The land was dark, bare, empty except for the four of them. Their feet pattered across the packed earth. No voices escaped the wall. Noises from the forest were still distant. It was an alien feeling, but an advantageous one—any attacker would give them plenty of warning.
Slowly the fortress, Vivian’s home for the past year, receded. The trees loomed up ahead. Darkness spread under their leaves. That was a point in their favor, too, but Vivian had to remind herself of the advantage.
“Head left,” said Emeth quietly. “There’s a game trail. Takes us through some underbrush.”
They veered to one side, passing beneath the first branches that the defenders had left intact. Vivian spotted the trail Emeth had mentioned, which was barely more than a slightly worn spot in the undergrowth. Most animals had stopped coming so far out months before.
She took the lead, Olvir falling in behind her. Branches were their greatest danger at first, and Vivian used Ulamir to great effect, slicing off any bit that threatened to put an eye out or snag on their clothing.
As they went on, alert for movement on any side, their passage did get easier. Game was scarce here, so close to both humanity and the twistedmen, but elk, bear, and larger beasts had roamed freely once. The path still bore the tracks of their passage. Moreover, the deeper shade farther into the forest killed off most of the underbrush.
It would have been a pleasant walk in other circumstances. Leaves were unfurling on the trees that weren’t evergreens, blue sky occasionally showed through the cracks above, and sunlight filtered down in small patches. Alert as Vivian was, her body responded favorably to new sights and sounds, to freedom from the same walls and people she’d been looking at for weeks, and to the chance to stretch her legs without actively being in danger of losing them.
The body was fundamentally illogical. There were many times when this was unfortunate, but a few when it came in handy. Trouble would be in good supply in the future. For the moment, there was the forest, the day, and for some variety of last time, her friends.
Vivian kept her sword out, kept watching the trees for movement and listening for sounds, but let her chest ease and her breathing deepen. When a smile snuck onto her face, she let it linger there.
All was not well. It never was. She’d learned, over the years, that it didn’t have to be.
* * *
Vivian’s shoulders had a slightly jaunty set to them as the group went onward, Olvir noticed. He wasn’t observing her most of the time, trying to scan the forest for threats instead, but she was ahead of him. Forming an impression or two was inevitable.
Therefore Olvir noticed that Vivian walked as though she were really on a hunting party on some noble estate rather than the middle of hostile territory. He also noticed the firm roundness of her backside and the length of her pleasantly curving legs, clearly outlined by tight gray deerskin, but quickly brought his attention back above her waist, doing his best to be respectful.
They hadn’t had to travel much when they’d worked together before, so Vivian’s long, light stride hadn’t made an impression on Olvir. Now he took note. Emeth had something of the same pace she did, which meant it was likely part of the Order of the Dawn’s training, but Emeth was shorter, her body more angular and her motions choppier. She darted from one spot to the next, while Vivian glided.
Granted, Emeth also had a shorter journey in front of her.
It wasn’t very long, in fact, before she stopped and held up a hand, bringing the other three to a halt. They stood in a small bare patch, not quite big enough to be a clearing worth the name, with spots of dark-green moss and yellow-green celandine breaking up the brown of the dirt.
Emeth reached into a pouch at her waist and came out with a palm full of wheat kernels. Looking up into the trees, she pursed her lips. The sound that emerged was exactly like the calls of greenwings that Olvir had been hearing every spring of his life. A young member of that species promptly flew down, ate a few of the kernels, and sat on Emeth’s wrist.
The Sentinel let out another series of chirps and trills. Vivian chuckled. “Sure, she can talk to every creature but the nobility,” she told Olvir and Kev.
“Why would I want to?” Emeth asked, not taking her eyes from the bird until it flew off, its feathers matching the celandine almost perfectly as it rose against the forest’s shadows. “With luck, this won’t be long. They’re some of the quickest around by day.”
“We must seem very ponderous to them,” said Olvir.
“Oh, yes. I’m a slug to most of the creatures I talk to.”
“Do you talk to slugs, Sentinel?” Kev asked.
“Tried a few times but didn’t get much of a response. Birds and bats are easiest of the wild things. Wolves aren’t bad either, but not useful right now and probably asleep.”
“I wouldn’t mind a wolf or two for company,” said Vivian.
“You know they wouldn’t go with you.”
“No?” Kev asked, though he hadn’t looked like he liked the idea at all when Vivian mentioned it.
“Beasts don’t understand about Thyran. His Twisted hunt them for sport when they can catch them, so wolves might attack the bastards when they encounter one another, but leaders far away make no sense to them. They wouldn’t come fight beside humans or seek out Twisted to kill. And I can’t make animals—or anyone—do what I want against their will. That’d be Gizath’s arts,” Emeth added and spat through her fingers in a gesture of aversion. Kev did the same.
Vivian made the fourfold sign instead, and so did Olvir. It was a reflex after twenty-odd years. He was more than halfway through before he thought, and then hesitating would have drawn attention.
He went on, alert for any odd sensation, then felt foolish when none occurred.
Naturally. He’d been making warding signs almost his whole life, and all that time he’d been…
