We had a standoff of sorts. We could not get at Goblin and the Daughter of Night when they were most vulnerable. Their thugs did not know that we had lost our most potent weapons, at least for a time. My ravens, who had returned conveniently only when it was time for them to become Tobo’s mouthpieces, informed me that Howler and Tobo had survived but were hurt. They were hidden in the woods a few dozen yards from where the Daughter of Night and Goblin, barely recovered enough to keep breathing, were hunkered down.
I tried to let Sleepy know quietly but Sahra was too alert. In moments she worked herself into a state that even Murgen could not soften. “You’ve got to do something!” she shrieked.
“The Daughter of Night will hear you,” Murgen growled.
“You’ve got to get him out of there!”
“Be quiet!”
I agreed. Somebody had to do something. That somebody might be me. But the only useful help I had was my two raven assistants. They alternately reported Tobo unconscious or quietly delirious. They could not get reliable orders from him. They refused to let me use them to transmit orders to the other Unknown Shadows. Those were gathering in numbers such that it was impossible not to catch glimpses of them when you turned or moved suddenly.
“We can’t get close to him,” Murgen told Sahra. He shook her. She was not listening. If she listened she would have to hear uncomfortable truths.
Shukrat stepped forward. She told us, “I can bring him out.”
Sahra shut up. Even Sleepy stopped pulling the remains of our army back together and offered her attention for a moment.
“I’ll need my own clothing back,” Shukrat told us. Her accent was slight. “The enchantment won’t touch me if I’m protected by my own clothing.” Her use of Taglian had become conversational.
Sahra’s hysteria faded immediately. I will never understand that woman. I would have bet on it getting worse.
The rest of us exchanged glances. We could not survive without Tobo. Not in this world. Not with our enemies. We had to get him out of there before the Daughter of Night discovered the opportunity that fortune had thrown down at her feet.
Shukrat said, “You’ve got to trust me sometime. This might be a good time to take a chance.”
Maybe she was not as dumb as she put on.
Tobo trusted her.
I looked over her head to where Sleepy had resumed expostulating angrily with Iqbal Singh and an officer in badly dented Hsien style armor. She had heard. She waved a hand and nodded to indicate that the decision was up to me. I knew the Voroshk kids better than she did.
“All right,” I told Shukrat. “But I go with you.”
“How?”
“I’ll put on Gromovol’s...”
She was more amused than alarmed, though she was troubled. She was very worried about Tobo.
Because I have this obsessional thing about loyalties and brotherhood and keeping faith with the past I sometimes have trouble believing that other people respond as flexibly to their situation as they do. I could not have made my peace with such a dramatic shift in circumstances as easily as Shukrat had.
I said, “That won’t work, eh?”
“No. The clothing is created specially for each of us. Individually.” She had only that slight accent, no greater than my own, but she did not yet possess a large vocabulary. Her speech was simpler than it might have been. “Though it can be adjusted by a tailor of sufficient skill. The skill takes twenty years to learn, though.”
“All right. Where’s that stuff stashed? In Tobo’s wagon?” The kid had so much junk he needed his own wagon and teamsters to haul it around. The wagon contained things as diverse as marbles and miracles. He had been indulged all his life and would not leave anything behind. “Let’s go.”
I hoped he had not left any protective spells where they would keep us from getting at the tools we needed to save his scruffy young butt.
73
Midway Between:
The Rescue
Fully attired in her family uniform Shukrat seemed a lot more formidable than the cute little freckle face who hung around with Tobo. Her apparel seemed to be alive, seemed excited to have rejoined her. The black cloth kept stirring around her, restlessly. She resembled an Unknown Shadow who had chosen to let itself be seen. Her blue eyes sparkled. I suspected she might be having fun. I told her, “Tobo’s dad and I will come along as far as we can,” although she did not seem to need reassurance. She did understand that having Murgen along meant Thai Dei would be there, too. And Thai Dei did not trust her at all.
Our sometimes odd personal entanglements did not interest Shukrat. Not that she would ever talk about them with an old fart like me.
Shukrat forgot that she was wearing that same outfit the day she fell into our hands. When she was not alone. She forgot that she was not invincible.
Sorcerers never lack for self-confidence. Especially young sorcerers.
Those whose self-confidence is justified live to become old sorcerers.
A platoon of elite fighters would creep along behind us, far enough back not to irritate Shukrat’s pride but close enough to salvage her cute little behind if her confidence was not completely justified.
For Tobo’s sake I would try to make sure she became an older sorceress, by at least one more day.
Murgen scrounged up fireball projectors for himself and Thai Dei. Uncle Doj scrounged up himself and Ash Wand and invited himself into the game. He might be older than dirt but he was still spryer than me. He and his disciples stole through the battered wood in silence so total I wondered if my hearing was going. My old bones were less cooperative so I ended up as rearguard. Today my whole body insisted on reminding me that I had been critically wounded not all that long ago. Although it did that almost every day.
I wore my Widowmaker armor. Though the Hsien reproduction was quieter than the metal original that Soulcatcher made I still seemed to be all clang and clatter.
I took One-Eye’s spear along, against Lady’s advice.
Shukrat’s flying post trailed behind her. My ravens rode it, one offering directions, the other poised to carry news or unexpected holiday greetings to the rear.
It would be a holiday somewhere in the world. And fate offered me a glimpse of Goblin in the distance, evidently passed out, much as he had done after preferring the holiday excuse for being drunk, half a lifetime ago. I hefted the black spear.
I glimpsed the girl, too. She was moving but doing it like a drunk on the brink of passing out. I recalled another time, long ago, when a brother named Raven and I had ambushed a sorceress called Whisper on Soulcatcher’s behalf. Circles of fortune. The madwoman had been our employer at the time. Now she worked for us. Or would be given the opportunity to work for us if I could keep her alive. That might be a tough assignment.
Seeing the girl and my old friend hurt. I wished I had a weapon I could use to end this here, now. One-Eye’s spear seemed to turn in my hand. I pointed out the view to Murgen and Thai Dei. I breathed, “On the way out. After we have Tobo and Howler.” I indicated their bamboo poles.
Murgen worked to keep a blank face. Thai Dei did not have to work. Thai Dei did not come equipped with facial expressions, so far as I could tell. Uncle Doj nodded. Uncle Doj was old friends with unpleasant necessity.
I told Murgen, “I’ll do it if you can’t.” Sometimes you have to build a wall around your heart.
A few steps onward we encountered the emotional phenomenon the soldiers had reported. But with the girl stunned it did not overcome reason. I just had to concentrate on not giving myself up to love for the Daughter of Night.
