“What’s wrong? Cat got your tongue?” the Kanosee said with a tone sounding both suspicious and accusatory.
Therrador swallowed hard. “No,” he ventured.
The man glared at him a few seconds before breaking into a wide grin.
“I’s just having at you. Come have a bite with us.”
Therrador made himself smile back.
“No,” he said again. “Already ate.”
“Fine. Be like that then.” The man waved him off and returned to his companions at the fire. “Don’t tell no one I weren’t hospitable, though.”
“I won’t,” Therrador agreed.
He strode away, a droplet of sweat running down the back of his neck. Tension remained in his limbs as he wondered if the men would see through his ruse and come after him. They didn’t. Years before, during skirmishes with Kanos before Braymon became king, Therrador learned to speak Kanosee out of necessity-if you spoke their language, questioning your prisoners was easier. As king’s advisor, it came in handy dealing with the occasional ambassador, but he never expected he’d use it to keep from discovery infiltrating an enemy camp. He sighed and unclenched his fists.
The camp was vast. Therrador passed more fires and more men as he balanced between keeping to the shadows and looking like he belonged. No one else challenged him and after a while, the tents changed from plain tan canvas to larger structures, colored and striped and decorated. He saw fewer soldiers here, where the higher ranks made their beds, and many of the tents were empty-most of these men now resided behind the wall of the Isthmus Fortress. The thought twisted Therrador’s gut; he set his jaw and pushed on.
As he came around a large red tent with a white roof, Therrador halted and shrank back into the shadows. Ahead, a group of five soldiers were gathered around a tent easily the size of the next four largest combined. He crouched and waited, squinting against the light of the tall torches set on either side of the door. The men didn’t talk, instead grunting and growling at one another. One turned toward Therrador and he receded further into the shadows at the sight of the man’s black breastplate splashed with red.
The undead.
Given its size, Therrador guessed the tent must belong to the Archon. A wisp of smoke curled from the peak of the pavilion, dissipating into the night sky. But a fire wouldn’t be lit if there was no one inside, guards wouldn’t be posted at the door of an empty tent, and he knew the Archon to be at the fortress. Hope stirred in Therrador’s chest.
This is where they’re holding Graymon.
He breathed as deep as the ill-fitting armor allowed to ease his excitement and nervousness, then let it out slowly, quietly. Getting here had been relatively easy, now came the difficult part-rescuing the boy and finding a way back through the camp with him. He shook his head to dispel the thought.
First I have to get past the guards.
Therrador crept back around the curve of the tent until the soldiers were no longer in sight, then stood and adjusted the too-small chain vest. He’d never favored the sneaky approach, preferring instead to face things head on. With little effort, he slipped into a posture of command he’d become accustomed to wearing over the past two decades-back straight, eyes ahead, step purposeful. He strode around the tent and directly toward the guards. One of them saw him immediately and grunted at the others. Hands touched hilts, but none drew weapons. He halted in front of the biggest of the group.
“The Archon sent me to check on the boy,” he said and wondered if a man perhaps more dead than alive would notice his accent.
The thing stared at him; Therrador forced himself to look back. Its nose had rotted off in some dark grave; one eye moved while the other stared off at a peculiar angle. Therrador saw crooked yellow teeth though a hole in one cheek.
“Hmm.”
“Sheyndust sent me to look in on the hostage,” he said again. “Step aside.”
The thing opened its mouth sending the stench of death wafting to Therrador on the sea breeze. He gritted his teeth and willed himself to hold the thing’s gaze.
“Why she sent you?” the creature asked finally, its words run together like a child not yet used to speaking. “We guard him.”
Therrador frowned and narrowed his eyes.
“She had a vision of someone coming and taking him.” He glanced at the others watching the exchange. “I’m doing as I’m told, I suggest you do the same.”
One of the others grumbled words Therrador didn’t understand; the leader turned toward the other soldier so his unmoving eye came to gaze upon Therrador. The dead, unseeing orb made Therrador think of Suath’s empty eye hole and he wondered what had become of the mercenary.
“Okay,” the dead man said without moving out of his path.
Therrador took a step forward and came chest to chest with the soldier. It still didn’t move. He glared into the thing’s good eye, knowing he couldn’t be the first to move. A minute passed; the other soldiers moved closer and a flicker of claustrophobia flared in Therrador’s stomach. He held his breath against the stench of rotted flesh gathered around him. Finally, the creature stepped back and gave him space to pass. Therrador went by confidently, bumping the undead man with his shoulder on the way, pulled the flap aside and entered the pavilion.
The fire blazing in the iron fireplace at the center of the tent made it almost unbearably warm inside; smoke curled up through a hole in the peak as he’d seen from outside. He breathed deep, happy to draw air not smelling of rotted flesh after being in close quarters with those dead things.
The tent’s interior was sparsely furnished-not what he’d have expected to find in the Archon’s lodging. Perhaps he’d been wrong about this being her tent. A plain chair made of driftwood lashed together with lengths of heavy twine sat to one side. A basin of water rested atop a short stool; a honey pot sat nearby. On the far side of the makeshift room was a straw-stuffed mattress draped with thick green blankets. Underneath them, a sleeping shape. Only a bit of tussled brown hair showed under the coverings.
Graymon.
Therrador took a step forward, then stopped. He looked about the room again, searching the shadowed corners and behind the stick furniture. They were alone. He hurried across the dirt floor, struggling to contain his excitement. Three strides from the bed, less than ten feet from his son, he stopped. He hadn’t meant to.
What…?
He attempted another step but his foot wouldn’t move. It stayed in place as though stuck by strong glue. He struggled against the unseen grip, grabbed his thigh with both hands and pulled, but nothing happened.
“Graymon,” he whispered and reached out toward his son lying just out of reach. “Graymon.”
The boy shifted under the covers, turned over to face his father, eyes closed in sleep. Therrador’s heart leaped to his throat at the sight of his son with his features so much like his mother’s. He reached again, stretching his fingers as far as he could, but he was too far away.
“Graymon.”
“That’s enough.”
The sound of the woman’s voice stopped Therrador’s breath half-drawn. Goose flesh galloped up his spine despite the fire-warmed air in the tent.
How could she be here?
He struggled to face the voice but found himself unable to move at all. His head wouldn’t turn, his arms wouldn’t raise. Only his eyes would move; he directed them toward the Archon as she stepped up beside him.
“I told you I could not trust you,” she said.
She wore the black cloak she’d worn the first time they met that night on the salt flats, but the cowl was pulled back from her face this time and her blond hair spilled over her shoulders.