He moved out of the way, and she led Hellsbane past him, onto the narrow ledge and the path that led up to it, still refusing to look back.
:Good luck,: she heard behind her as she emerged into the moon-flooded night. :May the gods of your choice work on your behalf, Kerowyn. You are deserving of such favor. And may we all one day meet again.:
That started the tears going again; she blinked her eyes clear enough to see the path, but no more. She had to move slowly, because she was feeling her way, and she was profoundly grateful that Hellsbane was surefooted and could see the path. She couldn’t stop crying until she’d reached the ridge above the cave. There, she took several deep breaths, and forced herself to stare up at the stars until she got herself under control.
It’s over, and I’ve finished it myself. Ratha and his own sense of duty will keep him from following. It never had a chance of working between us anyway, and at least I’ve ended it while we were still in love.
She closed her eyes, and rubbed them with the back of her hand, until the last trace of tears and grit was gone. Then she set Hellsbane’s nose westward, and descended the ridge, heading for Menmellith. Soon the hunters would be following, and she needed a head start.
I’ve done brighter things in my life than this, she thought, cowering in the shadow of a huge boulder and wishing that she wasn’t quite so exposed on the top of this ridge. But this was the only place she had been able to find that had any cover at all, and she had to see down her backtrail. Without Eldan, and his ability to look through the eyes of the animals about him, she was finding herself more than a bit handicapped.
The hunters had found her in the middle of the night, as she crossed from the heavy oak-and-pine forests into pine-and-scrub. She’d felt those unseen “eyes” on her just about at midnight, and this time they hadn’t gone away until she had crossed and recrossed a stream, hoping the old saw about “magic can’t cross running water” was true. By the time dawn bloomed behind her, the human hunters were hot on her trail, and not that far away, either. The best she could figure was that the “whatever-it-was” had alerted its masters, and they, in turn, had alerted the searchers directly in her path.
Dawn saw her doggedly guiding the mare over low mountains (or very tall hills) that were more dangerous than the territory she’d left behind, because the shalelike rock they were made of was brittle and prone to crumbling without warning. She didn’t dare stop when she actually saw a search party top a ridge several hills behind her, and caught the flash of scarlet that signaled the presence of the red-robe among them. So there was to be no rest for her today; instead, she set Hellsbane at a grueling pace across some of the grimmest country she’d ever seen. This area was worse than the near-virgin forest, because she kept coming on evidence that people had lived here at one time. Secondary growth was always harder to force a path through than an old forest; tangly things seemed to thrive on areas that had been cleared for croplands, or where people had lived. This growth was all second- and third-stage; pine trees and heavy bushes, thorny vines and scrubby grass. All things that seemed to seize Hellsbane’s legs and snag in Kero’s clothing.
She had left Hellsbane drinking and got up on another ridge to look back about noon, and as she peered around her boulder, she saw the trackers still behind her, spotting them as they rode briefly in the open before taking to cover. This time they weren’t several ridges away; they were only one.
She swore pungently, every heartache and regret she’d been nursing since leaving Eldan forgotten. She had something more important to worry about than heartbreak. Survival.
Hellfires. They’re good. Better than I thought. And they were gaining on her with every moment she dallied.
She slid down the back of the ridge and slung herself up on the mare’s back, sending her out under the cover of more pine trees. And the only thing she could be grateful for was that the day was overcast and Hellsbane was spared the heat of the sun.
They’re going to catch up, she thought grimly. They know this area, and I don’t; that’s what let them get so close in the first place. I’m in trouble. And I don’t know if I’m going to get out of it this time.
She wanted to “look” back at her pursuers, tempted to use her Gift for the first time in a long time—
And stopped herself just in time.
That isn’t me, she realized, urging Hellsbane into greater speed as they scrambled down a gravel-covered slope. Something out there wants me to use my Gift, probably so they can find me. Or catch and hold me until they come.
She fought down panic; Hellsbane was a good creature, and bright beyond any ordinary horse, but if she panicked, so would Hellsbane, and the warsteed might bolt. If Hellsbane took it into her head to flee, Kero wasn’t sure she’d be able to stop her until she’d run her panic out.
And that could end in her broken neck, or the mare’s, or both.
Kero kept Hellsbane in the cover of the trees, even though this meant more effort than riding in the open. She looked automatically behind her as they topped the next hill, and saw not one, but two parties of pursuers; both coming down off the slope she’d just left, and both parties so confident of catching her now that they weren’t even trying to hide. They couldn’t see her, but they could see her trail; she wasn’t wasting any time trying to hide it.
They were perhaps a candlemark’s ride from her, if she stopped right now. The temptation to leave cover and make a run for it was very great. If she let Hellsbane run, she might be able to lose them as darkness fell.
Assuming that their horses weren’t fresh.
Hellsbane had been going since last night, and she couldn’t do much of a run at this point.
They could. And would.
Kero sent the mare across a section of open trail when they dropped out of sight, hoping to get across it before they got back into viewing range. This was one of the worst pieces of trail she’d hit yet; barely wide enough for a horse, bisecting a steep slope, with a precipitous drop down onto rocks on one side and an equally precipitous shale cliff on the other. No place to go if you slipped, and nowhere to hide if you were being followed.
She breathed a sigh of relief as they got into heavier cover before the hunters came into view. She hadn’t wanted to rush the mare, but her back had felt awfully naked out there.
Thunder growled overhead; Kero looked up, pulling Hellsbane up for a moment under the cover of a grove of scrub trees just tall enough to hide them. She hadn’t been paying any attention to the weather, but obviously a storm had been gathering while she fled westward, because the sky was black in the west, and the darkness was moving in very fast—
How fast, she didn’t quite realize, until lightning hit the top of a pine just ahead of her, startling Hellsbane into shying and bucking, and half-blinding her rider. The thunder that came with it did deafen her rider.
And the downpour that followed in the next breath damned near drowned her rider.