Page 62 of All the Wandering Light

Shadows gathered over the stream. In the forest, more shadows stirred, sliding onto the bank like animals seeking a drink. The soldiers gazed about, wide-eyed. For some reason, they had fallen back from Tem, who stood alone at the center of a swirl of shadow.

More shouts, and an arrow flew toward Tem. I opened my mouth to scream, but a shadow darted out, and the arrow went wide. A soldier approached him, sword drawn, but a skein of darkness wrapped around his ankle, and he fell with a clatter of armor. Realization hit like a shock of ice water.

The shadows belonged to Tem.

“Seize him!” a woman shouted, her voice hoarse.

“No,” I said, as chaos erupted on all sides. One of the soldiers had made it through the shadow-cloud to Tem, who seemed to have sagged forward. Lusha was yelling. The soldiers were yelling. Everyone was yelling. Shadows skittered back to the forest.

“No,” I repeated, louder this time.

I didn’t know what I was denying—everything, I supposed. Everything was wrong. Well, I wasn’t just going to sit there. I was going to do something about it.

I dragged myself to my feet, and that was when the world tilted violently, and the ground came swooping up to greet me.

Nineteen

HANDS WRENCHED MY shoulder back, pressing something cold against it. I felt a shock of pain, then a spreading numbness that almost made me weep with relief. A voice chanted an incantation. I must have slipped back into unconsciousness, for the next thing I knew, the hands were gone.

I opened my eyes.

I lay on my side on the forest floor, a dark figure looming above me. I felt a moment of panic and disorientation. When I raised a hand to my shoulder, I encountered dry bandages, no blood. All I could see, at that angle, were the hooves of a massive horse. When I shifted position, there came a shaft of pain that made me wish I hadn’t opened my eyes.

“Who did this?” a cold male voice said. “The general said capture, not maim.”

“Apologies, my lord,” a woman’s voice murmured.

There came a curse, and then a pair of leather-clad feet landed on the ground not two paces from my head. A man, tall and armored, his face half-hidden by a gleaming helm that covered his eyes and wrapped around the sides of his neck, knelt at my side and passed his hands matter-of-factly over my body. I paid him little heed. My stomach felt as if it had been rearranged by the blow it had taken, and my shoulder throbbed beneath the salve. My breath came in wheezes.

“Get away from her,” snapped the familiar voice of the person beside me.

“Lusha,” I managed. It came out as two words. I pushed myself upright with my good arm, then wished I hadn’t, as the world tilted. The knot of soldiers surrounding us visibly tensed. Lusha didn’t look injured. There was a smear of blood across her palm, mixed with earth—she must have fallen.

“Tem—”

“He’s alive,” Lusha said. “No thanks to these cowards.”

“Cowards?” the tall man repeated as a little shiver traveled through the armored figures gathered in the glade. There were six of them, and most had arrows trained on us. “We are soldiers of the emperor’s Fifth.”

I felt a chill. Each of the emperor’s ten armies was renowned—or notorious—for its own specialization. The First Army was the largest and most powerful, and was often sent out to fight the fearsome barbarian tribes at the farthest reaches of the Empire. The Fifth was smaller—it kept close to the Three Cities, patrolling the forests and plateaus through which the Empire’s major trade routes threaded, searching out the bandits and thieves that preyed upon unwary travelers. Once caught, those bandits were dispatched with casual brutality and left where they had fallen as a warning to others. Father had spoken of the blackened bodies he had seen at the side of the road during his last visit to the Three Cities.

“I don’t care if you’re the emperor himself,” Lusha replied, her voice icy. “You attacked a group of unarmed travelers without provocation. What is the difference between that and banditry?”

The air cooled further. I contemplated clamping a hand over Lusha’s mouth. But though her hands on my shoulders shook slightly, her gaze was iron. She knew what she was doing—knew that it wasn’t suicide, as much as it appeared that way. With an almost painful effort, I forced down my objections. Lusha’s gaze was fixed on the man who had examined me for injuries.

He was silent for a long moment. Then, to my astonishment, he let out a bark of laughter. Instantly, the mood lightened. Soldiers shifted position, their armor clinking.

“Unarmed travelers?” I sensed rather than saw that the man’s entire focus was on Lusha. “You are witches.”

“No,” Lusha replied, reacting more quickly than I would have thought possible to that incomprehensible statement. “We’re flesh and blood. You’ve seen that for yourself.”

“And your friend?”

Lusha was silent. What was the man talking about? It couldn’t be Tem—and yet Tem was the one missing. Where had they taken him?

“Tem is not a witch,” I said. The very idea was ludicrous.

The man made a dismissive sound. “I do not doubt what I see with my own eyes. He can control the shadows. Only witches can work such magic.”