The Lady of Toryn Anthology (Lady of Toryn trilogy) (40 page)

All three of them turned to look
at the Toryn army, only visible by the lights of the torches they carried. It
was obvious that the army was stopping. If it was to make camp, Ashlyn
realized, this might be their chance.

“Let’s wait,” she said. “We can
get closer once they’re settled and work out what we’re going to do.”

She halted her horse, who stood
placidly and strangely content, despite the fact that they’d been riding most
of the day.

“Has it occurred to you that this
might be a ploy?” Drake asked. “Devlyn must know that we’re tracking him. He
might have bound your father so that you would assume Lord Li is innocent and
attempt a rescue.”

“I don’t think so,” Skye replied
before Ashlyn could speak up. “You and I could be tracking him, but he has no
reason to think that Ashlyn would. The wounds that she sustained would have
been life-threatening in any other situation. It was only thanks to you that
she’s all right.”

“Skye is right. No one but you
could have possibly healed my ribs without killing me,” Ashlyn said, “and Kou
has no idea how skilled you are with magic, so he probably thinks I’m
still…incapacitated or whatever. Actually…that might be why he’s moving now.
Maybe he’s hoping to attack Toryn before I get there.”

The three of them sat silently in
darkness for a long while, as the torches of the army continued to mill around
erratically. Ashlyn supposed it was fortunate that these soldiers weren’t very
well-organized, but she wished they’d hurry and set up camp.

Her mind wandered, her thoughts
straying to the tattoo she had removed from her ankle. Sometimes rash behavior
was gratifying, but right now she felt pretty dumb. Her father was clearly not
leading this rebellion, and Kou and Tag were clearly not her brothers. For all
she knew, every member of the Li bloodline was still rigidly documented inside
the scrolls in the gong library, and she’d scrubbed that tattoo off for
nothing.

Leaving on her own was a poor
decision, too, but in the heat of the moment, with Drake’s rejection still
ringing in her ears, it had seemed like the right choice. Maybe if she’d stuck
to the original plan and left Toryn with Skye and Drake in tow, she would have
already rescued her father and reached the city by now. She felt stupid and
foolish, but it was too late to change anything.

A tingle ran down her spine, and
Ashlyn glanced up to see Drake watching her, his eyes glowing faintly in the
darkness.

“They’ve settled,” Skye said
before Ashlyn could react. “Ash, let’s you and me move in and assess the
situation.”

She obediently dismounted her
horse, handing the reins to Drake again. This time she met his eyes boldly,
daring him to continue their earlier conversation.

“Be careful,” was all he said.

She followed Skye closely,
keeping low to the ground as she inched forward. The darkness was a convenient
cloak to their movements, but the army was unusually quiet, and Ashlyn had to
take great care to keep silent.

The soldiers had camped as they
marched, strung out in a thin ribbon along the path on which they had marched
rather than grouping together. It would be more to Ashlyn’s advantage than
Kou’s, because the soldiers would have difficulty making their way to the
source of the battle if she, Skye and Drake were using magic to put barriers in
their path.

Ashlyn and Skye had to move
further up the line to find Kou again, but he was easily identified, removing
his horse’s tack as other ninjas worked to erect small tents in the area around
him. His movements were smooth and unhurried. Ashlyn found herself clenching
her fists, angry at his casual attitude. She wanted nothing more than to
inflict the same kind of pain and suffering on this man as he had on her
father.

As she watched, two soldiers
untied Lord Li and eased him down off the horse. His arms and legs were
trembling fiercely, fingers curled like claws as he clutched his hands to his
chest. Ashlyn’s throat tightened as she watched. She’d never seen her dad
helpless like this before. The dread and pity that welled in her heart were
nearly overwhelming.

The soldiers were not ungentle as
they set her father on his knees, but they did nothing to help him as he fell
forward weakly. The Lord of Toryn, face-down in the dirt, and these men were
doing nothing to aid him. Ashlyn blinked furiously, trying her damnedest not to
cry, and tapped Skye on the shoulder. He glanced back at her, and she motioned
to him to follow as she retreated.

“What’s wrong?” Skye asked when
they reached Drake, and Ashlyn shook her head mutely. She couldn’t speak,
couldn’t think, couldn’t see anything except for her father, near death and
being discarded on the ground like a piece of trash.

She took several steps away from
Skye, facing the darkness of the night, and took one deep breath, then another.
Acting on impulse was what had gotten her into this mess in the first place.
She would not let her dad down this time, not when so much depended on her
ability to stay calm.

Determinedly, she turned and
walked to Skye and Drake. “Okay,” she said. “I’m no tactical genius, but it
shouldn’t be impossible to run in and get them stirred up to the point where
they don’t know who to chase after I’ve rescued my father. I’m not even going
to worry about Kou. Kill him if you can, but the objective here is to get my dad
out. I’m going to run in and use
lightning
to fry as many of them as I can reach. Drake can stick with me as I go in
and use whatever he has to keep the soldiers at a distance, then help get my
dad up on the horse with me. We’re just not going to have time to tie him to
his own horse so I’ll have to carry him with me. Skye, if there is any way you
could open up- I don’t know, a ditch or something, maybe right behind us as
we’re running, that would slow them down in a big way?”

“I think I can help before that,”
Skye said, “using
earth
to create a
protected path towards your father.”

She knew what he meant- raising a
wall of soil on either side of her as she ran- but had never seen him use the
magic that precisely before. “That sounds like a good plan,” she said. “If you
think you can do it, I mean. I don’t want to ask you to be a superhuman here.”

“Aren’t I always?” Skye said with
an easy smile, his teeth gleaming in the faint light. “This isn’t much
different from what Drake and I did earlier when we were rescuing you.”

“I don’t like the term
‘rescuing,’” she said lamely, trying to preserve her dignity, but she was
smiling too. “Oh, one more thing- if we get separated somehow, we meet up back
in Toryn. No running around the forest searching for each other. It’s going to
be too dangerous, and Toryn needs us if the army moves against the city.”

“You got it,” Skye said as he
tightened the cinch on his horse’s saddle. “Are we ready to move?”

“Yes,” Ashlyn said, accepting the
reins from Drake. She checked the cinch and then put her foot into the stirrup,
taking a deep breath before swinging up into the saddle. She checked her sword
and armlet, reassuring herself that all stanes were accounted for, and glanced
at Drake, who was already astride his horse, waiting.

“Here we go,” she whispered, more
to herself than the others, and nudged her horse with her heels. Fear was
unfurling in the pit of her stomach, but she tried to tamp it down. Skye and
Drake were with her- they would help her. They would save her dad.
No need to be afraid.

She urged her horse into a
gallop, clutching the reins in one hand and her shuriken in the other.

The soldiers heard Ashlyn and the
others coming, but for some reason didn’t react immediately, looking up in the
direction of the forest as the hoof beats resounded. The moment Ashlyn left the
protective cover of the trees, she pointed her sword at the closest ninjas and
cast her spell, too breathless to do anything but whisper the words as a
lightning bolt hit the ground in the midst of the group, scattering them. She
followed up with a wave of flame that roared through the frightened soldiers,
singeing everyone in its path.

On her right, Skye used
earth
to literally flip the ground up
beneath a large cluster of advancing ninjas, flinging them backwards and
sending wet soil raining down on top of them.

She urged her horse on, seeing
her father lying in the dirt ahead of her, seeing Kou struggling to calm his
horse so he could climb back on. Ashlyn furiously threw an ice spell in his
direction, but Kou managed to leap out of the way, although his horse reared up
and tore its reins out of his grasp.

Ashlyn continued to pelt the
soldiers around her with fire and lightning, working hard to keep her terrified
horse under control amidst the chaos. For his part, Skye was making it nearly
impossible for any other soldiers to reach them, raising high walls of dirt
around their immediate area and boxing them in with Kou and a handful of
ninjas.

As she drew even with Lord Li, he
turned his head ever so slightly in the dirt, eyes widening as he recognized
her. Ashlyn leapt off her horse, keeping hold of the reins as she hastily
shoved her sword into its sheath on her back. She dropped to her knees beside
her father.

“Hold onto me, Dad!” she yelled,
grabbing one of his arms and hooking it around her neck. She tried to stand,
but he was too heavy. Suddenly there was an explosion next to them and her
horse spooked, shying sideways. Ashlyn held onto the reins and was dragged
across the dirt, losing her grip on her father. She rolled aside, kicking to
get her feet out of a smoldering clump of grass, and scrambled to her feet.
Dirt hailed down on her from one of Skye’s attacks, the blond swordsman
decimating everything around them and scaring her horse even worse.

A ninja appeared beside her.
Ashlyn ducked under his haphazard punch and landed a solid kick to his knee,
knocking his leg out from under him. She followed up with an uppercut, but was
pulled backwards again by her frightened horse before she could land a third
blow. Ashlyn knew she couldn’t let go of the animal or all chance of escape
would be lost. Frustrated, she pulled the horse’s head around with the reins,
turning the animal in circles in an attempt to contain its movement, and trying
to force it back towards her father. In the middle of one rotation, she
glimpsed Drake kneeling next to her dad, his midnight-colored horse standing
calmly beside them.

“
Drake!”
she screamed, and she didn’t think her voice was loud
enough to carry over the noise of battle, but the vampire looked up and met her
eyes.

“Get him out of here!” she
called. Drake nodded and turned, picking up Lord Li easily in his arms. Too
late, Ashlyn saw two ninjas running for Drake with their swords drawn. She
grabbed her shuriken, slicing her hand open in her haste, and flung it
sideways. The hira arced gracefully, slicing across one soldier’s throat and
glancing off the other’s shoulder. Ashlyn turned and vaulted into her saddle,
and her horse was only too happy to run. She urged the animal towards the ninja
who was now raising his sword to strike at Drake, but before she could get
there, Drake pivoted out of the way, awkwardly supporting her dad on one arm
and drawing his pistol with the other. He shot the ninja point blank.

Ashlyn drew her horse to a halt
next to Drake, and the animal skittered sideways, too nervous to stand still.
Ashlyn leaned down, hooking one knee over her horse’s neck as she came out of
the saddle, made a swipe and managed to yank her shuriken from where it was
embedded in the ground.

“Take him,” Drake shouted as she
straightened up in the saddle, and before she could object, he was moving
towards her, lifting her dad across the saddle in front of her just before her
horse danced aside again. Even though she hadn’t been strong enough to pick him
up, Lord Li was still surprisingly easy to support, and Ashlyn curled one arm
across his torso, hooking the fingers of her bleeding hand over his shoulder to
try to anchor him against her. Drake turned away and shot five times in quick
succession, dropping five ninjas who were advancing on him, and used the butt
of his gun to slam a sixth ninja in the face.

There was an explosion right
behind her-
pretty much the worst luck
anyone could have EVER,
Ashlyn thought later- and her stupid horse bolted.
Ashlyn struggled to keep control, wishing with all her might that she had her
own horse, Suki, back right now, and somehow managed to turn the animal back
towards Drake just in time to see him duck under a swing from Kou’s katana.

Ashlyn screamed Skye’s name,
searching for the swordsman amidst the flames and smoke and rain of earth.
Drake was driven back by blow after blow from Kou and two other ninjas,
blocking as best he could with his silver glove. Ashlyn tried to concentrate to
cast
fire
on Kou, but her horse was
moving too much and she was struggling too hard to keep her dad in the saddle
with her.

Terrifyingly, Ashlyn glimpsed a
strike from Kou that landed true- slicing diagonally across Drake’s chest even
as the vampire jumped backwards. Drake fell to his knees, and for one horrible
moment Ashlyn thought that it had been a severe wound, but then her horse spun
angrily, trying to escape from the pressure of the reins, and she lost sight of
Drake for just a moment.