Finnikin of the Rock

'You are evil,' he seethed.

'Oh, the way that word is thrown around!' she said. 'Everything is evil that humans can't control or conquer.'

'What do you expect me to do?' he argued. 'Fight the traders for the thief? You're the one who sold him.'

'Because I needed a horse for your escape,' she replied calmly.

'Which I would not have needed if you hadn't betrayed me. Then you go and sell the horse for the ring. So now we have no horse,' he continued, 'and a ruby ring that I'm presuming you're going to trade for a useless thief.'

'What a ridiculous suggestion,' she said. 'He stole the ring in the first place!'

Finnikin held the dagger tightly, a splinter from the wooden handle digging into his palm. He looked up at the thief and saw bleak relief pass over the boy's face.

'I will do the right thing and put him out of his misery.' He wondered when the horror of the day would end.

'And if you miss?'

'I never miss.' There was no boasting in his tone, just sadness. Finnikin turned the dagger and held the blade between his thumb and finger. He stared at his target, bile rising in his throat. But before he could take aim, Evanjalin placed a hand on his arm and took the dagger from him.

'We are not going to buy the thief, Evanjalin,' he said wearily.

'Of course not,' she said, leaning to whisper in his ear. 'We'll just steal him.'

'And what are we supposed to do? Storm the barge? I don't have my father's sword, and I can't see myself succeeding against ten traders and these feral buyers whose type I recognize from the mines. Remember the mines where you put me? For which I will never forgive you.'

'And I will never forgive you for the whore!' There was anger in her eyes. 'We wait until someone buys the thief and then we ambush the buyer. Which means, Sir No Sword and Three Knives, our chances of success are high, because I'm presuming there will only be one buyer to fight.'

'And what makes you think I carry three knives?'

She clutched his forearm where the smallest knife was hidden, then placed her arms around him and embraced him, patting his back to feel the second scabbard of the dagger she held in her hand.

'And the third?' he asked.

There was another flash of anger in her eyes. 'Do you expect me to get on my knees before you? Like your whore? The third is at your ankle.'

Fury rose inside him. 'I curse the day I climbed that rock in Sendecane,' he spat.

She looked at him sadly. 'That's where we differ, Finnikin. For I believe that was when it all began.'

They watched in silence as the traders unlocked the boy's shackles and bound his hands. Finnikin suspected that the buyer would take the thief along the river and wait for morning to travel down the waterway to the mines.

'If we do this...' he said, turning to Evanjalin.

But she was gone. He pushed through the crowd, searching, calling her name. He leaped onto the back of a man close by to get a clear view of the area and was thrown aside. There were grunts of hostility and elbows thrust into his face as he pushed his way to the river's edge, where the barges floated. Evanjalin had taken to wearing his brown woolen trousers and blue cap, but the colors were too dull to stand out in the waning light. He hoped she had enough sense to find her way back to the tavern. The thought of her being lost to them as he had once wished suddenly sent a shiver through him.

Farther down the bank, he caught sight of the thief being dragged away. Had the owner clothed the boy, Finnikin might have left things as they were. But in the fever camp, he had stumbled over the naked body of a boy the same age as the thief. In Lumatere, boys that age had been robust and full of mischief, teasing the girls they had grown up with, not knowing whether they wanted to follow their fathers or cling to their mothers. There was something unnatural about a boy of fourteen lying dead, and Finnikin had seen it too often. Enough, he thought. Enough.

Finnikin followed the thief and his owner down a trail deep into the woods. He knew if he did not succeed in setting the thief free that night, he would at least put him out of his misery. It would be simple, he told himself. He would race farther ahead and cut them off, taking the slave owner by surprise. But then he lost sight of them through the thick foliage and decided to scale the pine tree closest to him. When he reached a height that gave him a better view of his surroundings, his heart sank. From where he was balanced, he could see the thief and his owner walking toward a clearing. And in the clearing was another man setting up camp. Evanjalin had been wrong. The buyer was not alone.

He knew he had to move quickly. But just as he was about to climb down, he saw her. She leaped out of the trees at the edge of the trail and threw herself on the back of the thief's owner with Finnikin's dagger in her hand.

Finnikin hit the ground running. Between the trees he could see she had the advantage, slicing the man across the chest, her arm around his neck, her legs wrapped around his waist. But it was too late. The buyer's companion had reached them. He pulled Evanjalin by the jerkin and threw her face forward against a tree, twisting her arm to make her let go of the dagger.

Finnikin ran harder. Don't let him find out she's a girl. Please, don't let him find out she's a girl.

But the man's hands prodded and poked, crawling up her torso.

'Evanjalin!'

One dagger caught the first man in the back, and the second knife landed an inch above Evanjalin's fingers on the tree. In a split second she had yanked it out and thrust it backward, catching her attacker unaware. When the man stumbled away, she plunged the knife twice more into his thigh, crippling him for a moment.

'Run!' Finnikin yelled as he tossed his cloak to the boy. He fought off the second man as Evanjalin grabbed the thief and they bolted into the woods. With a punch that left the man reeling, Finnikin raced after them.

'Keep running,' he yelled. Ahead he could see the thief, whose leaps and lunges warned him of the unevenness of the ground. And then he was beside Evanjalin, realizing, as the blood pumped into his heart and the pulse at his neck threatened to burst, that his need to distance himself from their pursuers was less important than his need to take the lead from her.

They reached the end of the trail and burst into the open valley, where the sun was just beginning to disappear. As he inched closer, he could tell by her sideways glance and the glint in her eye that she was not going to let him pass. But she was tiring, and when she pointed up ahead to the road that led to Speranza, she held her hand in front of him, barring him, keeping him back. He shoved her hand aside, pushing her in the process, and when she stumbled, he took the lead, following the thief as he leaped over the timber fence that boarded a meadow. By then there were no sounds of heavy feet behind them, just his breathing and Evanjalin's.

When the thief stopped and fell to his knees to catch his breath, Finnikin collapsed onto the grass and Evanjalin fell down beside him. He rolled onto his back, holding his side in an attempt to reduce the pain, and when he looked across at her, he thought he caught a glimpse of a smile on her face.

The thief stared at them. There was no humility or gratitude in his expression. And little else either.

'I own you,' Evanjalin said bluntly as she sat up. 'Never forget that, boy.'

Trevanion and Sir Topher were waiting for them outside the tavern. Sir Topher's eyes widened with disbelief when he recognized the thief, but before he could say a word, Evanjalin rushed up to him.

'Sir Topher,' she said breathlessly, 'I got it back!' She clutched the ruby ring in her hand. Finnikin watched Sir Topher look down at her with tender affection before reaching over and folding the ring into her palm.

'It's best you keep it hidden, Evanjalin.'

'We need to move. Quickly,' Finnikin said.

'The horse?' Sir Topher asked.

'No horse.'

'Who—'