Stalking Darkness

retort and eased her mount away from the sledge. There was no sense arguing the point. “Marten and Barius, you go take point. Tell Sergeant Mercalle I’ll be up to relieve her as soon as the others get back.”
    “Right, Lieutenant!” Barius said, grinning through his new beard. He and Marten set off at a gallop, cloaks streaming behind them as they raced each other out of sight around a bend in the road.
    The sound of their hoofbeats had just faded out of earshot when the scream of a horse raised the hair on the back of Beka’s neck. Wheeling Wyvern, she saw Syrtas’ mount buck him off behind the third sledge! The horse screamed again, then bolted for the trees.
    Rethus reined in beside the fallen man, then slung himself from the saddle.
    “Ambush!” they shouted, dashing for cover behind the sledge.
    An arrow sang past Beka’s horse and struck the side of the lead sledge. A glance told her that this was no military attack. The arrow was double fletched, rather than the military triple vane style, and the fletching was done clumsily, with one white vane and one a ragged brown.
    “Bloody bandits!” the carter growled, pulling a short sword from under his seat and jumping over the side.
    “Take cover!” Beka yelled, although the others were already doing just that. She slid off Wyvern with her bow in hand and whacked the horse on the haunches, hoping he’d get clear of the archers.
    Heart pounding in her ears, Beka dove for the scant cover at the front of the sledge. Crouched there beside the carter, she tried to size up the situation.
    The point riders weren’t back yet; that left Zir, Kaylah, Corbin, Rethus, Mikal, and Syrtas—assuming none of them were already killed—and the three drivers.
    Judging by the hail of arrows whining at them from the cover of the trees, however, her group was considerably outnumbered. Worse yet, they were being fired on from both sides of the road.
    “You said nothing about bandits when we set out,” she hissed to the driver.
    “Ain’t seen any most of the winter,” he replied grudgingly.“This crew’s come north early. They must of laid for us until they saw you send off them other two.”
    Beka moved to the opposite side of the sledge just in time to spot three swordsmen running at them from the woods. Almost without thinking, she fitted an arrow to her bowstring and shot one of them; the other two fell to someone else’s shafts.
    Arrows snarled and hissed over her head as Beka dashed back to the next sledge, where she found Mikal, Zir, and Kaylah shooting wildly into the trees to either side.
    “Stop shooting!” Beka ordered. “We can’t afford to waste the arrows.”
    “What
do
we do?” Mikal demanded.
    “Wait for a clear shot. And grab any spent arrow you can reach without getting hit.”
    Ducking low, she made it to the last sledge. Rethus and Corbin were unscathed. Their carter lay panting beneath the sledge, an arrow shaft protruding from his hip.
    That first enemy arrow had cut Syrtas just above the knee before striking his horse. The wound was bleeding freely, but it didn’t seem to be slowing him down much as he and the others shot into the trees.
    Beka repeated the order, and then nocked another arrow on her bowstring, waiting for one of their attackers to show himself.
    The bandits mistook their actions as a sign of surrender; in a moment the arrow storm stopped and swordsmen burst from the trees, yelling wildly as they charged the sledges on foot.
    “Now hit them, both sides!” Beka shouted, scrambling to her feet. Heedless of any archers who might still be lurking in the trees, she sent shaft after shaft at the swordsmen running at her, downing three of them. For the first time since the skirmish began, it occurred to her that she was taking human lives, but the thought carried no emotion. The thrum of bowstrings and the cries and shouts of battle filled her mind, leaving room for nothing else. Beside her, Rethus fired with the same silent determination.
    An arrow nicked the shoulder of her tunic and pinned her cloak to the side of the sledge behind her. Yanking the brooch pin loose, she dropped to one knee and continued to shoot.
    A dozen or more bandits fell to their arrows, but an equal number were closing in around them.
    “Swords!” Beka shouted. Drawing her blade, she strode out to meet a bearded man in scarred leather brigadine and raggedleggings. Ducking his wild swing with a broadsword, she whirled and struck at the back of