Mary Herbert - Flight of the Fallen

Yes, a light would be handy, but somewhere in this bloody carnage lay Amania’s mother and brother, and Hugh could not subject the little girl to that scene. He lifted the girl into his arms, gripped Fellion’s elbow, and began a slow, careful shuffle toward the faint light that glimmered through the cave opening. Amania buried her face in his shoulder. Fellion muttered feverishly to himself and stumbled alongside.

They managed to make it outside without falling over a corpse or stepping on body parts, and Hugh breathed a sigh when they finally left the cave behind. After the intense darkness of the underground passages, the pale moonlight seemed as bright as day. He cast a wary look around at the busy scavengers and at the empty camp in case the Tarmaks had left a guard. At last he helped Fellion to a seat on a nearby rock. He paused a moment himself to get his strength back. Sir Hugh was a compact man, athletic and well-muscled, but he was wounded and thirsty and already exhausted from his exertions.

“I’ve got to find some water,” he said softly to Amania. “Will you stay with Sir Fellion and watch him until I come back?”

In earlier days, Amania would have obeyed and done her best to help her friend, Sir Hugh. But not this night. She was only seven, and she had suffered through a horrendous nightmare. She would not let go of the one familiar and living person she had left. She wrapped her arms tighter around his neck and whimpered.

Hugh knew how she felt. In spite of the pain in his side, he continued to hold her, and taking Fellion’s sound arm again, he led the feverish Knight down the trail to one of the camp’s wells.

There were only two wells in the big camp, both dug into the lowest depressions of the ancient river bed. They tended to be muddy and yielded barely enough water to supply the basic needs of the population. But they were certainly better than nothing.

As soon as Hugh reached the closest well, he let go of Fellion, pulled off the cover, and reached for the bucket to lower into the well shaft.

“The well’s been poisoned,” a voice said out of the darkness.

Both Knights jerked at the unexpected words. Hugh whirled into the shadows, putting the cliff wall to his back. His eyes searched the path and the rocks around him.

Fellion laughed. “Fill ’em up again, boys!” he shouted, and he waved an imaginary mug. “Hugh! Dammit, where’s that ale?”

There was a long silence, then, “Sir Hugh? Is that you?” the strange voice called.

This time, Hugh thought he recognized the speaker. Her voice was lower than normal and husky, affected no doubt by shock, caution, or grief.

“Mariana?” he called and stepped out into the moonlight again.

Five forms clambered out of the rocks and surrounded the three survivors. Hugh heard familiar voices talking and questioning. The newcomers touched him as if to reassure themselves and him that he was all right. Others took Fellion and gave him water from a skin.

A tall, lean figure came to Hugh. She pulled off her helmet, revealing a head of pale silvery hair cut short. The long braids she had worn before the war were gone, hacked off in a gesture of defiance and grief.

He grinned a weak semblance of a smile. “Captain, glad I am to see you.”

The half-elf nodded once, and Hugh thought he saw moonlight glitter on a rivulet of tears on her cheeks. She helped him sit and pressed a waterskin into his hands. Using the lure of water, she encouraged Amania to let go of his neck and sit beside him.

The militia captain studied them both in the dim light and shook her pale head. “I have seen this camp. How did you three survive?”

Hugh could only shrug. He tried to explain. “I still don’t know. I was sitting up with Fellion when I heard Sir Remmik yell something. I thought he was shouting at a guard or a dog or something. A few moments passed, then all chaos broke loose. It was dark in the cave.” He shuddered, remembering the shrieks and the panic in the darkness. “Amania came to me. She couldn’t stop screaming. Fellion tried to help me. A Tarmak attacked us. He drove us back… his sword slashed me… Fellion and I killed…Amania pulled us back into a passage. We fled…” His voice faltered and failed to silence. He could feel tears running down his cheeks and could do nothing to stop them. He buried his face in his hands.

Mariana sat and watched wordlessly to allow him time to regain his composure.

Fiercely he wiped his eyes on his sleeve and took another long swallow of water. “Thanks,” he said with a thick voice. “How did you know we were here?”

“We didn’t. Varia found us and told us about the massacre. We came to see for ourselves. Some of my men—” she gestured to the militia men helping Fellion— “have friends and family here.”

“Is anyone else still alive?”

“None but you so far. We found General Dockett by the Post.” Her voice remained cool and contained—too much so, Hugh thought—as she said, “We found his head jammed on a stake. Vultures have been at it.”

“What about Knight Commander Remmik? Or Falaius?”

She repeated everything Varia had told her about the Solamnic prisoners and the absence of the Legion commander. Thus far her patrol had not found Falaius either.

“That’s odd,” Sir Hugh murmured.

Mariana left him by the well with Amania, Sir Fellion, and one of her men with strict orders not to touch the water from the well. The Tarmaks, in their efforts to destroy everything useable to the defenders, had poisoned both wells. While the men tended Fellion and treated Sir Hugh’s slash wound, the rest of the patrol finished their search of the caves and the canyon.

They came back tightlipped and silent. No one else was with them “We will have to come back and bury them,” one soldier said in a voice wracked with pain. He clutched a light-colored hair scarf often worn by women.

Sir Hugh shook his head. “Seal them in the caves,” he suggested. “There aren’t enough of us left to bury them all.”

“We were lucky to get in here tonight,” snapped the captain. “The Tarmaks may decide to post a watch to catch a burial detail. We’ll have to leave them for now.”

A misty hint of light edged the eastern horizon, and the late moon dropped toward its rest. Mariana eyed the sky and ordered her charges to move. The militia, what was left of it, was gathering at Sinking Wells miles to the east. She wanted her patrol out of the canyon and out of sight of any Tarmak hunters.

Reluctantly they gathered what little they could of anything salvageable and constructed a litter for Fellion. They left the Wadi at the mouth’s entrance. As soon as they were gone, the wild dogs and the old lion slunk out of their hiding places and resumed their feeding.

Linsha came awake abruptly. From only a few feet away a bony face stared down its aristocratic nose at her. Shadows cast from the torchlight outside their prison lay in sharp relief along the edges of its features. The steely gray eyes stared at a point somewhere beyond her left cheek as if their owner could not bear to look her in the eye.

“Your friend is back,” Sir Remmik said in a curt tone. “You may want to take a look at him.”

Having done what he felt was necessary, Remmik withdrew, leaving her lying in confusion.

Her mind, still drugged with sleep, did not grasp his meaning right away. Her friend? Which friend? She opened her mouth and tasted the acrid aftertaste of the general’s magic. Gods, how did he do that? Even worse she felt a stinging sensation on her neck where the gold chain had cut into her skin. Her hand flew unbidden to her throat. She touched the empty space where the scales had hung and felt the bloody weal on the back of her neck. The scales were gone.