Androkles sat by the tiny fire and wondered how much sleep he would get tonight. His head felt like sodden clay and his stomach had that odd ache that only exhaustion could bring, and already he could hear the creatures of nightmare prowling across the rocks and brush, just far enough out of the firelight to appear as mere hints of shadow.

This was a poor spot to make a camp, let alone when being chased; a flat, open, rocky meadow high up between mountain peaks, but it was where their travels had landed them. No trees here, no big tangles of vines and bushes to squeeze into. No great boulders to keep the wind off. Just snow and rocks and a cold breeze that never let up, and above them a half-moon causing half the stars in the sky to cower. And what use was hiding? The monsters knew where he was. They always did, creeping out of shadows and hidden places as he drew closer to them and then following far enough away that he could only ever glimpse them.

They would not come in numbers. There were too many different kinds and they never worked together. No, they would wait as they always did and come at him a few at a time, paced throughout the night to keep anyone from getting any real rest. Garbi was fraying like a rope; she no longer made any effort to tend her hair or straighten her dresses, and she had grown so peevish that even Ashe rested her wolf’s head on Flower’s lap instead.

But after four days of this, he couldn’t blame her. Or Flower, with his quiet words and empty, distant eyes. Or Agurne, whose each step got heavier by one handful of sand throughout the day, leaving her with an impossible burden by the time twilight came. At this rate, she was going to be as thin as Garbi by the time they made it to Dikaia, if there was anything left of her at all.

Androkles sighed and looked away from the fire, since he was the only one keeping an eye out for an attack. The others huddled under a blanket, gazing off into the southern sky. More of their attention lately was spent idly watching for Wolfscar to return than anything else. He wondered if they were even truly watching, or if turning their heads that direction had become mere habit.

When he heard the first attack of the night, he felt no fear at all. Just annoyance, if anything. Mostly just weary emptiness. But they all heard the gravel sliding somewhere behind them as something stepped on unstable ground. The children stiffened and Agurne held up her charms. “I’m ready, ogre,” she said, her voice cracking from thirst and not speaking all day. And what was there to say?

He stood, wincing at the pain in his ribs, which still wasn’t getting much better. Maybe a little, but not enough. At least the skin on his arms was finally starting to heal under the carpet of stitches. It held together now, usually.

Using the butt of his spear like a walking stick, he stumbled his way toward the sound, wondering what it would be this time. Child-sized half-goats again? Another hairless bear with two arms and four legs? He didn’t see anything glowing, so it wasn’t the swirling leaves with eyes of coal embers. Oh well. He’d see it soon enough.

Behind him, Agurne’s soap-bubble shield of magic appeared and gave the shadows the barest blue tinge. He still couldn’t see the thing encroaching on their camp, but the snowy gravel crunched again, perhaps ten paces up the rocky incline. Close enough.

Androkles gathered his killing intent and pressed it out of himself, and thank the gods, it responded. The space of one breath passed, and another, and then the area lit up like a festival as the thing burst into flames. He had not expected that, but apparently it was covered in dry hair.

Its scream of agony was grating and high-pitched. It was about Agurne’s height and shaped mostly like a man, except that it had no legs--instead, two more arms came out where its legs should be. All four of its limbs ended in a thick hand with fingers twice as long as normal and a thumb to match. It had a tiny head that was mostly mouth and a long tongue that spun as it flailed against the flames.

The hideous creature gave one final effort and leaped at him, fingers outstretched. He let it reach him, let its fingers close around his throat, before he pressing his killing intent just a bit farther and burned out its insides. A strangler. Some sort of night-strangler monster. That’s what it was. Two more of the same grating screams came from behind him to either side, and he turned to see that they had been attempting to flank him.

Too bad for them, Androkles’ killing intent wasn’t something to be flanked. They had made it admirably close, though. Close enough to get past where most men fall frothing. Close enough to become torches against the restless darkness.

His killing intent slipped away from him before he was ready to let it go. It had been doing that lately, as if his weary mind was losing its grip on whatever part of himself that power came from. It had yet to fail him, though. Ever since Wolfscar removed the miasma that blocked its flow, it had been far stronger and hotter, but he was nervous to release too much at once lest he lose control of it in his exhaustion. Gods only knew what might happen then.

But for now, things were resolved. Those strangler creatures weren’t fleeing toward the campfire. Let them burn and let everything else in this gods-forsaken mountain meadow watch them die. Let it take a while. Good riddance.

He hobbled back to the campfire and sat back down. He hated sleeping sitting up; it left him sore and unrested. Only getting a few uneven hours at it didn’t help either, but there was nothing for it. All it’d take was being a few seconds too slow getting up, and some monster would snap Garbi’s neck, or drag Flower off, or stab Agurne in the back.

“I hate that smell,” muttered Garbi. It was not a complaint so much as a condemnation of him for causing it.

“Me too,” said Flower. “This is dumb. We shouldn’t have come here.”

Androkles kept his mouth shut, too tired to even think of a response to that that wouldn’t get him in trouble. He met Agurne’s eyes instead, and she raised her eyebrows slightly as if to say, ‘By the fornicating gods, Androkles, I have had it up to here with these ornery brats!’

A faint smile curved his lips. ‘Me too,’ he silently nodded. ‘Let’s use them as bait.’

“What are you smiling about?” said Garbi crossly.

Androkles said, “Nothing. Go to sleep.”

“No, why were you smiling?” insisted Garbi angrily. She was mad about something, but Androkles doubted she knew what it was.

“Papa can smile if he wants!” snapped Flower.

“Mind your own business!” snapped Garbi back.

They were both lucky they weren’t in arm’s reach, because he had a mind to club the both of them into silence.

“Hush, my darlings,” said Agurne, her voice gentle and motherly despite clearly being ready to strangle them. “We don’t need to fight each other, do we? Too many other things to fight instead.”

“I’m not fighting,” insisted Garbi.

“Yes you are! You’re speaking mean to Papa and he didn’t even do anything. You’re being mean to everybody!” said Flower.

“I am not! Stop being stupid!”

“Children,” interrupted Agurne. She spoke as quiet as the grave. “If you don’t stop this very instant, I am going to flip a coin and decide which one of you we leave behind. I will not have any more fighting. Do you understand?”

“No, you won’t,” said both children at almost the same time.

Agurne almost started strangling them. Androkles could see the strain in her face as she resisted the urge.

“Stop copying me,” said Garbi.

“No more talking. Go to sleep,” said Androkles.

“She copied me,” muttered Flower.

“No, I didn’t,” said Garbi.

Thank the gods, that was the last of it. They fell back into a restless, uneasy quiet, both too tired to sleep, and scowled toward the southern sky.

Garbi fidgeted angrily, unable to make herself comfortable in the exact spot she’d been happy with all this time. Androkles watched her temper rising, much like a pot steamed as it got ready to boil. Before she blew up, though, Poppy the thrice-cursed Stag sauntered over and nuzzled her face like a dog might. The poor girl’s mood quickly shifted, and a moment later, she took Poppy’s enormous head in her hands and nuzzled him back. Twice, Agurne had to lean out of the way of the antler spikes, but it was a small price to pay.

Androkles caught himself jerking back awake after nodding too far. He hadn’t even realized he was falling asleep. He resolved to watch for danger just a bit longer. A few heartbeats later, he found himself jerking back awake with a startled snort yet again.

Flower was staring at him. The boy was planning something. His little mind was working, his shiny yellow eyes glinting with new life in the dim firelight. The moonlight caught in his snow-white hair and his ears almost looked like they were glowing. Or… something about his posture didn’t look right. He was… this was probably bad.

Androkles began to speak, to ask, but Flower opened his mouth.

The next thing Androkles knew, the sun was shining against his eyelids. Waking was an instant event, not a process, as panic dropped him back into wakefulness with a startled thud. He had been laying down, he realized. He sat up quicker than his ribs preferred and looked around.

The sky was bright. All was silent. Flower was sitting up, but only barely. He’d wrapped a blanket around himself and was leaning forward, ready to collapse. Agurne and Garbi were cuddled into one indistinct lump. Poppy and Ashe both slept as well, right where they’d been before.

By the gods, the boy had sung. Where he found the energy, Androkles had no idea, but he’d been singing the song of sleep, and passed the entire night somehow.

“Do you feel better, Papa?” Flower whispered, unable to speak any longer.

“Much.”

“Good.” And with that, he collapsed.

Androkles stepped carefully over to him, but thank the gods, his son was still alive. Just sleeping. His frail, skinny little body had given its last measure of energy and then some, and he was simply done.

Only then did Androkles begin to take note of the dark shapes all around them. The closest was a mere five paces away, a mound of hairy flesh the size of a horse. But there were more. Dozens more. Silent creatures of every color and shape imaginable ringed in their little campsite in ranks ten bodies deep.

All asleep. Flower had put them all to sleep. Androkles’ dawning sense of wonder quickly vanished when he heard the first of them grunt restlessly. So much for a slow morning after a good night’s sleep.

Ashe and Poppy stirred and rose silently. The wolf and stag both gave a wary eye to the creatures surrounding them and made not a sound, and for once, Poppy had no condescending side-eyed snorts for him. All its attention was on the swarm of monsters. At least the cursed beast was smart enough to know when it was being hunted, he supposed.

Ashe crept over to nose at Garbi and wake her up, so Androkles hurriedly stepped in, dug her face out of the blankets, and clapped his hand over her mouth. She fought for a moment with startling ferocity, but once she opened her eyes enough to see it was him, she quieted down.

He moved to give Agurne the same treatment, but Garbi pushed his hand away and scowled at him. Then she leaned in and quietly whispered in Agurne’s ear. The woman woke without even a yawn and sat up carefully to avoid making any noise.

She peered around, then pointed down at Flower, one eyebrow arched in question.

He nodded.

Agurne looked around again and mouthed a word. It took him four times before he realized what she was saying: “Horse?”

He hadn’t noticed it was gone. Where was the stupid thing? He couldn’t see it anywhere. How could it have been carried away when everything was asleep? He stood again to get a better look, even stepping a pace or two in this direction or that to improve the angle.

He was truly starting to worry by the time he finally spotted it, off about twenty paces amongst ten other silver-furred beasts of some kind. He only spotted it because its dark brown coat stood out against the others. With them all clumped together like that, those silvery things had been in the process of dragging it off when Flower’s song finally overtook them. How they got that far, he wasn’t eager to find out.

He pointed and the women looked. Garbi seemed mostly confused, but Agurne scowled. She must be thinking the same thing he was—how do they get it out without waking up the others?

The women rose very, very quietly and began rolling up the blankets. All around them, nothing but early morning stillness and frosty air. Not a sound, not even morning birds.

Now what? Agurne could make a shield, but it did nothing against any sort of actual attack. She could protect the children and provisions against his anger, but if he got too far away and the monsters got in, that would be the end of them. Twenty paces was probably too far. Something would get to them.

Androkles looked over again and considered his chances of getting the horse back. They were likely slim. He’d have to stab all those silver-furred things, killing them silently one by one, then wake up the horse and lead it back over without disturbing anything. One sound during any part of that and things would get bad.

No, they would have to leave it behind and sneak away now, as quick as they could before everything started waking up. Flower would have to be carried, of course. He wasn’t going to be walking, and he’d fall off the stag and break his neck, or maybe wake up from his sleep and be miserable. Androkles wasn’t sure which outcome was worse.

All the weariness that had been building up for months was gone now, and he felt better than he had since… since he couldn’t remember when. He felt like he’d slept in a bed, not on rocky dirt. Only the injured parts of him were sore, and that was rare for a man his age sleeping as rough as he had been. He was fully rejuvenated, mind, body, and spirit.

And yet here he was, having to leave behind even more provisions they desperately needed—the horse’s bags still had most of their food. What else could he do? What he needed right now was an army, one full of foolhardy young men with something to prove, and preferably drunk. Or perhaps a thousand fairies to carry him in a giant basket.

He was ready for it to be over, all over. All of it. He was ready to be home and eating fish and taking the boys to the Gymnasium and the Baths. He was ready to invite all the notable men of Dikaia to a midday feast, and then he’d bring out Garbi to introduce herself and make them all burn with jealousy at not having such a daughter themselves. He wanted to see how long it would take before every other woman in town bowed when Agurne walked past, too.

But none of those things were up here in this frigid mountain valley. All he had right now were hundreds of twisted monstrosities and more things to carry than he could fit in his arms.

Arkoleos always hated travel. The man once sacrificed a goat to all the gods together and asked them to make the next war happen at the gates of Dikaia so he wouldn’t have to march anywhere. If he were here now, he’d say…

Androkles paused. He was having trouble picturing the man unless he really thought about it. He’d never had that problem before; any time one of his dead friends came to mind, they came so strongly his heart ached in mourning and he could scarcely shake their voice from his ears or their faces from his mental vision. He’d always felt like in some way they called for him from their graves and never let him move on. But now, the man was a memory like any other. A fond one, with his long red beard and fierce eyebrows that hid his compassionate heart. A man never to be forgotten. But just a memory now, nonetheless.

His hand reached up and paused over his heart, where the dark mass of miasma had rested for years before Wolfscar popped it. All this time, Androkles had been gathering it and stuffing it away without realizing, gathering the death and poison of a hundred battlefields, countless thousands of deaths… Now, there was nothing there but lightness. The energy of his killing intent flowed gently throughout his entire body, no longer dammed up.

Well, there was no time to dwell on that now. He had many years of leisure ahead of him, and he could ponder on it then.

Agurne and Garbi were watching him silently, the blankets all rolled up and ready to go. He pointed at the horse and shook his head. No, we will have to leave it here.

The tough little woman frowned, then looked away. She knew well what that meant, how bad things were continuing to get. Winter was the wrong time to have to choose between tools, bedding, and food, but that was what the useless lump of a god Diorthodon Path-clearer had seen fit to send them.

He gave his spear to Garbi to carry, then gently lifted the sleeping Flower with one flayed arm and took up the heavy sack of money with the other. His ribs screamed in pain, sending waves of sharp agony from his eyebrows to his toes, but he paid it no mind. There was nothing to be done.

Agurne handed Garbi the biggest blanket, then took the other herself. She collected some flatbread, a bit of ground barley, and the sparker into a sack, then stuck the knife in her belt. She looked at him with red, watery eyes and nodded. He had never cared for horses, since they had a habit of dying any time he tried to ride one, but she did, poor woman.

Androkles walked in front, heading southward. He stepped slowly and carefully across the treacherous ground, trying to make as little sound as possible in the snow and not slip on the wet rocks beneath it. He kept his steps close together so the women would have no trouble using his footprints and keep their shoes a little dryer.

He had to wind carefully around sleeping clumps of monsters and beasts, slowly and quietly. He did not relish the smell; each cluster was different and none of them pleasant. One group of canines with ears like rabbits smelled of feces, and a group of hairless humanoids smelled like mine slaves. Those were particularly wretched—they had no heads, lay on their stomachs in the snow to sleep, and had red, weeping sores under their armpits.

It occurred to him that a couple more nights of this, and he’d have to start picking which ones he was going to eat.

The rest of the morning was cold and silent. The only sound was his footsteps crunching through the snow. Warm sunlight arrived a bit earlier up here than down in the mountains’ shadows, but the air was colder. Androkles led them southward across the high meadow and then below a bare rockslide toward a pass between lopsided peaks. It was only a couple miles, all in all, but the going was slow and getting slower. Carrying Flower had seemed like a good idea at the time, but the boy was getting awfully heavy. He’d hardly stirred; he was such an inert lump that Androkles had checked twice to make sure he was still breathing.

Despite that, Androkles walked with his head high. Proud and bold, in good spirits like a proper soldier. So what if death was close? He’d faced that a hundred times already. So what if his family all died? He’d done all he could. So what if each step sent a shock of white pain from his ribs to his knees and eyebrows? There was nothing he could do about that now. It was only pain. No, he would march like a man from now on, and that was that. He stopped short of singing, though. No reason to take unnecessary risks.

The pass was long and narrow, perhaps another mile, but it broke into a long descent down the mountainside into an immense valley of mixed woods and farmland below.

And there, spread out as numerous as dropped grains in a miller’s courtyard, the King’s armies had gathered. They arrayed themselves brightly, armor and weapons shining in the late morning sun. Their number spread broadly, stretched out across miles of terrain in narrow strips with clumped bunches that reminded him of fruits on a long vine.

He tried to estimate them, but the number quickly eclipsed fifty thousand. An impossibly large army. There were only a handful of nations he knew of who could field an army so large, to say nothing of on such short notice. How long ago had he escaped the King’s court? Two weeks? Three?

And despite the distance between him and the closest fighters, they looked like they were armed. Most had horses, which meant this was just the King’s cavalry, and just the ones close enough to answer his call and make it here on time. How many footmen could he get together if he wanted? How had he even gotten the word around? That strange whistling was the only answer Androkles could think of. He should learn the trick of that someday.

Nothing about his time as the King’s slave had given him any impression the man was this powerful. His war camp was mostly just busy with chores, the tending of the King’s horses, preparations for constant feasts, and so on. But what did Androkles know of barbarian courts? Maybe they were all like that. For all he knew, each of the king’s countless stream of guests headed a force of five hundred men.

One thing was sure, though. If Great King Lugubelenus decided to gather all his hosts, assembled as they must be from so many defeated weaker kings, it was likely a force that could stress even the invincible armies of the Glories. Perhaps even overrun them simply by weight of numbers. And worse, no one would expect it. Very few Laophileans believed there was much up north of note, despite tales of this barbarian or that showing up and performing a feat of strength or giving a good fight. The odd border skirmish when one side or the other tried to steal a bit more farmland, but nothing important. There was some trade; gold and textiles, mostly. And demon berserkers. A precious commodity the Great King alone controlled. No wonder he was rich and powerful.

“Mari’s teats, Androkles, that’s a lot of soldiers,” said Agurne as she breathlessly caught up to him.

“Well, I’m going to try to avoid fighting them all at once. Do you think we can get them to line up for me?”

“Papa?” muttered Flower, finally stirring. Barely.

“Go back to sleep, boy.”

“Okay.” He stopped moving.

Androkles grinned at Agurne, but she fretted and knotted her eyebrows and didn’t look back at him.

“What are we going to do?” she asked plainly.

“Eat some late breakfast, I suppose.”

“No, what are we going to do about the army, you half-donkey whoreson?” she yelled.

“Which half do you suppose is the donkey?” he asked her in a low and sultry voice.

“Androkles.” Agurne was not amused. At least, she wasn’t letting on if she was.

“Papa,” said Garbi, matching Agurne’s tone. She scowled at him over the big sack of his money, which she had in her lap and both arms around. Her mount, may the gods smite the tick-ridden animal, gave him the same look, but side-eyed and more condescending.

He sighed and looked back down across the long valley. The foothills on his side of it were pleasant terrain, only soft hills and very little in the way of jagged rocks and narrow passes. But on the other side, across perhaps ten miles of flat farmland, another range of smaller mountains rose, rocky and sharp. A road looked to have been cut out of a canyon, creating as narrow a pass as he was likely to find anywhere.

Beyond that smaller mountain range, the land stretched for countless forested miles, mostly hills. Somewhere in that vast and trackless wilderness was Pepper and the demons who kept him captive, and far beyond that, lost to sight in the low purple haze, rose the mountains of the Glories.

“Oh, Papa, what are those footprints?” asked Garbi, pointing at a series of small cavities in the valley floor that made the illusion of a trail, crossing all the way from one end to the other.

“They’re not footprints. Nothing could leave footprints that big. They might be water troughs or something. They only look like footprints.”

“What if they are? What if it comes back? Look, Papa, they even go up over the mountains there.”

“They’re not footprints.”

“What if they are?”

He sighed. Poor thing. There was a whole army down there waiting to kill them, and she was worried about a bunch of holes in the ground. “Garbi, dear girl, those can’t be footprints. If they were, the thing that made them would have to be as big as that image Wolfscar made of me the other day. Remember that? What would something that big eat? Where would it sleep? Why don’t we see them all over the place? It can’t exactly hide, can it? There are no giants that big, or we would know about them already.”

Agurne fidgeted impatiently, but she said, “That’s too bad, because I bet Garbi could talk it into carrying us.”

Androkles looked at her. Even ornery, she was still charming. “I don’t doubt it,” he said. After another moment of thought, he added, “If it could hear her down on the ground from all the way up there.”

“She’d crook her finger and it’d kneel to listen.”

He snorted in amusement. But Agurne looked like she was just about done with humoring him, so he said, “All right, here’s how I see it. Wolfscar said the monsters are after us because the King bewitched them, so they must be reporting back about where we’re headed. He’s got the army all spread out down there because he knows we’re going to try and cross here.

“Now, do you see down across the way there, that little mountain pass with the road? If we can get there, it won’t matter as much how many men the King brought with him because they’ll only be able to come after us a few at a time. He’s going to try and stop us before we get there. They’ll probably have the whole line lit up with lamps all night, and more men awake than asleep.

“As soon as one of them spots us, they’ll send word and the line will collapse on us. They don’t have to worry about formations or strategy or anything like that because I’m not an army. As long as they get me surrounded, they’ll probably get me down eventually. At this point, it doesn’t look like the King cares how many men it takes. He wants my money and my blood and that’s just how it is.”

“So how do we get through?” asked Agurne.

“I don’t know,” he said honestly.

“Well, you’d better hurry up and figure it out, Androkles.”

“I’m thinking. For one, we might have to split up. Maybe I’ll just draw their attention and you can sneak past somewhere else. But I’m not sure if that will work because they’ll all be headed toward me, and riding across anywhere you might try to cross. But if we all go together and there’s a fight, there’ll be no running away from it. You can’t keep a shield up while fleeing and I’d rather not have to try and poke them all one by one with my spear. And if we cross at night, they’ll probably see us anyway. You can see they’re all in clear, open areas. All that will be lit up tonight and the King’s little pets might be back by then. I’m surprised they’re not here already.”

“Even if those nasty things start showing back up, you can handle it like before.”

“Until one of them yells loud enough for a single soldier to hear, anywhere along that line. Like I said, I’m thinking.”

“Papa, we could wait until Flower wakes up and he could sing to make them go to sleep,” said Garbi.

“I thought of that. But you know what the problem is? Flower did that once already. That’s how we got out of the Great Hall with all our parts still attached. If I was King Lugubelenus, I’d make sure every man down there had wax earplugs and a javelin ready for the appearance of any white-haired Skythander kits.”

“Can you do that? You can just plug your ears?” asked Garbi.

“I don’t know, but this is the wrong place to put it to the test.”

Garbi thought about that for a moment, her little mind working hard to unknot the family’s predicament. Her gaze wandered here and there, but suddenly her face lit up as her fixed on something behind him. “Oh!” she whispered.

“What?”

“Oh, I, I just thought I saw something. Would it help if Wolfscar was here?” She was trying to be coy and hold it in, but her mood had lifted so much her wheat-golden hair was about to start sparking.

“Why, do you see him?”

“No, I just thought I saw… something that reminded me of him. But it was far away, past those mountains.” The little girl pointed southward and Agurne and Androkles turned to see if they could catch a glimpse of anything.

There was nothing unusual, at least not yet. No playful star zipping through the treetops. Androkles said, “Another thought I had was that maybe I should just leave you here and go down there myself. See if I can kill enough of them to put an end to it. The problem with that, is that the King will have all his demons with him. Somewhere around twenty. I don’t want to fight them all at once out in the open. And not with him mixed in among them—his witchcraft turned away my anger and he’s no poor fighter. We’re going to—By the gods, there he is! Look, right there!”

Androkles pointed at the dancing light, barely visible in the bright late-morning sun, that was just now heading down into the long valley from the far mountains. Wolfscar flew low and fast, where he’d be less likely to be seen by the whole army at once. Whether that was deliberate, the gods only knew.

The fairy crossed the line at such a speed the soldiers didn’t react any more than just to be startled and scratch their heads, wondering what just happened. But after that, Wolfscar didn’t know where to go, and he turned this way and that as he darted from patch of bushes to clump of boulders and back again.

Agurne ran out into the open where she’d be easier to find. Garbi’s stag carried her closely after, and Androkles made his way as well. He couldn’t move as fast, though, for several reasons, and by the time he got there, he found the Wolfscar had turned already and was heading back where he had come from.

“Where’s he going?” asked Garbi, her excitement draining out of her like wine from a dropped pot.

Agurne said, “He must have seen us. He was right over there when he turned back.”

“Well, did he see you or not?” said Androkles.

After a moment’s reflection, Agurne nodded and said, “Yes, he did. I’m sure of it. He’s probably going to get Pepper now that he knows where to lead him.”

“Then I suppose the first step of our bold plan to escape the army is to sit here and wait until he comes back. I’ll let you know what the next steps are when I think of any.”

Agurne said, “Well, may as well stop standing out like a pimple and move somewhere less obvious.”

The place she pointed out was as good a spot as any and would give them an acceptable view of the valley below while they waited. And waiting was welcome, because Flower was getting heavier and Androkles was ready to put him down.

Garbi bade her stag sit down, and she sat and leaned against its belly while it kept an alert eye on the surroundings, and on Androkles in particular. He hated it more by the day. Each time he glanced over at it, it had an eye on him like he was the thing to be wary of. Stupid beast. And Garbi was just petting it and scratching under its chin like it was a cat. Ashe the Wolf crept in and sat down over her legs and demanded its own affection, and that kept both the poor girl’s hands busy for a while. Sitting in between the two big animals made her look tiny in comparison. Or maybe he was finally seeing her in proper perspective, sweet little thing she was. She was nearly lost in all the fur, just her tiny little head and shoulders poking out.

Agurne gently pulled Flower from Androkles’ back and draped him across her chest, resting his chin on her shoulder. She sat where she could lean back against the curve of an old, gnarled tree. The boy barely reacted. Androkles had seen dead men with more life in them.

He considered sitting down, but then he’d just have to get back up again and his ribs still hurt. He prodded them again, and it stung enough to make his eyes water. The cold air didn’t help. But as far as he could tell, they were intact in there. Just cracked, not shattered. He needed to stop worrying. There wasn’t anything he could do about it, except maybe go down there and kill a couple Allobrogians for their cloth so he could bind his chest properly.

“I hope Wolfscar isn’t just leading Pepper across fifty miles of rough forest and snow to come to us,” said Androkles.

“Now there’s a thought, Androkles. Thank you for sharing your good humor with us. I didn’t have enough to worry about before,” said Agurne. She huffed to herself and scowled at the ground, but something about it told him she wasn’t as upset as she was letting on. Just worried, probably. The good night’s sleep must have done it—she must have been too tired to be very worried before.

“I’m sure Wolfscar knows where to find enough dead bugs to keep him alive,” said Androkles, unable to keep his soldier’s humor to himself.

Agurne chose to let it slide, rather than complain and encourage him to keep going. The silence stretched out as they relaxed, but it wasn’t long before Androkles was pacing and Garbi started looking impatient. Which was too bad, because until the animals chose to let her up, she wasn’t going anywhere. Even Agurne kept shifting her weight and changing what she was doing. She adjusted the bags on her belt, then went back to gently stroking her fingers along Flower’s back, then tried to press wild strands of her hair back into place.

Rest was doing them no good because no one was tired. They’d all had the best sleep in their lives and the day was young. Sitting around doing nothing was intolerable and all three of them felt it. Androkles had half a mind to try and wake up Flower, just to be a pest.

Scarcely ten long minutes later, the army started moving. Still two or three miles away at the closest, he couldn’t hear a peep out of them, but he could watch up and down the miles of the army’s length as the soldiers came together from their line and formed into clumps. It took him but a moment to realize why—the King had found him already. Somehow.

“Get up,” he said. “Get up!”

Dread stole his breath, chilling his skin and making his fingers tremble despite his resolve. He tried to swallow it away, but he found it wouldn’t leave. It was like that moment of finality in a dream about falling—that moment when his fingers slip and the branch is out of reach. That instant where the fall becomes certain and unavoidable and he was helpless. Or a dream of falling off a trireme in his armor, in the moment where he realizes the heavy bronze armor was dragging him to the bottom of the sea no matter how he struggled.

The King’s armies were gathering to collapse around him, circle him in and destroy him at all costs. The ones directly south of him were content to gather and wait. They were slowly reinforced in columns two deep, then three, then four. Thousands and thousands of men directly in his path. He watched as the ends of the line at either distant end formed into groups and rode northward, toward the mountains he had just come from. It would take them ages to reach him, an hour or more.

Garbi was the first to her feet and she hopped back onto her stag, which stood and tapped its hooves in readiness. Androkles lifted the heavy sack of money back into her lap, choosing not to say anything rather than too much. Agurne was having difficulty extricating herself from her comfortable reclining position without tossing Flower to the side, so Androkles took her hand and helped lift them both.

Agurne acted like she thought she’d just keep on carrying him, but although he was half her weight, he matched her height and that was ridiculous.

“Garbi, untie a couple of these bandages. Hurry. Two of them. No, don’t argue. Just do it,” he said holding out his left arm. With growing trepidation and shaky fingers, she reached out and undid the two bandages farthest down his arm, exposing pale, cold skin and the nest of stitches keeping it together.

Androkles took the bandages and handed her his spear. He stepped around Agurne and bound Flower’s hands, then knelt and bound his feet.

“You can’t be serious, ogre. You’re tying him up?” said Agurne. There was misery in her voice. He was breaking her heart. Oh, gods, what she must think he was doing…

Hastily he replied, “No, no, I’m doing this so he doesn’t fall off the wolf. Not for any other reason. I would never.” He gently pried Flower off her and set him down on the wolf, stomach first, and bent the boy’s knees to bring his feet in. They rested just above the wolf’s tail and Flower seemed somewhat stable. He stepped back. “Garbi, tell Ashe to be careful with him. Got it? He can’t fall.”

“I think she understands, Papa,” said Garbi. She showed no particular signs of concern.

Ashe looked up at him for a brief moment, fixing her bold yellow eyes on his. No understanding passed between them. All he saw was an animal. Then she looked away and squirmed a bit, then shook, and Flower rested a bit easier across her back.

Androkles stepped over and kissed Garbi on the forehead, then once more for good measure. Then he stepped over and put his arms around Agurne and hugged her gently. For a tiny moment, she had thought he was going to do away with Flower, and it had wounded her. He could feel it in the weakness of her arms. He felt sick about it.

The moment passed and she stepped away. Androkles said, “Since they started bunching up like that there’s a tiny chance we can slip through before the net closes on us. Wolfscar and Pepper will have to figure something else out, but I doubt they got very far yet. Keep together and stay low. Stay out of view. Got it? We’re going south-east. Let the bastards chase us. Let’s go.”

Androkles led the way this time and challenged the others to keep up. Garbi had no trouble on her stag, of course, and Ashe kept up just fine despite her burden. Flower being so inert probably helped with carrying him. Agurne walked in back and moved about as fast as Androkles figured her short legs would carry her. He kept glancing back to check on her. Each time, their eyes awkwardly met, and after about a half mile she said, “Would you stop? You are not an owl. You’ll hurt your neck, you stupid fool.”

She was fine, then. He gave all his attention to the path ahead. After only two miles to the southwest, they had left the mountainside and entered the trees that ran along the valley length. Mostly pines in this area, scraggly and see-through with long, floppy needles, but there were enough of them that he could only guess where the soldiers might be.

They came to a small opening, a patch of blacker soil that nothing wanted to grow on. He motioned for everyone to stop, then listened and peered around for any signs of the King’s warbands. He heard nothing, but that didn’t mean much. A shout wouldn’t travel far over terrain like this.

If only Wolfscar were here, this would be a lot simpler. That gods-blighted little flying rat had picked the worst time to make himself scarce. Without being able to fly up there himself, Androkles was left to make his best guess as to where the enemies were.

They were on horses. All on horseback. So that was something. As they closed in, they’d naturally avoid anywhere it was hard to get a horse to go, or anywhere they’d get bogged down and break formation. They would have to send in a man or two to check for him in any thick growth, but the warband would ride where it was easiest.

He’d just have to keep an eye out for where he’d want to go if he was a warband, and not go there. Simple.

“Keep quiet,” said Androkles, motioning to start moving again. He walked at a pace that was almost a jog, fast enough to cover good ground and slow enough to step quietly and listen as they went. The animals were shockingly silent this time, both the prey and predator well suited for the Games of the hunt. He had to check several times to make sure they were still there. He did not have to check on Agurne. She stepped quietly, but she also breathed as heavy as the fattest runner in the Games.

They crossed a quarter mile, then another; Androkles gave every attention to reading the lay of the land, where it dipped and rose, or where plants grew thicker or thinner. Snow or bare ground. Anything to indicate where a warband might come riding up. The land here was terrible, however. Sandy dirt, rough trees, patches of clay mud that sucked at his shoes.

Once out of the clay mud, the ground switch to soft loam and taller pines, with only rare bits of snow or deep mud. And up ahead, he thought he saw a trail.

Another thirty or so paces, just far enough to get a better view of the trail, he and one of the King’s men spotted each other at the same time.

Right behind him was an entire warband, well over a hundred men on horse and riding to kill. A shout went up among them and they kicked their horses into a charge.

Androkles had only seconds to warn his family, but Agurne was ready. She darted forward and grabbed Garbi’s stag by a horn and pulled to lead it back the other direction. Garbi never lost her balance; she may as well have been sitting on a chair in a stone palace. Ashe the Wolf, ever wary, turned and followed, carrying the still-sleeping Flower right behind Agurne.

Fifty paces away. Forty. Androkles dropped everything but the spear and took a couple steps forward. Twenty. Ten.

Androkles screamed for blood and charged forward into the oncoming cavalry, spear held high. He leaped for a stab.

He hit the lead man in the throat with a lucky shot, then crashed into the side of the man’s horse with a heavy thud, almost losing his balance. Androkles got his feet back under him, braced his back against the dead man’s horse, and kicked the torso of the next animal to open some space.

A javelin whistled past his neck, then another past his stomach. Androkles turned his spear and let the tip ride up the nearest soldier’s leg and deep into his groin. It penetrated and caught bone, pushing him from the saddle. The soldier gave an awful scream and fell beneath the hooves of another horse. His scream turned to a death moan.

Five fighters surrounded Androkles, but they hesitated with sudden shock that he was actually fighting them and had killed two so quickly. They had not expected serious resistance. He could see it in the wideness of their eyes through their helmets. But the incoming press forced them to courage and they raised their swords.

Then there were a dozen fighters, and a heartbeat later, too many to count. Only their poor discipline slowed their swords—they didn’t leave each other enough room to swing properly. Soon it wouldn’t matter, though. He couldn’t move much either.

Androkles held out as long as he could, unable to see Agurne and the rest but offering a silent, wordless prayer to the gods for their safe escape. Just far enough. They just had to get far enough.

The first cut came from behind, a glancing slit along his back shoulder. The second came right after, a javelin bouncing off the bone of his shin.

He parried a swing at his neck, then pulled the man from his horse with one arm and tossed him under the legs of another. He ducked just in time to avoid a second swipe, and a third. He blocked the fourth with his spear, then got kicked in the back of the neck just hard enough to whip his head back.

They were too many. Men with winged helmets and riding spears, others with thick leathers and long swords, still others with a ready javelin, all trying to outmaneuver their neighbor to get an opening. And all on horses. Androkles was not used to fighting at an equal height.

He got kicked again, a hard push on the forearm to knock his spear away. A man on his other side swung a sword into the opening. Androkles grabbed low on the blade, near the hilt, stopping the iron only inches from his teeth.

There was no more time. If Agurne didn’t have a shield up yet, then there was nothing more he could do about it. Androkles stood straight, lowered his eyes to a scowl, and released his killing intent.

The swell of fury burst from him and crashed against the soldiers like a volcanic shockwave. The air rippled and tore. Cloth and hair began dancing and singeing as if caught by winds of flame.

It was more of his killing intent than he’d expected. More than he’d used since Wolfscar had released the miasma, certainly. With so much radiating out, and so cleanly, his mind could follow it. It seemed a part of him, an extension of his awareness beyond his body. He could almost feel the shape of everything around him, the squirming flesh of his enemies, the complaining ground beneath him drying and cracking.

The nearest horses stopped in their tracks and most simply toppled over dead. He had to step quickly to avoid being bowled over. Every man within five paces of him died or fell unconscious immediately. Ten paces out, they gasped and shook, collapsed and convulsed. Horses lost their wits and some fell; others tried to flee. The sound of cracking bones punctuated the air.

The warband did not relent. There were too many riding too fast to stop. Their approach pressed into his killing intent as clearly as a hand pressing on his flesh. His awareness of them increased the closer they got until it seemed to him that he could caress their very lives with mental fingers. He felt how his anger pushed on them, made them suffer and die.

He briefly turned his attention to the ones who had fallen and lived. He could sense the life in them, like a cluster of force that could only resist the fire for so long. One winked out, vanishing like a child’s sand sculpture caught in a wave. Then another. Whatever force it was that fought for survival dissipated beneath the unrelenting fire of his anger.

By now the farther men had begun to slow, and the rest seemed to have noticed something had gone wrong. They could probably taste it on the air. Perhaps for quite a distance, if Wolfscar was to be believed about it.

Glancing around, he estimated that more than twenty men were now dead or incapacitated, a sizable chunk of their number.

Androkles spared a quick peek behind him. Agurne had the shield up, thank the gods, and the beasts and children were inside it. To his new awareness, her shield felt like slippery and ephemeral, impossible to grasp.

She had a dripping red cut on her temple, a dead Allobrogian at her feet, and a knife in her hands, a small one. How she’d killed a man with it, he had no idea. Garbi wasn’t hurt, and it looked like Flower was still asleep.

Satisfied, he turned back around just in time for the haft of the javelin to slam against the top of his forehead and bounce away.

Androkles saw a flash of white and his eyes briefly lost their focus. The dull, thudding pain of the skull-crack hammered through his head as his awareness flickered. His killing intent snuffed out like a lamp under a thumb.

The second javelin missed his flesh but caught him in the pants-leg and got stuck in the hole it made in the cloth. The third and fourth missed when he hunched down to pull the second free. He stood and leaned to the side to dodge the fifth and nearly got skewered when his chest spasmed from the pressure on his broken ribs. The pain was enough to leave him gasping. Too much to easily ignore.

The soldiers had ceased their charge and began to spread out in a half-circle around him, at a distance they must have thought would be safe. Of course they’d been given proper tactics to fight him. Lovely. They must not have believed their orders at first or they might never have charged him.

Androkles didn’t wait. He had only a moment to break up that formation. Turning to charge at one of the corners of the half-circle, he raised his spear overhead and shouted. Expecting a hail of javelins, he kept his feet light to jump aside or tumble, but the riders instead tried to back their horses up and just collided with their neighbors. Some raised their swords against his approach and others readied javelins, but he reached them before they could throw any.

His mind now clear again, he released his killing intent, unstoppering it to let it roar out from his skin and engulf the nearest men and beasts.

He had no need of the spear. The impact on them was immediate. A handful died. Another handful fell and convulsed. The farther ones went pale and trembled.

Androkles turned to charge across the open ground at the middle of the circle, which had turned and readjusted. No less than thirty men raised javelins, their hands shaking as they prepared to throw.

He gathered and released even more of his anger. The air rippled. It trembled, all of it together, as if it feared him. The ground shied away from his feet. Snow and water burst into steam and dry leaves went up instantly in puffs of smoke.

Only one man threw his javelin. Androkles had a mere instant to react and nearly failed to move when he discovered he could sense the thing flying through the air. His reflexes instinctively drew his full attention to it and before he realized what was happening, the broad field of his anger collapsed suddenly down on the javelin like a hand clap.

It exploded into smoke and iron dust. The sound slapped his skin and made his ears ring. Fifty horses panicked and tried to throw their riders. The frantic horsemen tried to sooth them, but a dozen were thrown and a dozen more were carried off by their fleeing beasts. The warband fell into chaos and filled the air with the cacophony of their cries.

Androkles did not wait to watch them regroup. He charged, exultant, feeling their lives wink out one by one. The ones far enough away to keep their wits turned their horses to flee at full gallop.

All except three. They rode into his killing intent like triremes splitting the ocean and were nearly upon him before he even realized the danger.

Two rode to either side of him, aiming their swords at his neck. Androkles deflected both swings up over his head with the spear.

The third rider’s horse slammed into him, knocking him back head over heels. Androkles rolled with it and up onto his feet again, but the horse was faster. It had already reared up and was striking down at him with its hooves.

He took hoof strikes on the shoulder and arm, which hurt less than he expected except where it tore the stitches out beneath his bandages. The soldier tried to split his skull with the edge of his little roundshield but Androkles stepped back just in time.

He heard a raspy whisper and noticed the severed heads, two of them hanging from ropes laid over the saddle. Their mouths hung open, faces dried and hard, eyes sunken and empty, hair black with oil and rot. And yet they twitched, and he could swear they were whispering.

The other two riders circled back around for another pass at him. They had severed heads as well, two or three each hanging from ropes tied across their saddles. Much farther back, the several dozen remaining fighters had begun regrouping to watch. No heads there.

Androkles scowled at himself. He should’ve seen this coming. Did he think only the King and Prince had sorcery to protect themselves in battle? Ridiculous. He was lucky these men had chosen to wait their turn instead of charging him in the first rush. They may very well have hacked him apart before he realized what had happened.

So now what? Try to yank the heads away? Stab them and kill them twice?

One thing was clear now, however. He was not going to fight this army by himself and win, no matter where or how. He still had much better odds in the pass than anywhere else, but if the King could simply send a hundred men protected by sorcery, or fifty, or even ten, then it wouldn’t matter where he fought them. He’d lose.

The two riders raised their swords again, this time point first to stab instead of cut. They rode down on him with expert precision. He idly noticed one of them was left-handed. He raised the spear and readied himself.

The men stabbed forward, aiming directly for his heart. At the last instant, he left the spear standing on its butt, ducked down beneath their stabs, and grabbed their ankles with either hand.

Their forward momentum almost dislocated both his shoulders, but he held firm. The muscles along his chest and arms hardened to steel and the pressure on his ribs caused a flair of pain so sharp it got a whimper out of him.

The two men were ripped from their saddles and came crashing down beside him. It became a mad tangle as the three of them struggled to get away from the rest without exposing themselves to a blade. One man lost his helmet but pulled a knife and nearly got Androkles’ eye. The other thrashed and kicked to free himself and slipped away.

Androkles rolled onto the man with the knife and smashed his forehead into the man’s nose. It connected, but it did very little harm. It felt like bouncing off an inflated bladder. The man was still protected by sorcery.

He ripped the knife out of the man’s grip and tossed it. Then he grabbed a handful of dirt and shoved it into the man’s eyes, pressing and rubbing it in. Let the blighted heads protect him from that!

The other man picked up a long sword.

Androkles rolled off the enemy and jumped to his feet just in time to intercept the first swing. There’d be no ducking or dodging at this range so he closed the distance instead, stopping the strike by catching the man’s front elbow. He reached in and grabbed one of the helmet’s wings and yanked it away to discover he was fighting a man his own age, face twisted in a snarl of threatening fear.

In a sudden burst of rage, he grabbed the man’s head with both hands and spun away, using his momentum to lift the man from his feet and fling him in the air. Androkles spun and yanked and snapped the man’s neck like he was ringing a chicken, then threw the still-jerking body at his companion. Let the heads protect them from that!

The second man flailed to get a grip on the corpse and push it off. Androkles stepped over and brutally drove his foot into the man’s throat, pushing him back into the ground. He leaned hard and dug in and felt all the stringy bits inside the man’s neck squishing against each other. The man’s face turned purple. His eyes bulged. He twisted and jerked and tried to punch Androkles’ calf, but all to no avail.

As the man pathetically squirmed out his last, Androkles brought his gaze to the third rider. The man had stopped his charge, his sword aiming limply at the ground now.

“Come, weakling!” shouted Androkles, raising his arms in challenge. “Come save your friend here!”

Genuine wrath fueled his killing intent, which grew hotter and stronger. It began to rotate in a great circle with him at the center. Smoke lifted from everything within twenty paces—grass, leaves, cloth, hair. And still, like an outcropping surrounded by stormy waves, the rider’s sorcery resisted.

The man’s horse stepped back several paces and turned against the reins, eager to flee. The severed heads on the man’s saddle bounced and flopped wildly under their own power.

The man on the ground went limp, too long without air.

Unable to resist the heat of wrath any longer, the snapped-neck corpse lit on fire, roaring up into a pillar of greasy flame ten feet high. Androkles barely stepped away in time to keep his pants from catching.

That was more than the enemy could bear. The remaining man turned and kicked his horse into a gallop to flee. Once he reached the stunned group keeping their distance, they fell in behind him and were soon swallowed by the woods.

Androkles withdrew his killing intent and cold rushed in to fill the empty air it left. It took him the space of ten full breaths to calm down and collect his thoughts.

He looked at his hands, even though his power wasn’t in them. His killing intent was… he had no idea what to make of it. How could he sense anything through it? Why only now, after so many years? He had no idea, but he knew it felt natural. Clear, pure, and inevitable. Part of himself.

The chill on his skin showed him the places where he was bleeding, and thank the gods, it wasn’t too bad. Head and arm was all, minor injuries.

“Is it safe now, Papa?” called Garbi. She seemed only a little tense, as if the outcome had never been in doubt. He wasn’t sure whether to feel proud or annoyed.

“Yes, it’s safe now,” he replied. Each step he took made the pain in his ribs worse until he found himself hissing and gasping and hunched over. The pain was bad enough to make him ill. Gods, he was about to vomit.

“Okay, I’ll be right back. Don’t go anywhere!” she yelled.

He stood up straight, shocked she would dare, and saw her bouncing off past him on her stag. She rode standing and bold, like a captain on the figurehead of his ship. The animal carried her so gracefully she never so much as leaned the wrong direction. Her golden hair flashed in the wind and sun, quickly coming undone from most of the ribbons.

Androkles wanted to yell for her to stop, to reach out and catch her, to stare in amazement or possibly horror. He did none of those, however. What was a man to do, with children like his? Get used to it. That’s what. “Don’t go too far, Garbi girl,” was all he said.

“I won’t, Papa,” she might have replied. He didn’t quite hear. She was moving too fast. Then he saw what she was doing—her target was one of the riderless horses wandering not too far off. Once she got close enough, Garbi began talking to it, and by all the gods, the thing stopped, turned its head, and listened to her.

Androkles sighed to himself and stepped over the man Agurne had killed and pulled her hand away where she was holding a cloth against the cut on her temple. “Doesn’t look too bad. Probably won’t even need stitches. Although I don’t think we even still have the needle, do we?”

“I don’t have it. Maybe Garbi does,” she said calmly.

He let his hand linger on her head just a moment longer. “You realize nothing we do for the rest of our lives will be this interesting. This is it.”

She snorted and pushed his hand away. “You realize we’re all going to die. This is it, you detestable lump.”

“Then I guess we really don’t need to sew it up after all. Hand me that knife,” he said, holding out his hand.

Agurne scowled and slapped it into his palm. He took it and stepped over to the Allobrogian she’d killed. The man had a rough cotton shirt over his armor, which was a shirt of woven links of iron. The cotton looked about as clean as anything else he was likely to find, so he used the knife to cut and tear a long strip of it away, which he tied over Agurne’s cut as a bandage. It’d have to do for now.

“Next time you need to kill someone, do it before they smack you with a sword,” he said.

Agurne chomped her mouth shut as she tried to think of a good reply to that, one that wouldn’t be the obvious thing, and finally said, “Stop teasing me and go get your daughter. Looking at you is wearing me out, you exhausting, three-legged mule.”

“I’ll have you know I am not a mule. I am a full-blooded Dikaian ass,” Androkles said.

He turned and went to see if he could find Garbi, hopefully somewhere close enough he could yell and she’d hear it. She was not too far away, though, perhaps fifty paces across the battleground charnel. She was still standing on her great red stag, her arms on her hips and looking intently into the woods, unmoving. A horse stood at her side, waiting patiently for her to finish whatever she was doing.

Androkles started making his way over when two more horses emerged and came to address her. They licked their lips as they approached, heads low, and he wondered for a moment if they thought she was food. But before he cried out, they lifted their noses and nuzzled her face affectionately while she patted their heads. Once the little group was satisfied with the number of face rubs and pats given, the stag turned and Garbi headed back, three saddled Allobrogian horses in tow.

She rode straight to him, arms folded with her little brow furrowed in childish seriousness. When she got there, she wagged her finger down at him from her stag and spoke with an admonishing tone. “Papa, I got some horses. You have to ride one, and you can’t argue! I got you one that it won’t matter if it gets tired. You can’t walk because they’ll catch us if we’re too slow. So you can ride the one that’s all brown, since he’s the strongest. If you are going to say that you’ll walk, then you can just keep your mouth shut!”

He might have been upset at how she scolded him if she wasn’t still scared from the fight, so deeply scared it made her eyes flash like a beaten dog’s. As it was, he loved her for it, courageous little thing. What noble children he had.

“Why did you get three?” he asked. The brown one did indeed look strong enough to carry him, for a short while, anyway; horses never lasted long with him riding. But it wasn’t his horse, so he supposed it was fine.

“Because Flower needs to ride one. Ashe is getting tired. She’s just a wolf.”

“Isn’t Poppy getting tired, too?” Androkles asked, daring to hope they could finally leave the hateful beast behind.

“No, he can run really far.” Well, so much for that.

“You did well, Garbi girl. We will ride. Come here, Agurne.” Androkles lifted the woman into the saddle, since she had no good way of getting up there on her own. She felt even lighter than she looked, which troubled him, but his hands remembered her warmth for several minutes after.

He went to retrieve Flower from Ashe’s back. He untied the little boy’s hands and feet, frowning at the rough skin underneath the cords. Flower resisted slightly, but never fully woke. By Abraxia Dream-weaver, the boy sure knew how to sleep.

“What do you think, Agurne? Should we wake him up, or should we try and carry him like this?”

“I’m not good enough on a horse to carry him through a chase. I’ll drop him on his head. How about you?”

“I want to ride as light as I can or the beast’s stomach will be dragging on the ground.”

Garbi said, “Just put him up there. He can stay asleep. Just lay him down over the saddle. Milkdrop won’t drop him. Come on, Papa, hurry up, before they come back!”

“Milkdrop?”

“That’s what I named her. Put him on there! Let’s go!” she said nervously.

Androkles gave her just enough of a glare for her to realize how she was speaking to him and cast her eyes down, but she wasn’t wrong. There was no time to spare. He laid Flower on the horse’s back, draping him across the saddle and hoping its four horns would hold him in place.

“Agurne, you ride behind him just in case. There’s no way he’ll stay on there.”

“Your horse will be the slowest. You’ll end up in back no matter how we start,” she said.

“I’m the only one who knows where we’re going,” he replied curtly. He stepped over to the brown horse, which did indeed look a little meatier than the others. It looked back at him and he could swear he saw fear and resignation in its eyes.

“We all know where we’re going, you mule. You pointed it out,” said Agurne.

“Oh? And can you find it from here?”

She pointed in the right direction, or close enough. He scowled.

“Papa,” said Garbi, “I can go in front and let Poppy find the best path.”

“Why him?” said Androkles.

“He’s good at finding trails and avoiding hunters. Because he’s a deer.”

“But what if…” he started, but then stopped because he had no good reply. He did not enjoy the thought of following that smug future sacrifice victim, not at all. But he needed a better reason than that or he’d look petty, and he didn’t have one.

“And Ashe will listen and she can smell if there are horses, too, because she’s a wolf. Papa… Flower helped last night. I want to help now. I can help as much as anyone else.”

Androkles’ little princess gaze earnestly down at him from where she stood on her stag’s shoulders, wheat-golden hair only barely tamed with a ribbon, eyes like sapphires in sunlight. He sighed. He was never going to win against her again, was he? Never again for the rest of his life. He was a doomed man.

He climbed on to the horse, and just as expected, the wretched thing bowed beneath his weight. Hopefully it’d last more than a few miles, but he wasn’t confident about that. At least they’d be away from here, and that would have to do.

“Lead on, Garbi girl.”

She nodded, and Poppy left at a bound. The horses needed no directing and simply fell into line behind the great stag, in the proper order.

The horse struggled beneath him, but it survived the first mile, and the second. As unpleasant as it was wondering precisely when the poor animal would break a leg or collapse and die, Androkles knew they needed to move with haste. So far so good.

The stag picked impossible paths, turns and tangles and trails where Androkles wasn’t sure he could throw a rock through, but somehow they made it without a scratch and never had to slow down. The longer it went, the more uncanny it was, as if he was seeing something not meant for man to see. Someone for only gods and beasts to know.

Another mile and the horse failed beneath him. It collapsed halfway across a small, rocky stream, only barely stumbling far enough to dump him on the icy gravel instead of into the water. Androkles had been listening and watching so intently in every direction for any movement that it took him completely by surprise. He failed to get away in time and it pinned his lower leg, but not so far he couldn’t pull it back out again. Could have been worse. Had been, several times.

He rose to his feet, gritting his teeth against the red-hot firebrand pain of his ribs, and tried to dust off the mud. It just smeared.

Garbi had already turned around and was on her way back. She leaped down from Poppy and rushed to the fallen horse, which was foaming at the mouth and breathing its last. She knelt and petted its face and neck and whispered, “I knew what I was asking you to do. Thank you so, so much. I’ll never forget you. You can rest now.”

The stallion exhaled and died. Garbi patted it once more, then stood, her face red and her eyes sparkling with tears that she refused to blink away. She met Androkles’ eyes and boldly declared, “Put Flower with Mama, and you take his horse. Then we ride.”

Without waiting to see if he’d do as told, she strode back over to Poppy, who knelt for her to get back on. She chose to ride standing this time, arms crossed and face forward. Except that as soon as her back was turned to the others, she quickly wiped tears from her eyes. He saw her shoulders tremble as she suppressed a sob.

Seven years old. She was seven years old. Androkles was astonished. He knew she was a darling little thing, strong and kind and beautiful. But this? Who expected this?

No time to waste, however. Best make use of her sacrifice. Androkles lifted Flower and draped him over Agurne, who had a miserable, pitying look on her face. He kissed her hair.

It was with even more hesitation than before that he climbed up on the other horse, the one Garbi had named Milkdrop. It had carried Flower perfectly, never letting the boy so much as slip right or left. Androkles really didn’t want to kill this one, too. Not now.

They rode, following Poppy’s impossible paths. The next mile covered a great deal of open land, with broad views of the mountains and foothills in every direction. He spotted at least a dozen warbands, each a hundred or more men on horseback. The stag’s paths had him so turned about he wasn’t sure where anything was anymore, but he could guess that many of them were heading toward the battle. A few others seemed to be heading south, however, toward the pass. That was troubling.

Fortunately, none seemed to notice him, or if they did, they didn’t react and give it away while he was watching.

Milkdrop the Horse only made it another half-mile before giving out, right in the middle of a snow field. This time Androkles was more ready and hopped off backwards before he went down with it.

The horse was dead before it hit the ground. Once more, Garbi jumped down and knelt to show her appreciation. She said nothing this time, though, because the horse wouldn’t have heard. It wasn’t breathing and its face was stuck about a hand’s length into the snow. When she stood and faced him again, it was harder for her to keep her composure than before, but keep it she did. “You’ll have to walk from here, Papa. I’m sorry.”

“It is enough, my daughter. You did well. This probably saved us. There are at least a thousand men riding behind to cut us off and we got out ahead of all of them.”

She nodded gravely and turned to get back on Poppy. From the set of her shoulders, how she kept her head up but her legs hesitated to carry her, he could almost feel her sadness and conviction. In fact, maybe he truly could. She could spread her emotions like he could his killing intent. Maybe she was leaking.

“Agurne, I’m starting to think she might be my favorite daughter,” he said. He had tried to use the joke to hide his sincerity, but his voice caught anyway.

Agurne just gave him a sad little smile and a nod that said, I love her too.

Androkles tossed the sack containing his money over one shoulder, carried the spear in his other hand, and tossed the rest of the blankets up for Garbi to hold while she rode. They were just about out of everything. He should have searched the dead soldiers for more food—they only had the one smallish bag of ground barley left. How long until they had to eat Poppy? Because for the first time since meeting the horrible beast, Androkles didn’t really want to.

Poppy started walking and Ashe kept pace alongside. The rest fell in line and then they were off, marching through the snow, which was up to a foot deep in places. Why it hadn’t melted here, he had no idea other than just to spite him. It knew he was coming.

They crossed the rest of the field, perhaps another half-mile through tiresome snow, and straight into the tangle of bushes and dead vines and clumping trees on the far side. Poppy continued to lead them over an effortless trail that only he could see, and even on foot Androkles couldn’t tell how he did it. For the first time in his life, he wondered if animals were capable of sorcery. Or even worse, if Poppy was some sort of fairy creature like Wolfscar, just shaped different. That thought drained the blood from his face.

The pace was unpleasant, mostly because Androkles couldn’t breathe too deeply without regretting it and carrying all that money was hard work, but the progress was worth it. Only a short while later, they emerged into a smaller clearing where he had an open view of the pass, three or four miles farther on. As he suspected before, a respectable group of men was gathering there and lining up, awaiting his arrival. Androkles couldn’t see the King or any of his demons, but there was no doubt he’d appear. He was likely on his way if he wasn’t there already.

“Wait, hold on,” he said. He stopped to catch his breath and the others slowed and came back over. He found a lumpy rock to sit on and said, “I need to think for a moment about how we’re getting past them. See how they’re gathering right where we want to go? Give me a few minutes.”

To make it as clear as possible it was time for a rest, Androkles stood and took down Flower, laying him on his back on a dry patch of yellow grass so Agurne could relax, then sat down to think some more.

Agurne went and started straightening out Garbi’s hair again and retying the bows, clucking at her in that way she had where she sounded cross but meant the opposite. Poor Garbi permitted the treatment, rigid at first but soon relaxing as Agurne flicked away all the girl’s stress and worries with her fingers. Agurne was letting out some of her power, her maternal love, and Garbi was responding in kind; their spirits mingled and spoke in a language only witches like them could understand.

Perhaps rushing up the mountainside instead of the pass could buy them more time, but not much. It would be impossible to stay hidden. The King had scried them out once this morning and he could doubtless do it again. Maybe already had.

But facing off in the pass, even if he could get everything through and into position, didn’t seem much better. Now that Androkles knew some of them were protected by sorcery, and perhaps it was hundreds or thousands, of them, he would be hard-pressed to win without an army of his own. If he had a few hundred good, trustworthy men with long spears and shields, then maybe. Maybe. But still doubtful.

The minutes passed and Androkles felt his brow get more and more knotted as the problem got more perplexing. How far would the King chase him, anyway? Assuming he could get away somehow. He wished he had some idea how far from the Glories he was. He hadn’t gone far enough east or west that south would not take him home, but how far south, he could scarcely guess. Would the King chase him all the way to the border, or was there some other tribe or kingdom in between?

Out of nowhere, Flower started crying. The boy had finally woken up. He gave deep, mournful sobs that shook his whole body and it was miserable to hear, especially today.

Agurne was the first to respond. She said, “Flower, what’s wrong, my sweet love?”

“I had a bad dream!” he blurted out, eyes still shut. Tears were streaming down his face. “I dreamed I felt Pepper laying next to me, and it was so real but he’s not!”

“Yes I am,” said Pepper. He was sitting right next to Flower, holding his hand. One moment the air was empty, and the next moment he filled it.

Flower gasped so hard he choked. He opened his eyes. He looked at Pepper, then at his hand, and squeezed it to make sure it was real. “Pepper!” he screamed and leaped onto his brother so hard he knocked him over. Then they wept, clutching each other so tightly they were going to get bruises.

Wolfscar was here as well, hovering just over them, looking like he was trying to find the right way to join in.

Androkles and Agurne stared in shocked silence as it sank in. Garbi recovered the fastest and leaped back down from Poppy with a cry of her own. She couldn’t form the words but as soon as she got in arm’s reach the boys pulled her in. The three of them cried together, hot and wild, hearts overflowing.

“What a little turd, that boy!” exclaimed Agurne, wiping away the tears that began to rush from her eyes.

Dyana stepped in and gently started pulling them apart. “Pepper, mind your back. Flower, you need to let go of him, he’s injured. Garbi, you too. Children, come on, get up. Get up, you dear things.”

Androkles hadn’t seen her approach; she must have snuck in with Pepper and been hiding a few steps away. Her dark brown hair was longer now, about half the length of a finger. She still wore nothing but plain trousers and a ragged cloth tied across her breasts, but her demeanor had changed. Her air was different. She looked a little sheepish and nervous, more gentle. More mature, too, with less bravado.

He was not excited to see her, and she knew it. Still trying to get the children to untangle and sit up, she gave Androkles an apologetic smile and said, “He put me up to this. He said he wanted to surprise you.”

“Pepper!” shouted Agurne. That got their attention. “Get over here and give me a hug right now, you impossible little dangle-shit on a goat’s ass hair!”

Pepper laughed through the tears and let Dyana pull him up. He rushed over and jumped onto Agurne with a hug that involved both arms and legs. She almost fell over, but then she was turning in circles and holding him and laughing and crying. “Mama!” he said. “Mama.” He couldn’t say anything else and didn’t need to.

After a moment, Agurne’s hand slipped into the long, ragged tear all the way across the back of his shirt and she gasped. “Mari Mother, what’s this! What happened to your back?” She whirled him around and pulled open the flaps of cloth and revealed a long, stitched gash that went from shoulder to shoulder, covered in a pale, sticky salve. “Pepper!”

Androkles had started to get upset and wonder when it was his turn, but that injury changed things. “Dyana, what happened to him?” he asked, trying to cool his rising anger. It wouldn’t do any good here. He wanted to cuddle his dear son, not kill anybody. Yet.

Pepper said, “No, I want to tell him!” The boy needed a moment to compose himself, which he was permitted while everyone waited silently. He wiped tears from his eyes with both forearms and flitted his black tail nervously behind him until Flower stepped over and wound their tails together.

Giving no care to preserve the moment, Wolfscar said, “Hi Garbi. I brought back Pepper.” Garbi snatched him from the air and kissed him, then pressed him warmly against her chest.

Pepper started, “Papa, I got this… I’m sorry, I just really missed you.” Then tears came again and he couldn’t speak. Androkles wiped them from his face with both hands, then held his hand and looked at him, how beautiful he was. Flower leaned his head on his brother’s shoulder to console him.

“What happened to your arms?” the boy managed to say.

“You first.”

Pepper took a deep breath, his yellow eyes glistening as he blinked away excess water. “I got this cut when I fought a demon all by myself. I killed him with this,” he said, and pulled out a sharp black spike over a foot long. A demon’s horn.

Androkles nearly let out a burst of rage, but stopped it just in time. “They chained you up, and then attacked you? Pepper, my son, I swear on the grave of my fathers that I will kill every last—”

“No, wait!” Pepper interrupted. “It’s more complicated. There’s, um, well, they didn’t keep me chained up after Wolfscar said to let me out. And they fed me and I had a place to sleep. They didn’t know what to do with me, because I told them about you and that you’d be angry when you came to get me. And the one I fought, Kema, he was a scout, but he sort of went crazy when the shades…”

The boy’s thoughts got too tangled to let out and he paused.

Dyana came to his rescue. “Several days ago, the King of the Allobrogians called up a whole horde of evil spirits to attack the Night People. It made some of them lose their minds, and one of those attacked Pepper. Pepper fought bravely and saved himself. I wasn’t there to protect him, and I truly regret that. I’m sorry.”

Androkles said nothing, and she looked at the ground and continued, “They didn’t treat him well. He had no friends among them and a few quiet enemies. But he got his revenge, didn’t you, Pepper?”

“I killed nine of them with a single kick,” said Pepper solemnly. “They had a circle to keep the shades out, but then I got mad at them after… after everything, and I kicked it. It broke the magic, so the shades got in and attacked them, and nine people died. Then Palthos came and asked me if it was enough, and I said it was, so then we were even. And after that, they started treating me normal, and I met all the other children finally. Then Wolfscar came and led me here. Dyana had to carry me, though, because she can run faster than… faster than anything, I think. Too fast.”

Dyana said, “You left out the giant.”

Pepper grinned. His eyes sparkled. “Papa, you’re not going to believe this! There was a giant, and it was so big that just its toe was bigger than Dyana, and she fought it and chased it off. I saw it—she had to climb up and down him like a squirrel on a tree, but she kept punching his feet and eventually he got hurt so bad he left. He was coming to step on the Night People, where I was. She saved everybody and me.”

“I told you they were footprints!” yelled Garbi.

It took Androkles a moment to accept it. The gears of his mind simply refused to click at first. His mouth went dry.

Well, it wasn’t here now, so no use worrying. “So you killed a demon and got revenge on his tribe for being mistreated? Is that the story?”

“Yes, Papa. Sort of. There’s more to it, but…”

“My son, Pepper the Demon-slayer.”

“I just wanted you to be proud of me,” said Pepper, and then like a tipped bucket, the tears came back out. Androkles pulled the boy in to a hug, careful not to mash his wound. Androkles wet his face and beard with tears of his own while Pepper wept into his shirt.

“My boy,” said Androkles after a moment, “you are nine. You don’t have to earn my pride.” Then, after swallowing to make sure his voice stayed even, he added, “But you did.”

Saying that just made it worse, and soon everyone was crying again, except for Dyana, who tried not to look like she was intruding. A moment later Agurne insisted it was her turn again for a hug, and then Pepper got passed around for affection like a flute girl.

Overall, it was still a lousy day and they were probably all going to die. But Androkles was glad this had happened first. Very, very glad.

When things started dying down, Dyana said, “I think it’s time to take you to meet the Night People. They have matters they wish to discuss with you, a peerless fighter, and with Agurne, a priestess of Palthos. And then… I have some things I want to say, too. To ask.”

“Where are they?” he asked.

“South, up through the canyon.”

“There’s an army in the way.”

“There’s Pepper,” said Dyana, pointing.