Traitor's Moon

road. Arrows sang around her and she bent low, fighting at the ropes that still bound her hands.
    One hand came free, then the other, and she snatched up the flapping reins. Over the thunder of pursuing hooves, she heard Korious shouting wildly, trying to rally his men.
    Undisciplined fools!
she thought in disgust, wondering how Nyal had managed to lumber himself with such a sorry bunch of green fighters. A handful of Urgazhi could have had that lot trussed up in no time.
    The men who’d attacked them were another matter, however. Looking back over her shoulder, she saw two of them in close pursuit.
    She hunched low over her horse’s neck and plunged onward. There was no way she was going to elude them on the open road, so when a sidetrack appeared to the left, she reined hard in that direction, ducking overhanging branches.
    Giving her mount its head, she clung on and tried to yank her right leg out of her boot. Muscles up and down her side protested, but she pulled free, nearly unseating herself in the process. Steadying herself, she reached down and pulled at the knot securing her other leg.
    Her pursuers had faltered a moment, perhaps caught off guard by her sudden swerve. She couldn’t see them at the moment, but she could hear them calling out to each other not far behind.
    Shielded for the moment by a bend in the road, she reined in, jumped free of the horse, and slapped it hard on the rump, sending it on with her right boot still lashed in the stirrup. She just had time to dive for cover in a bramble patch before the men thundered past, unaware as yet that they were now chasing a riderless horse.
    If they were as smart as she guessed they were, it wouldn’t be long before they figured it out. Crawling from the brambles, she scrambled up the slope.
    She ran until her lungs burned, using the sun as her guide. When she was satisfied that she’d left her pursuers behind, she paused to wash her bleeding foot in a stream, then slowly circled back to the place where the ambush had occurred, hoping to find some sign of who their attackers were.
    Someone had been there before her, doing the same. A single set of footprints led from the road to the place where the ambushers had lain in wait, crossing their tracks and meandering in a way that spoke of a thorough search. The shape of the bootprint was familiar.
    â€œNyal,” she whispered, resting her fingers a moment in one long footprint. The ground in front of her blurred, and she dashed the tears away angrily. She’d be damned if she’d weep for that traitor like some jilted dairy maid.
    Following the tracks back to the road, she saw that he’d come back alone.
    â€œGood for you, my friends!” she whispered, refusing to admit any other possibility than that Seregil and Alec had eluded him.
    What she found next closed the dark fist of anger tighter around her heart. From here, Nyal had dashed off to track her.
    Look for me in Sarikali, you son of a bitch!
she thought, limping back into the trees.

46
A C OLD W ELCOME
    A lec woke to the sound of waves slapping wood close to his head. Rising from his cramped place in the bow, he looked back past the sail and found Seregil at the tiller, scanning the horizon. He was a sorry sight, with his bruised face and filthy tunic. In this early light, he looked pale, drained of life.
    Ghostly.
    Alec secretly made a warding sign on his friend’s behalf. Seregil glanced his way just then and gave him a tired grin.
    â€œLook there,” he said, pointing ahead. “You can just make out the Ea’malies there on the horizon. Keep an eye out for sails.”
    And so they did, through the morning and into the long afternoon. Their eyes burned from the glare, and their lips cracked from the salt and sun. They kept to a northeast course, using the distant islands as their guide as they tacked back and forth. Alec spelled Seregil at the tiller now and then, urging him to sleep, but he refused.
    At last, as the sun slanted down toward the western horizon, Alec caught sight of a dark spot against the silver face of the sea.
    â€œThere!” he croaked, hanging over the side in his excitement. “Do you see it? Is that a sail?”
    â€œA Skalan sail,” Seregil confirmed, swinging the tiller hard. “Let’s hope we get to her before nightfall. They’ll never spot us in the dark, and we’re too slow to chase them.”
    Over the next two hours Alec watched as