Nightblade: A Book of Underrealm (The Nightblade Epic 1) (9 page)

“I hope to do it again,” said Loren. “I have always wanted a horse of my own.”

“To roam the land as a wealthy thief,” said Annis, a light growing in her eyes. “Riding from town to town with a bag of gold on your back. It sounds glorious.”

Loren looked at Annis askance. “I recall speaking no such words. Some might call that a foolish wish, and few would see glory.”

“Oh, come now,” said Annis, leaning in close and dropping her voice to a murmur. “You cannot fool me. After all that talk of Mennet last night? That is your wish, is it not? To become a great righter of wrongs? I could see the light in your eyes as you spoke.”

Loren swallowed hard and focused on her food.
Fool!
She had been too free with her words, and Annis seemed less starry-eyed than Loren had thought.
 

“I desire no such thing. I think Mennet used his skills honorably. But only a fool would seek to win her fortune through thievery.”

“Or speak so openly about it if she did,” said Annis with a wink. The girl was not half so silly as she seemed, for all her prudishness. “You spoke foolishly indeed, and you should guard your tongue more closely. But I am not fooled by your naysaying. And I may be able to help with your first conquest.”

Annis reached into a fold in her cloak and withdrew a small leather purse. She tossed it gently in her hand, and Loren heard the
clink
of coin.

“What is that?” Loren looked up, frantically scanning for Gregor or one of his guards. But she could not see him, nor did any guard give her a second glance.

“A purse. The first in a long, fruitful career for the nine lands’ next great thief.”

The girl thrust it forward with outstretched hands. Loren snatched the purse and threw it back. The bag slammed into Annis’s chest, making her wince.
 

“Are you a fool? I am your mother’s guest. What would any honorable person think of me if I stole from her? And as for you, what daughter thieves from their mother?”

Annis’s nostrils flared. “And you took nothing from your parents when you ran away from home?”

Loren balked, unable to think of a reply.

“I thought as much,” said Annis. “It’s a fine thief who calls another sneak dishonorable. This purse is a tiny thing, one from a chest of many. No one would notice it gone, least of all Mother. How do you think you will make your way upon the road without a penny in your pocket?”

“Your mother is kind and generous to me, and to you as well. What reason could you have to do this?”

“Because,” said Annis, her eyes flashing. “I wanted to come with you. But now I think I may not wish to travel beside one so stupid.”

The words might have stung, but Loren’s mind leapt far away in an instant. She saw herself beneath the Birchwood boughs, Xain standing before her.
I want you to bring me with you.

That is what I feared,
Xain had said.
No. I will not.

How could she have been so foolish? Now she could see herself in Annis, too young by half, asking a favor she could not understand.

But no. There
was
a difference.

“My parents had turned my life to something scarcely worth living. Your mother tends to your every need and has raised you to be no fool besides. We are nothing alike.”

“We are more alike than you know,” hissed Annis. “If I do not—”

A shout cut her off. Both their heads snapped toward the sound. Near the front of the caravan—a bustle of sudden activity.

“What is that?” she murmured.

“An alarm,” said Annis. “They’ve spotted someone on the road.”

They jumped to their feet and ran. It took only a moment to reach the front of the caravan where Damaris stood with Gregor looming beside her, blocking his lady from the road.

“Mother, what is it?” cried Annis.
 

Loren looked for the purse of coins, but it had vanished.

“Riders,” said Damaris. “Several, and led by a constable.”

Loren quailed. “Is it . . . ?” She could not finish.

“One from yesterday? I cannot tell. But we should not take any chances. Loren, come with me. Quickly.”

Damaris hurried down the line of caravans. “You remember the compartment set in the wagon floor?”
   

“Yes,” Loren panted, breathless from fear. “I can hide there.”

“Not the same one. Here.”

Damaris stopped at the fourth wagon in the line. Loren vaulted into the back, squinting as her eyes adjusted to the darkness.

Now that she knew what to look for, Loren spotted the edges of the panel easily. Her fingers found the crack, and she heaved it upward. This compartment held no brown cloth packages, leaving her plenty of room to lie down. Grateful, she slid into the floor and pulled the panel back over herself.

It took forever before she heard the thunder of hoofbeats down the road, growing ever louder before pulling to a stop nearby.

“Who approaches?” Gregor’s booming voice shook the caravan floor.

“The King’s men, about his business.” Loren did not recognize the voice as either Corin or Bern.
Yet they might still be here,
she reminded herself.

“The road seems fairly thick with constables,” said Damaris. “Two visited only yesterday.”

“The same who sent us,” came the new voice. “They seek a man and a girl, and said they saw the girl near your caravan.”

“They told us the same,” said Damaris. “But we told them we had seen nothing.”

“I have heard the tale. But then I questioned them closely. For many merchants upon the road carry goods that give the King great displeasure. To stow them, such merchants might hide panels and holes within their wagons. I asked my brother constables if they had searched for such concealment, and they confessed to their folly. They sent me to see if such might be found.”

Loren’s throat went bone dry. Silence lingered outside the wagon.

At last, the man spoke again. “What say you, my lady? Must my men break your wagons apart plank by plank?”

Damaris hesitated only a moment before answering. “There is no need. The girl hides within that one. Come, and I will take you to her.”

eleven

The constable’s thin, wheedling voice rang out in the still air.
 

“Surround the wagon! Leave no space for escape.”

Loren feared she might vomit. If she had held any illusion of walking with Damaris outside the law, that fancy had gone. She must flee as fast as she could, before the men surrounded the wagon.

Loren flung away the wooden panel. With no one standing at the wagon’s rear she still had a chance.

As she tensed to run, a cry of alarm sounded from outside the wagon:
Damaris.
 

“She has fled!” Damaris cried. “Where did she go? Gregor!”

“I know not, my lady,” said the captain. “My men stood vigilant.”

“Vigilant as sleeping bears,” snapped Damaris. “Find her, or it will go ill with you all!”

Loren stood rooted to the wagon’s floor. No one stood near her wagon. What game did Damaris think to play? Loren could not know, but she had no choice but to place her faith in the merchant.

Quick and quiet, she settled back into the hidden space. Her fingers slid across the wood panel, and she winced as a splinter sank into her flesh. Silently, she lowered it back into place.

The wagon shook under heavy feet just seconds later. A man climbed inside. Loren heard shouts farther down the line: the lawmen had split up, searching the wagons in ones and twos.

In a moment, they would find Loren, and all would converge upon her. Whatever Damaris planned, Loren hoped it would take place soon. The wood shook beneath her head. Her breath fell fast and ragged.

The man grunted and heaved. The wood panel flew up to reveal her. Not the constable, but one of his riders. A grey mustache sat atop old, weathered lips. Deep lines creased his face from cheeks to eyes. Those eyes squinted, and then widened.

The man’s chest erupted in a spray of blood, twelve inches of steel protruding from his breastbone.

Loren screamed.

The man gurgled and sagged. His lifeblood soaked her, dousing Loren’s cloak. She saw Gregor behind him as he fell. The giant’s eyes shone cold and baleful, like the blue flame of an ancient king’s funeral pyre. His boot lashed out, kicking the man toward the wagon’s front.
 

Outside, Loren could hear the sounds of ringing steel and men screaming death. The wagon’s canvas could not mute the screams. Loren feared she would hear them as long as she lived.

Loren leapt up and threw off her cloak. Blood had soaked through it in places, and she could feel it pressing upon her skin. She stumbled past Gregor, who did not move a muscle.

She lost her footing on the wagon’s edge and crashed to the ground on her shoulder. Pain lanced her chest. Loren scarcely noticed it as she rolled over onto her stomach and retched. She lost the night’s salted meat, thick and chunky, reeking of bile. She vomited until her stomach offered no more, and then lay unmoving save for her heaving chest.

Loren had known death before. No one went forever without accidents. She had seen people crushed by falling oaks, or wasting away from infection after a wayward axe claimed a finger. But never had she seen a man murdered in cold blood, stabbed through the back.

The sounds of death subsided. Gregor’s men had won before their foes knew of the battle. A half-dozen corpses littered the ground.

Soft footsteps drew Loren’s gaze upward. Damaris loomed. Her dark eyes found Loren’s green ones.

“Whose blood stains your tunic?”

Loren looked down at herself and saw the crimson streaks.
 

“Why would . . . they were
King’s
men!” Loren tried to stand, but wobbly knees soon made her think better.

“Aye, and with noses too keen.”

“They would not have killed me! They did only their duty!”

Damaris’s brow crinkled for a moment, and she softly shook her head. “Oh, simple child. You think too highly of your worth to believe I played this hand for you. You are an amusing companion, but I do not risk the King’s wrath for mirth alone.”

Loren finally found the strength to stand and slowly gained her feet. Gregor appeared by his lady’s side in a blink. His blade lay bare and dripping blood. Loren swayed backward to lean against the wagon.

A quiet, persistent voice screamed in the back of her mind, growing ever louder. Soon, she could make out the words:
Mennet, Nightblade, Mennet, Nightblade, Mennet, Nightblade, you fool.

“For what, then?” said Loren. “For your hidden panels and your packets of brown cloth? What do you judge worth these lives—lives of men you did not know, who may leave widows or orphans behind?”

Damaris rolled her eyes. In that gesture, Loren saw a wealth of dismissal, a wide ocean of scorn and embarrassment. “The nine lands make widows and orphans of us all in the end. Nine lands are the rule, and joyous folk the exception. Not needless do we spill blood, I said—but I did not say we feared to, or had not before.”

Loren blanched. “What of me, then? Do you mean to send me to the dark forest with them?”

Damaris shrugged. “Why should I?”

Loren did not know what madness seized her, but she needed to understand the manner and meaning of what had happened. “I have seen this.” She gestured around at the soon to be rotting bodies, unable to look. “How could you let me live, fearing that I might reveal today’s deeds?”

“Do you mean to?” Rather than fear or anger, Damaris displayed only faint amusement.

Loren said nothing.
 

“Your wisdom is, again, a welcome surprise. If you think you could report this to the King’s law and escape justice, you are sorely mistaken. These men died, in part, to keep safe my cargo. But, too, they died to protect you in your flight from the constables. You would face the block for that, and find your own way to the dark forest apace. None who walk shaded from the law may withstand its burning light.”

Loren shuddered to hear the ghost of her own thoughts on the merchant’s tongue.

“Now, come,” Damaris continued. “I tire of this argument and its lack of purpose. You will help rid the ground of this . . . mess. Gregor will instruct you.”

Loren’s knees grew weak. “Me? I do not . . . I could not.”

“Oh, not alone,” said Damaris. “Gregor’s men will manage the bulk. But you will help and learn something of value. Who knows but that you will need to dispose of a mess or two yourself one day—you will find it no worthless skill.”

Words of denial, of protest leapt to Loren’s mind.
Nightblade did not murder.
Nor would she. But those words died under Damaris’s steely glare. Instead, Loren bowed her head. And when Gregor summoned his men and set them to drag the corpses off by their limbs, Loren walked beside them.

She watched lifeless heads bounce against the ground. The constable’s face pinched thin and reedy, reminding Loren of a squirrel. A thin, pathetic mustache clung to his upper lip—and that lip sat drowned in blood, probably summoned by the man’s dying coughs. His chest lay open, and slimy ropes trailed behind him in the dirt. The others wore simple clothes, no uniforms. One of Gregor’s men, too, had been killed. Bodies numbered eight in all.