Except Perryl.
Where had he gone? Off to the rogues?
Tylar stared out at the spread of black water. Rain pebbled the surface, but the downpour was already ending.
Calla appeared at his side, her face a mask of worry. “Krevan?” she managed to ask, though she feared the answer.
Tylar nodded. “Alive. By the tent. But he needs help.” He pointed. “Grab the giant and get him to carry Krevan back to the fire.”
Calla ran to obey.
Rogger came up to him. “So you fixed your sword.”
Tylar glanced over to him.
“We sent Pupp with the diamond,” Rogger explained. “Figured his fiery form would pass unmolested through those skaggin’ ghawls, while we didn’t dare.”
Tylar turned the blade, examining its brilliant length. The deaths of the daemons had failed to douse the blade. It required no replenishing blood. Made whole by the diamond, the blade now abided. The stone held it firm in this world.
“But how…?” Tylar finally muttered. “The diamond…”
“You can thank Brant and Dart for that,” Rogger said. “Dart for her special eyes, Brant for his insight. Those two make a nice pair.”
Tylar noted them standing hand in hand. Then counted the others. Someone was missing.
“Lorr,” Rogger said, noting his search. “He was slain protecting the young ones.”
Dart stumbled closer to the water. “But he fell right there,” she said, pointing to the shallows near the bank. “Now he’s gone. Could he still be alive?”
Hope rang in her voice.
But in answer, something dark surged up in the water, humping black scales, then vanishing back into the depths.
“Taken,” Brant said, coming up and putting his arm around Dart. He understood what was written in the ripples. “Nothing goes to waste in the forest of the world. It is the Way.”
Dart covered her face, but Brant plainly found comfort in such an end. And maybe he was right. Lorr had been a creature of the forest. It was only fitting he should return to it again.
A scrape of leather on stone drew their attention around.
From the nearby pinnacle, a handful of women descended on ropes, landing lightly. They were all that was left of Meylan’s tribe. One stepped forward. Tylar could not say if this was Meylan or another.
“Wyrd Bennifren,” she said dourly. “We spied him falling.”
She swung around and headed toward the camp.
Tylar had forgotten about the Wyr-lord. Bennifren had gone off to fetch a repostilary for Tylar’s humour. He had no idea of the strange man’s fate, and normally he wouldn’t care-but there were the promised maps.
“Keep the others by the fire,” Tylar ordered Rogger.
The thief nodded, adding wet wood to the fire.
Tylar set off with the women. They led the way into the nest of tents. Bodies were strewn everywhere, blackened by the burn of the ghawls’ swords. It had been a slaughter.
They found Bennifren’s milk mare collapsed face-first in the mud, just as blackened. One of the women knelt down and heaved the body over. Beneath the charred remains, still swaddled, lay Bennifren, pink and hale, sheltered and hidden by the dead woman.
One arm lifted weakly. He gasped and sucked air, plainly only moments from suffocation. His eyelids flickered open, wet with tears. He breathed deeply for several breaths, then coughed a meanness back into his eyes.
His gaze found Tylar.
“Find the rogues…” he seethed sibilantly.
“I’ll need the maps.”
His eyes flicked to the woman who freed him. “Meylan, fetch them for him.”
So the woman was Meylan. How the Wyr-lord could tell the women apart was a mystery to Tylar. Meylan ran off, while another gathered their lord up into her arms.
“And what about our bargain?” Tylar asked.
The Wyr-lord turned to him. Perhaps he was still rattled, or perhaps it was a generosity born of fury, but Wyrd Bennifren finally relinquished a debt. “It is forgiven…” A hand reached out and tiny fingers clutched the edge of Tylar’s cloak. “But only if you free those rogues. Make the Cabal suffer…make them pay.”
It was a bargain Tylar accepted gladly.
“Bound and done,” he promised.
Dart stared at the strange craft, lent to them by the Wyr.
She stood on the bank, chewing on the back of her thumb, nervous. It looked like a small flippercraft cleaved open through the middle, leaving only the bottom half intact. The flitterskiff was a shallow-keeled boat lined on each side by six long bronze paddles, but these required no oarsmen to row. It was a mekanical craft that ran on alchemies of water.
“And Air?” Rogger asked as he knelt beside the boat, examining one of the paddles. He ran a hand along its double-hulled side. The alchemies ran between the hulls.
She had seen Rogger test it under the guidance of a squat Wyr-man, one of the few survivors. The thief was to be their pilot. None of the Wyr could venture where they intended to travel, to where seersong bent the will of those Graced. Like Eylan, they would be easily captured by the song. Even Krevan had to be left here under Calla’s care. He would be a threat once within earshot of seersong.
They readied to leave.
Tylar clasped Krevan’s good shoulder. His other was cross-wrapped in a large bandage. Dart had learned that the pirate owed his life to his Wyr heritage. Krevan had been born without a heart. Through his veins ran a living blood, a blood that had refused to flow out those same veins when his arm had been cleaved away. Still, he would need time and rest to heal.
Tylar turned to the pirate’s swordmate. “Keep him safe, Calla, until we return.”
“I will,” she said sternly.
Malthumalbaen helped push the flitterskiff off the bank and into the water. It had sat rather crooked in the sand, a rough landing by Rogger, but it was his first attempt.
The giant held the boat for Brant and Dart to climb aboard. Brant gave her a hand, and they found a bench near the front. The skiff was large enough to hold a good dozen. So they had plenty of room, even with a giant on board.
Rogger hopped in and crossed to the bow, where foot pedals and a wheel sat before a scooped wooden seat. He sank into it, rubbing his palms.
Tylar left Krevan’s side and splashed into the water. Grabbing the starboard rail, he struggled a bit, confounded by a bad leg. Malthumalbaen helped him with a push on his backside. Tylar straightened once aboard, his cheeks slightly flushed.
With the sword at his belt, Tylar certainly did seem somewhat more solid of foot-but he still hobbled. While Rogger had learned to wield the flitterskiff, Tylar had tested his new sword. It would be best to know its abilities before venturing into unknown territories.
Applying a bit of force, he found the black diamond could be removed from the pommel, but once free, the sword’s blade vanished, and the stone returned again to black rock, both snuffed out. The attempt disturbed them all, especially when Tylar gasped as his body crumbled into further ruin. Still, it took only another drop of Dart’s blood to ignite the stone and feed it back to the pommel. The gold melted over it hungrily, and the silver blade sprouted anew. Tylar’s body also straightened a bit.
Not much, but enough.
But Dart had overheard him with Rogger. The poison still spreads. Some poison born of Chrism’s blood. The sword and stone may stave it off somewhat, but I can feel my bones’ ache leaching outward.
Another reason for haste.
The gift of the flitterskiff was gladly accepted. It would speed them where they needed to go. They also had
