Fool’s Quest

I had ceased my struggling but Shun fought on, shouting and kicking. Vindeliar was there, smiling a warm welcome at me, and I knew then how Kerf had been used against us to do Dwalia’s will. Alaria held me captive, firmly gripping the back of my coat and my arm as she pulled me toward the small campfire. I had dreaded to see the soldiers still there, but there was just one horse, a blanket pegged from the ground to a tree as a sort of shelter, and a small fire burning. Dwalia’s face was bruised. She rushed at me and seized my other arm.

“Hurry!” she whisper-shouted at the others. “They are still hunting for us. Two of them passed at the bottom of the hill not long ago. We must get the shaysim away from here as quickly as we can.” She shook me roughly by the sleeve. “And don’t think to pass yourself off as a boy any longer! A girl. Not what we were sent after. But you’re the only coin we have to buy our way back into good graces at Clerres. Hurry! Get her under control! Don’t let her scream! She’ll bring them down on us if she hasn’t already!”

They had dragged Shun from her horse and Kerf had a firm grip on her wrist. “What’s wrong with you? You’re safe now!” he kept saying. She bared her teeth at him, still struggling.

“Hold her!” Dwalia ordered the two luriks and thrust me at them. Alaria seized my wrist and Reppin took my other arm. They gripped me between them, holding my arms so tightly that they almost lifted me off the ground. From a pouch at her hip, Dwalia had pulled out a scroll and a single strange glove. I could not tell what it was made from. The hand of it was pale and thin, almost translucent, but to three of the fingertips a shriveled silvery button had been attached.

“I don’t even know if this will work,” Dwalia said, and her voice shook. She unrolled the scroll and held it by the tiny fire. They had shielded it with packed snow on all sides to keep us from seeing it too soon. She had to bend close. She studied something written on it, then straightened and ordered, “Bring her, bring both of them to the stone. I will go first, then Vindeliar. Alaria, take Vindeliar’s hand and grip the shaysim tight. Reppin, you take the shaysim’s other hand, and also Kerf’s. Kerf, bring the woman. Soula, you are last. We’ll have to leave the horses.”

My head was spinning. Still caught, still dragged along with them, into ever greater danger. I could imagine no good ending for us. I had no idea why she wished us all to hold hands. Reppin gripped my wrist as if she wished to break it. Perhaps she did. Kerf was not as mean but he had stripped his mittens off to grip my other wrist. There would be no tugging free. I tried. He smiled benignly as I struggled. How had I not seen how dazed he was?

I heard voices through the trees. Chalcedean. They were calling to one another in Chalcedean. “Now!” Dwalia cried, and she sounded almost hysterical. I could not make out what she intended to do, and then I saw the standing stone that now leaned drunkenly, nearly toppled by the immense spruce that had grown up beside it.

“No!” I cried as Dwalia gripped Vindeliar and reached toward the faded glyph with her gloved hand. “No, it’s dangerous! My father said it’s dangerous!” But her hand touched the stone and I saw her dragged in. She did not release Vindeliar and he followed her, and then Alaria. I screamed and I heard an answering scream from Shun. Then, in an instant as brief as a flash of lightning, I saw. I understood. Change it. One tiny chance to change it. Not for me. My escaping was too unlikely. Reppin would never release me, and if she did, they’d come back for me. But I could change it for Shun. I suddenly coiled down, mouth wide, to where Kerf’s bared hand gripped my wrist. I bit his forefinger as hard as I could, sinking my teeth into the second joint, tasting his blood as he yelped. He let go of Shun to slap at me but I held tight to his hand, teeth, and fingers as I dragged him with me into a tarry darkness dotted with distant stars.

Chapter Twenty-Seven Aftermath