The Lioness

“Water-ship-people—” She stopped, her heart leaping suddenly into her throat. “People coming out of the forest—”

In a long line they came, men and women with children by the hand or on their hips. Kerian counted twenty. They were bound one to the other, and they went attended by weaponed guards. Sunlight ran along the edges of naked blades and pricked on the tips of steel-headed arrows.

“What, Keri? What do you see?”

Shaking, Kerian watched as four boats left the ship rowed by humans. Her stomach felt queasy; her throat went suddenly dry. The boats landed, the prisoners made to run. Up from the beach came the sound of children wailing. Kerian shivered, watching as the prisoners were loaded into the boats, some flung in, others made to move by the pricking of steel. One by one, the guards climbed in after and in short time the rowers had the boats out into the bay again.

“Keri!” Iydahar’s voice held a note of impatience now. “What do you see?”

Tears pricked Kerian’s eyes. She saw the boats return to the ship.

She saw that not all of those who had put the captured Wilder Elves into the hands of slavers had gone with the boats. Five—she counted them carefully—five turned and went back up the beach, into the forest. Five returned to their tribes, their filthy work done.

Years passed, and Kerian earned her tattoos, became known to all as Kerian Wing-Swift. One day she and her brother were caught and taken for “service” in Qualinost. On that day, the two huddled together in the hold of a ship very much like the one Kerian had seen in the waters off Ergoth from the top of a tall pine.

Keri can’t catch me!

The old taunt drifted up from memory and present need.

A swathe had been cut through the forest wide enough for a patrol of six Knights on broad battle chargers to ride abreast. Jagged stumps of killed trees lined the roadside, beyond lay the ruin of trees that the workmen had not had the decency to dry for firewood but left to rot. Tangles of trunks and branches loomed like a barrier between road and forest.

Kerian had a walk of several hours ahead if she wanted to reach the Hare and Hound before nightfall—and she did want that. She wanted to be well off this road with its dead trees like skeletons before dark.

High above, leaves whispered and, higher, crows called; from the middle terrace, softer notes of dove-song drifted down. Shadows gathered here in the wood. Kerian shifted the broad leather strap and the weight of the leather wallet on her shoulder. The will to run like her brother gathered in heart, legs, and lungs.

Under her feet a storm of thunder gathered. The wounded earth groaned beneath the weight of steel shod war-horses.

Knights!

Kerian looked ahead and behind. Quickly, not choosing her direction, she bolted. She ran off the road, scrambling in the stony earth, slipping and sliding down the pitched edge. A rock turned under her foot, her ankle collapsed beneath her. Kerian tumbled to her knees and rolled. She didn’t stop until she fetched up against the barrier of white birches. Hands scraped to bleeding, she pushed up to her feet. Her ankle throbbed, but it took her weight or would for a while. Braced against a white birch, bark peeling under her hand, Kerian stood still, trying to decide how to dare the barrier of broken trees.

On the road, the thunder of horses grew louder. A rough voice shouted something—one vile word in Common. Heart slamming in her chest, Kerian looked around wildly before plunging into the deadfall. Branches tore at her face, at her hair, ripped her shirt as she shouldered through the tangle. Her ankle gave way, she fell, and scrambled up again. On the road, the sound of riding grew, harsh voices shouted to each other. Damning her ankle, her bleeding face, Kerian shoved her way into the thicket of dead trees.

Almost through, the strap of her wallet snagged on the last branch. She pulled, she tried to twist away. On the road the Knights grew closer. Cursing in the language of her childhood, a word her parents had never taught, she yanked her little knife out of the belt sheath and severed the wallet by the strap. She reached for it as it fell—

“Ho!” cried a voice from the road. “Chance, what’s that! Supper, eh?”

Supper: a deer in the thicket, a wild turkey, a covey of quails?

Kerian left the wallet, and heedless of the noise she made now, ran. Tripping, falling, and climbing up again, she put as much distance between herself and the road as she could. Headlong, she splashed through a shallow stream, soaking her boots. She slipped on stones, on patches of fallen leaves.

The last time she fell, she did not rise.

All around her, the forest seemed to waver. Her mouth ran dry; she tried to swallow and failed. The air seemed to press against her ears, against her temples. As from a great distance, she heard the Knights, their voices raised in sharp cries, yet she couldn’t make out their words.