WHERE?

Are you with me? Karigan mind-asked Ripaeria.

I fly far above, yes, came the eagle’s response.

Cloaked by her fading ability and the cover of night, Karigan worked her way toward the pickets, where she loosened the tethers that secured horses and mules in place. From there she moved to one of the large supply tents, cutting through the side wall so she didn’t have to confront the guard at the front. It was filled with crates and barrels of goods, and to her pleasure, bushels of arrows. When she detected a pungent fishy scent, she followed it to a cask set on its side on a pair of support braces, with a spigot pounded into it. Beneath the spigot there was a small puddle of whale oil where it had dripped. The gods were surely smiling on her. She opened the spigot and let the whale oil pour freely onto the ground.

She slipped outside and grabbed the nearest torch. If no one cried out, it was because they were too surprised to see an apparition carrying away a torch. She threw it inside the tent toward the cask of whale oil. She smiled at the thought of all those arrows burning. As she hurried on to her next task without a backward glance, shouts went up behind her and people ran in panic as fire consumed canvas.

She was headed toward the pen that held the captives when she glanced toward Torq’s tent. He was standing in the opening watching the commotion. She thought about his travel device. Would it be within?

She moved to the back and slit the canvas as she had with the supply tent. She had to move more carefully than ever for the front flaps were tied open and Torq was standing right there, though looking outward with his back to her.

She entered through the slit, stepped around his cot, and looked for the gold coffer she’d seen before. It sat on his table beside a stack of playing cards and dice. She crept to the table, her luck holding. The lid was open and within sat the travel device, a silver orb nested in velvet. She had not seen it close up when the Raiders had captured her, and now she took in the decorative etching on its surface, the fine script that was like nothing she had seen before. It shone untarnished and unscathed even after what must have been extensive use by the Raiders over the years.

“You!” Torq’s bellow was like a crack of thunder.

She looked up to see him charging her. She snatched the device and, as she turned and ran, wished she knew how to use it. She remembered when she had been taken how the Raider had twisted the two halves of the orb. She leaped through the slit she’d made in the tent wall and felt Torq’s hand swipe her shoulder in his attempt to catch her.

She twisted the sphere. Where? came a gentle query in her mind.

She pictured the pen where the prisoners were kept and the world spiraled around her and she was carried away by the traveling. When it ended, the ground spun beneath her feet and she staggered.

“Karigan?” asked a shocked voice.

She promptly vomited and fought for her balance. When her vision settled, she found Renn standing before her. He placed steadying hands on her shoulders. As the miasma subsided, she became aware of the turmoil around her, of the scent of smoke mixed with that of her vomit, and the shouts of panic from the encampment’s inhabitants.

“I’ve come to get you out,” she told him. “You and your family.”

“How? How have you—?”

“No time. Where are they? Your wife and children?”

A guard who had been watching the excitement across the encampment suddenly took notice of her. “Intruder!” he shouted. “Intruder!”

“Hurry,” she urged Renn. Then she saw Torq and a handful of other soldiers storming their way toward the prisoner pen. Ripaeria!

I come! the eagle cried with unrestrained enthusiasm, and a winged maelstrom started tearing tents from the ground and flinging them around. She overturned carts and screeched at the humans who ran in terror before her.

In the pen, prisoners screamed and scattered in confusion as guards poured in. One swung at Karigan with a cudgel, and she ducked just in time. Then Renn was there and he bashed the guard over the head with a bucket. Even as the guard hit the ground, Renn thrust a woman and two children at her.

“I love you,” he told his family. To Karigan, he yelled, “Go!”

Before she could grab him, he turned to fend off another foe. There was a flash of steel and the tip of a curved sword emerged through his back. His wife wailed.

“Renn!” Karigan cried, still reaching as he sank to the ground and slid off the blood-slicked blade. He would not rise again. His wife tried to go to his side, but Karigan grabbed her wrist. “Hold on to me,” she instructed the children. The boy clung to her arm, and the little girl to her leg, crying out for her papa.

Karigan twisted the sphere. Where? it asked, its voice calm in contrast to the surrounding chaos.

Ripaeria swooped low over the pen raking a guard aside with her talons. You go, the eagle told Karigan. I go scare horses now.

Karigan told the orb the first place that came to mind, and as the travel began, a sword blade sliced across her side, leaving a burning trail of pain across her ribs.

This time the world’s whirling lasted much longer, but eventually she slammed into the ground spinning, and then she thought she blacked out for a few moments.

When she came to, she shook her head, which only worsened the dizziness. She disgorged whatever remained in her stomach. “Dear gods.”

When everything finally stopped turning and her stomach settled down, she found Renn’s wife hugging her children nearby. The little girl was sobbing inconsolably. Karigan had no idea if the travel had made them sick, but at least they appeared to be in one piece. Some distance away stood the main gates to Sacor City and she was never so glad to see them. Many small campfires flickered in the night among tents, shanties, and wagons huddled up alongside the city wall. Refugees, she thought, seeking safety from Raiders and war.

She rose unsteadily, another wave of vertigo making her stagger. She quelled it with a deep breath, then winced with the pain in her side. “Cora, isn’t it?” she said to Renn’s wife. “I am going to take us up to the castle.” She wished she’d been more specific with the instruction she had given the travel device.

“I am not putting my children through that again,” Cora told her. “It’s bad enough they had to see their father slain before their eyes.”

Guilt surged within Karigan. If only she’d called upon Ripaeria sooner, or had managed to grab Renn before the swordsman stabbed him.

“I’m so sorry,” she said.

Cora gazed at her in accusation. “And what of all the poor people you left behind? It would’ve been better if you’d just left us alone. I thought you Riders were better than this.”

Karigan wanted to argue she had done her best, that she had been on her own for the rescue, that it was most important to save Renn and his family to ensure Cade’s future. Instead, she said in a tired voice, “If you’d like to rest here, I’ll send help back to you.”

Cora did not reply, but hugged her children hard.

Told you, Nyssa said, sounding well pleased. You failed.

Before her torturer could say more, Karigan moved away from Cora and her children so they would not be affected by the use of the travel device. This time when she twisted the halves and it asked, Where? she pictured her bed chamber in the Rider wing.

Everything spun ’round again, but abruptly she hit what felt like a wall and bounced back onto the ground.

“Ow,” she whispered. The stars above rotated in her vision. There was the Hunter chasing mischievous Ru’uth, the river otter, in a glistening stream of heavenly light. Fortunately, the universe soon stopped moving and she discovered she hadn’t gotten far.

What had stopped her? She tried again with the same result. Did something about the city walls or the castle prevent her from using the device to enter? Were they warded against its magic?

Guess I’ll have to walk.

She approached the gates under the curious gazes of refugees and guards. The guards blocked her passage with crossed pikes.

“What is your business?” they demanded. “Who are you?”

“I am Rider G’ladheon. I’m on business for the king.”

They did not look convinced, and she had to admit she probably didn’t much resemble a Green Rider in her current condition, especially with the plain cloak. She pulled it off her shoulder to reveal the embroidered insignia of the gold winged horse on her sleeve. They still looked skeptical.

“Oh, for the sake of the gods,” she said. “I have important news for the king.”

The guards exchanged glances. A third sauntered up and said, “It’s all right, lads. She is who she says she is.”

Finally. “Thank you, Sergeant Keen. Might I have a horse? I need to speak with the king and his advisors immediately. There is also a woman and her two children who came with me, and they need some assistance.” She roughly explained how they had escaped from Second Empire.

“We can certainly assist the lady and her children, Rider. Private Seften, please go see to them.”

“Yes, Sarge.” The private trotted off.

“As for the king,” the sergeant continued, “he’s long gone with his troops to fight Second Empire in the east.”

“To the Eagle’s Pass?”

“That is the rumor I hear. Castellan Javien remains at the castle if you need to speak to someone. The queen, too.”

“Colonel Mapstone?”

“She and a fair host of Riders left about the same time as the king.”

She sighed, very tired by it all. And now Zachary wasn’t even here. “How long ago did they leave?”

“It’s been a couple weeks, Rider.”

She calculated travel time and distance, and thought that they should have reached Oxbridge by now. “Can I have that horse?”

“You’re going to ride after them?” the sergeant asked. “Excuse me for saying so, Rider, but you look like you could use a rest, and the services of a mender, too.” He pointed at her side.

She glanced down at her shirt where it had been rent by the swordsman’s blade, and in the light of lanterns, she saw it was stained by a good deal of blood.

“It’s not deep. There is no time to lose.”

A horse was found for her along with a freshly filled waterskin and some provisions from their personal stock. She appreciated the gesture, but hoped she’d not need them. While she waited for the horse, she wrote a message to be taken to Mara who, she was to understand, commanded what remained of the Riders in the absence of Colonel Mapstone and Captain Connly.

She mounted the horse with some pain to her side. Nothing, however, hurt as much as seeing Private Seften returning to the gate with Cora and her children, but no Renn. Guilt washed over her once more and deepened her own grief. Renn had reminded her so much of Cade. He’d put the lives of his family before his own, as she’d imagine Cade doing in a similar situation. He had, in fact, sacrificed himself for her. At least, for Renn, she had brought his wife and children to safety. She prayed that if he were indeed a progenitor of Cade, that it was through his children that Cade would one day live.

“Thank you for your assistance,” she told Sergeant Keen.

She reined the horse around and clucked her into a canter. She would have loved to have gotten her Condor from Rider stables, but it would have taken too long and she’d be subjected to too many questions from Mara, Javien, and perhaps even Estora.

When she was some distance from the city gates and people in general, she pulled the mare to a halt. She grasped the sphere in both hands and twisted.

Where?

“Oxbridge.” She pictured the village square and the world whirled away.