He argued a little, but in the end, he swung his beloved into his arms and he was weeping unashamedly when he delivered her to Tegan. She registered at once who he carried and what she’d meant to Spence. Tegan waved frantically at Morgan, who had some carts. His men must’ve gone across the river to ask Rosemere for help.
Tegan said, “I need you to take care of her for me.”
“I will.” Morgan had proven he was steady as a rock, so his word was good.
“How the devil did you get here just in time?” I asked.
“Thank your traders. They’ve been haranguing all towns in the territories to send men for weeks. On their last trip, which they made without your protection, they swore there would be no more supplies unless we all manned up and did our share.”
“We owe them our lives.” I pitched my voice low, casting a glance at Spence, who stood like a ghost beside Tegan. “He’s not all right. Keep an eye on him while I search the battlefield? I’m missing some men.”
Morgan agreed with a ready nod. “You know, Colonel Park wants to speak with you, as soon as you get the chance.”
It was funny to me how formally he referred to his own wife, but her position made their relationship a quiet, private matter, glimpsed primarily in a subtle look.
“I have a lot to take care of first, but I’m heading to Soldier’s Pond when I’m done.”
With no more conversation, I returned to my mission. I found Rex soon after, and my stomach lurched when I saw him lying there. Momma Oaks would never forgive me for taking another son from her. But when I put my fingers to his throat, I felt a pulse. I searched him from top to bottom and uncovered a flesh wound on his chest and a bruise on his jaw. He was bloody enough, however, that the poison-fogged Freaks had thought he was dead.
Shaking him gently, I set a jug to his mouth and poured. At first the water just trickled down his neck, but apparently that was enough irritation to bring him around. He slapped my hands away and struggled upright, his eyes fuzzy at first. I knew the second he focused on me and realized he was still alive.
“That’s a bit of a surprise,” he said.
“A good one. On your feet. I need you to help me find Morrow and Fade.” Actually I was more interested in seeing if he
With my help, Rex clambered up and he looked around, his face going green. “This is…”
“Yes,” I said softly. “It is.”
Though Rex was unsteady on his feet, he seemed sound enough, so he stayed with me as I sorted the living from the dead. Three times, we found men who looked as if they were done, but I found a heartbeat and called Tegan’s workers to treat them. It was terrifying and exhausting, there among the wounded. Somewhere past midday, Szarok found me. His sharp features were familiar in a way I found strange, considering we’d only spent one night talking. Rex stepped closer in reflex until he remembered that the monsters were dead.
“Your soldiers fought well,” he said.
“As did yours. One of them saved my life.”
“I wish there was a way to take the memories from the dead,” he said somberly, “so they’re not lost.” Before I could reply, another Uroch approached, and they hissed and growled a conversation. Then the other hurried away. “I’ve been reminded to state my terms for our alliance. We keep Appleton. While it’s regrettable the way we acquired it, I doubt any of your people care to settle there now.”
“I don’t have the power to—”
“The devil you don’t,” Rex cut in. “You led this army. You united every able-bodied person willing to fight in the territories. You beat the horde. So if you offer Appleton to our allies, nobody will argue with you.”
Could that be true? I supposed it was. “All right. Appleton’s yours. This isn’t the time to talk about such things, but there will need to be…” I didn’t even know the words.
“Treaties,” Rex supplied. “Trade agreements. And the Uroch will probably want to wear those armbands, at least until the last of the old mutants are gone.”
A flicker of pain registered in Szarok’s golden eyes. Those were his people Rex was casually dismissing. We hadn’t killed all of them; there would be stragglers in forest and field, but if we were careful, they’d die out in a few years and their legacy of violence with them.
But I couldn’t help wondering, “Can the few remaining old ones breed … and start the cycle all over again?”
Szarok shook his head. “They’re past the age of reproduction. The future of my people rests in our hands now.”
“That’s good to hear,” Rex muttered.
The Uroch favored him with a sharp glance, before saying, “We’re returning to Appleton now. These bodies are nothing to us since we can’t collect their memories. So the crows are welcome to them.”
That was a way in which we differed, but I didn’t judge him for it. “Might be best. I don’t know how the men will react, now that the fighting’s stopped.”
Rex nodded. “Peace takes time.”
Szarok went on, “The Gulgur have returned to their burrows. They told me to ask you to bury their dead along with your own. I don’t know if they’re interested in treaties or trade agreements, but they’re pleased it’s safe to come into the light, if they so choose.”
“I’ll take care of it. Thank them for me,” I said.
With a lift of his taloned hand, Szarok turned and signaled his surviving warriors with another of those exploding things. They loped away, along the river and out of sight, leaving me to continue picking up the pieces. With each body I turned over and each face I searched, my hope grew fainter. The sun was past its zenith when I found Morrow.
“Tegan!” I shouted, knowing she’d drop everything to tend him.
He was covered in so many wounds that I didn’t know how he was still breathing. Two men came with her, drawn by my sharpness, and we carried him to the tent set up away from the bodies. I figured it, too, had come from Rosemere, and I silently thanked them for their help. There were fires burning and water boiling in huge pots, and women from the village moving among the wounded soldiers with bandages that looked like they had been torn from sails.
“Someone should fetch his father,” I said.
I wished I’d let him inform the governor, as he’d wanted. Then they could’ve had a just-in-case farewell. But Tegan fixed a look of such ferocious denial on me that I stumbled back to the tent’s entrance. “Nobody is going anywhere. Get me a damned pan of water, some clean cloth, and my medical bag.”
I did as she demanded, then Rex and I washed up and assisted her as she cleaned his wounds and then prepared the tincture that had saved Harry Carter. With steady hands, she poured the noxious mixture into the bites and stitched Morrow’s wounds. His men heard about his condition, and fifteen of them paced outside the tent. We’d suffered such losses before reinforcements arrived—I cut the thought as I daubed away the blood leaking from his side. I couldn’t afford to let fear and impending grief distract me. A friend’s life hung in the balance.
It seemed like it took forever before Tegan finished working on the storyteller. He was so pale that it didn’t look like he had any blood left in his body. She dropped to her knees and pressed her cheek to his, and that seemed like my cue to back out of the tent. Along the way, I stumbled, but there was nothing to trip me, only the smooth roll of grassy ground.
Rex steadied me with one arm and said, “You have to eat something.”
“I can’t. I have to find Fade.”
“Eat,” he demanded gently. “Or I’ll tell Momma that you don’t listen to your brother.”
Shakily, I assented, but only because I’d never locate Fade if I collapsed. If he was wounded and unable to call out for help, buried in a pile of corpses—I shook all over, just thinking about it. This battle would never end for me if he didn’t keep his promise.
Rex led me to a fire where village women were warming soup. I took a wooden bowl of it and drank in a few furious gulps—anger because pain would drown me without the protective shell. Then I downed some water
