The Knave of Souls - Fantasy - Sequel to The Jack of Souls

Chapter 41 - Flight

FLIGHT

*

Dim watery sounds drifted through a fog of pain to Harric. He struggled to make sense of them. Yapping, barking. A cascade of jumbled syllables, like a cart of drums spilled down stairs. Something pressed his temples together as if it would crush his skull like a walnut under a boot. Dim light moved in the fog, and he opened his eyes to see frantic movement around him.

Brolli pulled a shirt over his head. Strange words came from inside the shirt. Muffled. Brolli wore no pants, which was awkward.

But then he saw this Kwendi had a narrower face than Brolli and a wider mouth with a tangle of snaggled teeth at the front. Someone else shouted in the small space of the pavilion, and Harric turned to see another half-dressed Kwendi pointing and retreating into a corner.

Oh.

As his memory of the situation returned, embers of panic blazed into life in his stomach.

He surged to his hands and knees, only to fall over tangled in a pile of furs and blankets on the bed. Flailing, he leapt up and hit the ground running, trailing blankets through the hangings.

Kwendi shouts pelted him as he fled down the ladder, but faded as he slammed through the kitchen and down the ramps to the cellar. He sprinted for all he was worth through the tunnel, trusting to the knowledge that it was clear and without impediment, and flying as fast as he could...and then the floor dropped away he was indeed flying.

Into the cistern.

With a cry, he swam through the air. As the opposite rim of the cistern flit past he extended his arms and grabbed for it. His hands hit the rim and held as the rest of him slammed the cistern wall. Pain shot through his ribs. The air whoofed from his lungs as the wall slugged him in the stomach. He'd let go of the glowing globes when he grabbed for the rim, so once agin he plunged into darkness. For a moment both hands held, but then his left hand slipped and he hung by one hand in the darkness. Below him, the stolen spheres glowed like drowned moons in the the pool.

Harric groaned, but dared not move lest he cause his single hand to lose its grip.

Shouts echoed down the tunnel behind him. The Kwendi had still been dressing when he fled, so he had a head start and now they couldn't know which way he'd gone. They might seek him in the wrong direction, or they could even leave the tunnel and seek him on the terrace in front of the houses.

Heart pounding in his ears he listened until it was clear the shouts were growing louder.

Harric cursed and strained upward with his left hand, only to find his reach well short of the rim. Gods take it, they would catch him. He considered dropping into the pool, trying to hide there in the Unseen. But then what? He'd be stuck while they raised the alarm. And if he passed out in the water he'd drown.

Gods take it, what an idiot. Too frightened to think straight, and now flown into the cistern and lost everything.

He hadn't realized his feet had been scrabbling for purchase, but they must have been, because his big toe found a mortar seam between stones. Hope rekindling, he put his weight on it, and though it hurt like the bite of a ragged tooth, it gave just enough grip for him to push himself up and grab the rim with his other hand.

"Stop!" The heavily accented word echoed through the tunnel behind him. It was the female Kwendi's voice. The male echoed the command with an accent just as thick and an odd whistling note.

Judging from the sound, they would reach the cistern in moments.

Harric's hands burned with the strain. His limbs seemed to move at half speed as he pulled and levered and scrabbled his toes against the stone to get first one elbow and then the other over the rim, and finally to hump his torso up over the rim like a seal climbs a beach head.