Something about how Shades reacted bothered her, how he stared at the bodies they passed.
Hours later, with the moon high and painting the road surface in paleness, they paused at the foot of the mountainside that was the beginning of the volcano. They stood in the middle of the track, unsure of what to do if John failed to turn up, and also sure that if there were pursuit, they were making themselves obvious.
But they had to wait for him.
After looking about alertly, as if scanning the surrounding forest for people, and perhaps he could do that, Shades bent over with his hands on his knees. She heard a whirr from his joints, noticed the blue of his eye was subdued. Then Po recalled he’d said he could adjust the brightness, and the responses of his leg and arm also. To be able to fiddle with your own senses was unique, but she wondered what was happening now, for his hands were shaking.
Ruth trundled over, her two birds asleep on her shoulder rather than on the rucksack roof. Ruff had abandoned her and was ahead, sniffing the track and eager to go onward.
“Are you okay, Shades?” She put her arm over him, and once more Po thought they were a good match, in size at least, if not in… Was it species or race?
A cyclan must be human, and Ruth was simply a bigger variety of human. And if he wasn’t really human? She cocked her head. They had in a way taught her that nothing mattered except that you liked the other person—not size or sex or whatever.
“I am okay,” she heard him say, with his voice shaking too.
“Was it the dead?”
He nodded. “It brought back that day, the terrible slaughter.”
And yet Shades had almost volunteered to go out and kill? Po didn’t quite understand.
“I should’ve helped John.”
“I don’t think he wanted or needed it. It would have gone badly. Not everyone needs to be good at killing.”
“John would—”
“John does not regard his skill as a blessing. Neither should we. You’re a good man. Breathe. I will stay with you and help you get over this, for as long as you wish me to.”
There was silence then, “Thank you.”
Po left them alone. It seemed wise, and it would be intruding to do anything else.
John emerged from the darkness lower down the track where trees shielded it from the moon. He was mounted on a chestnut mare with his guns holstered. As he came nearer, he looked as calm as a man out for a picnic, with only a few splashes of something dark and wet shining on his shirt reflecting the recent carnage he had wrought.
They hugged and spoke a moment, then all of them rode or jogged up the mountainside track. From here on they must rely on Shades to find a safe path. He might think he’d failed but what he was doing was crucial. Funny how these people were happy to risk their lives for others they barely knew.
She said so to John, who turned in the saddle and stared at her.
“It is, and I’m grateful.”
“You seem unhappy?” she ventured. “We escaped without a scratch on us.”
“True. You think this was good or easy? I killed who I had to, scared a few with my eyes, words. They were not nobodies.”
Though he paused it was obvious he had more he wished to say.
“They had families, kids, hope. I never kill easily.”
Which raised him in her eyes. He’d clearly thought on this a lot, as he should.
“Yes. I see, and I agree with you. Remember though, the prince would have tortured us all. Or worse.”
Ruth was walking ahead with Shades and Ruff, and she glanced back over her shoulder at them then seemed to decide it was none of her business.
It was a minute before John answered, so long that she thought he’d forgotten to answer.
“The prince is a terrible man, however…”
“Yes?”
“So am I.”
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
his internal Glorious Pathway Sensing, Shades led them higher, into the path of lava, across thin ridges, over chasms, and not once did Po fear them losing their way. The heat from the volcano’s crater permeated the air, filled it with the stink of acid and sulfurous fumes, but they trekked onward, at times padding the horse’s hooves with dampened cloth. Ruff would hop into the saddle when his paws grew sore.
Her boots held up well.
For a man who feared the death of the battlefield, Shades bore the dangers as well as any—inscrutable would be the best description of him.
For over two days they trekked and passed the peak and began the descent. The lava streams were fewer, though they stopped to eat lunch where a steaming chasm loomed to the left.
Po was used to it, and whenever she was done with a bread crust or rind of fruit, she tossed it over the edge to watch it fall. Nearby, Ruth sat with her shop rucksack unloaded but not unfolded, behind her on a shelf of rock. Her bluebirds rested on it, preening and eating a handful of seed. Ruff was further along this plateau of rock, where John and Shades were playing catch with a leather ball Ruth had retrieved from her usual cache of everything ever needed to mankind.
While chewing a mouthful of dried tomato, Po decided to avail herself of Ruth’s advice. It couldn’t hurt, could it?
Grimacing, she spat out a bitter piece of the tomato and threw it. A bird swooped down, one of the many gray ones that existed
