Saben shook his head. “Not me. I know it’s south somewhere, that’s all. You, Paks?”
Paks ignored the question at first. “Canna—you aren’t leaving us, are you?”
“No. But if this wound goes bad, or we have trouble on the way and I’m killed, I wanted to know if you could find the Duke yourself.”
“Oh. I—I think so. At least, I’ll recognize the roads when we get there, the crossroads and such.”
“Good.” Canna shifted, looking around the tiny space in which they lay. “Saben, can you tell what they’re doing, and if it’s safe to start moving? And Paks, let’s get the rest of those berries packed up.”
“It sounds like they may too occupied to worry about us,” said Saben. He rose cautiously and peered out the upper level of the brambles. “There’s a force on the walls—maroon and green both—the Halverics must have armed our men too. Wise of them. And a lot of troops below the walls, and horses. I think we can go, but we’d better stay down. Canna, can you crawl with that arrow wound?”
“As opposed to lying here to be captured by those barbarians, certainly. It’s a good thing our tunics are dark. But let’s eat what we can of these berries before we go.” They stuffed handfuls of juicy berries into their mouths, gaining strength from the sweet juice. In a few minutes, Canna started them moving toward the trees. She sent Saben ahead, and Paks followed her, bringing one pail full of berries. They had buried the other under fallen leaves, in hopes that searchers would not find evidence of their presence.
Paks could see that Canna was having a hard time crawling; several times she stopped, swaying, but she never fell. Luckily their explorations during the berry harvest had left little trails running here and there almost to the forest edge; they did not have to force a new path. Canna managed to keep moving, and at last they fought free of the thorns. It was growing dusky; they could see fires twinkling on the meadow below.
They pushed through the hazels that fringed the woods and moved on into the darker shelter of the trees, now walking upright. When they found a sheltered hollow, they settled in to make further plans. Even in that dimness, Paks could tell that Canna was paler than usual.
“At least we’ve got full waterflasks,” she said quietly. “And we’ve got some berries. I have a lump of cheese. What about you?” Saben had a hunk of dried meat, but Canna had only the berries she’d put in her belt pouch. “We can cook in the berrying pail,” Paks went on.
“If we have anything to cook,” said Saben. It was almost too dark to see. “Canna, how are you doing?”
“Could be worse—” Her voice was shaky.
“You’d better have the cheese and meat,” said Paks. “That’s what they told me when I lost a lot of blood: eat to make it up.” Canna protested, but Paks was firm. “No—you need it. Saben and I can eat berries. You’re the one who will slow us down if you don’t recover.” She handed over her cheese, and Saben gave Canna the meat. They ate in silence; Paks and Saben, already full of berries, ate little.
“I wonder what they’ll be up to tonight,” said Saben at last.
“Not much, I hope. I suppose it depends on how far they’ve marched today—and how the assault goes.” Paks suddenly found herself yawning, though she was not at all sleepy. She pushed thoughts of her other friends aside. “How glad I am, Canna, that you said we should bring our cloaks to lay over the thorns. It’s going to be cold out here.” It was already hard to believe how they had sweated under the brambles.
“Shouldn’t we try to get farther away?” asked Saben.
“No—we’d just blunder around and make noise in the dark, and we might get lost. What do you think, Canna?” Paks remembered that Canna was senior to them.
“I think you’re right. It’s too dark. Though I wish we could find out what they
“That I’ll go along with,” said Saben. “But won’t Gird be angry if non-Girdsmen pray in his name?”
“No,” replied Canna. “He welcomes all honorable warriors.” She reached into her tunic, the cloth rustling as she moved, and pulled out her holy symbol. Paks heard the faint chinking of the links of the chain. “Holy Gird, patron of warriors, protector of the weak, strengthen our arms and warm our hearts for the coming battles. Courage to our friends, and confusion to our enemies.”
“Courage to our friends, and confusion to our enemies,” repeated Paks and Saben. Paks felt strange, calling on one she did not follow, but surely such a simple request could not be misunderstood. She heard the chain jingle as Canna replaced the medallion, and reached to help Canna wrap her cloak around her injured shoulder. She added her own.
“I’ll take the first watch,” she told Saben. “You sleep.”
He rolled up in his own cloak and lay next to Canna. Paks sat with her back against a tree, listening to the noises from the fort, and trying to imagine what they meant. She wondered which of her friends had been killed, and which were in the fort—and who had been captured. And who was the enemy—and why here, at the end of a road? Ferrault had said that the worst they could expect was brigands robbing the grain wagons—yet first the Halverics, and then this army, had marched up to take the fort as if it were important. Why?
She slipped her knife from its sheath and tested the edge. It had dulled on the cloth, as she’d feared. She felt for her whetstone, then paused. The sound would be distinctive if anyone heard it. Still, a dull knife—she decided to take the chance. She moved the blade lightly across the stone. Not too loud: good. It would take longer, but she had time.
When her blade was sharp, she put the stone back in her pouch and the dagger back in its sheath. She looked for stars overhead, but the leaves were too thick. No way to tell how time passed. She heard no noises from the fort, now, and only wind in the trees. She stretched first one arm, then the other. It was colder. She rubbed her arms, hard, then took down her hair and rebraided it by feel. The wind picked up; it smelled like rain. She thought she heard a drum in the distance, and wondered again who the attackers were. An owl called, a long wavering hooo—hooo—hoo hoo. She stretched one leg at a time, and wished she had not wrapped Canna in both cloaks. It seemed much colder. Saben began to snore. Paks reached out and touched his shoulder.
“Don’t snore,” she said when he jerked awake.
“Umph,” he said, and rolled over. She stood and swung her arms vigorously to warm up. Better. The wind dropped, and she squatted down against the tree again, hoping it would not rain, hoping the wind would die away altogether. It didn’t. Just when she thought she would be warm enough after all, a chill current of air flowed into the hollow and she started shivering. She rubbed her arms again, but it didn’t help. Her teeth chattered.
“Paks,” said a voice out of the dark; she nearly yelped. But it was Canna’s voice. Paks scooted around to her side.
“What is it?”
“I woke up and heard your teeth—take this cloak; I don’t need it.”
“I don’t want you to get chilled.”
“I’m warm enough. Don’t be silly; take the cloak.” Canna heaved up and began unwrapping herself from the second cloak. Saben woke up.
“What’s going on?”
“Paks is freezing, and I’m giving her back her cloak.”
“It’s time for me to take a turn watching anyway. Warm up, Paks; I’ll wake you later.”
“Th-thanks.” Paks rolled into the warm cloak, and lay beside Canna, shivering for awhile. She fell asleep as soon as she was warm. She woke in a panic, with Saben’s hand firmly over her mouth. Before she could move away from his hand, she heard the reason for it: horses somewhere nearby. She touched his wrist, and he moved his hand away. She looked at Canna. Canna looked back without moving. She had heard the horses too. A heavy wet fog lay between the trees; their cloaks were furred with moisture.
The horses came nearer. She could hear the jingling bits, the squeak of leather. And voices. “There won’t be stragglers out here—we’d have found ’em holed up in that woodcutter’s hut in this weather.”
“Or else they’re already far away.”
“No—we hit late enough, they’ll have been close in. The only thing is those brambles, the big ones, but Palleck’s squad went over that yesterday.”
“Shot arrows into it, you mean. Those lazy scum wouldn’t pick through thorns. But I agree, that should have flushed anyone out. Still, if
“Right enough. I won’t argue. I wonder though—I thought we were going to lift the siege at Rotengre. What’s
