part0011

“ Y OU TRIED TO ESCAPE ME !” Lord Necroniss’ shout cracked Lady Dread’s skull with its power. Her armor glowed white with heat. “DID YOU THINK YOU COULD HIDE FROM ME ?”

Lady Dread fell to her knees, screaming. She felt her eyes boiling in their sockets, felt her bone catch fire inside the armor.

“Give me the child,” Lord Necronis hissed. “Bring me to her now!”

Lady Dread fell on her face. Her steel-encased fingers dug into the earth. She wanted to whistle for her horse, to reach the baby before the Dread Horse arrived, but she could only scream and convulse.

“TAKE ME TO THE CHILD !” He turned her from white-hot to freezing in a second. Her bones, unable to keep up with the temperature changes, cracked and broke. Her pain, agonizing before, was near unbearable. “WHERE IS IT ?”

Lord Necronis tore through her mind, searching every memory from the moment she touched the child to that instant. He found an image of the cabin and the infant girl being nursed at the woman’s breast.

“STAY THERE ,” Lord Necronis’s voice scraped through her aching head. “You will watch her die and then return for proper punishment. Remember. ”

The word opened up a memory. She hung naked in darkness. Manacles cut into the skin of her wrists. Her left eye had swollen shut. The right was open wide but could see nothing. Her body bled from scores of injuries. She hurt, worse than she ever had on a battlefield.

A cold blade touched the skin on her thigh. She tried to struggle but could not move. The knife slid into her flesh, slipping through it, leaving the muscles beneath exposed to the air. She gritted her teeth, refusing to scream.

“After this, your muscle,” Lord Necronis said from the darkness. “And then, oh…”

Lord Necronis laughed in her head. Lady Dread opened her eyes, saw the burnt ground around her and the flaming grass on the hilltop. She wanted to stand, but her broken legs wouldn’t support her weight. So, she pulled against the earth with her fingers.

It hurt. The bones in her arms grated as she reached out. Every move hurt terribly. She didn’t scream but only because she had no strength for it. She pulled, forcing her body onto the hillside.

“STOP !” Lord Necronis screamed.

It should have been enough to make her lie still. Before, she would not have—could not have—disobeyed him. Now, Lady Dread pulled one more time.

Her body slipped sideways and fell down the hill in an ungainly roll. Every bump and dip on the hillside, every half-buried rock jolted her broken bones. She hit the bottom in a clanking, grinding mess of pain. In the village, old men and women called to one another for weapons and torches.

What if the woman is gone? What if she ran, now she knows the village is in danger?

“Stop where you are!” Lord Necronis’s screams sounded fainter. “Do not move!”

Hooves stomped beside her. Her horse’s reins fell in front of her. She reached out, caught them. “Take me to the cabin.”

The horse dragged her forward. Lord Necronis shouted in Lady Dread’s ear, but the words sounded miles away. She heard people shouting. Torches flared around them, but no one came close.

The bones in her arms joined together, the pain of it almost worse than the breaks themselves.

Why so fast? Lord Necronis’s magic made her heal quickly, to help her survive both battle and the punishments he inflicted on her. But not this fast.

Her thighbones came together next. Above her, the horse screamed out a warning to the humans around them. Its mane, dark a moment before, burst into red flames. She let go of the reins and started crawling.

The closer she got to the baby, the fainter Lord Necronis’s voice sounded.

Her horse reared, lashing out with hoof and teeth, keeping the humans away from her. The villagers backed up, fear on their faces. Her steed stayed beside her, flaming mane and burning red eyes lighting the crowd surrounding them.

Lady Dread rose to her hands and knees. She drew her sword, planted it into the ground and used the hilt to pull her aching body upright. Standing hurt, but then everything hurt. She managed a limping walk toward the cottage, supporting her weight with her sword. With every step her bones knit, and the pain vanished, replaced by a dull itch.

She shoved the door open. The baby girl lay on a blanket on the floor. The woman knelt over her, swaddling the squirming girl with practiced hands. Her son lay on the bed, swaddled. A large pack sat nearby, a walking stick and knife on a belt beside it.

“She’s fed.” The woman finished swaddling the girl and held her up. “I’ve cleaned her up, and I’m wrapping her. Then you can take her out of here.”

“I cannot keep this child alive by myself.” The words escaped Lady Dread before she realized it. “I do not have the skills, or the milk. You must care for her.”

“I have to save my son!” The woman put the infant on the bed and picked up her own child. “We have to leave, or we’ll die.”

“The Dread Horsemen are almost here,” Lady Dread said. “You’ll die anyway. Even if you run.”

The woman’s face collapsed on itself. Tears welled up in her eyes. She wavered, her knees shaking. She shook her head as if the motion could stop what was coming.

“Come now!” Lady Dread’s voice reverberated through the cottage. The woman dropped to her knees and wrapped her body around her child as if the frail shell of her flesh could keep him from death.

There is no time for this. Only the sure knowledge she would have to find another to nurse the girl kept her from killing the woman on the spot. She looked at the baby girl, swaddled on the floor. The child stared back, her violet eyes wide.

“I won’t go without him.” Desperation filled her voice. “He has no father living, nor any close kin. Take us both with you or we’ll die here.”

The infant will not slow me, and I need the woman to keep the girl alive. “Then come. Both of you.”

The woman scrambled to her feet. She grabbed a length of cloth, tied into a circle, and draped it around her neck. She put the baby inside it and grabbed the pack. “Clothes and linens for the babies. They need them.”

Lady Dread growled her impatience. The woman reached into her cupboard and pulled out another long length of cloth. She tied it and held it out to Lady Dread.

“Put this on. You can carry her and keep your hands free.” Her voice still shook, but she still held the cloth out. “I can’t hold them both. Not safely.”

The woman stepped forward and threw the cloth over Lady Dread’s neck. She took the girl, nestled her in the blanket. The baby cooed and fussed but didn’t cry. Lady Dread grabbed the woman’s arm and dragged her outside.

Her horse was chasing the village men, snapping at them and keeping them off balance, kicking at them with its hooves, though none come close to striking. It whinnied—the first time Lady Dread remembered hearing the beast make that sound. The child is affecting him, too.

“Douse your flames,” Lady Dread said.

The horse’s mane turned from flame to smoke. Lady Dread mounted, careful to keep the baby from being squished against the side of her horse. She grabbed the woman with one hand. The woman opened her mouth to protest, but Lady Dread used her strength and magic to lift her to the saddle in front of her.

“What about the others?” the woman asked in a low voice. “What happens to them?”

“They’ll die.”

“All of them?” Horror filled the woman’s voice. “Can’t you do anything?”

“No.” She snapped the reins, kicked the horse’s ribs and charged over the hills away from the oncoming army.

“There’s fire,” the woman whispered. “Behind us.”

Lady Dread twisted her body to look over her shoulder. She saw the flames of the Dread Horsemen, spreading out across the hills. Even at that distance, she could see the red eyes of the horses and the heavy armor of their riders glowing in the light of the horses’ burning manes.

They’re making sure I can’t turn. They want me to keep going this direction. Why? What is waiting for us? She tilted back, looking for the stars. Clouds covered part of the sky, but she found the Fisherman’s Wife and the Huntsman’s Dog. How do I know their names? And how do I know which direction they point?

They pointed north, toward the Great Forest.

Ten times Lord Necronis’s army had attempted the Great Forest. Ten times it had been pushed back. The corpses of a thousand Blood Haunts and hundreds of Dread Horse now fed the trees. Lord Necronis tortured Lady Dread worse every time she failed to take the forest. Its borders were etched into what memories he allowed her to keep.

“What are we doing?” the woman asked. “Where are we going?”

“Toward the Great Forest.”

“No one goes in there.” The woman’s voice shook. “The Spellbinders of the forest forbid it. Why are we going there?”

Because Lord Necronis knows that none of our kind can go inside. How far is it?”

“A day’s walk,”

The woman fell silent. Lady Dread suspected she was weeping. The children were quiet, too, though it did not matter anymore. They were found, and their pursuers were driving them to a place of no escape. All because she disobeyed Lord Necronis.

She rarely paid attention to her body. It sat in its armor, protected from the world. She had thought it could feel nothing but pain. But now it itched. Everywhere. Her legs itched. The back of her neck begged to be scratched. Her entire torso itched so much she wanted to tear off her breastplate and roll in the dirt like a dog.

I have nothing that can be itchy. I am skeleton, eyes and armor .

And yet, the itching continued.

Is it Lord Necronis’s doing? As far as his torments went, this was nothing. Is it all the punishment he can deliver while I am in the child’s presence?

The Great Forest came into view, a line of darkness so deep it stood out against the night sky above it. The line was not utterly straight but as near as could be the case with living trees, as if there were a mark on the ground: here and no farther. A band of wild grasses, tall and hardy, separated the forest from arable land.

The forest stretched to either horizon, leaving nowhere to turn. Lady Dread shifted in her seat to look at the riders behind them. They still maintained formation; still kept their distance. She thought of turning and charging them but knew it was fruitless. Her power was unmatched among the Dread, but even she could not face a hundred other horsemen.

“Save us, oh great Aten,” the woman mumbled under her breath. “Save your servant from the fate that will befall her and save the children from the death that comes after us. Deliver us from the evil we face and let us live to sing your praises. And if we cannot live, then let us die without pain, filled with the joy of your presence. Save us, oh great one—”

“Praying does nothing.” Lady Dread said.

“It keeps me from screaming,” the woman said. “And maybe Aten will listen.”

The dark line of the trees on the horizon loomed higher, the grass ended, and the ground became rough and rocky. Lady Dread held the woman tight, making sure neither she nor the child fell as the horse swerved past boulders and jumped fallen trees.

Still the Dread Horsemen kept their distance.

They were near the trees now and the near-impassible wall of underbrush beneath them. The forest did not want visitors, it seemed, and did whatever it could to stop them entering. The outermost trees were not saplings, as in an ordinary forest, but sentinels, tall and broad, many with a radius wider than a man’s spread arms. Lady Dread looked either way along the forest’s edge.

A small gap opened, just wide enough for her steed.

She heard horses scream behind her and the galloping increase in speed. The line of riders behind turned into a crescent, coming up on both sides. She pulled on the reins, directing her horse to the gap. She kicked the animal’s ribs and it put on a burst of speed.

They slipped between the trees and into darkness. What little light came from the night sky vanished above the canopy, and the sounds from outside faded into silence. The demon horse slowed. Lady Dread twisted again, trying to see behind them through the narrow slot on her visor. Branches and tree trunks obscured her line of sight. The darkness thickened. She growled and turned back to the front.

The demon horse jolted to a stop. Lady Dread froze in place, unable to move.

“You are ours.” The voice boomed through the trees and made the branches shake. “Set down the child. Now.”