* * *
Hadwe gone south or east, things might have been different. I’ll never know. But the North was where the fiercest fighting was that fateful night… and where my true enemies waited.
* * *
The three ofus reached the battle lines and supported the Vauphani troops already fighting, most without armor, some in nothing but nightshirts, fighting without weapons. They’d been caught mostly unawares, sleeping, but they fought fiercely, knowing their lives were on the line.
Silence, Sparrow, and I fought as a unit, Silence and me in front, Sparrow behind, using her bow to pick off targets coming from the sides. I was quick. Silence was quicker, darting in and out, avoiding the slashes of axes and swords. My spear worked well, I had a longer reach than most of the enemy and dealt with them before they were a threat. But then some strong man caught the haft of the weapon as it was thrust at him. A quick jerk and he pulled it from my hands. Sparrow put an arrow through him a moment later, but I didn’t have time to pick up the weapon with others rushing in. I had to switch to swords.
I was surprised to find out how good I was in the chaos of a melee. I would have assumed dedicated soldiers were well trained… and it isn’t that they weren’t… but my training seemed to have been… better.
The fighting drew close, the enemy on all sides. Sparrow had thrown down her bow and was using her sword now, the three of us fighting in a tight circle. We may have been better trained, but the sheer number of the enemy was wearing us down. We were all bleeding from nicks and cuts, nothing serious… yet.
“I love you… both!” Silence called out. I couldn’t see him in that moment and couldn’t spare a glance for fear of an enemy taking advantage of my lapse in attention. But when I heard him grunt in pain… I couldn’t help myself.
I looked quickly to see him holding his stomach, shield lost, but he was fighting still. I returned to my foes, but felt my worry spike.
He’ll not last long with a wound like that.
It’s a gut wound. He’ll last long enough.
Long enough for what?I asked Auwei.
But she had no answer.
Yet it turned out she was right.
A moment later fresh Vauphan troops found us, these ones well-armed and armored. They had probably been at the center of the camp and had time to prepare for the fight. They swept past us and the three of us were left in their wake.
Silence fell to his knees, and Sparrow and I both dropped our weapons to turn and try to catch him as he swayed.
We helped him lay back. His gaze flicked back and forth between us. “I love you,” he kept saying.
Spirits no! Don’t die you wonderful, innocent man!
I pulled up the light padding under my armor to get a handful of my webbing. “Show me the wound!” I said urgently. He didn’t quite seem to understand me, but Sparrow was able to pry his hand away from his belly. I could tell instantly, it had been a stab, not a slash. A small opening, not a long one, but that meant it might also be deep, which seemed likely given how it was gushing blood. I pressed the webbing over the wound, hoping to close and clot it, pressing hard. “Tear up his shirt,” I commanded Sparrow. “We need bandages.”
“It’s filthy.”
“It’s better than nothing!”
She nodded and began to rip off this shirt then tear it into strips, tying them together so we could wind it around his mid-section. He lost consciousness, but was still breathing, if shallowly.
I couldn’t lose him.
Turning to Sparrow, tears in my eyes and hoarse desperation in my voice I said, “Find Ant, please!”
She nodded and flitted away as a bird a moment later. Her night sight might not be good, but Ant was massive and hopefully easy to find.
The sounds of battle receded. I hoped that meant the enemy was retreating. I wasn’t paying attention. I should have been, but I was consumed with simply trying to keep Silence alive as if by force of will alone. He just needed to survive long enough for Ant to get here and heal him; just that long. But time seemed to pull and stretch. Every instant with Silence felt like an eternity. My vision became blurred with tears. TheHerogift inside me hardened into a terrible thing fused to revenge. If Silence died, so help the Elistan army. I’d slay them all myself!
“There she is.”
At first, I thought the female voice was Sparrow, leading Ant to where I was. It was a testament to how addled I was, that it took me far longer than it should to realize two things:
First: that wasn’t Sparrow’s voice, but I’d heard it before…
Second: there were more than two people drawing close to me. My hairs pricked up and my spider sense detected a group of five; and three of them were in the forms of large cats.
