Gods & Thieves ✔

51. Dagger and Ice

༄༄༄

The world flashes before my eyes in a blur. The sky and the ground change places.

My body aches, my elbows hitting the stones tearing my skin off. Then I find my face buried in the grass still damp from the morning dew, and everything hushes.

For a moment, I can't move.

Is this my death?..

But apparently not. Pain recedes, and I'm alive again. Gasping for air, which was knocked out of my lungs when I fell, I roll over on my back. I open my eyes...I try to. But then someone hits my head with something blunt and hard, like the handle of a dagger or a pistol, and everything swims in my vision again. Pain makes me feel sick again.

Nearby, I hear noise and ragged breathing, which reminds me of a fight, and I can only guess that it must be Loretto. There are several attackers, and not all of them are here to hit me on the head. They came for Loretto. Cale found Tom.

The thought that Lo needs my help miraculously gives her strength and desire to live. With an angry moan--intended, if not to scare the attackers, then at least to finally take a deep breath!--I push off the ground and swing my fist without looking. Someone jumps away next to me, and I have time to climb to my feet. But this someone doesn't let me straighten up, because I'm immediately attacked again.

And I'm falling to my knees again.

"I would have killed you if Her Majesty hadn't needed you alive!"

With my vision still swimming, I only make out a uniform and a strand of red hair pulled into a short ponytail before we stretch out on the damp ground together.

"Gen?"

"Don't fidget, or I'll break your ribs!"

"Why... Aw!" The same handle hits me in my ribs. It's a combat knife. A grumble of pain escapes my throat.

I grab Gen's wrist as she swings, but she's strong. I only manage to slow her down, not stop.

Ian's sister is one of Cale's spies in Tik'al and she came after Lo on his orders? A breathless riddle pops up in my mind. But then why is she sparing me for Her Majesty's sake?

Knowing that there is still little information to find the answer, I frantically turn my head in search of Lo. And with a new wave of angry frustration, I realize that two guard, not one, dared attack my mentor.

Gen's friends are still trying to catch Loretto. One guard, immobilizing, holds Lo's hands behind faer back when the second one approaches--who is immediately rewarded with a kick of Loretto's boot sole in his chest.

The one who gets hit in the chest plops down on his ass, growls and starts to get up, but at this moment, Lo manages to take a confident step back and, disorienting, hits the opponent who dared hold faer hands from behind, with his back against the nearest tree. Then Tayen throws faer head sharply back, breaking the guard's nose. And as soon as the crippled guard howls, Mentor tears free, ready to fight the guard who is scraping his ass off the ground all this time.

It's hard to say how long Lo will last in this fight.

Tayen looks like a hurricane incarnate, rebellious and implacable. Fascinating...My mentor, surrounded by wisps of smoke, with a swirl of silky long hair over faer shoulders and a proud hem of faer robe fluttering.

But the guards are still twice as muscular as Lo. I used to believe that shamans had diamond skin, but now, having become one myself, I understand that we are still vulnerable, fragile, mortal.