Paragon - Book I

Rock and Root

An hour passes, and then so do they. Like carved marble she sits up there, unmoving, straining for a cry of surprise or, more hopefully, the sound of Keno's bird call. Neither happen, and though she has escaped capture, Allayria knows she is still in some serious shit. She doesn't know where she is, much less where Keno is, she doesn't have a bird whistle, the Jarles have swarmed the hillside looking for the escapees and attackers, and her friends will not be able to hang around and wait for her all day.

If they are still alive.

She shakes her head, snorting out ash and pulling her stiff fingers from the bark. She has to peel herself off the tree, and finds her arms unsteady as she drops down to a lower set of branches. She adjusts the uniform, trying to make it as presentable as possible, despite the dirt, blood, and scorch marks.

When she tumbles to the ground she's wearing the Jarles walk again too, and the stiff, tight movements do nothing for her protesting legs or ankle. The best way she's getting out of here is to be as unextraordinary as possible, which means she needs to be one of the many soldiers tearing apart the forest, looking for people like her.

She heads north. It seems that she dropped down from a turret on the southwest side of the fort, close to where she and Keno had entered that morning. If that really is the case, then heading north will take her to where they had gone their separate ways, some twenty minutes from the small overhang they planned to meet up at. She needs to keep going north and just keep an eye out for the—

The wooden club catches her right across the head and she slams against rock and tree root. The world shifts strangely, and then she sees the club lift again.

"No," she rasps, and before the owner can swing it again she skills it out of his hands.

"Shit," someone says as the club clatters on the ground a few feet away. "Oh, shit."

The bulky, grimacing man is unfamiliar to her, and he peers down in some confusion.

"Not a guard," she croaks. "D-disguise."

"Yeah, I figured that out," he rumbles with a frown. "I nearly killed you."

"G-glad you didn't."

"That's awful clever," another, thinner, weasel-like man says, hovering over her too. "They won't look twice at you, unless you start that Nature-calling again."

"I can't say I feel very clever right now," she answers, and tries to sit up.

The big one offers her his hand and he pulls her up to her feet. Both he and the smaller man are wearing gray, faded clothing accessorized with matching pairs of black, thick ankle cuffs. Fragments of chain links hang off their sides—someone has smashed through them.

"You don't look like a prisoner," the man says, and he peers closely at her face.

"I was a new addition," she says, rubbing her cheek. "I had just been taken in this morning."

"It's your lucky day," the other pipes in, chewing on a bit of grass. "How'd you get the uniform?"

"Stole it," she replies.

"I hope you made its owner hurt."

She nods, and then someone starts screaming up ahead.

They all look that way, mesmerized for a moment, and then the barrel-chested man says: "Time to get out of here, Bon."

He turns to her.

"Where are you headed? We're setting South. Maybe a Jarles guard could be returning to base with a few captives."