the pounding of her heart, whispered, "Think about what you're going to say to Kars," and the moment shattered with the old man's name. "Watch and wait," she continued. The training she fought to wrap around her had once fit like a second skin—she couldn't remember taking it off. "Make your move as soon as I have His Highness in my hands."

Once, the intensity in his voice would have stoked desire, bringing heat and hopelessness equally mixed. Now, it only stroked a chill down her spine.

Moving as quickly as survival allowed, Vree followed the shadow paths and made a wide arc around the tiny half circle of dead sentinels. Sometimes she was herself. Sometimes she was Bannon. Sometimes, she wasn't sure. Unseen, or at least unremarked, she/ they came at last to the ambush site she'd chosen earlier.

A thorntree, a multibranched and thriving cousin to the tree at the way station, rose into the night. Vree tucked herself into the safety of broken shadow, the separate pieces of darkness together hiding the whole. This is where the prince would come in the morning. Men seemed to prefer to piss on bushes and trees, she didn't know why, and this was the only one of any size close enough.

"Wake up,
my heart. The night is nearly gone and we have so far still to go.
You must wake."

Otavas stirred, trying desperately to hang onto the remnants of a dream. He was listening to a song—a sad song filled with loss and confusion and pain. Somehow he knew that if he could just find the singer, then everything would be all right.

"Wake up,
my heart."

He had no choice. His eyes opened, and he saw the dangling bits of bone and the old man's face above that. Above them both, the sky arced silver-gray. Not quite day but no longer night. Balancing his head like an egg on a spoon, Otavas pushed himself up onto his knees and waited for the world to stop wobbling.

He loves me
. Black brows drew in as the prince tried to figure out why that was wrong.
I
don't love him
.

Perhaps that was it—but it didn't seem to be enough. Attempting unsuccessfully to push the accumulated residue of induced sleep away, Otavas struggled to his feet.

"Don't leave me,"
the old man said.

"No, I just have to…"

"
An Imperial prince does not discuss his bodily functions
." The voice rose up out of memory. "
Do you understand me. Highness
?"

"Yes, Nurse." But Nurse Zumi had been dead for years. Hadn't she? "I just have to…" He waved a hand at the thorn tree and was relieved when the old man smiled again.

"Go ahead, my heart. I promised you mush this morning."

Ignoring the silent sentinels, Otavas stood by the tree and fumbled with his trousers.

"It's too early to be so cheerful." It was the old banter. As much a part of the loosening up before a job as muscles flexed within their sheath of skin. If she didn't pause to think about it, she could almost believe that everything was all right. "We'll take him just as he turns, hold the blade to his throat, and hold him hostage for Kars."

Bannon snorted. "I was here when we made the plan, sister-mine. I haven't forgotten."

Will alone swept Vree's gaze over the dead. The three on the ground had pivoted to face the old man, leaning toward him as though he were a fire and they were searching for warmth. The one on top of the out-cropping had stood but looked like it would stay where it was.

The prince tucked himself away and, frowning, lightly touched a six-inch thorn. Then he sighed and turned.

"Now!"

They moved her body together and a heartbeat later her knees drove into the back of his and dropped him down to a height she could better manage. The bard hadn't mentioned that His Highness was so tall— although to Karlene he probably wasn't. Her arm whipped about the prince's throat, pushing up his head, and the point of her long dagger lightly parted the soft whiskers growing under the curve of his jaw. It seemed very strange not to slash through and sever the spine.

"One move and he dies!" she yelled, adding directly into the prince's ear. "We're here to rescue you, Highness. But Kars must believe you're in danger, or we won't be able to control him."

She caught a fleeting impression of horror on the old man's face, then the prince began to struggle and all her attention went to not slitting his throat. "Highness! You are in no real danger! I swear it!"

"Unless he impales himself! Watch his elbow!"

Otavas heard the voice, but terror drowned out words and meaning. The kiss of the blade had pushed him over the edge and all he knew was that he could not die. He'd seen what happened to the dead.

Had they wanted to kill him, they could have done so easily. Keeping hold of him and keeping him alive was a lot harder. A trickle of blood ran into his shirt from a thin slice on one collarbone.

"Otavas,
stop it! She's a friend! Hold still!"

"Karlene?" The prince twisted toward the voice and nearly lost an ear. "Karlene?"

"I said,
hold still!"
Her pale hair streaming like a banner behind her, the bard raced over the uneven ground toward them.

"So much for the plan…" But Vree continued to hang on to the Imperial shoulders. Although he didn't seem to realize it. His Highness was safest here with her.

"You!"

The old man's voice stopped Karlene in her tracks. She rocked back on her heels as though she'd been hit.

"Demon!" The staff stretched out, the shepherd boy's shoulder bone pointing toward her. "I know you, demon! You will not torment my heart, as you tormented me. Stop her, my children!"

Wheyra, Iban, and Hestia rose. Hestia held a rock in one hand and she let it fly with a precision little touched by death.

"Oh, shit." There had been a boy in the regiment who'd thrown with that same flat, economy of movement. Vree had never seen him miss.

The rock hit Karlene in the forehead, the impact sounding like a fist slamming into a green melon. She cried out, spun around, and dropped to one knee, both hands clutching her face.

As the walking dead bent to pick up another rock and the other two continued to advance, Vree realized they'd made a mistake. Kars could not be bribed with the prince's safety, he was too far gone in insanity for that. Shoving the unresisting young man under the protecting spikes of the thorn tree, she raced the dead to Karlene. The dead were slower, but they were much, much closer.

"Destroy the demons! Destroy the demons! Destroy the demons!" Tears streaming down his cheeks, the old man swayed back and forth in time to the rhythm of his chanting. "Destroy the demons!"

"Kars!"

Still racing forward, Bannon glanced sideways to see Gyhard standing almost close enough to touch the old man. "My body!…"

"Is in a lot less danger than Karlene's." Vree yanked her head back around, threw herself past the dead man, and drove the point of her long dagger up into the armpit of the dead woman with the rock. As a killing blow would be a wasted effort, teeth clenched and able to look at her target only obliquely, Vree slashed through the tendons holding the muscles of the arm to the shoulder. The arm dropped.