She whirled and sprinted toward the trees. Scree shifted and flew beneath her boots. She zigzagged and ducked around boulders, fearing an arrow would land between her shoulder blades any second. The bowman would not be worried about snipers on the ledge any more.
Something snagged Amaranthe’s legs, constricting them like a rope wrapping around her ankles. She pitched forward. She tried to turn the fall into a roll, but something rooted her feet. The ground came hard and fast. She barely managed to keep from smashing her nose against a rock.
Amaranthe shoved herself upright and scrabbled at her ankles. Nothing visible or tangible bound them.
The shaman strode toward her, pain and fury contorting his face. He gripped his shoulder with his free hand, and blood ran through his fingers.
The bowman followed. He stopped a few paces away, nocked an arrow, and pointed it her direction. Amaranthe gave one last yank to her legs, but they remained rooted.
“We talk now.” The shaman grabbed her wrist and yanked her to her feet.
The pressure wrapping her ankles disappeared, but it was too late to do anything. The shaman had an iron grip, and the bowman appeared competent.
Amaranthe gazed up at the cliff top to the destruction left by the shaman’s magic. If Sicarius had survived the explosion, it seemed he had no means to help her at the moment. If he had not survived…it was her fault.
CHAPTER 14
T he first drops of rain spattered, leaving wet stains on the rocks. Wind whistled through the canyon, tugging at Amaranthe’s clothing and battering the tents surrounding her. The moist air smelled of burning coal and a coming storm. The approaching clouds were almost as dark as the black plumes wafting from a pair of steam shovels working on either side of the camp.
Amaranthe sat on her knees before an unlit fire pit. Ropes bound her ankles to her wrists, which were pulled behind her back, making her shoulders ache. The shaman had marched her past piles of limestone on the way in, but she still had no idea what the men sought. Surely not the rock itself.
The shaman strode out of a tent with a slight wiry man at his heels. The attendant clutched scissors in one hand, tweezers in the other, and a bloody rag dangled over his arm.
“Please, wait, sir. I’m not finished.”
The shaman snarled a chain of words in his tongue. The attendant, who had the darker skin and hair of a Turgonian, lifted his arms in bewilderment. “If you would just sit down for a moment…”
The shaman stopped before Amaranthe. From her knees, she had to crane her neck back to find his eyes.
His bone-blade knife came out, and he rested it at her throat. “Before you die, you will speak to me all you know of Sicarius. All weaknesses, all everything.”
She sat straighter. “Does that mean you didn’t find his body? That he’s still alive?”
The shaman had dispatched a team of men to check, but they had not returned yet.
He scowled. “Much rubble. Probably he dead and buried. You tell me his weaknesses anyway.”
“If he has any, I don’t know them.” She shrugged, deciding on a casual response rather than open defiance. She would tell him nothing, but it would be foolish to declare that and imply there was no point in keeping her alive. “Though he is a poor conversationalist. I don’t know, can you use that?”
The shaman glowered. “You are no funny.”
“No, I suppose not.”
“Sir,” the attendant said. “You’re bleeding all over camp. Shall I get that pistol ball out first?”
The shaman returned his knife to his sheath. “Yes. Mundane weapons no always best way to get answers, and I must have concentration for other ways. No pain.”
They strode into a nearby tent together, leaving Amaranthe wondering what non-mundane interrogation methods he might subject her to. Best to escape and not find out.
The camp lay deep within the canyon. To escape she would have to run past several pickaxe-wielding workers as well as the ambulatory machinery. One step at a time, she told herself. Hands first.
The bowman sat on a boulder, oiling the limbs of his weapon, glancing at her from time to time. She shifted slightly to keep her hands hidden behind her back while she worked at the ropes, trying to dig a thumbnail into a knot. Inside the tent, the shaman spoke to someone in a language she could not understand. He wasn’t conversing with the Turgonian surgeon. So, who was he talking to?
She had encountered a communication device before, in Larocka’s basement, and wondered if the shaman had one inside. Though he had not asked Amaranthe her name, someone, maybe a lot of someones, would soon know Sicarius was up here. If he wasn’t dead.
Amaranthe did not want to consider that possibility. He was too aware; he would have seen or sensed the attack coming. Even if it was magical. He would have run off the ledge before it collapsed. But, if he was alive, wouldn’t he be doing something to help her escape the camp? And to get rid of the shaman before he could report Sicarius’s whereabouts?
Maybe he was injured and needed her help.
Amaranthe doubled her efforts on her bonds, scraping skin raw, but loosening them infinitesimally. She eyed the camp as she worked. If she managed to free her hands, she would need a distraction, a big one considering the shaman could immobilize her from a distance.
Wind battered the tents framing the fire pit, though not enough to blow open flaps so she could see inside. A crate sitting beside one caught her eye. A faded stamp read, Blasting sticks. That, not magic, must be what someone had thrown at Sicarius. She grimaced. It made little difference.
Pained curses came from the shaman’s tent. His assistant must be pulling the pistol ball out. Little time left.
A young man Akstyr’s age jogged into the camp. He paused to eye her curiously before angling toward a tent. Dirt smudged his cheeks, and stubble fuzzed his chin, but neither hid the handsomeness of his face.
“Afternoon,” Amaranthe said as the youth passed her.
He twitched in surprise and glanced behind him, as if checking to be sure she was addressing him.
“I’m Amaranthe,” she told him. “What’s your name?”
“Er, Dobb.”
Her guard kept sliding a rag along his bow, but his eyes lifted, tracking the exchange.
“What’re you doing working up here?” she asked the youth.
Dobb shrugged. “Need the money.”
“Looks like hard work. Hope it pays well.”
“Not really.”
The rain grew heavier, pattering on the tent roofs. Amaranthe hoped it kept the shaman from hearing her chitchat. She continued to pry at her bonds as she talked.
“Then why work way out here?” she asked.
“I don’t know. It seemed like a smart thing to do when they offered the job. I didn’t have any work in Stumps.”
“Dobb, quit your yammering and get back to work,” the bowman said.
The knot Amaranthe was working on loosened. Careful to keep her shoulders from moving too much, she untied it.
“Gonna be a big storm,” Dobb said. “Pit boss said to get the lanterns lit and bring tarps to cover the machinery.”
“Then you best do that,” the bowman said.
Amaranthe sat up straighter at the words “lanterns lit.” Dobb slipped into the tent, revealing crates and food sacks before the flap fell shut. When he came out, he carried a large folded tarp. A box of matches stuck out of his pocket.
“With your looks, you could be working as a female companion,” Amaranthe told him.
The tarp slipped from Dobb’s arms. “A what?”
“An escort for well-to-do women seeking handsome men to attend social events with them.” Amaranthe unwound the rope from her wrists.
Dobb stared at her. “You can get paid for that?”
The bowman stood. “Get back to work, Dobb.”
“Paid well,” Amaranthe said, eyes locked with the youth’s. “One of my comrades used to be in that business. Maybe I could have him arrange an introduction for you.”