Talon (The Astor Chronicles Book 1) (32 page)

I crouched down and stroked the grass, giving me a moment to think.

‘When I marry,’ I began, ‘I want to be able to give my wife something that I’ve never given anyone else.’

Her expression softened. ‘Nobody’s ever mentioned marriage to me before.’

‘I find that difficult to fathom,’ I said, staring deep into her eyes. ‘A woman of your birth and beauty. Didn’t your parents have some plans for your future?’

She turned away, staring into the trees as if they could reach out and engulf her. I felt a pang of guilt for rejecting her and reminding her of her recent loss. It seemed like I was about to miss an opportunity. I wanted to say something more, to mitigate the impact of my words, but I didn’t know what to say. I wasn’t sure I knew Lira well enough yet to begin a relationship. I was interested in finding out, but not if she wasn’t willing to go at a more reasonable pace.

I stood beside her, placed my arms around her shoulders and rested my head against hers. She sighed. We stayed like that for a while, listening to the rustling insects and the noisy chatter of the stream.

‘Wait here,’ Lira said and she left me momentarily.

I continued to stare into the woods enjoying the sounds of the wilds. She returned with the wooden cup she had offered me earlier, and held it out.

‘A tribute,’ she began, ‘to future possibilities.’

I grinned and accepted it, draining the whole cup. Lira wiped a drop of moisture from my mouth and licked her lips. My groin ached. It was a real effort to hold back from her. I gazed at her face, so pale and perfect. Her black hair fell delicately around it, framing her large blue eyes and pink, full lips. I leaned in to kiss her, but before I could, a wave of dizziness overcame me and I fell to my knees. Something was stinging me. My vision blurred and went black.

When I came to I was still on the ground. Lira held her palm to my head and asked me again and again if I was well. Gradually, her face came into focus. I was breathing hard and my skin was warm and sweaty.

‘What happened?’ I asked.

‘You were stung,’ she replied. ‘You became hot and you thrashed around.’

Blood pounded through my muscles and I felt fatigued.

She held me against her lap, which was damp with spilled water. ‘Everything is fine now. Everything is good.’

I allowed her voice to soothe me. I felt satisfied somehow.

‘What was it?’ I asked.

‘It looked like a recknid,’ she replied. ‘It’s a little, round wasp with a sting that causes an enemy to black out long enough for it to escape.’

I sat up slowly, trying to clear my head. I felt a powerful need for sleep. If I’d been fighting against my desire for Lira before, the feeling was now gone, quashed by the recknid sting. Lira looked a little shaken up herself.

I ran my fingers through my hair. ‘Did I hurt you?’

‘I am well,’ she said. I caught a hint of amusement in her eyes. ‘You closed your waves a little earlier. Do you think your little friends will be looking for you?’

I contacted Rekala, Kestric and Tiaro. Their relief and anger barrelled into my mind along with several questions at once. I explained what had happened. All three of them probed my memories, except for those I kept locked away.

Kestric did not realise what was blossoming between Lira and I, but it was harder to keep that from my own kin. I was grateful that neither of them questioned me about it; they sensed my uncertainty. I was pleased with myself for resisting the temptation to lie with Lira. It was like I had passed some kind of test.

Tiaro was lying in the grass some distance away, having fallen from my pocket. She glowed slightly when I picked her up and slid her back into my earlobe.

‘You’d better head back,’
Rekala suggested.
‘Sarlice is getting angry.’

Sarlice had grown weary of waiting for us and had already eaten. She lay in her bedsack under the bivouac watching the flames. When she saw the half-filled watersacks, she raised an eyebrow.

‘Talon had an encounter with a recknid,’ Lira explained.

Sarlice’s lips pressed together.

I sat to have a look for the spot where I’d been bitten. I still felt a little weak.

Rekala snuffed all over me, saying,
‘You smell different.’

‘Poison?’

‘Nay, you smell like her.’

Lira approached a pot of stew that was hanging over the fire. ‘Did you prepare food for us? Thank you, Sarlice. That’s just what we need.’ She filled a bowl for each of us.

Saying nothing, Sarlice turned over and went to sleep.

After we’d eaten, Lira encouraged me to lie down while she cleaned the dishes. Feeling exhausted I pulled off my rumpled shirt, crawled onto my bedsack and stretched out. It was too hot to get inside it. Rekala lay at my feet, watching Lira and thinking deeply.

A sinking feeling crept into my belly and I put it down to the poison of the recknid. Soon after closing my eyes I fell asleep.

Chapter Sixteen—Animal Instinct

I
n the early hours of the morning, a sense of warning splashed through the waves and a terrible howl woke the night.

‘Rada, there is danger!’
Rekala cried as she raced away from a pack of slavering wolf-like creatures at least three times the size of ordinary dogs.

They pursued her with demonic speed.

Sarlice leapt to her feet, warbow in hand. Before she could draw, an arrow struck her upper body, the force of the blow knocking her to her knees. Her shout of alarm roused Lira, and the girl awoke in a panic, staring around half-asleep, not sure what to do. Sarlice screamed in pain and Kestric’s response on the waves was deafening, like a tidal wave of snarling.

‘Help her,’ I yelled at Lira. ‘Help Sarlice.’

I fumbled the bedsack off and stumbled to my feet. Tiaro was praying through the waves, trying without success to banish the demons inside the beasts that pursued Rekala in the distance. Without physical contact her efforts barely slowed the demons.

A dark shape emerged from the shadows behind Lira, startling the horses. Fleetfoot bolted into the forest, but the Zeika managed to grab Duria’s halter before she could follow. He pointed his one-handed crossbow at Lira’s head. She froze on her way to Sarlice’s side. A huge, dapple-grey horse galloped into the camp. On its back was a dark knight in shiny black armour and blood red chainmail. No average weapon would pierce the mail of a Zeika warrior such as this.

I decided to try icetiger teeth on it instead. Leaping forward on my human feet, I blurred into icetiger form mid-air and bounded twice to reach the knight on the horse. The dapple grey faltered and nearly fell when I came down on its right side, clawing at the Zeika. My jaws worked at the gap near the Zeika’s underarm and he toppled off the horse, landing with a clank. My teeth jarred against his shoulderplate and pain engulfed me, causing me to lose my concentration and fall back into human form.

‘Rekala, Kestric, hurry!’

‘We have our own problem here, Anzaii,’
Kestric responded.
‘Can you not help
us
?’

On the ground beside me the Zeika elbowed me three times in the side. His movements were slow because of the armour, but the blows he dealt me were severe and knocked the breath out of me. Out of the corner of my eye I saw Sarlice writhing in pain, but she somehow managed to kick her arrow quiver up to within reach and hide it behind her back.

While I was still winded the Zeika pulled a rope from his pack and tied my arms and feet. He dragged me over to Sarlice and dropped me beside her. She was gasping in agony, trying not to scream. Blood seeped from her shoulder where the arrow still protruded.

‘You will be a fine boon for my troubles,’ he told her, ‘after I have spent the other.’

I looked up at Lira who was shaking with fear, doing nothing to stop the first Zeika from grabbing her hands behind her back. A torrent of rage swept through me and I lashed out at the Zeika with bound feet, but my attempts were feeble. He pinned me down easily and tied Sarlice against my back, causing her arrow quiver to dig into my left shoulder blade. At least the Zeika hadn’t noticed it. He fixed the long end of the rope to the horn on his saddle.

‘What do you want?’ Sarlice choked out.

Ignoring her the Zeika remounted and dug his heels into the dapple-grey’s sides. With some effort it managed to drag us across the ground. Sarlice spluttered in pain, trying to choke back the sobs. With the rope so taut, neither of us could reach up to her arrows. Some of them fell out and were scattered behind us. I had the marble-hilted knife in my boot, but that was even harder to reach.

I kicked my feet, trying to get them under my body. Sarlice did too, and we struggled together until we’d managed to get to our feet. Back to back we crabbed sideways behind the horse, stumbling over each other’s legs. I hooked my arms under Sarlice’s so I could half carry her. The blood from her shoulder seeped down through my shirt, soaking my arm as well.

‘Stop!’ I shouted. ‘She’s injured.’

The Zeika on the dapple-grey ignored me, kicking the horse into a faster walk when he realised we were on our feet. The other man rode a chestnut horse alongside us. He had Duria on a lead rope with Lira gagged and tied to her back. The petite, young woman I had come to cherish cried silently into her bonds. Unlike Sarlice and I she had probably never been attacked by Zeikas before. Her kindness to the Zeika in Sarm would not aid her now.

She had been caught up in our conflict, something I should have foreseen. Sarlice had been right. It had not been a good idea to allow Lira to join us. She had no battle skills, no kin—she wasn’t even a believer. If something happened to her I would have only myself to blame.

‘Our Rada-kin will tear you to pieces,’ I roared.

The Zeika on the chestnut merely laughed at me.

Rekala and Kestric were running for their lives—they had taken wolf form so as to maintain both speed and stamina. A dozen bristling death hounds were on their trail, baying like something from a nightmare. The hounds were so close to Rekala that she could taste their blood-hot breath in the air. I cried out in fear. The beasts were unnaturally large and muscular with red eyes and jowls glistening with saliva. The fur seemed sparse over their expanded bodies, sticking out like thin, black spines. I was already breathing hard from the strain of walking sideways and helping Sarlice, but the vision I saw through the waves made my breath come in even shorter, faster puffs.

‘Lightmaker!’
Tiaro shouted, through the waves.
‘Send Sy-tré to help us. Show us what to do.’

‘Can we help them from so far away?’
I asked her.

‘I know not,’
Tiaro replied.
‘I am too new… I haven’t yet been able to study them on the waves.’

‘What are they?’
I demanded.

The earring’s emotions were in turmoil as she desperately searched her knowledge for the answers. Without being closer to the abominations it was difficult for her to access the information. It seemed as if proximity to the works of Zei was what triggered her ingrained ability to teach me what I needed to know. The more time we spent with Zeikas, I concluded, the more powerful we would become as Anzaii.

‘I think they are dogs possessed by demons,’
she eventually replied.

‘Can’t we dispel the demons, then?’

‘They’re too far away. I can’t even get a fix on them except for what I see through Rekala’s mind.’

I roared my frustration. What was the point of being Anzaii if I couldn’t even do anything just when it was needed? This kind of attack was exactly what Anzaii were meant to defend against. With such a huge distance between the Rada-kin and I there was little I could do except stumble along behind the dapple-grey horse. It took great effort to prevent Sarlice from falling and my concern for her heightened as she sagged against me. Her neck arched back so that her head rested on my shoulder, despite being jostled as I walked.

‘You with me, there?’ I asked her.

‘Aye… arghh… can’t you stop… I need to rest….’

‘Soon,’ I answered, not sure if she was still aware of what was happening.

‘Don’t drop… me….’

‘I won’t,’ I reassured her. ‘I’ve got you.’

‘You left… me… you chose… Lira.’

‘Nay’ I stammered, out of breath. ‘I wouldn’t do that.’

‘You did. You swooned… not that I blame you… she’s beautiful.’

‘You’re delirious,’ I told her, wondering if her words indicated the jealousy of friendship or something more. I still wasn’t ready to analyse how I felt about Sarlice nor was I sure what had happened between Lira and I. Right now all that mattered was getting them both away from the Zeikas. Keeping them away from me in the future might be better for them as well. It seemed that I attracted Zeikas like the stench of carrion attracted flies.

By dawn the Zeikas had taken us to a small dip in the land. As we passed into it the smell of blood came to me. Through the waves I sensed the presence of a spirit circle. The last time I had seen one was at the Zeika camp in Naioteio. Before Tiaro and I had a chance to do anything about it the Zeikas dragged us through. Two tents and a campfire that hadn’t been visible before blinked into view.

‘Another spirit circle?’ Sarlice croaked dragging her head off my shoulder to gaze around.

‘Yes,’ I replied glumly. ‘And now that we’re inside I don’t think there’s much I can do to dispel it. The border is too far away.’

The Zeikas came to a halt and dismounted. Four rabid demon dogs were staked beside some kind of cesspit. Seeing them in front of me was vastly different from the impressions I’d received of the ones chasing Rekala and Kestric. The smell of death was upon them making me gag. They gurgled with bloodlust as the Zeika dragged us closer. He lifted the cover off the smelly pit and shoved us both down into it, making my insides turn with rage and nausea. Lira cried out from above. Even if Sarlice wasn’t tied to my back I wouldn’t have been able to jump high enough to see out. The demon dogs growled at us over the edge of the pit.