19. Chapter 19

Chapter 19

Aliya

"B rooks, do you know where you're going?"

The familiar baritone voice rumbled through Aliya's bones. The hard ridge of the speaker's shoulder jammed into her gut with every step. Her headache shoved two spikes deep into her brain at the temples. She bit back a groan. The longer her kidnappers didn't realize she was awake, the more time she had to figure out an escape plan.

Hopefully Lindir had survived. Her stomach twisted, sending a dagger of ice through her heart as she thought of Cressida's cooling body lying in the middle of the clearing. She'd been Aliya's last best hope at learning to control her magic, now ripped from her grasp by her own stupidity.

And she'd killed two people.

A tear worked its way free and spilled from the corner of her eyes.

She was a murderer now. Even if it had been in self-defense and lost in the throes of emotion, that was no excuse. She'd taken two lives. Her hands would be forever stained with their blood. Nausea roiled, sending a bitter aftertaste up the back of her throat.

"Shove it, Stephen," Brooks grumbled from somewhere up ahead. "Just cuz you couldn't find your way out of a beer stein don't mean the rest of us're lost."

Aliya swallowed. She was a terrible person and would never be able to look any of her friends in the eye again.

Someone hissed behind them. "Both of you shut up, will ya? Yer yammering'll bring the elves right to us."

Aliya frowned. The voice was female. She hadn't noticed any women among their attackers.

But then, she hadn't really been paying attention to details like that.

Keeping her arms loose, she pulled them apart and met the cold resistance of the iron manacles. Well, she wasn't expecting her captors to be stupid enough to take them off while she was unconscious, but a girl could hope.

The metallic clink of gears in a hollow canister sounded near her ear.

Stephen, the man carrying her, whirled around. "What are you doing? You can't set one of those off here. We're way too close to Filathas."

"He's right," Brooks said. "Put it away, Anabelle."

"This is the only way to make sure we're not followed," the female said.

Aliya's blood turned to ice. Elessan would surely track her as soon as he realized she'd been taken. If her kidnappers had some way to murder anyone who came after them, she may be the cause of Elessan's death, as well.

She bit her lower lip to hold back a cry.

Brooks' footsteps passed around Stephen. A scuffle ensued and Annabelle swore under her breath. "What do you care? A few more elves will die. So what?"

"If we kill everyone in Filathas, it'll provoke the fae to attack before we're ready. Our heads'll roll. I'll be holding the Whisperer for now, I think."

Aliya frowned. What in the mages was a Whisperer?

She opened her eyes, peeking between her lashes. Long grass and brambles rushed by on either side of their path.

"We need to stop somewhere for the night," Stephen said. "I don't wanna continue carrying her dead weight."

"Awww," Annabelle said, "is the little bitty girl too heavy for you?"

Aliya bit down on a bitter laugh. If only she'd drunk enough water to quadruple her size. A five-hundred-pound prisoner would put a serious kink in the assassins' plan.

Brooks growled. "Will y'all quit your bickering before I decide to cut my losses and kill the both of you?"

No. Keep up the infighting. Maybe someone would pull a weapon on the others and the group would degenerate into a full-out brawl so she could escape.

Her first step was to find out if her shapeshifting still worked through the iron and antimonite manacles. Though she couldn't adjust her density, she might be able to alter her looks. But she needed to be subtle. If the woman behind her noticed anything awry, she'd lose her best chance of surprising them.

As a child, one of her maids had suffered from rheumatism in her hands. She could try to change one of her knuckles in a similar way.

She squeezed her eyes closed and concentrated. Stephen stumbled, his shoulder digging into her stomach. Aliya opened her eyes and sighed. Her hand appeared the same as before.

She bit back a groan as fear stirred in her gut. Subtle changes were harder than drastic ones. She may be better off drinking more water and waiting until everyone fell asleep.

The world heaved without warning, and she flew through the air, hitting the ground with a thud as the breath exploded from her lungs. She groaned but managed to keep from opening her eyes.

"I'm done. We stop here for the night." From the sound of his voice, Stephen stood above her, brushing his hands against his pants.

"You idiot," the woman hissed. "If you damage her, the king'll claim all our heads!"

Footsteps approached. Brooks. "Damnit. Do you see anywhere around here to camp?"

Stephen cleared his throat. "Ain't elven forests supposed to adapt to our requirements? I say we need a campsite."

"We aren't elves," the inquisitor said. "The trees don't give a rat's ass what happens to us."

Aliya cracked one eye open to peer at the three kidnappers. She wasn't human and had been welcomed in Filathas. Hopefully the forest would welcome her, too.

She needed a break in the foliage. Something she could slip through where the larger, more muscular assassins wouldn't be able to follow. Off to her right, a dark patch lurked at the base of two bushes.

Aliya smiled.

At least the woods cared what happened to her.

"Come on," the woman said. "Pick her up. The sooner we're out of here, the quicker we all get paid."

Aliya took a deep breath.

Stephen gave an emphatic sigh. "Fine."

Now.

She leapt up and lunged toward the break between the bushes. Her ankles jerked, refusing to move independently. She crashed face-first into the brambles.

"Ow." Rolling onto her back, she glared at the thick rope bound around her legs. She'd been so focused on her wrists…

"Hey!" The larger shadow loomed over Aliya. Rough hands grabbed her shoulders and dragged her to her feet.

She scrunched her face and turned away, wrinkling her nose as Stephen's rotten breath blew across her face.

His voice vibrated her teeth. "Try that again, Yer Majesty, and you'll spend the trip back home high on milk of the poppy."

Brooks laughed and waved a bottle of something in front of her face. "Won't be able to run far then, will you?"

By the Seven Gods. She pinched her lips closed and swallowed hard as her stomach heaved.

"You wouldn't." The words rasped past her suddenly dry throat.

Fingers with well-manicured nails wrapped themselves in her hair and yanked her head back. "Addict you to poppy? Trust me, Your Majesty," Annabelle said. "Stand between us and our gold, and we'll do whatever it takes. Understand?" The cool pressure of steel pressed against her skin.

Aliya couldn't nod without risking cutting her own neck open.

"Yes," she whispered, as her gut plummeted to her toes.

"Excellent," Brooks said, bending down and untying the rope around her ankles. "Since you're awake, be a dear and follow old Stephen, here." He stood and tied it to the manacles on her wrists before handing the line to the other man.

The female lowered her sword but kept the blade at her back.

Stephen tugged on the lead, pulling her down the path.

Aliya frowned. She was not some dog on a leash. But she couldn't do anything unless the other woman relaxed her guard and put the weapon away.

They'd walked in silence for several minutes when Brooks called a halt at a small clearing. Stephen shoved her to the ground and retied her feet. She sat as her kidnappers went about setting up a camp. The inquisitor disappeared into the foliage, returning with an armful of branches he broke down into firewood.

You're doing it wrong. She smiled and held back a vicious chuckle as Brooks struggled to light the green wood.

A silver canister, narrower than her wrist and half the length of her forearm, dangled from his belt. It banged against his leg for a few minutes while Aliya bit her lip. Pressure built until the words spilled out. "What's a Whisperer?"

Brooks paused, staring between her and the metallic tube on his waist. Silence reigned, broken only by the squeal of Annabelle's blade scraping over her whetstone.

"A Whisperer," the woman said in a reverent voice, "is a magical marvel. When activated, it kills every person in hearing range."

Stephen chortled. "Except Whisperers are silent. No one can hear them."

Annabelle's ivory teeth glinted in the dark.

Valek. Invisible bands wrapped around Aliya's chest and squeezed. Annabelle wanted to trigger one near Filathas?

"But it would kill whoever deploys the Whisperer, too," Aliya said.

"Not if you use earplugs." The woman sneered. "Don't worry, Your Majesty. We brought a pair for you. Can't have you dying before we're paid."

Brooks swore as the flares from his flint and steel fizzled into nothing.

"Don't you know how to light a basic campfire?" Stephen asked, ripping the rock and chunk of metal from the other man's grip. He banged the two together, casting sparks across the area.

Annabelle cursed as a few flew toward her hair.

"Maybe the forest doesn't want you to build a fire," Aliya mumbled. It would serve her captors right but would make for a chilly evening.

They couldn't be that far from Filathas yet. And by now Elessan would be tracking them. A bonfire would send up a decent signal, assuming he didn't already know their location.

Aliya inhaled and braced herself. "I can start it."

Brooks glared at her, eyebrows pulled together. "What?" He grabbed his flint and steel back from Stephen.

"I'll light the fire for you." She raised her hands, clinking the manacles. "If you take these off."

Stephen guffawed. "You think I'm gunna take those off you, mage, you've got another think coming."

The inquisitor growled under his breath and slammed the flint and steel over the wood again.

Aliya scooted back to lean against a tree and rubbed her wrists around the handcuffs. "If you want to make fools of yourselves, that's your prerogative." Though this would be easier if they would drop their guard a little. She held up the manacles. "What is antimonite, anyway?"

Stephen smirked. "Wouldn't you like to know?"

"State secret," Brooks growled.

A cool breeze blew through the clearing, tugging at Aliya's hair and raising goosebumps on her arms. She curled into a ball to conserve her body heat.

Annabelle threw a quick glance at the surrounding forest. "Elves are uncanny in the woods. Who knows if any of them are following us? We'll all sleep with one eye open if we don't rid ourselves of them, first. We should let one of the Whisperers loose."

Aliya froze. No. They wouldn't…

Who was she kidding? They killed Lady Cressida, tried to murder Lindir and kidnapped her. Clearly, money motivated them more than common decency.

Brooks shrugged, reaching into his pocket for bits of wax that he shoved into his ears. "Fine, go ahead. We deserve a decent night's rest."

"What? No!" Aliya jumped to her feet, screaming at the top of her lungs. "El! Run!"

With a sharp tug on her manacles, she found herself face-down in the dirt with Stephen's scowling face inches above hers and someone's boot heel rammed painfully into her lower back.

"Shut up, Yer Majesty." He jammed a foul-smelling wad of cloth in her mouth and tied it behind her head, catching several strands of her hair in the knot.

She screamed through the gag and kicked at him.

Brooks swore, dropping the flint and steel and moved over to pin her legs. The two men wrestled her into place until she laid on her side, the restraints bound to the rope wound between her ankles. Her toes tingled from reduced blood flow. She flexed her leg muscles and roared at her captors.

Annabelle came over and jammed two bits of soft wax into her ears.

Ow! Aliya shook her head, trying to dislodge the offending plugs.

One fell to the ground. Annabelle picked it back up and glanced at Stephen. "Take care of her, will you?"

He rammed the earplug back in her ear. Brooks leered at her as he twisted the Whisperer and dropped it on the trail.

Aliya screamed.

Elessan stepped around yet another dead bird laying in the grass, tracking four sets of footprints in the dirt. The morning sun poured its heat onto his back, as though mocking the ice in his heart.

Something terrible had happened here.

Where was she?

One of Tsara's scouts called out ahead, so he picked up his pace.

"Over here," the man said. "I found their camp."

Elessan broke into the clearing, nodding at the scout, whose name he'd never bothered to learn. A pile of dew-damp wood lay in the middle of the space, with a discarded set of flint and steel in the tall grass.

"There was some sort of scuffle." Tsara pointed as she stepped beside him.

Elessan narrowed his eyes. They'd tied Aliya to the tree. She'd spent several hours curled up in a ball, laying on her side.

When he caught up to them, they'd be dead before the intruders knew what hit them.

"Princess, I found this." The elf clutched a silver container, about half the length of Elessan's forearm.

Tsara's lips thinned, and her eyebrows drew together as she took the canister and held it in the sun. She passed the tube to Elessan. "Any idea what this is?"

He turned the metal cylinder over in his hands. What a strange contraption. Unfamiliar symbols wrapped around the edges. One end jiggled a little in his hand. Giving the top a slow turn, the cap clicked into place. Nothing happened.

Elessan shrugged. "I've never seen anything like this. It resembles a courier case, but the ends don't come off, and the tube's too bulky for official correspondence. Besides, messenger canisters aren't made of silver, they're tin or leather." He tried to return it to Tsara, but she shook her head and turned away. With a shrug, he shoved the unusual find into his backpack.

"There's nothing else here," she said. "We should move on."

Elessan frowned, exhaling through his nose. She was right. Without Aliya, he had no reason to linger. He studied the clearing. "They went this way."

Hours later, as the last of their scouting party disappeared back into the forest, Elessan pushed himself up from his knees. "I can't tell for sure." He kicked at the tall grass. "Valek! Why couldn't they have parked their…whatever-it-was in the dirt?"

Tsara scowled at his temper. "It has four wheels and needs two horses—it's obviously a cart. You say it sat here for several days?"

He nodded. "But I can't tell if they used a carriage, a wagon, or a prison transport."

She shrugged. "Does it matter? What way did they go?"

Of course it mattered. The information would give him a definite answer as to Aliya's situation. He pointed down the road. "They went southwest." Toward King Malkov's castle. They were probably only a few hours ahead of him, but it would be hard to catch up with them. Unless… "Any chance of snagging some horses?"

Tsara raised an eyebrow and, with an exaggerated head turn, stared in each direction. The edge of the forest marking the border to the human lands disappeared, uninterrupted, into the distance.

He sighed. It was unlikely. Any villages in the borderlands had long since been abandoned.

He turned in a circle, comparing the sun to the mountains. "I could be mistaken, but I think we have an outpost a few miles west." He glanced at her. "We may be able to commandeer mounts there."

Tsara studied him for several seconds, her lips pressed into a thin line, before she nodded. "Very well. If we can find the settlement, and they have horses, I'll allow the appropriation."

Elessan slumped as he exhaled. "Thank you."

She hefted her pack higher on her shoulders. As they headed down the road, Tsara peered at him from the corner of her eyes. "You're certain they're taking her back to Lions Grove? And not somewhere more…discreet?"

He brushed his hands off on his slacks and shrugged. "That's my best guess. They're going to be impossible to track on the roadway, or to tell if they take one of the turn-offs. The main route leads straight to King's City." There was plenty of room in the castle to hold a prisoner. And if the king took Aliya elsewhere, there was no chance they'd be able to locate her before it was too late.

Lead congealed in his stomach. He shook his head, setting the second possibility aside. He would make the most of the information he had. Distracting himself with worst-case scenarios wouldn't help Aliya.

Tsara threw him a wicked smile and sped up her pace. "Then let's find this outpost of yours."

The sun hung four finger-widths lower in the sky, burning into Elessan's shoulders as he stood, jaw slack, in the entrance to the outpost.

Tsara came to a stop behind him. "What happened here?"

By Abaddon… More than twenty elves laid in the courtyard where they fell. Many in the middle of routine tasks like chopping wood or fletching arrows. There were no visible signs of a struggle, or pain in any of the victim's expressions. No blood marred their clothing or splattered the walls or ground.

They hadn't even had time to bar the gates.

Elessan nudged a prairie dog carcass with his foot. Rigor hadn't set in yet. This was recent. He glanced at the buildings from the corner of his eyes. The culprits might still be nearby.

Tsara's voice drifted from the stable. "The people, the horses, everything. Dead." She paused. "Valek. There's a group of humans here, too. Prisoners, it looks like."

Something flashed in his peripheral vision from the edge of the barracks. Pulling out his sword, he strode to investigate.

"Is this some sort of disease?" Tsara stepped into the sunlight, one hand covering her mouth.

Elessan picked up the metallic object and held it up to her. "I don't think so."

The princess' eyes grew round as she approached. "Another canister?"

He nodded. "I don't think these are as harmless as we thought." A quick twist, and the loose side of the tube clicked into place. "See? It's identical to the other one, with the odd writing all over."

Her voice turned breathy. "You think this is a human weapon? Could it kill everything in the area?"

He blinked. "I do…but how?" It explained all the dead animals they encountered in the forest. Lead pooled in his gut.

She held her hand out, and he handed it to her. "We must learn whatever we can about these, including how to stop them. Starting with its range."

Elessan gazed over his shoulder. "You go that way, I go this way?"

The princess nodded. "Meet back here when you find something living."

A half-hour later, they had their answer. The weapon ended all life within a half mile, down to the last insect. The sun had dropped two finger-widths lower in the sky by the time he returned to the outpost. His heart hung heavy and cold in his chest as Tsara rejoined him after several minutes. Her skin was abnormally pale, her eyes wide.

"This can't go unchecked. We must end it, so they can't kill anyone else." She held up the canister. "I'll take these to my father's scientists and mages, then rally the army. We'll meet you in Perdition Pass."

"You spoke to the king?"

She nodded. "I scried with him and showed him what we found. He agrees we need to crush this before the humans unleash another. They're called Whisperers, but we don't know much more about them." She paused. "The elves are going to battle. One last time."

He reached into his pack and pulled out the other canister, putting it in her waiting palm. "Fly like the wind."

"Find your girlfriend, get ready to finish this war. And Svialto." She flicked her hair over her shoulder. "Be safe. They've already used two. Chances are, they have more."

He waited until Tsara was long out of sight before heading in the opposite direction for Lion's Grove.

Less than a half-mile later, a twig snapped behind him, accompanied by the sound of several footsteps.

"Hey! Elf!"

Elessan cursed his luck. The road was the faster route to catch Aliya, but this close to the dead at the fort and the border, he should have stuck to game trails. Or at least kept his hood up, regardless of this heat.

A blade slid from its sheath. "Halt!"

With a sigh, he turned to face the group of human soldiers, keeping his hands on his backpack straps, well away from his weapons. Six…seven…eight-to-one were not great odds.

"You have some explaining to do, elf. What happened to the humans at Stonefist Outpost?"

Elessan's eyes flicked from the man's face to the top of the hill behind them. The base was on the other side, out of view. If only he'd gotten a few more leagues between it and him before running into anyone.

He curled his upper lip. "I did nothing. You can thank your kind for that atrocity." His fingers twitched, itching for his steel. He let the pack slip from his shoulders and fall to the ground.

"You besmirch us, pointy-eared scum? You'll sing before we're through with you!" The soldiers' leader screamed and charged him; blade pointed at his neck.

He hadn't been able to work off some frustration in a truly satisfying way in far too long. Pulling both swords from his hips, he braced and flashed his canines at the human.

Come on, then.

Minutes later, Elessan wiped his weapons on the dying leader's cloak. He glared at the eight bodies around him. Those who weren't yet corpses would be soon. Stupid humans, never content to leave well enough alone. Sliding his blades into their sheaths, he hissed at the sharp sting in his arm.

A trail of blood slid down to his elbow from the lucky swipe one of the soldiers snuck in. The cut was on his right bicep, but didn't look deep, fortunately. Making even stitches with his left hand was easier said than done.

He removed the yellow-green disinfecting poultice from his pack, along with the same bandage he wrapped Aliya's injured ankle with so many weeks ago.

Spreading the mixture on the gash, he bandaged it and used his teeth to help secure the knot. Ruffling through the humans' pockets and bags, he came up with a handful of silver pieces and a diplomatic pouch stamped with the royal crest.

Interesting. "What have we here?"

Sliding the tip of the closest human's sword under the seal, he removed the letter and shook it open.

It was written in some sort of code. Valek.

Undoubtedly to prevent this exact situation. With a growl, he folded the paper back into the envelope, and shoved both in his backpack. He would decrypt it later, when Aliya's life wasn't on the line.

With a sigh, he grabbed the arm of the nearest body and dragged it into the brush on the side of the road.

Stupid humans.

Aliya groaned as her head bounced hard against the wooden bench. She opened her eyes and squeezed them closed again as the daylight tripled her headache's intensity. Beneath her, wheels squeaked and jostled over uneven ground.

It reeked of rotten meat.

She was in a wagon of some kind. Squinting, she glared at the tall black walls surrounding her. Small windows with four metal bars hung near the roof. There were no handles or hinges on the inside of the door.

Fabulous. A new low, even for her. Elessan was probably dead, because of course he'd been tracking her when her captors set off their Whisperer last night. Or was it the night before? How long had she been unconscious? She groaned and pressed her fists into her abdomen. Enough time had passed for her stomach to gnaw a hole through her gut, and for the need to relieve herself to become semi-urgent.

These handcuffs hurt her wrists. She brought them close to her face. Her skin was pink and swollen beneath the iron.

Her head gave another throb as they hit a pothole. Grunting, she pushed off the floor, trying to not clank her manacles together and alert her captors she was awake.

Stretching up to her tiptoes, she peeked outside. They were on a well-traveled road, in a valley with dense forest on one side with no signs of civilization. On the other…

A torn-up field stretched away to the northeast. Discarded bits of metal armor flashed in the sunlight, half-buried in the red-brown dirt. A few posts stood scattered throughout the area, with something round shoved on the top of each of them. Strands of tangled string hung down, blowing in the gentle breeze.

Her gut heaved, filling her throat and mouth with acid. She'd never been so grateful to have not eaten recently.

They were heads. Heads on poles.

The buzz of insects was audible over the creak of the wagon. Carrion birds circled lazily overhead.

A battlefield. And judging from the stench, a recent one.

War had always been an abstract concept, something that could be easily dismissed and shoved to the back of her thoughts. But there were bodies there…just laying out in the sun, left to decompose and spread disease throughout the spring and summer.

A gentle breeze carried another wave of rot that roiled her stomach further.

Turning to face the forest, as if that could block the image of the dead from her mind, she pushed her face against the bars but pulled back at the tell-tale tingle of iron on her skin. The rails were too narrow to squeeze through unless she could shapeshift.

She took two deep breaths through her mouth, but the smell was so strong, it coated her tongue and throat.

Ugh.

Now would be an opportune time to figure out if she could change shape and escape.

Who should she be?

Of course. It was perfect. She smirked as she imagined her captors' faces when they found King Malkov in their prisoner cart.

Less than an hour later, Aliya sat on the floor in the corner of her wagon, knees pulled up to her chest, feeling sorry for herself. At least the smell from the battlefield had lessened.

The wheels ground to a halt and a fist pounded on the door.

"Hey, Yer Majesty! You awake yet?" Annabelle's face hovered above the door. "Lunch." She pushed a loaf of bread and a small bar of cheddar through the window. A leather canteen the size of two fists followed.

Aliya lunged for the food before the roll collided with the chamber pot in the far corner. She crammed the cheese into her mouth and washed it down with the water. The bun was hard, like a baguette three days past its baking-date.

The voices and muffled laughs of her captors floated to her ears from the front of the wagon.

If only she could shift. Cursed manacles. She needed to get them off. This time, she wouldn't be able to rely on Elessan, or anyone else, for help.

Aliya dug her thumbs into the leathery crust of the bread, pulling the roll apart. She'd figure something out.

Hopefully.