CHAPTER 9

Nobody Comes Back Unscathed

Eager to be on the road again, Archer roused the others as soon as he and Sefia returned.

Some of them grumbled and pulled their blankets over their heads, but Griegi was up in an instant, whistling happily as he stoked the coals of the previous night’s fire.

Archer was about to stop him when Kaito bounded over, seized a pot of water, and upended it over the ashes, which hissed and sent up a cloud of smoke.

“Rotten hulls, Kaito!” Griegi leapt to his feet, coughing. “What’s the matter with you?”

“Sorry, Grieg, we’ve got to get a move on.” With a shrug, he jogged away and began pounding on the prisoners’ crates. “Wake up, bootlickers! Time to stretch your legs and empty your bladders!”

Griegi looked disappointed. “Archer, come on, please?”

Shaking his head, Archer tossed his pack into the supply cart. “Kaito’s right. We have prisoners to unload,” he said. “I promise you can cook your heart out tonight.”

The boy’s face lit up. “You won’t regret it.”

Although almost everyone wanted to escort the captives, they agreed it was best to send in as few of them as possible: Archer driving one cart of prisoners, Sefia driving the other, Scarza to bring up the rear on his dun mare, and Kaito to ride ahead.

The nearest town was little more than a handful of weatherworn buildings and a single dusty street. At the north end, the jail was nestled between a general store and the messengers’ post.

As they passed the stables, Kaito rode back and forth along the carts, his hands continually going to his weapons as he checked the porches and yellowed curtains for signs of trouble.

When they reached the sheriff’s office, Kaito was the first to dismount, followed by Archer, who brushed off his trousers and straightened his cuffs uneasily.

The boy grinned at his discomfort. “Relax, brother. Compared to last night, this’ll be easy.”

Archer ran his fingers through his hair as the sheriff, a plump woman with a gold star winking at her shoulder, approached. Two deputies with their own silver stars followed behind.

“I’d rather be fighting,” he muttered.

Kaito laughed, earning a scowl from the sheriff as she halted in front of them, tucking her thumbs into her belt.

“Sheriff.” Archer’s voice cracked.

Kaito snickered.

The sheriff raised an eyebrow. “Boys.”

Kaito nudged him, and Archer stumbled forward. The sheriff looked unimpressed.

“We’d like to turn over eight criminals we picked up south of here,” he said, motioning to Sefia and Scarza, who began unlocking the crates and pulling their prisoners into the light.

The sheriff’s gaze traveled over the captives, their bruised faces and wrinkled clothes. Her nostrils flared at the stink of them.

Their unwashed smell brought back Archer’s memories of wooden walls, split fingernails, soiled bits of straw.

His chest tightened. His pulse roared in his ears. Not now. He grasped for the worry stone. Not now.

“What’s the matter, boy?” the sheriff demanded.

Boy. He gasped. Tears squeezed from the corners of his eyes as he fought to control his breathing. I’m not back there anymore. I’m safe. I’m safe. I’m safe.

“Archer!” Sefia called. “Kaito, help him!”

Then Kaito’s hand was on his shoulder, his voice gentler than Archer had ever heard it: “It’s all right, brother. I’ve got you.”

At the words, the pounding in Archer’s veins eased enough for him to hear the sheriff mutter, “What’s wrong with him?”

Archer looked up as his heart slowed. “Nightmares,” he croaked.

The sheriff frowned. “I sent my deputies for the warrants. We’ll see about these criminals of yours.”

He pocketed the worry stone as the deputies came scampering back with sheaves of paper in their arms. Silently, the sheriff began perusing the wanted sketches. Her frown deepened.

“We’ve got wanted notices for five of your criminals. Assault, highway robbery, kidnapping, a couple are even wanted for murder. Bad folks you’ve got here,” she said. “But these three are clean.”

As she pointed at three of the prisoners, one of them adjusted his bandages with a sly grin.

“I can take the others,” the sheriff continued, “but not them.”

The quartz point dug into Archer’s palm. He couldn’t let them go. He’d promised Kaito. Promised.

Before he could speak, Kaito darted forward. “Let them go?” he growled. He opened his collar, exposing the pink scar at his throat. “Here’s what happens if we let them go.”

Startled, the sheriff looked up at him, then back to her papers. “Kidnapping,” she muttered. Her gaze went to the prisoners and back to Kaito’s scar. “Impressors? I thought they were just a story.”

Kaito’s green eyes gleamed like a coyote’s. “Some stories are true.”

“We should tell Allannah,” one of the deputies murmured.

Who? Archer glanced around. The rooftops and shadowed doorways would have been perfect cover for an ambush. At the rear of the caravan, Scarza adjusted his grip on his rifle.

The sheriff shook her head. “After what they did, why didn’t you—” She made a cutting motion across her throat.

“Believe me, I would’ve, but . . .” Taking a step back, Kaito clapped Archer on the arm. “I owed someone, and I always pay my debts.”

The sheriff chewed at her lower lip. “We had a boy go missing about two years ago now. Most folks thought he’d run off, but his aunt, she never believed it.”

Allannah. The bereft. The one waiting for a boy who’d probably never come back. “I was taken about two years ago,” Archer said.

And there are people waiting for me too. Or rather, waiting for the boy he used to be. But that boy was gone. He’d died in the dirt with Argo.

“His name’s Parker,” the sheriff added. “Fifteen years old. Yellow hair and blue eyes you almost wouldn’t notice behind his glasses. Any of you see him? When you were, you know . . .”

Abruptly, Scarza passed off his captives to Sefia and began leading his mare back down the road.

The sheriff raised her eyebrows.

The scar in Kaito’s cheek twitched. “No, sorry. Didn’t know him.”

“It’s all right. It was a lot to hope.”

The deputies took the prisoners from Sefia and began tugging them away. Over his shoulder, one of the trackers shot them a last venomous glance.

“You fixing to stay awhile?” the sheriff asked. “Knowing what you did, folks would gladly put you up for the night. Feed you pretty well too.”

“Thanks, but we have to keep moving.” Archer’s restlessness had returned, and all he wanted was to hunt and fight and break things, splintering the impressors crew by crew until they were no more than a dream, distantly remembered. “Got a place to water our horses and fill our canteens?”

She nodded. “You passed the stables on your way in. There’s a trough and pump out back.”

He tipped his hat to her.

“You’re doing good work here, boys. Keep it up.”

As they made their way back, Kaito drew up beside Archer’s cart. “We did see him,” he said.

“Parker?”

“He fought Scarza.”

“Oh.” The very fact that Scarza was here meant Parker hadn’t made it.

At the drinking trough, the silver-haired boy silently stroked his mare’s shoulder with his one hand. He had a generous mouth and cheekbones so sharp you could cut your knuckles on them, and over the past couple of days together, Archer had discovered he was quiet too—like a cloud passing over a landscape, so unassuming you didn’t realize he was there until he was right beside you.

As if he could sense Archer watching him, Scarza’s gaze lifted briefly before dropping again. “Kaito told you,” he said.

“Yeah.”

“I should’ve said something. I should’ve told them I killed him.”

“The impressors made you do it.”

Scarza laughed bitterly. “Is that what you tell yourself? That they made you?”

Archer looked away. They had, hadn’t they? Every life he’d taken, he’d done it because he’d had to. Because the choice had been forced on him: kill or die.

Right?

When they started back around the stables, they found a small group of people waiting for them on the main road. Arrayed around them were cloth-wrapped packages, small stoppered kegs, paper parcels tied with string, even a bundle of neatly chopped firewood.

One of the people, a woman with hair the color of straw and large powder-blue eyes, stepped forward. “We heard what you did,” she said. “We wanted to thank you.”

“Allannah?” Archer asked.

Scarza stared fixedly at the hills in the distance.

She placed a basket in Archer’s hands, and he caught a whiff of baked sugar, butter, and lavender. “After Parker’s parents died, I was supposed to raise him. I tried, but he . . . we could never seem to get along, you know? But he didn’t deserve . . .” She retreated, drawing a pale shawl closer about her shoulders. “Anyway, thank you.”

Archer gripped the basket. We didn’t save him, he wanted to say. Or, I’m sorry.

As he searched for the words, Scarza dismounted. He walked up to Allannah and took one of her hands in his. “Don’t thank us,” he said in his soft voice. “He’s never coming home.”

Tears formed in her eyes, and she clasped his hand tighter. “Some of you get to. Thank you for that.”

Then she embraced him and hurried back to the others, who began loading the empty carts with supplies.

Stunned, Scarza looked up at Archer as if for direction.

They’d hurt so many people. Scarza’s right arm had eleven burns—one of them for killing Parker. Kaito’s had nine. And every one of the others—even Mako, only twelve years old—had at least two.

Archer had fifteen, though his count was much higher.

He could picture each of their faces when he closed his eyes—boys, impressors, trackers—their jaws gone slack in death, mouths forming questions to which they’d never hear the answers.

Sometimes he felt like the dead would always be with him, hounding his steps, forcing him to keep moving, keep fighting, because if he tried to turn back, the dead would be all he saw.

He’d come back, all right, but neither he nor Scarza nor Kaito, none of them had come back unscathed. Their scars were just an outward sign of it.

But now, maybe they could save enough boys to make up for the ones they’d killed. Maybe they could save enough boys, and maybe when they were done, they’d deserve to go home again.

There was a touch at his shoulder, and Sefia’s fingers twined in his.

He gripped her hand. They had Frey and the boys. They had the Book. They were together. Nothing would stop them until they’d rid Deliene of the impressors.

One crew down.

Three to go.