With her hands free, Amaranthe lunged to her feet. She yanked the match box from Dobb’s pocket, then sprinted around the bowman, kicking him in the back of the knee as she passed. He crumpled, grasping his leg. Dobb jumped backward to avoid him and fell through a tent wall.
Amaranthe threw open the lid to the crate and grabbed two blasting sticks.
“Get her!” the bowman yelled.
She tore open the box of matches, spilling them everywhere. She snatched one, swiped it against the crate, and lit the fuse.
“Idiot, don’t let her-”
Amaranthe tossed the stick into the center of camp as the shaman stepped out of his tent.
“What-” he started.
“Run!” The bowman crashed into him in his race to escape the camp.
Amaranthe snatched a handful of spilled matches and ran toward the mouth of the canyon. Ahead of her, dozens of men chiseled at the stone walls with pickaxes, and two ambulatory steam shovels belched smoke.
The explosion rocked the earth, its thunderous boom echoing from the walls.
The workers dropped their pickaxes and gaped in her direction. She veered toward one of the rock walls, hoping she could follow it to the mouth of the canyon before someone shot her.
“Get woman, or nobody get paid!” the shaman roared, voice muffled.
Amaranthe hoped a tent had fallen on him.
Despite his ultimatum, most of the workers scurried out of her way when she waved the remaining blasting stick. The closest steam shovel operator did not. He rotated his machine toward her, and it rolled forward on its huge treads.
She kept going, hoping she could outrun the steam shovel. She lifted the blasting stick in one hand and a match in the other so the operator could not miss her threat. Amaranthe did not want to blow anyone up, but she was not going to let him crush her beneath those treads either.
As she ran, rain blew sideways, stinging her eyes. More orders to stop her came from the remains of the camp.
The operator continued toward her, narrowing the gap between the machine and the wall. He must think the metal cab enclosing him would make him invincible to the blasting stick. Not likely, she thought grimly.
Amaranthe slowed down to swipe the match. She tried to light the fuse without stopping completely, but running made it difficult.
An arrow clattered on the rocks a half foot from her. No, she dared not stop. The match flame brushed the fuse. It smoldered but did not light. Too wet.
The steam shovel bore down on her. Another arrow skimmed past, stirring her hair. Her match went out.
“Cursed ancestors.” She gave up on lighting the fuse and pumped her legs faster.
Amaranthe hurled the unlit stick toward the smoke stack, thinking she might get lucky and it would drop inside and ignite. It bounced off the roof of the cab. The driver swung the long, extendable shovel at her. It scraped along the wall, sheering off rock as it veered toward her head.
She ducked low but did not slow down. Shards of rock thudded onto her shoulders and head, and warm blood trickled down the back of her neck, but she pressed on. The shovel was not agile enough to outmaneuver her. She escaped its reach and sprinted for the end of the canyon. Ten meters and she could run around a corner and disappear in the forest. She hoped.
A dark figure stepped from around that corner, rifle raised.
At first, she saw only that weapon trained her direction. It fired, billowing smoke into the soggy air. Sicarius.
A cry sounded behind her. The driver tumbled from the cab, a pistol flying from his fingers. It fired when it hit the ground.
Relief washed over Amaranthe, both at seeing Sicarius alive and at his action. That weapon had surely been aimed at her back.
The driverless steam shovel crashed into the wall.
Amaranthe sprinted around the corner, slapping Sicarius on the shoulder. She wanted to wrap him in a great hug, but there was no time. They needed to put distance between themselves and the shaman.
She ran several steps before realizing Sicarius was not following. Thinking he had paused to reload, she whirled to tell him to do it later. He was not there.
One of the rifles, the one he had fired already, leaned against the rock face where he had been standing. Amaranthe backtracked and peeked around the corner.
Sicarius stood, the second rifle raised, using the crashed vehicle for cover.
Before she could decide whether to join him or yell at him to get out of there, he fired. The steam shovel blocked her view, and she did not see what-who-he hit, but she could guess.
“The shaman?”
“Yes.” Sicarius jogged past her without slowing. “They’re gathering weapons.”
Amaranthe grabbed her rifle and chased after him.
“He knew you were out here,” she said when they reached the trees.
He slowed so she could run beside him.
“He knew your name and your history with Mangdoria,” Amaranthe went on. “I think he told someone. Someone who speaks Mangdorian. If it’s Ellaya, well, she’s already irked with me for destroying her gizmo-making machine. She’ll want us extra dead now. Me anyway.”
“I’ll kill her when we get back.”
Amaranthe missed a step. His cold, blunt efficiency should not surprise her by now, but sometimes, when he was acting more…human than others, she could forget about it. “She didn’t actually seem to loathe you, not the way this man did. Maybe I can talk with her, convince her she doesn’t want to be our enemy.”
“Doubtful.”
“You’re in a dour mood. Is it because I almost got you blown up?” She eyed him as they jogged between the trees, mud splattering with each footfall. With his black attire, it was hard to spot blood, but he appeared unharmed. “I am sorry about that, but…” She started to make an excuse, to explain that it was the shaman sensing him that had caused trouble, but it had been her scheme to go down and talk to him in the first place. “I’m sorry. How did you escape?”
“They weren’t as stealthy as they thought. I’d moved before they threw the blasting stick.”
“Good. I’d feel-” utterly and irrevocably devastated, she thought, “-a little upset if I got you killed.”
He slanted her a flat look. “You should.”
Thunder boomed through the valley, and the rain picked up.
“I found out some new information at least.” More about him than the mystery, but her mind did not want to process that yet. Safer to think about the land and the water plot. The pieces of that puzzle floated on the periphery of her mind, and she felt close to drawing them together into a cohesive picture.
Her comment only made Sicarius’s expression harder, and she wished she had said nothing about his history with Mangdoria.
• • • • •
Books fought back a yawn. He shifted in his hard chair and turned his gaze from the crackling fireplace toward the log bed-and its soft, inviting quilts. He had the room to himself and the opportunity to enjoy a serene night of sleep. Too bad that was not the plan.
A thump occasionally sounded downstairs, audible over the rain pelting the roof. Someone in the household remained awake. In another hour, he might be able to leave his room to investigate. Amaranthe would call it snooping.
He wanted to accept Vonsha’s explanations as truth, but Maldynado was right: she had shown them no evidence to justify a trek through the pass.
His chin drooped. He dozed until his own snores woke him.
The fire burned lower. Books listened but heard no footsteps, no bumping about, only wind buffeting the walls.
He stood and removed his boots, not trusting his ability to walk stealthily in the clunky footwear. He padded
