Bastial Frenzy (The Rhythm of Rivalry: Book 4) (22 page)

So Zoke was overcome with shock when Vithos stopped them just as he had before. He and Reela pointed to the branches of a tree only ten yards ahead. Zoke’s eyes shot upward. A man blended into the leaves. He was so close it seemed unlikely he hadn’t heard them yet.

Then he turned his head.

“Psyche!” Terren whispered with urgency.

Reela and Vithos ran forward with their palms extended. The man already had taken the stopper out of his potion and was about to throw it when his body stiffened from the spell of pain and he fell.

Reela’s feet got caught on something, making her fall before their enemy did. The potion crashed between them and broke, the clear liquid spewing forward and catching Reela in the face. She screamed in agony. Terren ran past her and drove his blade through the enemy’s chest before he could stand.

Finding no other enemies in sight, Zoke hurried toward Reela to see if he could help. Vithos was already there. Reela had jumped up and brushed at her face and neck, panicked. Her screaming worsened. She tried to flick the substance off her fingers. Then she was caught between making another attempt to brush the burning liquid from her skin and her instinct not to touch it again.

Terren produced a piece of fabric. “This is clean.” He dabbed her cheek and neck. But then his hand drew back and he cursed. He wiped his finger on his pants, then dabbed her wound some more.

Reela’s screaming had quieted to moans. She’d gone pale and looked to be having trouble standing. “It’s still burning!” she whispered furiously and began to shake, clearly thinking the substance was still on her.

“I got it all off,” Terren said.

But she still shook and looked to be in terrible pain. The skin from the center of her cheek down the side of her neck had been seared and turned bright green. It was difficult to look at.

Zoke noticed movement. Someone ducked behind a tree trunk when he turned. Someone else was jumping behind the next tree down.

“This way!” Terren commanded.

Someone screamed, “Don’t let them escape!”

Suddenly there were more attackers than Zoke had time to count. It became clear they’d been trying to surround them before being noticed, and to Zoke’s dismay, they’d nearly formed a full circle around his group.

Arrows hissed by. A woman yelled. She’d been shot by mistake and collapsed before she could hurl the glass bottle of clear liquid in her hand.

“Stop shooting!” another voice called out.

Reela couldn’t keep up. She was stumbling too much.

“Come on, Reela!” Terren yelled.

She grunted, yet her pace didn’t change. Zoke could hear enemies closing in behind them.

“We must fight,” Zoke said.

“No,” Vithos blurted. “Too many.”

But there was one man closer than the rest who needed to be stopped before he reached Reela. Zoke was about to slow and draw his weapon when she turned and pained the man. He tripped and began to roll, screaming. Then Zoke saw the man’s own sword protruding from his stomach.

There were ten more behind him and countless archers to their sides.

“I can shoot them!” one archer yelled to Zoke’s left. The man already had his string pulled back.

“Do not!” their commander said from somewhere behind Zoke.

But the archer let the arrow loose anyway. Zoke felt the touch of it on the top of his right shoulder. His tunic was ripped, but he knew the arrow hadn’t pierced his skin deeply. A man to his right took the arrow in his chest and said a curse word Zoke didn’t recognize as he fell.

“No more arrows!” their commander screamed.

Terren was leading them the only way they could go without running straight into their enemies. But it occurred to Zoke that they were going the opposite way they needed to. Their army was farther and farther behind them.

Reela huffed loudly. She couldn’t keep running, and even if she could, what then? Could they really hope to outrun everyone chasing them? As well as Terren knew this forest, Zoke was certain their enemies knew it better.

Immense pain made Zoke fall. The moment he hit the ground, he realized it was a psychic. He thought of Zeti aiming an arrow at him, her eyes hungry to see his blood spill.

The psychic was cast out, the pain gone. Vithos and Terren had their arms on Zoke, pulling him up.

“I stop them,” Vithos said. “You run.”

“No!” Zoke and Reela screamed at the same time.

“You won’t do that again,” she added, gasping violently for air. “I should stop, if anyone’s going to. I can’t…”

“Keep running, both of you!” Terren urged. “We can make it.”

“Make it where?” Zoke asked.

Two men were coming from his right side. Both had potions of the same clear liquid. Vithos extended his hand and each man dropped to the ground, uttering a cry of anguish.

“To that cliff.”

Between the trees, Zoke saw what Terren was referring to. They were approaching the edge of the hill that sloped to their left. But their enemies would chase them down it just as they’d chased them thus far.

“We’re going to jump off the edge,” Terren said. “They’ll take the hill.”

Zoke felt his eyes widening. Of course their enemies would take the hill. They weren’t idiots.

Reela was puttering forward even slower than before. “We’ll break our legs!”

“Better than dying.” Terren shot a glance over his shoulder. “Last push, Reela. Hurry.”

The poor young woman was in miserable pain. Zoke could hear it from her labored breaths.

They passed by the last trees leading up to the hill that descended to their left. But as much as he wanted to, Zoke knew they wouldn’t be taking the hill.

He could see the tops of trees over the ledge. Their apexes reached a few yards higher than his head. Based on the height of the other trees in the forest, they were going to break more than their legs.

“Now fire!” the enemy commander shouted. But the archers must’ve been too far behind, as all the arrows were intercepted by trees.

Could we turn and fight?
Zoke wondered. He still had little idea how many there were.
No, if Terren chose to flee, it must be the right decision.
It was too late anyway, their leader was about to jump.

“Aim for the tree branches to break your fall,” Terren said. He was first to leap, and Zoke was right after. He couldn’t see what happened with Vithos and Reela.

Zoke changed his mind in midair, or only made it up just then. Ignoring thin branches covered in prickly leaves that slapped every part of his body, he soared toward the trunk of the tree ahead. Using his claws and every muscle he could, he latched his body firmly against the rough bark.

Amazingly, he’d stopped himself from falling. He could hear the screams of the other three falling below him, as well as the snap of branch after branch breaking. He clung, unsure what to do.

“Shoot him!”

The archers! He had to get down, but how? He couldn’t climb down. The moment he loosened his muscles, he would slide. As tough as his skin was, it still would be ripped apart by the jagged wood of the tree.

He shimmied and quickly got around to the other side. An arrow struck so close to his hand, for a moment he thought he’d been hit. The tree rippled as more arrows beat against it. His hands and feet were vulnerable, for he needed to keep them wrapped around the tree.

He tried to let his feet go so he could use them on his way down, but the bark he held onto so tightly ripped, and he began to fall. His arms and legs flailed. They smacked against the branches. His whole body turned and twisted from the force of them.

Suddenly he was on the ground without remembering hitting it. He was on his back, pain shooting through his body. All around him were the thin, leafy branches. Zoke was practically buried in them.

“Move, move, move!” Terren yelled.

More arrows came, raining down from the peak.

“Can you get up, Zoke?” Terren was pulling on his bicep. When the Human’s grip shifted to his forearm, Zoke screamed.

His arm was caught on something that felt like a knife twisting into his bone. He saw then that he’d been impaled by the sharp edge of a branch.

It was a struggle to yank his arm free.

Reela and Vithos were both groaning as they hobbled. Reela collapsed, but Vithos pulled her up.

“We need to hide,” said Terren, seemingly the least injured of the group. Zoke figured it was his steel breastplate. But when Terren turned to look over his shoulder, Zoke saw his face was bloody from a cut down the center of his forehead, though his shaggy blond hair made it difficult to tell how deep it was. Blood trickled down his nose.

“We can check our wounds in a moment. Over here. Let’s go.”

The arrows had stopped. They each limped and said nothing. Reela struggled the most, completely unable to put weight on her right foot. She clung to Vithos, both of them ponderously walking after Terren. Zoke took his place in the rear, looking back for any signs of their enemies trailing them.

They went painfully far before Terren gestured toward a cluster of tall plants that would conceal them. He navigated to the center, shoving down the resistant thicket to make a spot to sit.

“We need to cross back the way we came to get to our army,” Terren whispered.

“How many were there?” Zoke asked.

“I can’t say. Probably thousands, which is why their army looked so small when we first saw them in front of their wall.”

Reela hissed as she bent her leg to squeeze between Vithos and Terren. The burns down her cheek and neck looked agonizing. The substance seemed to have made her skin melt. And it was distractingly green, making it look like some sort of syrupy food was stuck to her.

“I don’t know how much farther I can walk,” Reela whispered. “I didn’t hit the ground right. Something’s wrong with my knee.”

“Reela, your face.” Terren looked at her in horror.

Her hand reached to touch her cheek, but she stopped herself. “The pain is immense. It left a mark, didn’t it?”

Terren nodded. “Whatever you’re imagining it looks like right now, it’s ten times worse than that.”

She gritted her teeth. “What vile substance is it?”

“Nothing I’ve seen before,” he said.

“Shouldn’t we be quiet?” Zoke whispered.

“They won’t waste their time searching for four of us,” Terren said. “We just have to make sure they don’t see us on their way back to Tenred. As long as we stay here for a bit, we’ll be fine.”

“How can you know this?” Zoke wondered, still concerned he’d be found and they’d burn his skin as they’d done to Reela.

“The whole point behind all these traps and surprises is to kill as many of us as they can before we reach their wall. That small army was designed to ambush our men and women and then flee to safety. When the search team came into their trap, I’m sure it was a slaughter. Hiller’s men must’ve expected Hem to send many more. Now that we’ve discovered their plan, they won’t stay there. Nor will they waste time searching for four of us. They’re either on their way back to Tenred right now or setting up another trap in the woods—somewhere our army will have to pass through. We just need to wait for them to move before we go back, so we don’t cross paths.” Terren shifted to a squat and peered over the bushes.

Vithos was unusually silent, staring down at his lap. Zoke touched his shoulder. “Are you hurt?”

“Where are we?” Vithos asked in Kreppen.

Reela gently put her hand on his forehead. “I saw him hit his head hard.”

Terren peered into Vithos’ eyes. “He might have a concussion.”

Vithos asked Zoke in Kreppen, “What are they saying?”

“I don’t know. They used a word I haven’t heard before.”

Zoke’s own head was throbbing, but his neck was far worse, causing him agony each time he turned. His left arm was just as bad, stinging like a Krepp had his teeth buried in his flesh. Zoke checked where he’d been impaled. There was a hole, but luckily it was small. It didn’t look nearly as bad as it felt. The tree branch was quite thin where it had gone in, at least, and his right arm—his dominant arm—could still swing a sword.

“What about you, Terren?” Reela asked. “I see there’s a gash along your forehead, but are you hurt otherwise?”

“I’m fine.” He peered over the tops of the surrounding bushes. “Don’t get up, but I see them. They’re going west, back to defend their wall.”

“I don’t understand,” Reela said. “Why would they chase us if they weren’t going to look for us after we escaped?”

“If they’d caught us quickly, they could’ve reassembled whatever ambush they’d planned. But now that we’ve gotten away, we’ll inform Hem about the trap, ruining its effectiveness. I thought they might risk setting up somewhere else, but it appears they’ve chosen to rejoin their army.” He looked at Reela’s leg. “Will you be able to walk?”

“I’ll try.”

“Then let’s go.” He started to crawl through the bushes. “Stay low for now.”

Reela started to follow, but she stopped and hissed. “My knee. I can’t put weight on it.”