57.

Deep in the Forest

With the few coins Renzo had managed to “collect,” we bought more food from the villagers—who were already carrying their belongings toward their boats: baskets, pots, what food they could gather, and the simple tools of their professions—dried codfish and seaweed and a few stunted potatoes. For the horses we could only offer scrapings of moss that they did not relish but could eat.

Two leagues north we stopped, looked back, and saw Zebara burning bright, as whips of fire lashed the buildings and the beached boats. No matter how fast we traveled, it wasn’t fast enough.

We turned into a wood made up of tall firs. They stood in tight ranks that blocked any sunlight, which was already in short supply. To make movement harder still, the trees were covered with invasive weeds that spread in black vines along the ground, then wound themselves around tree trunks. Some trees were almost invisible beneath the weed wrapping.

Belligerent tuskers, huge wild pigs, threatened us but withdrew when they caught sight of Gambler. The few birds we saw were skimmers and foam-walkers. We saw only a single raptidon, an aging bird who showed no interest in us.

The peninsula narrowed until we could see water to our north and south. But the one-eyed man had directed us to the end of the peninsula, to a place he’d called Landfail.

“We are on a peninsula with a Knight of the Fire behind us,” Renzo said to Khara. “Just how do you propose escaping?”

“I assumed you would have a brilliant plan,” Khara replied. “You seem to have no problem pushing your way into conversations and even making deals.”

“Not I,” Renzo said. “When I am someday caught, it will be a T they brand on my forehead, not an R for Rebel.”

Khara studied the landscape, mentally judging distances as the spit of land grew ever more narrow. She stopped. We all stopped. Then, with obvious reluctance, she motioned Renzo close.

“What theurgy do you know?” she asked.

He shrugged. “Burglar’s tricks. I can dazzle with a bright light, I can fill a room with fog, I can coax a recalcitrant lock—but only if I use my picking tools properly. And I can make a noise at a distance, you know, to distract.”

“None of that will help us with this.” Khara considered. “All right. Here is our line. It’s only, what, two hundred feet from the north side to south? Here’s where we lay our trap.”

“Our what, now?” Renzo asked, head cocked.

“We are going to weave a trap,” Khara said, projecting confidence I doubted she felt. “We’re going to use these vines, these weeds we keep stumbling over. We’ll use them to weave a net.”

“He’ll burn right through it,” Renzo said.

“Mmm,” Khara said. “Yes. Now, let’s get to it!”

Frantically we hacked at roots and dragged them into place. Tobble supervised the task of weaving long strands of vine into a net stretched between trees across a fifty-foot span. It was exhausting and almost certainly a waste of time, as Renzo kept pointing out. Still, he worked as hard as anyone.

I was skeptical. I doubted. But as we worked, I started to sense Khara’s strategy. The net we were weaving with such care was a diversion. Just a few feet past the net, a steep gully cut across the peninsula. It was no more than three or four feet deep and would certainly not stop the knight or his horse—if they saw it.

Khara hacked down branches with her sword, choosing strong, straight limbs and cutting each into six-foot lengths. When she started sharpening the sticks at both ends, I knew what she was planning.

“Byx,” Khara said, wiping sweat from her brow. “Climb this tree and see if you can spot the knight.”

We are good climbers, we dairnes. But felivets are better, so I wondered why she chose me. I climbed easily—I have no fear of heights—until my head rose above the canopy of trees. It was an eerie sight: leagues of gray-green trees with a blanket of mist upon them.

I searched the horizon for signs of fire or smoke. I strained my ears and breathed deeply, scanning for smells. But the wind cut across us, north to south, and bore me nothing but the scents of salt water and pine sap.

“I don’t see anything,” I called. “I’m coming down.”

“No! Stay,” Khara ordered. “And whatever happens, stay up there and stay silent.”

I realized with horror what she was doing: keeping the precious dairne, the endling, as safe as she could.

I did not wish to be safe. I wished to fight, and if necessary die, with the others.

“I can’t let them die for me,” I said aloud.

As I began to descend, I checked around me one last time. I could easily see the end of the peninsula, a five-minute walk away. We were at the edge of the world, it seemed to me. The ocean stretched forever, dotted with whitecaps. I noticed a patch of trees—not gloomy firs, but trees alive with color, blazing reds, vivid yellows, soft greens, like a tiny, forgotten orchard at the edge of the forest.

A wave of loneliness washed over me. The little spot of color reminded me of the only home I’d ever known, the gentler, warmer, more fertile south where my band had always wandered.

A home I would probably never see again.

I’d begun my descent—Khara would have to accept my decision—when I noticed something odd.

The colorful stand of trees was moving.

Not swaying and fretting in the breeze, but moving.

Moving!

I had been ordered to stay up in the trees and stay quiet. Well, Khara had not specified which tree, precisely. I spread my glissaires and glided between the branches, alighting on a nearby fir.

Yes: The patch of color was moving.

I glided to the next tree, and the next, and suddenly I was at the end of the peninsula, the very end, and there before me was not an orchard.

There before me, across no more than a hundred feet of water, was an island.

An island floating past with surprising speed.

Moving like a living thing.