The Banished of Muirwood (27 page)

I will not let them, Maia. Trust in that. You need a ship. You will get a ship. I will send the
Argiver
to Hautland. The captain’s name is Stavanger. He can be in the port city of Rostick in two days. Is that soon enough?

Maia felt a flush of warmth, of appreciation.
Yes. It will take several days for us to cross Hautland. Thank you, Collier.

She felt his thoughts warm with delight.
I wish I could do more. You are very cold. I do not like that.
She could feel anger in this thoughts.

It is just a storm, Collier. I will be all right.

It reminds me of what I heard about how Lady Shilton treated you. She locked you in a room without a fire.
She felt his thoughts begin to blister with heat.
I could kill her for all she did to you.

Maia blinked, surprised.
You knew?

Of course I knew. I have spies in your father’s court. Deorwynn was very vocal in her hatred of you. She gave her mother strict orders to break your will. Yet you did not succumb, not even when they stripped everything from you. Every person who ever mattered to you. Every gown.
She could feel the bubbling hate inside him.
When you are crowned my queen, you will never wear rags again.

Maia felt strange, almost giddy.
You were watching over me?

Much good that did,
he returned blackly.
Remember, Maia, that it was your father who broke the plight troth between us. You and I were promised as infants. I have always thought of you as my future wife. Together, we will rule all the kingdoms. Believe it. You and I.

She could feel the ambition in his heart as well. His thoughts were burning with it.

Thank you for helping me, Collier. I will look for the
Argiver
in Rostick.
She wondered if he might abandon his army to try and join her, but she doubted it. The desire to conquer other lands ran thick in his blood.
I learned there is another kishion in your camp. I do not know who it is, but I thought you should know.

That is truly helpful, thank you. Let me return the favor. You have been traveling awhile now, Maia. You may not have heard the latest news from your father’s court.

Maia was concerned.
What news?

His thoughts were sardonic and contemptuous.
Your father passed a new act. The Act of Submission. Every man, woman, and child must recognize him as the sovereign ruler of Comoros, independent of every other power, including the High Seer. The Aldermaston of Augustin has already sworn it. Do you remember the previous chancellor, Tomas Morton? The one before Crabwell. He was a maston and refused. Well, he was just beheaded in Pent Tower. Your country is in an uproar over it.

Maia’s heart crushed inside her chest. Her father was breaking every vow. Every covenant.

No,
she thought with dread.

The Dochte Mandar will unite against him. I tell you, Maia, Comoros will be invaded. If I do not do it, someone else will claim it. Let me claim it for you. You are the rightful queen.

She squeezed her eyes shut, miserable at the news.
No, Collier. No, do not hurt my father.
Even now, after everything he had done, she could not bear the thought of losing him or seeing him usurped. As long as he lived, she would hold on to the hope he could change.

Still, she could not silence the thought that her father might have finally gone mad.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

Hautland

T
hey were trapped in a cocoon of cold. Maia shivered, snuggled her head against Argus’s damp pelt, and tucked in her legs. She could not feel her toes—any of them. Drips of water from the ice plopped in the small pan that Jon Tayt had set out to collect drinking water. She could not remember ever being so miserable and cold, even in the attic room of Lady Shilton’s manor. Her hair was stiff with ice and it crackled as she moved.

Jon Tayt snored softly, sitting up against the curved wall of the snow cave, his gloved hands resting on his belly. His nose was ruddy, but he had a contented look on his face. His cap was askew on his head, revealing his balding pate through the loose curls of his coppery hair. She stared at him, feeling a mixture of tenderness and humor. He was so unflappable and surly. Without his help, she would not have made it to the mountains bordering Hautland. She suddenly wanted to laugh. All her life she had wanted to travel and visit the other kingdoms, but she had expected to visit them as a princess, not a fugitive.

An especially loud snore came from his mouth and he startled himself awake. His gray-green eyes blinked open and searched the pure whiteness. Maia tried to hide her smile, but he caught her.

“Glad to see I amuse you, my lady,” he said gruffly. He shifted in the cave, twisting his shoulders around to loosen them, then flexed his arms and fingers. “Was I snoring?”

Maia’s smile broadened. “A little.”

He was abashed. “I fell asleep without watching your rest. At least we did not endanger anyone else. Did you have another dream?”

She shook her head. “It was too cold to sleep.” During the night, she had not felt the awareness of the Myriad One inside her. Perhaps it did not relish experiencing the human penchant for suffering the elements.

Jon Tayt bent forward and examined the hole he had carved to get them inside. “It snowed shut. We need more air,” he grumbled. After withdrawing an arrowhead, he jammed it into the snowpack above their heads and knifed it viciously upward a few times. Slush sprinkled down on them and Argus whined, but Jon shushed him. A few more pokes and they both heard the gush of air from above. Jon Tayt stowed the arrow away, then craned his neck at the hole and gazed up.

“Sky is blue. The storm is over.”

“Thank Idumea,” Maia said, brushing her arms. She lifted the pan of water and took a small sip. The water was frigid, but it helped soothe her thirst. She offered it to the hunter and then the boarhound, who finished it. Jon Tayt stowed his gear, hefted one axe and handed her another, and they both began chopping their way out of the snow cave.

As they emerged, Maia gazed in wonder at the crystalline expanse of the snow-clad range before her. It was impressive beyond words, the hulking crags of rock decorated with fresh snow. The air had a bite to it that stung her nose when she breathed, and she gently blew on her hands to try and warm them with her breath.

“Look there,” Jon Tayt muttered gravely.

She gazed around the destruction of their cave, but he was directing her gaze elsewhere. While she had been giving the majestic peaks her attention and admiration, Jon Tayt had been examining the ground. Now she could see, plain as day, the trampled ruts of boots. They were everywhere along the pass, cutting a swath from the way they had come and continued down the slope into Hautland.

“Persistent badgers,” Jon Tayt groused. “They nearly trampled over our camp as well. They were right on top of us without knowing it.” He chuckled darkly. “If one had wandered over here, he would have come crashing through.” He sniffed and pointed. “They are ahead of us now, lass.”

“Is that a problem or a blessing?” Maia asked.

“Both. It will be easier to hide our trail by walking over theirs. However, if we keep following their trail, it will lead us to no safe place.” He scouted the area, examining the size of the prints. She watched and waited as he worked to divine the signs. “Ach, at least thirty men. Mayhap forty.” He wiped his nose. “I do not like the odds of that.”

“At least they are not coming from behind us.”

He shook his head. “Cannot judge that either, lass. If I were hunting us, and granted not many men are as clever, I would not bring everyone in a mass. I would send a group behind to follow the trail.” He dipped his fingers into a snowy boot print. “These tracks are fresh. They may well double back and catch us in between them.”

“So going back would be equally dangerous as going forward.”

“Danger no matter what we do.”

Maia sighed. “We need to get to the port city of Rostick in two days. There will be a ship waiting for us.”

“A ship? And how did you conjure that, my lady?” He looked at her skeptically.

She did not want to explain the nature of her connection with Feint Collier and so she did not. She moved some of her frozen hair out of her face. “Which way do we go?”

He pointed with the axe down the mountain.

Huge pine and cedar trees crept up from the lower slope of the Watzholt, and the trail disappeared into it. The trees were blanketed in fresh snow and the branches drooped, but lower down the storm had only brought rain, and the trees were vibrant green and lush.

“I like not the look of that,” Jon Tayt muttered, standing at the edge of a rock looking down the trail into the maw of the woods. “Good place for a trap. They could see us coming down, but we would not see them until it was too late.” He scratched his neck and gazed at the trail from different vantage points.

“The woods will provide cover for us as well,” Maia suggested. She wanted a fire to warm her hands and feet. She was still shivering in spite of her many layers. But she had to agree with Jon Tayt—the trees would be an excellent place for their enemies to conceal themselves.

Jon Tayt shook his head and clucked his tongue. “Best to double back and take another pass down.” They started back up the slope, climbing away from the thinning snow. Maia despaired ever being warm again. They had not gone far when Argus began to growl and whine, sniffing and roaming around their trail. His ears went up as he stared up the trail.

“Black luck,” the hunter said. “Trap is closing.” He sniffed the air. “Must be more men following our trail. Better run for the woods then. We must forge our own trail rather than taking this one. It will be easier to hide in the woods. Caught on this slope, we are dead.”

Maia’s heart began to warm. “All right.”

They started back down the trail again and diverted from the already plowed path, heading into fresh snow. The way was steep, but the depth of the bank made it easy to sink their boots into it and slog down. Little bricks of ice came loose from their steps and tumbled down the fleecy slope. Argus followed in their wake, a low threatening growl in his throat.

The sound of a hunting horn filled the air from higher up. Maia looked back and saw men in the gap. The horn blasted again and the noise was joined by the sound of a horn from the woods below.

“Keep going!” Jon Tayt barked, crashing through the snow to carve a trail. The men were still a way up the mountain behind them, but they were running down the trail they had made, closing the distance quickly.

“How many!” he asked her.

Maia looked over her shoulder and saw at least a dozen. She could not see a uniform or insignia. Each was heavily bundled in a fur cloak and hat.

“Too many,” Maia answered frantically. “Keep running!”

The snow bucked and heaved as they went down. From the line of trees lower down, she could see men emerging as well. Yet another horn blared, answering the other calls. Dark shapes flitted through the snow farther down, snapping and barking, tethered by leashes. Hunting dogs!

“Ach,” Jon Tayt swore. He cut a steep path, trying to close the distance to the woods, but Maia could see they were not going to make it. Their pursuers from behind were covering ground faster than she and Tayt could make it, because the snow was already trampled, providing easier footing. Voices could be heard above and below, mixed with the barks of the dogs. Argus growled and began snapping in return, but he was only one and they were many. Horsemen appeared from the trees below them, streaming into the drift to close off their escape. The woods were teeming with men!

“A fine kettle of fish!” Jon Tayt shouted, wiping his face. His voice was rising nervously. He looked back and hissed his breath. He sheathed his throwing axe and brought his bow out, already strung, and adjusted the quiver bag so it was within easy reach.

Maia stared up at the mountain, watching crumbles of ice and snow come barreling down as the soldiers from above raced downward at them. Small clods of snow tumbled against her legs. She turned her gaze to the soldiers below. It was like a hunting party, complete with hounds, and they were the prey.

She reached down and took a hunk of snow in her frozen palm. She stared at it, taking in the way the sunlight winked off the crystal edges. The approaching soldiers were speaking in a guttural language, full of coughing sounds and unfamiliar inflections. She had never learned the Hautlander tongue, though she recognized its rough speech. The snow crystals in her hand triggered a realization. Snow melted. Snow became water. Water was from storms. Storms were under the control of her power. She was the master of storms.

She felt the kystrel’s magic flare. Even though it was not touching her skin, her chest burned with heat. Her mind went black with implacable power and vengeful triumph. She would not be hunted. Not
her
, not by these petulant mongrels. The look of fear in Jon Tayt’s eyes told her that her own eyes were glowing silver.

“No, Maia! No! Fight it off!”

He grabbed her arm to pull her after him, but the power flamed to life inside her like a thousand candles, burning away the chill and the frost. She was warm again. She was fire itself. She could feel Jon Tayt’s panic bubbling inside him like a kettle, so she snatched away his fear, crushing it like a tinder flame.

Already she could feel the web of the Dochte Mandar. They were responding to her use of the magic and they were rushing at her to tamp and bind her. When they got close enough, they would knit their wills together to forge a cage to block her access to the Medium’s power. Maia smiled deliciously. She turned back to the mountain and raised her arms to the sky, her fingers hooked and quivering with strain. Then she brought her elbows in, pumped her fists down and hunched over.

A rippling shock shook the mountain.

The jolt sent everyone except for her crashing to the ground. There was a sound, a sloughing sound, a breath puffed from a giant’s mouth. And then the snow began to tumble from the mountain, breaking loose in huge boulders of ice and slush. It came as a wave, a massive slide of tumbling snow that barreled down at them.

She and Jon Tayt and Argus started down the mountainside at a run.

Cries of terror sounded from the men below as well as the men above. The rumble of the avalanche was deafening. Her gray skirts were thick with snow and wet and heavy around her legs, but power and strength flooded her, banishing her weariness. She was plowing the way now, and Jon Tayt and the dog were following in her path. Strange—the snow was parting for her. Fissures of ice crackled and split, shearing away and carving a path down the mountain. They were rushing as fast as they could, a monstrous wave of ice coming hard behind them. The soldiers in pursuit from above were trampled by it, buried alive by the crushing weight of snow.

Down below, the horses were going wild with terror and the soldiers fled into the cover of the trees to escape the coming devastation.

Maia struggled to reclaim her mind. She had lost control of it with a single action, and she struggled to wrench it back. She was still aware, still seeing the scene unfold, but it was as if she were tagging along beside herself. Detached, similar to how she’d felt in the Aldermaston’s chamber. She dreaded harming anyone else.

“Too far!” Jon Tayt warned, one hand gripping Argus’s leather collar.

The snow roared behind them. The trees were just ahead and men cowered behind the trunks, some trying desperately to climb the laden branches to get to higher ground. It was hopeless. The avalanche billowed like a storm cloud forming over the sea as it came down. It rose higher and higher until it towered over the trees and over all the specks of rock and men.