Osha almost released the arrow but stopped himself as she vanished from his sight behind that far tree. He lowered the bow as he rushed leftward, and then heard her shift the other way in her stumbling. At his next reverse she countered again, keeping the tree between them.
She was listening as he would for any move that he made.
He planted himself in silence. He now needed distance for what he must do.
There was one further thing he had learned of his “gifts” from the Burning Ones. This he had not shared with anyone, even the blood-soaked greimasg’äh.
Osha raised his bow and drew back the arrow with a white metal head ... just as he had one late morning on the way to Wynn’s homeland.
One morning in the Broken Lands, he had stayed out too long in practice. As he had aimed at a far oak’s knot on his final shot of that day, the air grew still, and he let loose. In the same instant, Brot’ân’duivé shouted for his return. The distraction caused a flinch, and his aim shifted.
Even as the arrow left the bow, Osha knew it would miss the oak on the right side. He cursed under his breath and swung the bow out of his way to watch the arrow’s flight.
And the arrow neared the oak in an instant....
Osha heard Aupsha struggling away beyond the far tree, and he let fly through the dark just to the left of the tree’s trunk. In less than a breath, as the arrow passed the trunk, he shifted his hand—and the bow’s hand—directly in line with the tree.
It was not just the bow’s white metal handle that answered to the call of a like arrowhead.
Both were one and answered to each other.
That late morning alone in the woods, as the greimasg’äh had called out, the arrow missed the oak on the left instead of on the right ... when he had shifted the bow out of his line of sight.
Out in the dark, the arrow’s flight turned slightly as if nudged by a sudden breeze.
It vanished beyond and behind the tree, and Osha took off at a run before Aupsha even shrieked.
He only hoped—wished—the wound was not mortal as he rounded that far tree. And he saw nothing but the small trunk containing the orb rolling and crackling through low weeds down a slope to his feet.
Osha left the trunk where it lay and ran on, fitting the already-bloodstained arrow to his bow’s string. Atop the rise, he halted to listen. The only sounds he heard were those caused by the wind in the forest. He lowered the bow to his side and held its arrow against the string with his left hand.
Even if Aupsha had slipped away upon the breeze, she would be too far downwind to quickly double back for the trunk. She had been wounded again, though he did not know how badly or where. He could track her again by the second arrow carried with her once—if—she reappeared.
Osha hurried downslope for the trunk—and the bow twisted in his grip.
He halted, looking down it, for he had not raised the bow up to seek out an arrow.
One step below the rise’s crest lay the arrow he had guided around the tree. Its white metal head was obscured with blood, as was two-fingers’ width of its shaft. He snatched it up as he ran and slid downslope, for there was no time left to wonder where Aupsha had gone now.
Osha slung his bow over his shoulder as he slid both arrows back into his quiver. He grabbed the trunk containing the orb and stalled for an instant at its weight. Then he went running through the forest for the road. Often glancing behind himself, he hurried back for Wynn.
No one, especially a cloaked and masked shadow, reappeared among the trees.
Osha had the orb. He had not failed Wynn.
Chane ran with Shade in his arms, and she did not stir even once at being jostled so roughly. Her breaths were still slow and shallow. The blow might have done more damage than he could sense or see.
Back in the clearing, he had hesitated only long enough to grab the blood-smeared orb key off the duke’s—Sau’ilahk’s—shredded neck. He then quickly hung it around his own neck and retrieved his swords before he had gathered up Shade.
Amid his flight, shocks of pain shot through Chane’s back into his chest as he began to wonder ... to fear....
Had the death of the duke’s body truly taken Sau’ilahk with it? Had the wraith been trapped and killed by that as well? And, worse, how much should he tell Wynn?
She—they—had one too many times believed Sau’ilahk to be finished off. How could he tell her what he had realized in the final moment as he had faced the duke, and then share his own uncertainty? What was crueler, to know or not, and either way be left in doubt?
Unable to even shout at Shade to awaken, Chane looked down on her. He let hunger come again to eat his pain and charged faster through the trees than a living man could have with such burdens. His anger grew at the knowledge that even Wynn—or anyone within reach—might be unable to do anything for Shade.
Wynn anxiously watched for Osha’s return, for he had been gone far too long. She was about to go after him when Captain Martelle climbed to his feet.
Looking around, the captain appeared beyond confused. There were two other guards on the ground. One of them wasn’t moving, but the other began to stir as the last of the keep guards stumbled from the trees with a large knot on his forehead. That one stopped and stared at the others as Martelle continued turning slowly, looking everywhere.
Karl Beáumie was nowhere to be seen.
Wynn was lost for what to do. If she ran after Osha, what would happen if Chane and Shade returned to face the guards? She looked into the northern trees, but even if they were returning, it was too dark to see anything in there.
Someone snatched the staff out of Wynn’s hand.
She turned in surprised anger and looked up into the bleary and equally angry eyes of Captain Martelle. He now held her staff in one hand and a sword in the other.
“Where is the duke?” he demanded.
Wynn hesitated again, trying to think of a believable lie. “He ran off ... after ... after some of the Sumans turned on him. My swordsman went after him.”
For the moment, trying to take her staff back would be foolish, even if Martelle believed her. She could hardly blame him, since she’d used the staff to blind him and his men. Grabbing the staff in a sudden lunge to ignite a flash might not work this time.
Martelle’s angry expression turned confused as well, and he didn’t make another threatening move. After all, she was a sage, and Aupsha was the one who had actually attacked his men, though they wouldn’t recognize the servant woman the way she was attired now.
All that became pointless as the captain stepped around her and headed for the wagon’s front end and the dead horse. Wynn clenched her jaw as she followed. What would he think when he saw the dead bodies of the Sumans that lay beyond the overturned wagon?
The horse she’d freed had rushed off but remained in sight down the road. The captain halted before he fully rounded the dead one, and Wynn knew what stalled him.
A headless body lay there, likely Chane’s first opponent.
She circled wide so as not to startle the captain, but by the look on his face, he wasn’t remotely troubled by the deaths of the duke’s foreign guards. Perhaps he understood that something was terribly wrong with his duke and this was all part of it, but Wynn grew worried over something more. She stopped herself from spinning frantically to search and perhaps prodding the captain to act rashly.
The one wounded but still-living Suman was gone from behind the wagon.
Wynn swallowed hard, half wishing she hadn’t let Osha stop her.
Martelle stepped along the wagon’s back, but Wynn again looked down the road—and still there was no sign of Osha. She considered whether to tell the captain what was truly happening here. When she glanced back, he had paused, taking in all that he saw. He finally stopped studying the carnage and almost turned.