The De'Nauguath Chronicles - Book 1: The Summoner's Daughter

Chapter 7: Defend

I opened my eyes a slit. My head still swam. Crickets roared. High grass murmured in a breeze. Something soft brushed my arms. I opened my eyes all the way and saw a great field of scrawny wild wheat shining in high noon's light.

I reached out and grabbed a head. It broke up in my hand and fluttered away when I released my fist.

"What did you do?"

Triga shrugged as she flicked a few bits of grass from her shoulders. "You did it."

"The hell I did."

"I made the portal, but you chose the time and place. My focus was on fending him off. This must be somewhere you know."

"You really moved us?" I glanced around. "We e'nt dead?"

She let out a quick little laugh. "You would know if you were dead." Her voice was as perky as before. She actually skipped a few steps. "I fixed your head as well," she called over her shoulder.

I felt for the blood, but it was gone. There was only the slightest bruise left. "Cheers," I muttered. "Is he dead?" I called out in a hurry as she gained some distance from me. I hurried to bridge the distance.

"Certainly not. I was only making a point."

"A point?"

She peeked over her shoulder. The flicker in her eyes might've been wholesome if she'd been a normal child. "You wanted to know what an important choice felt like."

"Eh?"

"You forgot. It's been so long, and you wanted to remember. I only gave you the chance to remember."

I blinked. "Why?"

She stopped in her tracks and considered my face. "You fear me now."

I shrugged. "Be fair, I feared you before that."

"You think me bloodthirsty."

"I'm not sure if someone who hardly spills any blood can be called bloodthirsty."

"Don't act superior when your knife's bite is still on Vaco's skin. Everything I did to Gareth was exactly what you thought about doing to him for years. He was hardly the unfortunate bystander."

"A minute longer and he might've changed." My throat folded. I swallowed hard.

She frowned. "For a day, maybe–"

"No. He was turning. I felt it."

"And what do you think made him turn?"

I raised my hand. I stretched my fingers wide. It didn't matter if all the blood was gone now. I still felt the stiff wad of rag on my skin. "I showed him. He wavered." My hand shook. "I don't know why this time was different, but it was. He was changing."

She didn't blink. "The changeable can't change like that."

"You don't know that."

"Would you really forgive him all the damage he did?" She grabbed at my forearms and pushed them near my face. "I've seen it. You don't have full movement or full feeling in these. You never resented him for that?"

I looked down at them. Aye. My wrists were knotted messes of gray and brown, bits of dead muscle, dead skin, like wire embedded underneath instead of veins. There were burns, bites, even a little shrapnel. Aye, there were even dead nerves. I remembered getting too few of them. "Everyone has scars. I e'nt hungry for vengeance." I tugged at a weed. "Better to have sawdust or grass on your hands than blood. It's enough for me to be left alone."

"That's hardly a war strategy."

"It shouldn't have to be one. Every time I see men kill other men, I'm ashamed for them. I'm ashamed for this place. This can't be what they're meant for. They're dogs. They're already rabid and suffering and soon for parting this world."

There was fury in her mouth, but she kept her silence.

"In a thousand years, this whole island might be deserted, and maybe the world will be better for it."

"You would trade a hard-fought kingdom for an easy coward's hamlet?"

"There e'nt any kingdoms. There e'nt any hamlets. There are strong and weak. The strong plot gold and the weak plot blood. Rashness is no use to anyone. Aye, I'd trade recklessness for a little shelter from the worst of the storm. I'll die happy if I'm just rid of their ropes." I strode out a few yards and gave the place a hard look around. It had been at least a year, but the spot was familiar.

I nodded. "There's a ghost town near here." I squinted against the sun. "I fixed a house up for hiding. It might still be there if a squatter didn't find it."

A single crow followed us high above. The sun blazed on. It was fixed in the middle of the sky for much longer than it needed to be, like it was trying to outlast me on a wager I'd forgotten I'd made. My face burned, but the girl seemed oblivious – she wasn't even breaking a sweat. Her skin was as pale as ever.

"You didn't have to shift us out."

"You're not strong enough to fight him."

"He couldn't land a blow to my face. You saw me turn his fist away."

She stopped walking. Her face turned stony. "You won because I willed him to lose." Her eyes looked ancient again. "There is far more at work here than what you can see."

"And you can do better?"

"I can see every moment a moment before it happens. Even if you were in the very best health, you couldn't have said as much."

"You're half my size and you downed him. Why can't I do the same?"

"I had power on my side."

"And I'm just tripe fat?"

"You couldn't have stopped a bullet. You may have calmed him down, but that gunne was ready. A shaky hand fires hastily."

I stared. "And that's all there is to it, eh?"

"You're not ready yet. You have the capacity for power, but nothing more."

"Why?"

"You're not filled yet."

I was getting too tired to argue. "Handy trick, that. I must remember it the next time we're in a scrape."

"Space-shifting is grueling, and my strength doesn't regenerate by itself. I need help from time to time. I doubt you have the mettle to breathe life into me again."

"So I'm weak."

"Your mind is still deeper than other Krócians."

I planted a palm on the crown of her head. "Never call me a Krócian. Never call me an Adican." The fit passed. I took my hand back. "It's as you said. They're insects. I wasn't born here. Their tongues vex me even though I'm fluent in them. Their food still tastes odd to me. Someone cast me off onto this damned rock. The rest was up to me. The choice was to live or die. Since I didn't know how to die, I lived. I kept this body alive when everything told me not to."

"So you call yourself stronger than them."

"Damned right. This is all they know. They e'nt burdened by conscience. They enjoy everything you saw, and plenty you didn't see besides."

She set off walking, my scolding apparently forgotten. "Why did you call me Triga?"

"Old word for a bomb. Thought it fitted you. Unless you wanted to tell me your real name?"

A quiet settled around us. She was comfortable in it. "How much further?" Her voice was cheerful again.