Blade Archer ~ Forty-Nine

[annarti.livejournal.com]

The light breeze tugged at Kael’s hair and cooled the sweat that slicked his skin. He could feel his toes gripping his sandals, the roughness of the mud brick roof against his knees and the drumming of his heart in his ears. He felt alive. After years of pain and fear, Kael was alive. He no longer had to look over his shoulder or check every shadow. The last of the shadows lay below him, face down in a steadily growing pool of his own blood.

‘Kael!’

He broke his eyes from the body and looked to his brother standing beside it, casually wiping the blood from his dagger.

‘Come on,’ he said with a nod.

Kael shook his head, finally able to straighten. His every sense seemed heightened in his freedom. His skin tingled in the breeze, the hairs on his scalp warmed under the sun. ‘I’m going back to Ma’s,’ he answered. It wasn’t part of the plan. The group was supposed to all disperse when the war had been won. Take off their hoods and throw them away. Nobody need ever know they had been involved.

‘What for?’ Ynuk pressed. ‘It’s over. Go home. We won.’

‘I want to say goodbye,’ he explained. ‘Properly. To Ma and Elara. And Pa.’

‘Ye wants to get caught? The place will have a hundred Talons on it pretty soon. And here, too, if we don’t get moving.’

Kael shook his head again, unable to explain to his brother or himself why he wanted to return. ‘Ye doesn’t have to come.’

Ynuk shrugged. ‘Suit yerself. I’ll see ye around, though, right?’

Kael grinned down at him. ‘Yeah. Ye will.’

He made his way back over the rooftops, sometimes sauntering, sometimes jogging, once or twice skipping as his freedom spread through him. He could live with Ronanen now. It might not be the luxury she was accustomed to, but it would be a house just for the two of them. It wouldn’t be for long, anyway. In a few months he would be able to graduate and earn a real army wage, then he could give Ronanen the life she deserved.

There was a solid crowd around his mother’s house when he returned. Now that the potential danger had ended, the people’s morbid curiosity had returned, drawing them near to where the slaughter had taken place. Familiar panic gripped his throat. What if the hoods had won? Even before Kael and Ynuk had run, the Talons had been outnumbered.

He swung down from the roof and shoved his way through the crowd, ignoring the swearing and elbowing from those who thought he was just another sticky beak trying to get a better view.

There was still a decent ring of space around the site of the battle. The people might be curious, but not yet so curious as to approach a half a dozen armed Talons.

As soon as he was through the press, Kael ran towards them. The bodies had been lined up out the front of his mother’s house. Two Talons remained posted by the door, telling Kael that they still had living captives inside.

‘Got ‘em?’ he shouted to the Talons.

Those closest turned towards him, and the Talon in charge took a few steps forward. Her face was grave, but she managed to give Kael a grateful smile.

‘All but one,’ she replied.

A grin leapt to Kael’s face. ‘He didn’t get away,’ he promised.

The Talon’s smile relaxed a little. ‘We’ve been trying for months—years—to nail this guy to the wall. He’s had an answer to everything. Ordering the death of a citizen, though, in front of the eyes of half a dozen Talons… even if he had escaped, he wouldn’t be able to talk that one away. Thank you. You’ve shown great bravery today.’

Kael tried to shrug casually at her compliments, but the broad grin remained stubbornly plastered on his face like a five-year-old. He caught sight, then, of a few injured Talons behind her, with arms in makeshift splints and deep sword gashes in their exposed skin. ‘Did ye lose anyone?’ he asked, almost dreading the answer.

The Talon nodded stiffly, explaining her reluctance to celebrate too fiercely. ‘Three,’ she answered. ‘And one of yours was injured badly, too.’ She turned, gesturing for Kael to follow.

‘I won’t know who—’ Kael broke off when he saw Aen slumped against the wall, his face crumpled in pain. All the blood, Kael could see, had drained from Aen’s face into his shirt, now tied tight around his stomach.

‘Aen!’ he yelled, falling to his friend’s side.

Aen managed to look up at him, his face slick with sweat and deathly pale. ‘D’ye get him?’ he asked, his voice weak.

Kael nodded in a brief answer. ‘Ye needs a healing house,’ he ordered, hooking an arm around Aen’s back.

The assassin yelped at the sudden movement. ‘No!’ he gasped. ‘I can’t—Kael, the nearest one—the nearest is at the pa—the palace. I can’t. It hurts.’

‘Tough,’ Kael snapped, his fear rising. He hoisted Aen bodily to his feet. ‘Come on. Ye’re going to the palace whether ye likes it or not. Don’t let ‘im win.’

Some desire to live made Aen step weakly forward. One pace, then another. He rested heavily against Kael, so that Kael wondered if he might move faster if he simply picked Aen up and carried him to the palace, but he seemed determined to walk on his own now.

One foot after the other, Kael hauled the injured assassin through the streets. People gawked from a safe distance, as though Aen’s injury might be contagious. It wasn’t until they were halfway there that a random stranger finally offered help and hooked his shoulders under Aen’s other arm. Kael was too exhausted by that point to offer much in the way of thanks. His shoulders ached as though he had been carrying buckets of water back from the river all day, and his knees were shaking. His earlier sense of freedom had burned away in the familiar hot fear for a friend’s life.

Aen’s steps grew weaker and weaker. His feet dragged along the ground, only managing an actual step to every three or four that Kael took.

The palace walls loomed high and red to their left. For what seemed hours, Kael followed the outer wall until finally, as the red surface darkened under the shadows of sunset, they emerged onto the Main Road and came to the front gates.

‘We need to get in!’ he shouted up at the guards. ‘Please. He’s hurt real bad.’

The guard on top of the wall shook his head. ‘Any other night, maybe,’ he called down with little sympathy, ‘but not tonight.’

‘What?’ Kael barked. ‘Why? Can’t ye see he’s dying?’

He saw the guard spread his hands helplessly. ‘I wish I could help, really I do, but I can’t. Her Majesty is giving birth, right as we speak. His Majesty has ordered the healing house cleared but for her.’

Kael swore loudly. Aen seemed too weak to register what was happening.

‘Where’s the closest healing house?’ he asked instead. He knew there was no use arguing with palace guards over the king’s orders. Right now, he couldn’t afford the time.

The guard pointed over the streets to the north. ‘That way, a few streets back. Go past the three palm trees and…’ He sighed. ‘You know what, I’ll show you. Hold on a minute.’

The guard disappeared from view.

Aen murmured something too quiet for Kael to hear.

‘Don’t talk,’ Kael told him. ‘Save yer strength. The guard’s showing us to the closest healing house and we’ll get ye stitched up, right?’

Aen made no moves to show that he had heard. He hung, heavy and limp, between Kael and the stranger. His arm was cold over Kael’s shoulders.

Kael glanced up for the first time at the man who had offered his arm. ‘Thanks,’ he said, wishing he could put more feeling into the word.

‘No problem,’ the man said with a gappy grin. ‘I’ll leave ye now. Me ‘n’ the palace guard don’t get along too well.’

Kael smiled gratefully as the inconspicuous side door beside the main gates swung open, and the guard he had been talking to emerged. Without hesitation, he took up the stranger’s position in holding Aen upright.

‘Good luck,’ the stranger said, patting Aen on the back. Without another word, he was gone.

‘This way,’ the guard said, hefting Aen’s weight on his shoulders.

Kael gritted his teeth in determination, and forged on.

~ ~ ~

Because sometimes, people are nice for no reason or reward, and tbh Kael needed a reminder of that.