Matt Forbeck - Marked for Death

“Trail goes that way,” Burch called down from above. “Lots of people.” The shifter scanned the grass along the top of the ridge. “Some dragged.”

Sallah pushed away from Kandler and craned her neck to talk to Burch. “You think they were captured?”

“Warforged don’t eat.”

“By the Flame!” Sallah said, shocked at the shifter’s words. “What made you suggest that?”

“You only carry bodies for food-unless the bodies aren’t dead.”

The knight nodded. “I suppose so.” She looked along the ridge in the direction Burch had pointed. “Then there’s still time. We must go after them.”

“Come on,” Kandler said as he reached for the rope ladder and handed it to Sallah. “Even I can see the trail. Warforged leave large footprints.”

Sallah hauled herself up the rope ladder and then reached back behind her for the swords of her fellow knights. Kandler handed them up to her one at a time, hilt toward her, then followed her up the ladder.

“Let’s go,” Sallah said to Esprл. The girl smiled as she brought the ship a bit higher into the air. Kandler joined his daughter on the bridge while Sallah found Burch peering over the bow, where they both hunted for signs of the trail.

Esprл nudged the airship forward at Burch’s signal. As the ship moved along, Kandler looked up at the ring of fire.

“What do you think our chances are of sneaking up on anyone in this thing?” Esprл asked.

“It depends how fast you’re going,” Kandler said.

Esprл coaxed a bit more speed from the airship and let the wind blow through her hair. She looked up at Kandler and smiled. He smiled back.

The sky had grown a darker shade of gray. Esprл rubbed her eyes, and Kandler remembered that he hadn’t slept since the night before-and not much then. The cool air whipping past him made him more alert, but he longed for his bed back in Mardakine.

Remembering his home, he remembered his last few days there, and the weeks before that. Anxiety had been gnawing at him for some time as his suspicions about his daughter grew. Kandler reached around and pulled the collar of Esprл’s shirt away from her back.

There it was, just above her shoulder blades. A dragon-mark. When he’d first seen it, he’d thought it was black, but this close he could see it was mottled with many colors, mostly vivid blues and greens. Around the sharply defined edges, her skin was marbled with red, almost as if the mark had sprung painfully from the flesh beneath.

“I…” Esprл said quietly. Her smile vanished. “I didn’t think you knew about that.”

Kandler let the collar go. He’d seen enough. “I didn’t think you did either.”

“It itched when it first came in.” One of Esprл’s hands snaked back past her neck to scratch at the dragonmark, as if even thinking about it irritated the skin again. “Then it burned. Now, I don’t notice it much.”

Kandler stood there mute. He didn’t want to have this conversation. He just wanted his daughter back, for them to have their old life back.

“Are you going to arrest me?” Esprл asked in a small voice.

Kandler was so surprised he coughed. “What? No! Why would I do that?”

“Because,” Esprл said. A tear rolled down her cheek, but she kept her eyes glued to Burch and Sallah at the bow. “I… I killed all those people.”

It took Kandler a moment to figure out what the girl meant. Then it hit him. The people of Mardakine who had disappeared. He shivered in the evening air then reached out and hugged his daughter, shaking his head.

“You didn’t kill them,” he said. “The vampires did.”

It was Esprл’s turn to shake her head. “I think they turned Shawda into that thing that attacked the knights,” she said. “But she was already dead.”

Kandler narrowed his eyes at the girl. “What makes you say that?” he said slowly.

Esprл bowed her head. “Every night before each person went missing, I saw them. In my dreams. I saw them running.” She held her breath for a moment and closed her eyes. “I saw them die.”

Kandler ran his hand through Esprл’s hair. “Those were just dreams,” he said. “You can’t control those.”

Esprл looked up at Kandler, her face soaked with tears now. “That,” she said, “is what I’m afraid of.”

Kandler hugged the girl tighter as he wiped her eyes dry.

“It’s all right,” he whispered. He tried as hard as he could to believe that.

“Up there!” Burch called from the bow.

Kandler looked to where Burch was pointing. In the distance, smoke rose from a hollow in the hills.

“Does the trail head that way?” Kandler asked.

“Straight,” said the shifter.

“What’s the plan?” Sallah asked.

She and Burch turned back to look at Kandler. At Kandler’s direction, Esprл brought the ship in low over the crest of a hill and nestled it into the deepest part of a hollow.

“Does this thing have an anchor?” Kandler asked Burch.

“Didn’t see one,” the shifter said. “Just mooring lines.”

“Nothing around here to tie off to, though,” Kandler said, thinking out loud. “It’s just as well, I suppose. We’re not all going.”

Sallah snorted. “I should have known. Very well. I will go alone.”

“I’m in,” said Burch. “You’ll need a tracker.”

“I think I can follow the smoke,” Sallah said.

“You need to get back, too.”

The lady knight nodded at the shifter as a soft smirk played across her lips.

“Very well,” she said, gathering up her fellow knights’ swords. “Let’s go.”

“I’ll come!”

All three of the adults turned in shock. Esprл looked up at them bravely, her eyes still red from weeping. “You need all the help you can get, right?”

Kandler leaned over and put his hand on Esprл’s neck. “That’s very brave, but no.”

“But, Kandler-”

“Forget it. You’re not coming. Besides”-the justicar smiled-“we need someone to stay back here and fly to our rescue.”

“I knew you’d come, boss.” Burch grinned.

“You’re going to leave a child alone in the Mournland?” asked Sallah. She slung the other knights’ swords across her back.

“It’s safer than coming with us,” Kandler pointed out. “Besides, she’s the only one who can fly the ship.”

“I haven’t tried it yet.”

“But you’re going with us.”

Sallah grimaced. “You should stay here with your child.” Kandler looked down at Esprл. He wanted to stay with her-he’d risked so much to make sure she was safe-but he couldn’t leave the knights to die.

“Where’s the honor in that?” Kandler said with as much bravado as he could muster. He turned to Esprл and put his hand on her shoulder. “You’ll be fine. Haul the ladder up after us, and don’t let it down until you hear me call your mother’s name.”

The girl nodded.

“Your place is here with the girl,” Sallah said. She stepped between Kandler and the ladder.

Kandler looked down into Sallah’s eyes. “If those war-forged took down three knights, then you need my blade.”

Sallah glared at Kandler for a moment, then turned and lowered herself down the ladder. “We don’t have time to waste,” she said as she disappeared behind the railing.

Burch followed right after the knight, stopping to give Esprл a quick kiss on the top of her head before he left.

“I’ll be fine,” Esprл said as Kandler turned to her.

“I know you will.”

“Just come back alive, all right?”

Kandler kissed the girl on the forehead. “We’ll be right back,” he said as he started down the ladder.

When the justicar reached the ground, he gave the ladder a sharp tug. Far above, Esprл pulled the ladder up.