Prince of Bryanae (Bryanae Series) Page 11

  “Overseers,” he said. “The humans.”

  She shook her head. The ringing was so loud.

  “Where did he go?” she said.

  “Who? I don’t understand.”

  “My father!” she shouted. “What have you done to him?”

  Ber-Ote shook his head, his eyes gleaming in the darkness.

  “I don’t understand.” There was a plaintive note to his voice, as though he were close to tears.

  Her father was dead. She knew that.

  A ghost?

  No, an hallucination.

  She looked at the elven youth before her: dark-haired beneath his leather cap and very earnest, his face as smooth as a human pre-teen, his expression more guileless than Marcus at his most gullible.

  Willow shook her head.

  “Never mind,” she said. “You’re right: I am sick. I need a healer.”

  Ber-Ote nodded.

  “Come with me,” he said. He extended a hand. “Take my hand.”

  For an instant, her father’s voice echoed in her head: don’t give up. Be disciplined.

  She clasped her hand around Ber-Ote’s arm and he helped her up. She rose to her feet unsteadily, draped her arm around the youth’s shoulders.

  “Let’s go see your mother,” she said. “I hope she’s nicer than mine.”

  Chapter 27

  The forest seemed to go on forever. Hallucinations came and went, and Willow was never sure of the reality of what she saw. Once, it seemed as though they were no longer walking, but flying among the treetops; only it turned out that she had stumbled and had fallen onto her back. She had been looking up, not down.

  The ringing in her ears grew until she had trouble hearing any sounds other than her chattering teeth. Her footsteps came across as distant, muffled thuds. Her head throbbed, and her arm throbbed, and her foot … well, best not even to think about the foot. Encased in her makeshift iron and wood splint: out of sight and best forgotten. At least it no longer hurt.

  But that, of course, was a bad sign.

  Ber-Ote led her in silence. Or perhaps he spoke to her and she did not hear. As they proceeded, Willow became increasingly dependent on him for support. She also required frequent rest stops. Alternating waves of delirium and lucidity washed over her. She was still half-convinced she really had seen her father, even though she knew that it was impossible.

  Eventually, the trees began to thin, and Willow smelled the smoke of wood stoves. Through the trees, she caught occasional glimpse of wooden huts. But then she also saw glimpses of orange lights and, on one occasion, a flying snake, so she wasn’t sure what to believe.

  Ber-Ote said something as they approached the periphery of the forest but she couldn’t make it out.

  “What?”

  “I said we’ve got to be careful here. The overseers will see us if we’re not careful and we’ll get caught. We’re not allowed out of the village at night; only when we’re working the fields.”

  The sky was that ash gray that sometimes appears in the phantom hours before dawn. Still dark enough to provide some concealment, but not as dark as Willow would have liked.

  The huts were arranged in concentric rings of squashed circles, with a cleared road bisecting the village and heading away from the forest. Each hut had conical straw-thatched roofs. The nearest hut was several stone-throws from the tree-line, and it was distant enough from its neighbor that a dash between them would leave Willow and Ber-Ote very exposed.

  A handful of human men walked lazy paths through the village. Each was dressed in furs and wielded a large hand-axe. Willow felt herself go tense. She was too weak to fight and too exhausted to run. What if they captured her? No, never again!

  Ber-Ote pressed a finger to his lips and then led her from the shadows of the forest into the moonlit opening between the trees and the first hut.

  They crept across the clearing. Willow concentrated on placing one foot in front of the other, fearful that she might stumble and betray their presence. Once they reached the hut, she wrapped her hands around her head, trying to silence the ringing by squeezing.

  Ber-Ote tapped her on the shoulders and then held up three fingers. She had no idea what he was saying so she shook her head.

  He pointed at the hut against which they huddled, and then held up four fingers. Then he pointed at an adjacent one, and dropped one of the fingers. When he pointed at the next one, he only held up two fingers.

  Oh. Three more crossings to make.

  Three more chances of getting caught.

  Willow nodded, and Ber-Ote led her across the next crossing.

  One of the Kards stepped out into the clearing, moving perpendicular to Ber-Ote and her. They froze in half-crouches and Willow tightened her grip on her makeshift cane. The guard walked at a leisurely pace, seemingly occupied by his thoughts. He did not seem to notice them, and he vanished from sight.

  Willow glanced over her shoulder and inhaled sharply. Tamlevar’s head was suspended in the air above her. It was gigantic: easily bigger than her whole torso. The head grinned, and it was an evil toothy grin, and when it opened its mouth, an enormous red tongue unrolled from it and winded its serpentine way towards her. She raised a hand to ward her face, a terrified wheeze escaping her mouth.

  Ber-Ote tried to cover her mouth. Willow’s combat reflexes engaged. She grabbed his hand, spun him so that his back was to her, and once again wrapped her forearm around his throat. She grabbed the bicep of her other arm, locking the choke on him.

  Ber-Ote’s tiny hands wrestled with her forearm, but it was granite. His knees buckled and Willow eased down with him, not relenting on her death hold. Ber-Ote’s fingers pried at hers, but her grip was too strong, and his strength was fading.

  He raised his arm up as high as his range of motion permitted and brought his elbow down in a tight arc into her ribs.

  Willow felt one of them snap. She gasped, and released her hold. Crazily, she thought: nice one, kid. Then the wave of pain crashed over her.

  “What is wrong with you?” he hissed, glancing about for the overseers.

  “I’m …” She was bent over, clutching at her ribs. “I’m sorry.”

  The boy stared at her with eyes narrowed so heavily with suspicion that they were almost slits.

  “I’ll go,” she whispered, pointing back at the trees. “I’m endangering you and your family. If you can, send help tomorrow.”

  Ber-Ote’s expression softened, and after a moment’s consideration, he shook his head. He held another finger to his lips, and then led her to the next hut.

  Two more to go.

  A guard was approaching them from the direction they needed to go. As he walked, his axe whirled absently around his wrist by its thong, making a dull whistling noise. As he drew nearer, Willow and Ber-Ote crept around the hut, interposing it between them and the overseer.

  The overseer passed, and they made the dash for the next hut. Willow almost stumbled, but she pressed down against Ber-Ote’s shoulder and corrected herself. When they made it to the hut, Ber-Ote pointed at an adjacent one. Presumably, that was his family’s. Willow nodded.

  Ber-Ote looked both ways, and then led Willow to the hut. A colorful-patterned cloth was draped over the opening, and this he lifted to reveal a makeshift door constructed out of assorted branches tied together. He slid the door out of the way, and led Willow inside.

  The hut was small, and appeared to only have two rooms. They stood now in the main room, in which a low wood fire burned in a fireplace. There was no chimney to guide the smoke to the hole in the roof, so the room was hazy and the air acrid. A small straw pallet occupied one end of the room, and a wooden table the other. There wasn’t room for much else.

  “Wait here,” Ber-Ote said.

  He made to move to the curtain dividing this room from the next. However, it opened before he could reach it and a filthy elven woman emerged. She headed for Ber-Ote, a hand raised to strike him.

  “Where in the Icy—?�
� But then she saw Willow and came up short. “Well,” she said, slowly, shaking her head. “Who would have thought?”

  “Hello, Mar-Ra,” Willow said.

  “Well,” Mar-Ra said again. “Well, imagine that. Take your hat off, Ber-Ote.” A sneer rose to her dirty face. “You’re in the presence of royalty.”

  Mar-Ra swept her arm across her in a mocking flourish and then aped a courtesy.

  “Welcome to my palatial estate, Your Highness. To what do I owe this great honor?”

  Chapter 28

  “Begging yer pardon, Milady,” Mar-Ra said, her lips writhing in a sneer as she spat the words, “we weren’t expecting ye, ot’wise we’d’ve prepared a feast fer ya, Your Highness.”

  “Knock it off,” Willow said. She clutched Ber-Ote’s shoulder for balance. The youth’s eyes flashed back and forth between his mother and his guest, but his face remained neutral. Willow respected that.

  “Of course, Your Highness,” Mar-Ra said with a series of bows. “I’m sorry, Your Highness. Won’t happen again, Your Highness.”

  “And please stop calling me that.”

  Mar-Ra abandoned the obsequious act, her eyes alight with malice. “Oh, really? You never objected before.”

  “ ‘Before’ was almost two hundred years ago. I was around the same age as Ber-Ote.”

  Mar-Ra moved to the pallet and began straightening the blankets that lay upon it. For a little while, the sounds of her making the bed and the low crackling of the smoky fire were all that broke the silence.

  “You’ve found a grand one, Ber-Ote,” Mar-Ra said without looking at him. She fluffed a ratty pillow that was barely thicker than the woolen blanket stretched across the pallet. “Do you know that?”

  “Mother, she’s sick. And she’s hurt.”

  Mar-Ra spun, fixed a smoldering gaze on Willow.

  “Oh, is that it?” she said. “You abandon us to this hell while you run off to wherever it is you ran off to, but as soon as you need something, you figured you might as well stop in on your old tutor Mar-Ra? Is that it?”

  “I didn’t know that you were Ber-Ote’s mother.”

  “No, you wouldn’t have come here if you knew that, would you? Afraid I’d denounce you. And you’re right!” Mar-Ra’s eyes were afire with hatred. “You betrayed us!”

  “How?” Willow said, feeling Mar-Ra’s hatred washing over her but exhausted beyond caring. She knew the verbal blows were leaving their mark on her psyche, but for the moment she was pleasantly numb to the wounds inflicted. “How did I betray you?”

  Mar-Ra glared at Willow, seeming to struggle for words. Tears began to trickle down her cheeks, leaving tracks in the dirt smudges.

  “You were our royal family! You were supposed to protect us. And instead you betrayed us. You consorted with our captors, abetted them in their conquest.”

  “Do you think I—?”

  “I’ve lived here in squalor, Waeh-Loh. Do you think I like being this filthy?” She plucked at her clothes, and it took a moment for Willow to realize that it was a dress she was wearing … or rather the tattered, muddy remains of one.

  The tears were flowing harder now.

  “I had a station in life just like you,” Ma-Ra said, jabbing her finger at Willow. “I had a husband, and a warm bed, and prestige. Just like you. And now look at me.”

  She sprang at Willow, grabbed her by the lapels of her jacket. “Look at me!”

  “I’m old,” Ma-Ra wailed, her once-beautiful face ugly in its pathos. “I can feel it. I live in dirt, I work in dirt, and every day I have to look at that half-human bastard there!”

  Ber-Ote flinched at the words, but said nothing. A terrible silence filled the thick, acrid air, punctuated only by the occasional pop of the wood on the fire.

  “I shouldn’t have come,” Willow said, and then turned to leave.

  “No,” Ber-Ote protested. “Don’t go.”

  “That’s right,” Mar-Ra said. “Run away again. Leave us to our slavery.”

  A wave of dizziness washed over Willow. She steadied herself against the side of the hut, but the boards groaned and she heard a crack. Mar-Ra inhaled with a sharp hiss.

  “You …” she said.

  “You could always …” Willow fumbled. “Always fight back. You could organize.”

  Mar-Ra bared her teeth.

  “Oh, that’s just grand coming from you. Princess Waeh-Loh, Queen of the Cowards telling me to fight against a hundred thousand Kards! That’s just grand.”

  “How many did you say?” Willow said, aghast. “Did you just say a hundred thousand?”

  “Get out!” Mar-Ra shouted. “Get out of my home!”

  “Mother, no.”

  Ber-Ote put his hand on his mother’s shoulder, but she shook it off and slapped him. He fell to the ground with a stifled cry.

  “Get out!” she shouted, and shoved Willow at the door. The boards cracked, and Willow lost her balance.

  “Get out!” Another shove and Willow was outside the hut, sprawled in the dirt. “Guards! Help! A member of the Resistance is trying to kidnap me!”

  Willow cast her eyes about. One, two, no, three overseers were running towards her, axes in hand.

  “Mother, no!” came Ber-Ote’s wail from within the hut.

  Willow tried to get to her feet, but it was as though she were swimming through mud. The overseers were almost upon her, and a fourth one now turned the bend from ahead.

  “Mother, they’ll kill her!”

  “She’s had it coming for a long time.”

  Willow managed to get to her feet as the fur-skinned overseers closed in on her. She crouched into a defensive position, turning warily.

  The overseers were grinning.

  Time flipped itself, and Willow was a child again, during the invasion. She was small, helpless, and defenseless.

  Flip. No, she was a soldier, trained for combat.

  Flip. Her only escape was to surrender and beg for mercy.

  Flip. That was no escape. That would be worse than death.

  She faltered. Took a wobbling half-step, tried to correct herself by stepping on her splinted foot, and fell to her knees.

  “Kra na bar yu!” shouted one of the overseers, and all four of them laughed. He reached for Willow’s shoulder.

  Willow sprang at him. She grabbed his hand and brought her cane down on his wrist, breaking the bones. Then, still holding his hand, she bashed him in the face and crushed his nose.

  She didn’t stop. She hammered his face and throat repeatedly until one of the others came close enough to be a threat. Only then, did she stop hammering at him. He fell to the ground stone dead.

  Willow hobbled at the nearest overseer but he had learned the lesson his dead friend hadn’t had the time to learn, and he dodged. Willow tried to follow his motion, but couldn’t move as quickly. She turned just in time to deflect a blow from his axe with her cane.

  I’m coming, Willow, said a voice in her head. Tamlevar’s voice. Hold on!

  “Bar grak free! Bar grak free!”

  Dammit, she used to know this language. What were they saying?

  An axe whistled by where her head had been a moment ago. She grabbed it, pivoted, and accelerated the axe along its arc. She brought it back around and up into the attacker’s groin. He howled, and dropped to the ground into a fetal position.

  Blazing agony shrieked in her back as the blade of another axe buried itself beneath one of her shoulder blades. Her own axe dropped uselessly from her hand.

  Hold on, Willow!

  Willow turned on the attacker, his axe trapped in her back. She pivoted, throwing a punch with all of her weight behind it, and caught him in the nose with it. His nose broke, but so did some of her fingers. She also felt the wound in her back rip further open, and the embedded axe ripped free.

  The remaining attacker swung his axe at her head. She couldn’t move in time, so she raised her hand to protect her face, and the axe bit deeply into her palm, cutting into the bo
ne. Willow wailed in agony. She kicked her assailant in the kneecap. He staggered but remained standing.

  The night exploded into white, as something slammed into the back of her head. Willow dropped flat to the ground, the dampness of the wet earth seeping through the front of her uniform.

  I’m coming, Willow. Don’t give up!

  A leather boot caught her on the side of her jaw, tearing her cheek. Another kick caught her in the hip, and another in the back of the head.

  Willow curled into as tight a ball as she could and the kicks rained upon her. Fortunately for her, consciousness abandoned her quickly, and then there was only blackness and no more pain.

  Chapter 29

  Willow sailed through an endless blackness, buffeted between two powerful and opposing forces. One pole tugged at her, trying to drag her into infinity. You are worn, that pole said. Your body has sustained more punishment than it can endure. It is time for you to relinquish your hold on life. Relent! Let go. Rest.

  She deserved rest, she craved it. Her never-ending quest for perfection and the ultimate self-control was a fool’s errand. It had only taken the events of the last few days to show how feeble this edifice of hers actually was.

  But her discipline, that tenacious other pole, refused to yield. It was, in fact, unyielding by its very definition. To fail was unthinkable. To surrender to weakness, abhorrent. The pole of death spoke of a cessation of pain; this one spoke of centuries more of torment, yet its draw upon her was equally powerful.

  Adrift in eternity, neither alive nor dead, Willow dreamed. The visions were mutable, constantly changing from ecstatic visions to horrific nightmares and then back again.

  She dreamed of her father, his slender, skilled hands holding her and keeping her safe; but the hands turned into those of a lover, and the lover became Eric Snyde. In the middle of coital ecstasy, Snyde plunged a dagger into her back, only it wasn’t he who stabbed her, but Tamlevar, and it wasn’t a dagger, it was an arrow.

  The seas of Willow’s psyche batted her about, tossed her between the shores of life and death, fear and desire. Occasionally, the tumult brought her to the surface where she gulped at the air of reality.