Chapter 31

Corec stared, frowning, at the four tower shields—the three they’d hauled up from the armory the day before, and the heavy one he’d found with the enchanted weapons.

“What’s wrong?” Katrin asked, joining him.

“I can’t figure out what to do with them,” he admitted.

She snickered. “Then why did you bring them out?”

“I was hoping something would occur to me,” Corec said. Boktar had refused to carry one, preferring to stick with his heater shield so he could remain more mobile. Nedley didn’t have the experience or the upper body strength to use one effectively.

Setting all four together in a row could have made a decent shield wall for Katrin and Shavala, protecting them from arrows while they participated in the battle from a distance, except for the fact that there were over a hundred thick-walled stone buildings available, many of which were still intact. Some even had openings for windows, which could serve as the crenels in a parapet, offering the women a chance to see their targets while staying mostly out of sight. The buildings would provide much better protection than a shield wall could, especially if there was a wizard looking for obvious targets.

“What about giving them to the wagon drivers?” Katrin said.

“If the fight reaches them, the shields won’t help. They’ll have better luck if they can prove they’re locals, and not part of our group.”

Corec intended to position the five farmboys from Livadi well away from the battle. He’d given them each a staff-spear in case they had to defend themselves, but it was his job to keep them safe. Perhaps he should have sent them home after all, but he couldn’t have let them go off alone into the barrens without protection, and he couldn’t spare enough people to watch over them.

Katrin seemed to sense his concern. “Maybe we’re worried about nothing and there even won’t be a fight,” she said.

A voice came from behind them. “There will be.”

Corec turned to find Razai brushing dust off her clothing. “They’re coming here?” he asked.

She nodded. “You moved the camp farther back.”

“I wanted to make sure they couldn’t see us if they looked this way,” he said. “No mage lights outside the buildings, either. What did you find?”

“They’ll be here this afternoon.”

“That’s what Sarette thought the last time she went up the mountain to check on them. Do they know we’re here?”

“Yes; they’ve got a Seeker with them, tracking us down. It’s the same group that attacked us outside Tir Shar. They’ve got the knives with the snakes on the hilt.”

Corec exhaled. “Well, that’s what we’ve been preparing for. Farmers and villagers again? The ones with the knives, I mean?”

“Looks like it, but they had bows last time. I’m sure they will this time, too.”

“You didn’t see any?”

Razai rolled her eyes. “Why would they be carrying bows in the dark, in the middle of nowhere, while sitting around their own camp?”

Corec waved that off. “Did you figure out why they’re after us? Did Rusol send them?”

“They didn’t mention him. They just said they planned to kill us, and they’re looking for something here.”

“Something from the ruins?”

“They didn’t seem to know.”

“What about their numbers?”

“Over a hundred, like Leena said. An even mix of the armed guards and the men with the knives. I only saw one wizard, but there were two priests.”

“Priests? Priests of Pallisur?” What would priests be doing there? Had Rusol sent them? Corec wasn’t sure whether the Church in Cordaea was independent, or if it was bound to follow orders from Cardinal Aldrich.

“I didn’t stop to ask,” Razai said in an annoyed tone.

“Maybe we’ll get lucky and they won’t be blessed,” Corec said. Blessed priests—those who’d been granted divine magic—weren’t as common as the unblessed. His home town of Tarwen Village had never rated one; they’d just had the fraud Calwell, who’d allowed Corec’s mother to die. Even in Fort Hightower, blessed priests had been in the minority.

“If they weren’t blessed, I wouldn’t have been able to sense them.”

Corec paused. “I didn’t know you could do that,” he said.

“Good,” Razai said. “That’s why I don’t tell you things—so you won’t know them.” Corec wasn’t sure if that was supposed to be a joke or just a simple statement of fact.

“What are we going to do?” Katrin asked. “Can we really fight them?”

Corec said, “If they’re coming after us, we have to. We can’t just hide and hope they pass by, and if there’s a Seeker following us, running will just delay things. At least this time, we’ll be able to prepare.”

“But there are over a hundred men!”

Corec was worried too, but it wouldn’t do any good to show it. “They sent thirty last time, and that was an ambush. Here, we can use the buildings as fortifications. With any luck, Ellerie and Shavala will be able to take out their archers before they find any targets. Then we just need to hit the mercenaries hard enough that they surrender.” When he said it that way, it almost sounded easy.

Razai growled deep in her throat. “You’re going to let them go again?”

“After we question them. If they’re actually mercenaries, then the others probably lied to them, like they did last time.”

“Mercenaries who are willing to murder one group of people just because another group says so? You’re too easy on them. Better to kill them than to set them loose.”

Corec frowned. If a Senshall caravan master hadn’t given him a chance as a guardsman on a caravan leaving Larso for the free lands, he might have ended up as a mercenary himself.

“I’ll think about it,” he said. “We do need to try to take some as prisoners, so we can find out what’s going on. And I’d like to capture the priests and the Seeker if we can.”

Taking the wizard alive would be too dangerous. Their best chance was to kill him before he killed anyone else. Hopefully Ellerie, Sarette, or Shavala would be able to pick him out from a distance. If not, Corec would have to rush him before he could cast a spell.

“Good luck trying to take a priest prisoner,” Razai said. “I’m going to go get some sleep—I’ve been awake all night. Wake me up when it’s time to kill people.”

She strode off without another word. Corec stared after her. It felt like he should try to ask her more questions about what she’d seen, but he couldn’t think of anything else he needed to know. He was no general—he’d barely passed his classes on tactics.

Shaking his head, he turned back to Katrin. “Well, at least we know for sure,” he said.

“Tell me honestly,” she said. “Can we win? I usually like it better when you tell me everything’s going to be all right, but this time I want to know the truth.”

He sighed and took her in his arms, resting his chin on top of her head. “I don’t know. If it was soldiers fighting soldiers, the fortifications should be enough to tip the balance, but the truth is, we only have three soldiers and one archer. That’s not enough, regardless of the circumstances. We’ll have to depend on magic, and I don’t know how to measure that. How many of them do you think you can scare away?”

“I’m not sure,” she said. “It depends how close they have to get before they can hear me. Maybe five? Ten if we’re lucky?”

Corec had never tried to plan his strategies around the use of magic before. He’d rarely been given enough time to plan any sort of strategy at all. He sorted through the possibilities in his mind. Their best bet was to strike first, before the enemy had figured out their positions. That meant he’d have to take Razai’s word that the other group intended to attack. He couldn’t wait and try to talk it out, because doing so would give up their biggest advantage.

“This is just about the best battleground we could have hoped for,” he said. “The only thing better would be an actual fortress, but this will work fine. We can lead them to exactly where we want them. And if they’re like the last group, half of their men will be useless in a fight once we take out their archers. We may not be soldiers, but neither are they. They took us by surprise last time and we still beat them.”

Katrin stepped back and looked up at him. “You didn’t answer my question,” she said.

He stared into her eyes. Could he send her away before the battle, to keep her safe? Perhaps with Shavala to watch over her? But if the Seeker was searching for all of them, that would leave the two of them alone and unprotected. It was safer to stay together.

“You asked me for the truth,” he said, “and that’s as much of it as I’ve figured out so far.”

She nodded, then glanced at the last two items he’d brought back from the ruins. “Are you going to give those to her?”

“Yes, I should probably do that now. I don’t know if it’ll help, but it can’t hurt to ask.”

“Do you want me to come with you?”

“She doesn’t seem to want to talk to anyone. Maybe it would be better if I went alone.”

“Then I’ll go let Ellerie and the others know what Razai said, in case she didn’t bother to tell them.”

“Thank you,” Corec said.