All at once Danyal felt himself weakening, his guts once again churning with a feeling of despair as he wondered if he could, in fact, just murder this man in cold blood. But if he didn't, how were they ever going to rescue Mirabeth? "Ssst!"
A harsh, clearly audible whisper split the woods, and Danyal all but groaned, certain that one of his companions had given them away. Still, he shrank back into his own concealment, surprised to see that the man under the tree was wriggling backward with no indication of extreme alarm. Finally the bandit rose to his haunches, turning his face away from Danyal as he replied with similar furtiveness. "Yeah? What is it?"
Only then did Dan see the second bandit, a mustachioed bowmen called Kal. The fellow crept up to his compatriot and gestured into the field. "Any sign of 'em?"
"Nah." The reply was curt and disgusted.
"Me neither. They haven't tried to come along the ridge, or I woulda seen 'em for sure."
"D'you think we should head back to Loreloch, or at least meet Red at the bridge?"
The archer barked a dry laugh. "Boss said to wait until tonight. I'm not thinkin' I'd like to cross him."
"Yeah. Well-"
The snap of a dry twig was like a crack of thunder in Danyal's ears, a sound that overwhelmed everything else. It had come from behind him, near where the lad had last seen Foryth.
"What was that?" The bowman instantly had an arrow nocked, his weapon drawn as he peered into the thick woods. "Go check it out!"
"Me?" The squatting man was at first indignant. Then he looked at the other's weapon as he drew his own short sword, apparently reaching the obvious conclusion: His companion could cover him with an arrow, while his blade would only be useful at close quarters.
Rising to his feet, the swordsman advanced past the other side of the large tree trunk behind which Danyal crouched. Scarcely daring to breathe, the lad peered between the branches, saw the bowman moving closer to gain a clear shot past his companion's shoulder.
"Who's there?" demanded the swordsman, slashing at a few branches in an attempt to open up his view. "Don't make me come in there after you!"
"Tsk."
Suddenly Foryth Teel came into sight, stepping between two trees with his stout stick clenched in his hands. Danyal couldn't see much, but he was aware that the historian was trembling, staring at the bandit with wide eyes.
"Why don't you just drop that little club," suggested the swordsman with a grim chuckle. "Else I'll have to cut yer hands off first."
The historian lunged away with an abrupt movement, drawing a shout of alarm from the sword-wielding bandit.
"Hey!" Steel flashed as the man charged after Foryth, only to fall with a thud, then utter a shriek of pain. Emilo Haversack rolled free, his blade bright crimson as he bounced to his feet.
"Why, you little-" The archer lunged forward, ready to shoot, but he never released his arrow or finished his threat. As he darted past the tree, Danyal charged from his shelter with a yell of rage. He was so close to the bowman that he could smell the stink of his filthy clothes, and without pausing to think, he aimed for the spot where the ragged vest was laced with a few torn strips of leather.
The heavy knife stuck hard in the bandit's chest as the man whirled away, shocked by the sudden attack. His elbow cracked Danyal in the chin, and the lad staggered, feeling his hand slip from the hilt of his only weapon. He tumbled onto his back and waited for the arrow that would pin him to the ground.
But instead, the bowmen dropped his weapon from nerveless fingers. Both hands flailed at his chest, trying unsuccessfully to gain a grip on the weapon that, Danyal now saw, had plunged in very deeply.
A thick paralysis held the lad in place as he watched the man slump, saw the beady eyes grow dim and unfocused. Only when the bandit flopped heavily to the ground did Danyal release his breath, realizing that he was trembling all over and far too weak to stand.
"We make a good team," Emilo said, helping Foryth Teel to his feet from where the historian had fallen in his clumsy attempt at flight.
And then, seeing the handshake between the kender and the man, Danyal realized that it hadn't been clumsiness; it had been a plan! Foryth had acted as a diversion, giving the kender a chance to attack the much larger swordsman by surprise. The lad himself had then taken advantage of a similar chance when the archer had come to the aid of his companion.
"We do," Dan agreed.
He approached the man he had killed, feeling curiously empty. It made him squeamish to pull the knife from the fatal wound, and he gagged, almost vomiting when he saw the amount of blood that came welling from the puncture after the weapon had been removed. But when he turned away, drew a ragged breath, and thought of Mirabeth, he felt calmness returning.
"There's one more, the one named Red, waiting at a bridge," he reported, then added to Foryth, "And they're taking Mirabeth to a place you'll be interested in: Lore-loch."
CHAPTER 32
Second Palast, Reapember 374 AC
The trio found the bandit named Red snoring loudly on the soft bank beside the next bridge. The man didn't stir as Danyal, Emilo, and Foryth Teel approached to within a few feet. When the breeze shifted, the companions caught the scent of brandy and quickly guessed why the heavyset swordsman slumbered so soundly.
"We should just kill him, shouldn't we?" asked Danyal, cursing his own reluctance as he looked at the defenseless man. He told himself that if it had been Zack or Kelryn, he would have had no trouble making a lethal thrust. Whether that was true or not, he couldn't say, but he knew that he could never stick the cruel knife into this drunken man.
"Er…" Foryth was also clearly hesitant. "Perhaps we should just ignore him and go on by. He may never even know that we've been past here." The historian pointed along the road that extended beyond the far side of the bridge. "Loreloch is that way, according to my map. Why don't we just move on?"
"Seems risky to leave him here," Emilo suggested. "Though I really don't know about stuff like that. Still, we don't want him coming along behind us."
Danyal was about to argue further when they heard a clatter of stones behind them. Whirling, he saw the shape of a large black horse coming forward at a fast trot.
"Nightmare!" he cried, irrationally delighted by the appearance of the great horse. At the same time, Red stirred with a snort. Sitting up, the man blinked at the plunging animal as the mare swept toward the bridge. The three companions dropped behind the bank on the far side of the road as the bandit staggered to his knees, gaping in astonishment.
"By the gods, it's the demon horse!" Red shouted, lurching to his feet. The horse pounded closer, looming black and large as she thundered toward the bridge. The great hooves smashed on the roadway, and Dan felt each thud reverberate through the ground.
Red spun around, apparently without even noticing the three figures on the other side of the road. With a wide-eyed glance over his shoulder, the man took off running.
Nightmare thundered onto the small bridge, snorting contemptuously at the trio of companions. Danyal scrambled to his feet in a rush and made a lunge for the horse's halter, but before he had taken two steps, the animal sprang into a gallop and bolted away, the sound of the hoofbeats soon fading in the distance.
"Where did she come from?" Dan asked, staring after the horse in frustration. He felt a bleak sense of abandonment, made even more painful by the thought of Mirabeth's captivity. He had no doubt that the lass would have been able to bring the mare to an easy halt.