NOW: WARRIOR
Outside in the cold night air, with the heavy door shut behind us, Reed made us flatten against the city wall as best we could.
“Do you see guards?” I asked, watching him swivel his head slowly, his eye squinted. “We had to have missed their rotation.”
“I don’t, but it doesn’t matter,” he answered me. “There’s a chance the fire is a distraction. We have to make for the timber forest and hope for the best.”
“I don’t think I have it in me, brother,” Evangeline said.
“Give her to me,” Reed said, stepping to where the three of us were sagging against the wall. He circled his right arm around her, just under her arms, and then bent to put his left arm under her knees.
“I’m too much for you,” she protested. “You’re not Dermid.”
“Don’t insult me,” he quipped and shifted her weight so that her head could loll to his shoulder.
I could tell she was a strain. Reed was a strong man, but Evangeline was so close in size and strength to him.
It was slow going to the timber forest, which in our approach toSkow had seemed so close but was now farther along the dust road than I had understood. And it was all uphill.
Ilsit and I both had wounded limbs, and we held them to our fronts, staggering after Reed towards the dim, dark line of trees ahead. Reed would grunt, Evangeline would say to just let her die on the ground, and then he would shush her and redouble his efforts to hold her close. His neck and face were slick with sweat.
After what seemed like a long stretch of time, the hulk of Dermid’s shape came into sight, and I realized he was striding towards us from the trees.
“My girl,” he cried, forgetting we were supposed to remain hidden. He pulled Evangeline from Reed’s quivering arms and held her close.
“It’s bad, Dermid,” she said.
Keir and Tessa were there, full of questions.
In the distance, I could see the small shapes that must have been Jade, Adelaide, and Fox still in the forest.
“We stick to the plan,” Reed barked at Keir. “Get Evangeline in the wagon. Get people mounted. Get everyone in line and make for the road.”
The wagon with the false bottom had four horses harnessed to it aside from our four Dermid had liberated that morning and Zara, who was tied to the wagon’s back. Evangeline was situated inside, lying down on her stomach, her head between Jade and Ilsit. I was at her side, lifting up her tunic and the leather jerkin she wore that was similar to Reed’s. At her feet huddled Fox and Adelaide, Daisy’s whimpers louder than I had ever heard them. Tessa swung herself up into the driver’s seat. Outside, Keir, Reed, and Dermid mounted their horses, and we set out on the road.
In the wagon, I ascertained that the wound in Evangeline’s back was fatal, but I kept my mouth shut. “Make her comfortable,” I mouthed at Jade and Ilsit. Then I offered our friend lightleaf.
“I’ve gone numb,” she explained, dismissing me. “Promise me you’ll look after my boys,” she went on. “They are the only family Iever knew. You know my grandmother? The woman who owned the brothel? That wasn’t my real grandmother. My mother abandoned me there, and the owner took me under her wing, didn’t want to give me to an orphanage. And Dermid, one of her guards, he was a lot younger then. And he took me underhiswing, trained me to fight. Taught me how to be muscle for hire.”
“Are you sure I cannot ease your pain?” I asked again.
“If I’d’ve been a man, oh, I could have been a decorated soldier,” Evangeline sighed. “But this was more fun, I think. I was a guard. I had my brothers. Then this journey as a scout. I’m glad I won’t die in their city of death. I’m glad it’s with you. It’s a free death, you understand? That’s more than some folk get.”
“Shh,” Ilsit chided her, tears sliding down her face. “You be quiet and rest, you absolute madwoman. Saved my life, my bloody gods.”
“You’re my favorite,” Evangeline said, smiling into the hand Ilsit had placed on her cheek. “You’re so ornery all the time.”
When we stopped, forced to make camp halfway through the day as the horses were all worn, her brothers lifted the back of the wagon covering to see her peacefully laid out among us, appearing to be asleep.
95
NOW: SISTER
Dermid wept openly for hours, inconsolable. He had lifted Evangeline from the wagon and cradled her facing away from us, his back against a tree.
Our camp was silent and perfunctory. My right hand was swollen from Starling’s stamping, but none of the bones were broken from what I could tell, and I was able to bandage the cuts Reed and Ilsit had sustained. Tessa and Jade passed around cheese and bread, though no one wanted to eat.
“We have to keep going,” Jade said when Keir waved her away. “You yourself said we won’t be out of harm’s way until we reach Eccleston.”
