Part 27 (2/2)

”Unstrap yourself and climb out. You're sure you're not hurt?”

Without responding, she unbuckled the belt that held her in place and slipped down from the seat onto the ground. She brushed herself off, seemed to test her strength, and then looked at him and nodded. ”I'm all right. What happened?”

He shook his head. ”I don't know.”

He stooped down where he could study the undercarriage more closely, tracing the line of the break. Sharp, jagged edges ran all along the frame, as if someone had used a giant saw to sever the body and cha.s.sis. He found it again on the axles and gun mounts and even the door hinges.

As if something had cut the vehicle into pieces.

”Acid,” he whispered to himself, still not quite believing what his eyes were telling him. Where had the Trolls learned to make acid this strong? When had they discovered the technology?

But they were weapons makers, and they knew a great deal about chemical compounds and the forging of the materials created as a result. Either by experiment or by chance, they had found an acid that could eat right through the strongest metals. That they had used it on his crawler was a clear indication of how far out of favor he had fallen. It wouldn't have mattered if he had come to help them or not; they had intended to be rid of him once and for all.

”Taureq Siq.” He was still whispering to himself, still not quite believing what had happened. It occurred to him that he should have given in to his impulses and killed the Maturen and his weasel son when he'd had the chance.

”We have to go,” he said to the girl. ”They'll be after us and we don't have the advantage of speed or protection anymore. We'll have to rely on being smarter.”

She looked at him and nodded. ”We are smarter. But I'm still afraid.”

”You should be,” he said. ”Fear will keep you focused on what's needed. What's your name again?”

”Prue.”

”Here's the thing, Prue. We still have these.” He patted the b.u.t.t ends of the spray and the flechette. ”And these.” He touched the flash-bangs and the knives and all the rest. ”They don't have anything to counteract my weapons except numbers. We can still get away. Come on.”

They set out across the murky, sodden landscape, unable to see more than twenty feet in any direction, the rain and the night shrouding everything. He had thought the rain might let up eventually, but so far it was showing no signs of doing so. At least it would help wash away their trail and conceal their route of pa.s.sage.

He had started out toward the mountains, intent on following the directions on the map that Sider Ament had drawn leading to the pa.s.s, but after only a few minutes he abruptly changed direction and turned south. The Drouj would be using Skaith Hounds to track them. Grosha would be in charge, no doubt, urging his murderous little pets on. The hounds would have difficulty finding their scent while the rains continued, but when they stopped it would be another matter. In the meantime, Grosha would expect him to make for the mountains and the valley within. After all, he had rescued the girl; the a.s.sumption would be that he had done so in the hope of returning her to her people, perhaps for a substantial reward. So Grosha would travel east, hoping to catch up to them or at least to pick up their trail along the way.

But he would be looking in the wrong place, and with any luck at all he wouldn't figure that out before Inch and the girl were safely tucked away in Inch's fortress lair. Once there, they could take time to rest up and heal and could return the girl home later.

It wasn't a great plan, but it was the only one that made any sense.

The problem was, it relied on misdirection and luck, neither of which Deladion Inch had ever had much faith in. In this case, he would make an exception. After all, he didn't have much choice. His ribs and his arm had reduced his ability to defend himself, let alone the girl, and they would only get one chance at escaping. The Trolls were not overly bright, but they were strong and durable, and after the disruption he had caused they would be beyond angry.

They had walked only a short distance when the girl saw him wince. ”Are you hurt?” she asked.

”Broken ribs. My arm, too, I think.” He didn't want to talk about it. He just wanted to keep moving. ”I'll be fine.”

”No you won't,” she said, taking his good arm and pulling him about. ”Let me look at you. I know something about healing.”

She left the ribs alone, presumably because she did not want to take the time and trouble to strip off his armor and because she knew his body was already as well protected as it could be. But she took a few minutes with the arm, pressing it, watching him for a reaction, asking where it hurt. When she had finished, she told him the forearm bones were cracked if not broken, and she would splint it. She found a pair of straight sticks, tore strips of cloth from the hem of her cloak, and bound up his arm so that the bones were braced. Then she pulled some leaves from within her tunic and told him to chew them. Surprisingly enough, he felt the pain begin to lessen almost immediately.

They walked on. She offered to carry something for him, but he told her he could manage better alone. He glanced over his shoulder repeatedly, searching the darkness for pursuit, but saw nothing. He took them down streambeds and across wet patches wherever he found them, doing what he could to mask all traces of their pa.s.sage. He set a steady pace, even though he thought she might have trouble keeping up. She didn't.

Finally, he asked her about it.

”I'm a Tracker, just like Panterra. We were trained to read sign, follow trails, and live out on our own for weeks at a time. We can survive anywhere. I'm very good at it; Panterra is better. The best, in fact, that I've ever seen.”

She seemed about to tell him something more, but then thought better of it. ”I can keep up with you,” she finished.

He marveled to find that she could. A slip of a thing, no bigger than a minute, intense and determined, she was much tougher than she looked. Her red hair was soaked to a burnt umber, and her green eyes gleamed bright even in the darkness and damp. She glanced at him often, perhaps trying to read him. He smiled inwardly. Others had done so before her; none had succeeded.

By daybreak, they were miles away from the Drouj camp, off the flats and into hill country thick with deadwood and scrub and riven with gullies and deep washes. The rains had ceased, but the dampness lingered in the form of mist that snaked down off the distant heights and through the defiles. The temperature had dropped, and both Inch and Prue were chilled in their sodden clothing. It would have been nice to build a fire, but foolish beyond measure.

Even so, Deladion Inch called a halt and had them sit down on a fallen log so they could have something to eat. He could see bits and pieces of the land in the distance, but most of it remained obscured. All night, he had listened for the Trolls and their hounds, but he had heard nothing. He heard nothing now.

”Who are you?” she asked as they chewed on bits of cheese and fruit and some bread that wasn't quite dry.

He told her his name. ”I met Sider Ament weeks ago when he came through the mountains tracking an agenahl. Saved his life, matter of fact.”

”Why did you come for me?”

He shrugged. ”Seemed like a good idea at the time. Sider asked me if I would. I didn't have anything better to do.” He flashed her a quick smile. ”Sider planned to come for you himself, but his plans changed and he needed to get back inside the valley right away. That Troll that was helping you? Arik whatever he called himself? He's Taureq Siq's older son. He tricked you so that he could get into the valley and find out how things were. Since Sider needed to try to catch up to him before he escaped, I said I would come get you in his place. Things would have gone as planned, too, if the Trolls hadn't discovered an acid that can eat through the steel of a crawler.”

”They found that b.u.t.ton with the red light that you attached to me,” she said. ”They didn't seem to know what it was. They argued about it after they found it, so they might not have been certain you put it there. But I think they suspected it was you. Grosha tied me up, shoved me under those rugs, and waited to see if you would come.”

He nodded. ”I thought it might be something like that. I wanted to give it more time, but I couldn't wait; I had to get you out right away. Arik was supposed to return during the night.”

”How would they know that? Can they communicate with each other from that far away?”

He shook his head. ”I wouldn't think so. They don't have any real technology beyond ironworking.”

She looked down at her hands. ”I trusted Arik,” she said.

”Don't feel too badly about that. He's good at making people trust him. That's why he's so dangerous.”

”So all that business about being one of us, a descendant of a member of the Ghosts, that was just a lie?”

Inch shook his head. ”I couldn't say. I don't know anything of the story. The part I know is that he claimed to be the son of a Karriak Maturen given in exchange for Taureq's eldest. I knew that was wrong because the Drouj wiped out the Karriak some years back. Tricked them into thinking they wanted an alliance, persuaded them to let down their guard, and then ma.s.sacred them all.”

She was quiet then for a long time. ”I hope Sider catches up to him,” she said finally.

He gave her a smile. ”I wouldn't bet against it.”

THEY SET OUT AGAIN SHORTLY AFTERWARD, still moving south through the mix of haze and gray. The rains returned in a slow, steady drizzle, and the temperature dropped further. The low ground, already swampy and slick, turned to mud covered by large stretches of surface water forming small lakes and connecting waterways. Walking was all up and down, a tiring slog that quickly sapped their energy. The footing was uncertain, resulting in constant slips and slides that cost them valuable time. Everything about them was turning into a mora.s.s.

Deladion Inch tried to take comfort in the fact that it would be just as hard on anyone tracking them, but soon grew so tired from picking himself up that he no longer found comfort in anything. His arm had begun to throb anew, pain shooting up and down it in sharp rushes, and the girl gave him some more of the leaves to chew. But his body was aching everywhere by now, not just in the places where his ribs were cracked and his arm fractured, and his misery was pretty much complete. He guessed they were still several hours' walk from his safehold, and they might not reach it by nightfall. He regretted endlessly the loss of the crawler, a dependable rolling fortress he could never replace. He thought of countless ways he might punish Taureq Siq for his part in this, but all of them required that he first get through the day.

Not a sure thing, at all, he decided when he heard the distant baying of the Skaith Hounds.

He cursed under his breath, gave the girl a quick rea.s.suring smile, and kept walking as if the howling didn't matter. But they both knew that somehow, against all odds, the beasts had found their trail and were hunting them and that his efforts at misleading the Drouj had gone for naught. He began measuring their chances of reaching safety before the hounds caught up to them and decided they were slim or none. They would have to find a fresh way to throw off their pursuit or stand and fight.

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