Springwar (48 page)

Rhyxx glanced around in search of the missing Keexin, saw neither him nor his own counterpart on this side, and grimaced irritably. With Tymm looking on from outside, he unlocked the door and—with dagger drawn just in case—knelt beside the woman’s body. Her skin looked odd—gray, like a dead person’s, though he could’ve sworn steam rose from her flesh where sunlight struck it. A hand to her throat found … nothing.

He checked her wrist—and shrank back. She was as cold as any corpse he’d ever buried. Removing his helm, he laid an ear to her chest. Heard nothing. He checked her wrist, then her neck again. No change.

He paused, staring. She was too cold to have died recently, yet she was certainly dead. But then why the noise? Perhaps she’d had a seizure while eating and had only now slipped to the floor. Perhaps she’d even been poisoned. Lynnz was wise in the way of such things, and he and Barrax
had
been at odds over the disposal of the prisoners. Perhaps Lynnz had acted unilaterally.

In any event, he had a duty to perform. Prison space was at a premium—there were those half-blood triplets, for instance, who really should
not
be housed together. And the dead required no confinement.

“Tymm,” he called. “She’s dead. I don’t know how or why, though I’ve some idea, but—”

“What?”

“Confirm my opinion first, then—I guess we’ll have to tell the king.”

“He’ll have our heads!”

“He’ll have Keexin’s first. In any case, he’s free to inspect the body. He’ll find no wounds or trauma. It will be for him to have her checked for poison—not that anyone will be able to tell. If she was poisoned, it was by Lynnz. And if it was by him, he’s too smart to use one that leaves traces.”

Tymm shook his head. “I’m just a soldier,” he muttered, as he carried out his own cursory inspection. “We’ll need a stretcher,” he continued, rising. “And we’ll need to alert the warden. Let
him
do the dirty work. You can tell him,” he added. “Since you rank me—
and
Keexin.”

“And leave her here?”

“The king might notice things we wouldn’t. Until I hear otherwise, I’ve no intention of touching her.”

Rhyxx stared at her curiously. She was quite beautiful. And remarkable in other ways, it was said. It was certainly a waste. “I don’t want to leave her like that.”

“Suit yourself.”

Without reply, Rhyxx swept off his cloak and swirled it across Merryn’s body, where it lay like a swath of desert sand. The sunlight made the nubby fabric glitter like hot gold.

Merryn didn’t so much awaken as melt back to life. It was a strange sensation, actually. Not like sleep, where you dreamed, and then felt that dream shatter, and all at once you were awake with everything working but your mind.

This was the opposite. Her mind worked just fine, there in her innermost recesses. It was everything else that had slowed.

Yet warmth soaked into her at every shallow breath. And enough heat fought its way through cooling blood to warm her heart, prompting it to pump more vigorously. Her skin prickled, which wakened reflexes. She jerked, and blood
raced stronger. Her mind made sense of what her ears had lately told her.

She was dead.

Had
been dead.

No … Barrax’s men
thought
she was dead. They’d left her to rot like a slaughtered pig in the sun.

Maybe without a guard.

That
awoke her in truth. She made to move, and pain shot through her like ice breaking. But still she strove. It required effort enough to shift a mountain to make a finger twitch—but she managed, and the hand attached to it. Felt the texture of the pavement beneath her. An eye cracked open, and she saw … nothing but the weave of fabric backlit by the sun.

Someone was breathing, however—close by. And something about the air and the quality of light told her that the door was open and but minimally guarded.

She knew she was acting from instinct, with no regard for sense. But she’d never have a chance like this again. Not in this lifetime.

A flurry of movement that was like an earthquake of pain, and she sat up. The cloak slid away, so that she could see part of a soldier’s back, where he stood, half-in the doorway, half-out. Paying little regard to anything in particular.

She thought fast. She had a corner room, farthest from the gate. One guard had gone to seek the warden, who was quartered by that same entrance. There was typically one guard per side, and one per corner. But one of them had left before Avall’s contact, and another had apparently followed just now, which lowered the odds. …

Slowly, oh so slowly, she rose to a wary crouch, suppressing a gasp as pain took her, and then again as the act of breathing was like inhaling knives of ice. But what now? She still felt groggy, like coming off a three-day drunk. Every thought was like swimming through ice floes. But she
did
think, and the act of that cleared her head.

Only an instant she hesitated. It was barely two strides to the door, and the guard had his back turned …

More from reflex than thought, she lunged forward,
whipping the cloak outward, so that the lower corner snapped around the guard’s head, briefly blinding him, and stifling his startled cry.

She had him by then: an arm around his neck, another around his head, and a twist, followed by a sickening crack, and a groan that segued into the soft, sad hiss of life escaping. Miraculously he didn’t fall, merely slumped against the wall, looking almost comfortable. Pausing only to relieve him of the sword he’d been fumbling for, she left him there, amazed at her own luck.

Only an instant she hesitated—then ducked back into her cell. Her clothes were of Ixtian cut, fabric, and color—which was good. But she saw nothing of use save a lone wooden spoon and a pewter mug with a handle. She snared them, then stumbled over something.

A cup?

No!
A cap helm
. The one the guard had removed when he’d examined her.

And surely a gift from The Eight. Quick as thought, she snared it and crammed it on. Too big—no surprise—but she pushed it back, and returned to the light.

So how did one escape a guarded cloister? She scanned the arcade, found the two closest sides still unguarded—and dashed across the shaded pavement to brace herself against the back side of one of the stone pillars that supported a pair of arches.

Well, this
was
a cloister, and cloisters weren’t meant to serve as prisons, save in the most general way. And if this was the one she thought it was, the dormitory had been built beside a river—a tributary of the Ri-Ormill that watered South Gorge, in fact. They’d stopped by the outer precincts on their way south to War-Hold in the autumn. Which meant …

She peered down the arcade.

She was right. There was a stair to the rooftop at the next corner, maybe sixty paces away. And the man who should’ve been guarding that corner was standing dead two spans across from her.

And it was in the shadowed side.

A deep breath, a pause to square her shoulders and stand as erect as possible but with the cloak pulled tight around her, and Merryn strode toward those stairs.

Halfway there, she heard voices rising at the gate and saw a tall man without a cloak or helm arguing heatedly with two more, while a pair of men in servant’s livery lugged a stretcher out of the gatehouse.

She had to hurry—and dared not.

In any event, the altercation had drawn the notice of the guard from the next side. He stepped from it into the cloister square itself. Fairly close to her, too, as though he’d been on his way to investigate his fellow’s absence.

She didn’t alter her course, made no move to walk quietly. “What is it?” she called gruffly, in muffled Ixtian.

The man spared her but casual notice. “Some tripe.”

Though still in the arcade, she angled toward him, as if she shared his interest. Then, when she was close behind him, she raised the pewter mug and slammed it smartly into his chin. His head snapped back, even as his body slumped forward. The weight of his helm brought his head forward again, exposing his neck. A second blow connected the juncture of skull and spine. Maybe a killing blow, maybe not.

She didn’t wait to see.

A pair of strides brought her to the narrow, twisting stair. She paused there to catch her breath, then had to sit down in spite of herself, as reality threatened to spin away. Pain washed over her in waves.

“Merryn!”
a voice rasped from the spy flap in the door to the corner cell.

She froze, head awhirl, caught between fatigue, fear, the need to escape, and—perhaps—love.

She was on her feet at once. “Kraxxi?” she gasped. “Kraxxi, is that you?”

“Yes, and don’t waste time with me you don’t have.”

She could see his face between the bars. Tired, and scarred from scorpion stings, but with a certain nobility she hadn’t seen there before.

“I can get you out. And there’s a second sword—”

“He doesn’t have keys, if that’s what you were thinking,” Kraxxi countered. “I just”—he paused, breathless, face like a serious boy—“I just wanted to tell you that I’m sorry I’ve messed things up for you so badly. I’m sorry I got you into this. I’m sorry I’ve brought war to your country.”

“I’m sorry, too,” Merryn murmured, casting her gaze about. “But I also know that very little of this is your doing. The groundwork must’ve been laid long ago. You were just the catalyst. Or I was.”

“The gem was,” Kraxxi corrected. “If you want to spare both of us blame.”

Merryn was still watching both adjoining corners
and
the gate. She had so little time … “We’ve a lot to talk about,” she said finally. “That should give us both something to look forward to. Some reason to … go on living.”

“Enough for me,” Kraxxi sighed. Then: “I have to say this, Merryn, because I don’t know if I’ll ever get to speak to you again, and I couldn’t stand parting in anger … I love you. I truly do.”

“Tell me that again when we’re both free,” Merryn replied solemnly. Impulsively, she reached out and clasped the fingers that protruded through the bars.

“Luck.”

“Luck.”

She turned away before he could see that she was—almost—crying. The stairs beckoned. She charged up them. Behind her, someone vented an uncertain shout. Footsteps followed at a run.

She pounded on: two steps at a time, though she barely had energy to move, and shivers wracked her. Yet somehow, an instant later, she was easing somewhat more circumspectly out of the turret that covered the upper landing, with pain crumbling away like clay from a new-cast dagger hilt.

She barely noticed the roof, save to note that it was flat and empty, as she barely noticed the sudden sweep of landscape around her. The cloister tumbled off to the left, with the camp surrounding it on three sides: a crazy-colored maze of tents, flags, and pavilions.

To the right lay empty land—

She made the edge in two breaths, peered over the limestone parapet.

She’d guessed correctly. The river flowed below. A dozen spans straight down, and flooding up onto the opposite bank: typical of the season.

But what was the bottom like? She could survive the drop—but only if there was some depth to absorb her fall.

Still, even a broken neck was better than execution. Better than being made to breathe imphor fumes until she’d betrayed everything she knew about her country. Better to risk in hopes of seeing Avall and Strynn again.

Perhaps she was still groggy, or perhaps the still-incredible pain fogged intellect in lieu of instinct. Whatever the motivation, she threw caution to the winds—and jumped.

The cloak belled out around her—an odd image she glimpsed as though in slow motion. As she saw the face of the cloister become sheer rocks, laced with moss, grass, and springtime flowers.

And then she hit water, and life was nearly knocked out of her a second time in one hand. The cloak dragged at her, and she sloughed it off regretfully, and then water was fighting to gain access to her lungs, and all she could do was let go of herself and use what energy remained to help her rise.

To her surprise, she surfaced close to the fast-moving central channel, and far enough downstream that the shore showed not cloister wall but tents.

Another breath that she prayed wouldn’t be her last, and she dived once more, let the current carry her on, its pace accelerated by the fact that the river was swollen by the spring floods.

When she found air again, it was to see open land.

And freedom.

Kraxxi slumped back against the cool stone of his cell wall, closed his eyes, and took three long breaths. Breaths of relief.

He opened his eyes again, staring at what he clutched in his right hand.

A simple wooden spoon that had accompanied his last meal. It had been a different, harder wood than typical. More importantly, it was a kind of wood he’d recognized as leaving a keen, hard point when you broke it. Which he’d promptly done, intending to thrust that tip up under his sternum and into his heart.

They’d been very thorough about such things, his guards had, fearing, probably, for their lives, and this had seemed to be the only option.
Not
hanging—he could make rope aplenty from his clothes, but the ceiling was utterly smooth, so there was no way to attach one there if he had one. Or anywhere else that wouldn’t result in slow strangulation, in lieu of the quick snap-death he desired.

But now …

Merryn was free. He’d seen her, briefly, had proof of that. And for now that was enough excuse for him to, as she’d said, go on living.

Another deep breath, and he crossed to the narrow, barred window and flung both bits of spoon as far as he could. And stayed there until it was full dark, staring at the tiny bit he could see of a glimmering line of water.