Burn Me Deadly

TWENTY-FOUR

I took Argoset’s huge ebony horse from the inn’s small private stable; it seemed appropriate. I told the boy who saddled him about Pansy and vastly overpaid him to retrieve her and put her up for a while.

It was almost dark, but I headed straight out of town without even stopping at Angelina’s. Liz had been gone overnight; realistically, anything bad that was going to happen had probably already happened and hurrying was pointless, but where she was concerned I was not realistic.

I had only my sword and boot knife as weapons; over the years I’d amassed a large pile of overt and covert death-dealers, including a miniature crossbow that folded down into a tube I could strap to my arm and a garroting wire with a little spring-driven mechanism that automatically tightened it, but I did not stop and gather any of these. Liz was in the middle of the Black River Hills with Doug Candora and Marion the pitchfork murderer, and I couldn’t bear the thought of doing anything else but rushing to her. I no longer even cared that she’d lied to me; I just wanted her safe in my arms again.

The black stud proved equal to the task. I wore no spurs and could only urge him forward with heels and foul language, but neither proved necessary. He made great time down the road, maintaining a full gallop with little apparent effort, not put off by the darkness or the unfamiliar terrain. The stars came out above us as the last light of the day sank into the west.

When I guided him off the road, he took the forest trails with the same sure-footed grace, dodging anything he couldn’t leap over. I sank low along his neck and heard branches slash the air above me. We reached Bella Lou and Buddy’s place, but it was deserted. All the livestock was gone, along with their wagon and belongings. I’d just seen Bella Lou in town, mourning her loser of a husband; had they been looted out? More likely their paranoia made them prepare their departure so well that when it came time, Bella Lou was able to clear them out single-handed in record time before they set off for Neceda.

As the landscape grew higher and rockier the horse slowed a bit, but never faltered. The sky blazed with stars, and a waning moon provided light enough to see as the trees thinned. I was so preoccupied with thoughts of Liz that we were almost to the tree line before I realized why the horse was so sure-footed: Argoset undoubtedly scouted this whole region on his own fruitless quest for dragon eggs the day the stable burned down, and even if the horse didn’t know the specific trail, he remembered the terrain.

Still, the only thing that really filled my thoughts was Liz. I’d lost people I’d loved before, but it was nothing like this. Even the death of Liz’s sister Cathy, who I probably should have loved, or the long-ago murder of Janet as I was forced to watch, faded next to this new agony of anticipation. The thought of never again hearing Liz laugh, feeling her turn in her sleep beside me, seeing her sweaty face in the lamplight as we made love, twisted my stomach. I couldn’t be too late, not this time. I had to see her again; I had to save her. Or I’d have to die.

We’d once had that very conversation, lying naked beneath these same stars along another river, after I’d accompanied her on a delivery. We’d made camp, eaten dinner, taken a swim and ended up thrashing on the mossy bank until we were both satisfied. Then we’d washed off the mud and collapsed onto a blanket, wet and sated and content.

“Who do you think will die first?” she’d asked, not seriously.

“I get more sharp things shoved at me,” I pointed out.

“Yeah, but you’re used to that. I could be robbed and killed at any moment, too.”

“I’m older.”

“Oh, just barely. Seriously, though. Who do you think it’ll be?”

“Me,” I said with certainty.

She rolled on her side and looked at me. Her hair was longer than normal then, and her bangs hid one eye. “Really? Why do you think so?”

I brushed them back so I could see her face. “Because I refuse to live without you. So I’ll have to make sure I die first.”

“What makes you think I could live without you?”

Because you couldn’t possibly love me as much as I do you, I wanted to say. Because you filled a gap I’d learned to live with, and if it opened up again, I couldn’t survive it. That was the real reason. But that thought, verbalized, would’ve kept us both laughing for an hour. So I just said, “If you could call that ‘living,’ ” and we both giggled. Then we made out some more.

I was so lost in this reverie that the low, dark shapes moving through the shadows didn’t register until I found myself in the middle of them. My horse whinnied nervously and I discerned the red scarves, gray in the moonlight, of two dozen Black River Hills people.

I slowed my horse to a walk as they formed up around me. So this was who Candora got to help him search. It made sense; there were a lot of them, and they were used to the terrain. They emerged from the hawthorns like badgers, low to the ground and without a scratch on them. The big, crude knives they carried would do considerably more than scratch, I knew. The blades reflected the moonlight raggedly, befitting their owners.

“You best stop,” one said, and pointed his weapon at me.

I did, pulling the reins and murmuring, “Whoa.” The big black stud tossed his head but didn’t panic.

Torches flared to life around me. Too bad they hadn’t used torches when searching; that I would’ve spotted. But the flickering orange light did nothing to make them any friendlier. If anything, their mean little faces seemed more devilish.

“Fellas,” I said genially. “There seems to be some misunderstanding here. I don’t want any trouble; I’m just passing through.”

“I know you,” one said. He had bruises around both eyes, which made him look even more like some low animal that had learned to walk upright. “You punched me in the face.”

“Yeah,” I said with a weary sigh. So much for playing innocent. Steps scuffed on the rocks behind me as well, and I knew I was surrounded. Time to be clever again.

I swung my leg over the saddle and slid to the ground. I did not draw my sword; I still had some hopes I could talk my way out. I spread my hands in a wide, let’s-be-friends gesture. “Hey, be reasonable. I’m sorry I had to punch you, but things happen. Would money make you feel better?”

Black eyes shook his head, slow and serious.

“Good, because I’m flat broke.” No one laughed. They moved slowly in, not rushing but simply sliding forward, their boots scraping on the rocks. Those big knives dangled loosely in their hands, and I could see spots that could be either rust, or blood they hadn’t bothered to clean off. The torches guttered loudly in the wind.

I took a step toward black eyes. A fence of knives appeared before me.

Okay. Decision made.

I dropped to my knees and stared up at the stars, eyes wide, mouth open. “Oh, my God,” I said softly. “Lumina.”

About half of them followed my gaze, including most of the ones directly in front of me. Yes, it was the old “look behind you!” trick, but if you do it with enough conviction, it’ll always work.

I leaped up, drew my sword and struck all in one motion. My wide swing cut through the calf muscles of half a dozen of the red-scarves, including black eyes. They fell with a mass howl, and I dashed past them, turned and prepared for the rest of them to rush me.

Only three of them did, though. The first one swung wide and overhand. I dodged, kicked his feet out from under him, and he fell face-first onto the ground, his head smacking the stone like a cantaloupe. His knife clattered off into the dark. The second one ran at me, knife extended straight out. Again I sidestepped and slashed off his knife hand halfway up his forearm. I spun to face the third, who threw the big knife at me and gave me a nasty cut atop my left shoulder. When he saw he’d missed anything vital, he turned and ran.

The rest of them stood over their moaning, bleeding comrades. Some knelt to help, but most just stared at me with those blank, dead eyes.

I waited to see if any of them would make a move, and also listened madly for anyone behind me. It would be just like Candora to suddenly appear and cave in my skull again.

Finally I said, “Is that it? Are we done?”

“Why you here?” one man said. It wasn’t a challenge, more a whine of someone out of his depth seeking to understand. “Why you all here?”

“I’m just here to find my girlfriend,” I said. “You’ll have to ask everyone else.”

“We live back in here,” he continued. “This is our home, and nobody don’t fuck with us.”

“Suits me, pal. Just send my horse over here and I’ll be on my way.”

One of them slapped my horse, and he trotted across the skirmish line to me. “You ain’t gonna find Lumina, you know,” their spokesman said. “Only a believer find her.”

I swung into the saddle. “Then it’s a good thing I’m not looking for her, isn’t it?” I headed up the slope into the dark before any of them had a change of heart.