The first one comes at me low. I cannot lift my arm to block. I do not try. I step into his lunge, letting his blade scrape uselessly against my pauldron, and drive my skull forward. My tusk meets his face with a wet, sickeningcrunch. He collapses, his nose and teeth a ruin.
The second one hesitates, his eyes wide. It is the opening I need. I pivot on my heel, my good hand clamping onto his sword arm, and Ipullhim off balance, right into the path of a third mercenary who was charging from the side. They collide, a tangle of limbs and curses.
I do not wait. I shove them both away and a wave of black, sickening dizziness washes over me. The poison surges. My legs, suddenly numb, buckle under my weight. I fall to one knee, my good hand braced in the filthy mud, my head bowed. The world is a gray, spinning tunnel.
Get up. Get up. She is watching.
From my knee, my gaze darts to the side. A movement. A new variable.
A rickety, two-wheeled cart, pulled by a single, terrified taura, is trying to get through the checkpoint. The driver is a zagfer elf, his face pale and sweating as he argues with a guard, trying to get his load of stiff, stinking taura hides out of the city before the gates are sealed.
It is my only chance. It is not even a chance. It is a miracle.
Krell sees me look. His eyes follow my gaze. "No," he hisses, realizing the plan a second too late. "Stop him! Do not let him reach the cart!"
Krell lunges.
But I am already moving. I do not bother fighting Krell. I roar, a deafening sound of pure, desperate agony and rage, and use my last burst of strength, surging up from my knee. I am not a warrior. I am a force of nature.
I smash into the zagfer elf by the cart. He is light as a bundle of sticks. The elf does not move fast enough. I grab him by the front of his tunic with my one good arm and Ihurlhim. The elf sails through the air, a screaming, pinwheeling shape, and crashes into the spear-wall of the city guards. They scatter, aclatter of dropped spears and panicked shouts, as the elf’s body breaks their line.
It is the opening I need.
I turn to Aurora. She is staring, her face shocked. "Othic!"
"Get in!" I roar. I grab her, my bloody hand seizing her waist. My arm screams in protest. My grip, slick with my own blood, slips. She cries out. I do not have the strength to lift her.
No!
I roar in fury, half at her, half at my own weakness, and instead I hoist her, shoving her bodily onto the cart with a brutal, desperate heave. She lands hard, a small, breathless cry lost in the chaos, disappearing into the pile of stiff, stinking hides.
Krell is on me. "Traitor!" His sword slashes across my back, a line of pure fire.
I ignore it. I am fading. The poison. The blood loss. I have seconds. I do not try to climb onto the cart. I lunge for the driver's seat, my hand fumbling for the reins, my fingers numb and clumsy. I grab the rough leather, wrapping it around my wrist.
The taura is screaming, its eyes white with terror, its hooves stamping in the mud. Krell is at my back, raising his sword for a killing blow.
I have no weapon.
I kick backward, a blind, desperate mule-kick. My heavy boot connects with Krell's chest with a dull, satisfying thud. I hear his ribs crack as he flies backward into the mud.
I roar at the taura, a sound of pure, primal command, and whip the reins. The cart lurches forward with a crack of wood, its wheels finding purchase. It smashes through the broken spear-wall, scattering guards like pins.
An arrow thunks into the wood by my head. Another hisses past my ear.
I do not look back. I just hold the reins in my one good hand, the world narrowing to a gray, blurry tunnel, as the cart thunders through the North Gate and out into the wild, open darkness of Rach.
10
AURORA
The world is a blur of noise and violence. The clatter of the cart’s wooden wheels on the last of the city cobblestones gives way to the deep, sucking thud of mud as we smash through the North Gate.
Othic roars, a wordless sound of agony and triumph, and whips the reins with his one good arm. I'm thrown back against a pile of stiff, chemically-cured taura hides. The stench is a dead, salty smell that mixes with the hot, coppery reek of Othic’s blood. He is a hard mountain of muscle in front of me, his massive body shielding me from the arrows that are already flying.
Thunk. Thunk. Thunk.
Black-fletched bolts slam into the wood of the cart’s siding, inches from my head. I scream, burying my face in the stiff, stinking hides.
