The boy really must be scared. His fear didn’t give Kiri confidence, even with his knife tucked into her belt. She’d felt how strong he was when he was pulling on her hair. If he waited until the right moment, until she was distracted, it could work. While they rode across the river she kept thinking of ways he might escape, or hurt or even kill her. If similar thoughts were running through his head, they came to nothing. Getting into and out of the boat she had not been able to watch him carefully, although she did keep her grip on his arm. He did not seize the moment. As they walked through the woods and up into the rocky shoulders of the mountains, he remained docile. His arm was slick with sweat and rain, and it was hard to keep a tight hold, but he did not slip away.
With Feugh’s arm still gripped in Kiri’s hand, they stepped out of the trees, him slightly in front of her since he was leading the way. They had reached a tumbled field of boulders. The rocks were lying at the foot of a sheer cliff, as if the mountainside here had sheared off and crumbled to the ground. The scale of the cliff made the boulders seem small, but as they drew closer Kiri saw that many of them were massive. To make any progress they had to scramble over and between the rocks. Feugh made no complaint as the two of them awkwardly worked their way forward, or suggestion that this might be easier if she let him go. Even when they had to put their hands down to climb up a rock (all three, since Kiri was still holding his arm) he didn’t try to get away. Kiri didn’t understand it. Could it be he was sure she would no longer be a problem very soon. What might the backup plan be? Without knowing where they were going, she could think of nothing but to keep watching for archers.
They slid down the back of a particularly large boulder and Feugh led Kiri around to the side of it, where its irregular shape made a small overhang. Feugh pulled Kiri toward the ground and crawled under the overhang. There was, Kiri could now see, an opening in the ground in front of him.
“We have to drop down here,” he said. “It's not far.”
Kiri nodded and scooted forward next to him. She wondered what kind of trap she was letting him lead her into. Both of them dangled their legs into the empty space.
“One...two...three.” Kiri counted.
They both pushed forward and dropped into the hole. When her feet slammed into the ground below, Kiri stumbled, but managed to keep her feet and her grip on Feugh’s arm, which by now must have fingerprint bruises encircling it.
Feugh’s weight was pulling her down, so she guessed he had fallen, but it was so dark she couldn’t tell for sure. She heard some scrabbling sounds and imagined that soon she would feel a knife in her side. Instead there was a small spark and a torch blazed into life in the darkness. Feugh was holding it in his free hand. As her eyes adjusted Kiri saw that they were standing in a small chamber of a cave. The walls right next to her were shiny with the water that was dripping down from the rain above and she was standing in a small puddle, but the water didn’t extend to the dark opening in the chamber wall. Feugh led her through the opening into another chamber, this one large enough that the torchlight didn’t reach its boundaries. There were fascinating rock formations everywhere, but Kiri didn’t have time for them.
Ahead she could see the light of other torches. One, hung on a limestone column, cast light on Gilliam’s face, and glinted off a knife pressed against his throat. His eyes lifted towards the torch in Feugh’s hand and even at this distance Kiri could see anguished recognition in his face.
“Firebrand!” called the man holding the knife to Gilliam’s throat. It was him, the face from Kiri’s nightmares, the Untouchable. “Let the boy go or I will give your friend a new red smile.”
Gilliam’s shocked response echoed in the cave. “Firebrand?”
With the Untouchable’s knife pressed to Gilliam’s throat, Kiri didn’t have any choice but to obey him.
“I’m letting go.” She shoved Feugh, carrying his torch, forward and away from her, at the same time taking a giant step back into the shadows. Her instinct was good. An arrow struck right where she had been standing and skidded along the rock floor. Taking her best guess at where the arrow had been fired, she unleashed the full force of her lightning. The flash was followed by the crack and clatter of a stalactite falling. She could hear yelling and the scrambling of someone moving quickly. It seemed she had not hit her target exactly, but he probably wouldn’t be shooting at her anytime soon either. Especially since she was now standing in the dark.
“I still have a knife on your friend, Firebrand,” the Untouchable said. “It might be wiser to negotiate than attack my men.”
“It’s hard to negotiate with someone who is shooting at you,” Kiri said.
“Then let’s stop shooting,” the Untouchable said.
While he was speaking Kiri could hear the sounds of men moving all around her, and they seemed to be closing in. Could she really trust that they wouldn’t try for her again? Eventually one of them would find her, even if they didn’t shoot anymore. Feugh still stood with his torch casting a circle of light between her and the Untouchable. She couldn’t sneak past him. There weren’t any good choices. Kiri clenched her fist, bit her lip, and released a bolt right at the Untouchable. Just before it struck him it broke and spread out in a starburst of lightning as if it had struck an invisible, impenetrable wall.
The cave blew apart. The tremendous sound and light of the blast was replaced by complete darkness and a ringing in Kiri’s ears as a wave of hot air threw her backwards onto the ground. Small rocks and dust showered down on her.
Kiri gasped for breath and scrambled back to her knees. On hands and knees she crawled forward in the direction she hoped led toward Gilliam. The blast had been so disorienting she couldn’t be sure anymore. The torches had been blown out by the blast, and the ringing in her ears drowned out all other sounds. It made her feel completely alone, but she knew the cave was full of enemies. As she moved slowly, as much because the cave was now littered in rubble as because of the pitch blackness, she imagined the bandits groping over the fallen stalagmites too. They could be crawling along right next to her and she wouldn’t know it.
Her groping fingers found the softness of flesh where she had been expecting rock. She snatched her hand back, squeezing it shut, readying it for attack, but whoever she had touched did not react. Kiri waited for a few moments more, then hesitantly reached forward again. Before she could move on, she had to be sure this was not Gilliam.
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What she had first touched, it seemed, was an arm. She walked her fingers upward along the still flesh. When she reached the shoulder she found why the person had not reacted. It was warm and wet and sticky. Moving her hand, she found the wetness was seeping from a gash embedded in the hair. The hair was the wrong length for Gilliam, so Kiri wiped her hand off on the back of the shirt and went on.
Surely by now, someone was searching for her too. Kiri wondered why no one had lit a torch. Maybe they couldn’t find them. Or maybe they were all dead, like the one she had already found. Maybe Gilliam was dead too. Kiri crawled faster, although she scraped her knees in her haste.
She found another wrist, and this one was bound tightly with rope.
“Gilliam,” Kiri whispered. She squeezed his arm, trying to wake him but afraid to jostle him. He jerked away, and she lost him in the darkness.
“Gilliam!” Kiri said, louder. She groped forward, and gasped when Gilliam’s bound hands brushed her face. They moved back over her hair, enclosing her in the circle of his arms, then abruptly pulled her forward into a crushing hug. Gilliam had recognized her. She squeezed him back quickly, then slipped out of his arms. With shaking fingers, she went to work on the knots on his wrists. He would never be able to climb out of the cave bound like that. Not being able to see the knots made it exceptionally hard to undo them. Kiri drew the knife from her belt and started groping along the rope for a safe place to cut.
That was when someone finally lit a torch.
The light allowed Kiri to see the rope on Gilliam’s wrists clearly. She didn’t let the opportunity go, slashing it through with the knife before turning to see who had lit the torch.
It was one of the bandits, the terrifying one who had killed her mother. With him was one other bandit. Most of the rest were lying on the ground, but Kiri saw that at least two others were standing, although one was bleeding from his head. The Untouchable was on his feet, too, and he was unharmed.
The nearest bandit to her charged in immediately, brandishing his sword. Kiri hit him with a quick blast from her hand, aiming for his sword since she didn’t have time to build up a charge. He dropped the weapon and cursed, rubbing his hand. The other bandits, who had started towards her as well, hesitated. That gave Kiri the opportunity to hit one of them with another quick zap.
“Get her, quickly!” the Untouchable called. “Don’t let her prepare!”
Kiri hadn’t realized he knew so well how her power worked. She backed away as the bandits came on, GIlliam behind her. She balled her fist and squeezed tightly, but there wasn’t enough time. She unleashed her power as one of them lunged for her, belatedly realizing he was lunging with his empty hand. He ducked under the bolt, which struck one of the few remaining stalactites, sending it crashing to the floor.
His hand closed on Kiri’s arm, right behind her hand, and with his full weight pulled it to the ground. Kiri was dragged down to her knees. The hot meaty hand of the bandit was on top of her hand, crushing it and pressing her palm flat against the floor. She couldn’t use her power. She could hardly even move at all. She tried to twist away and found the face of her mother’s killer inches from her own. The third bandit, who seemed to be less interested in being in the thick of the fight, stood a little further back, now holding the torch.
The other bandits closed in. Kiri watched helplessly as one knocked Gilliam to the ground with a blow from the hilt of his sword.
The terrifying bandit who had pinned Kiri looked at the Untouchable, who still stood where the light had first shown him. “Shall we bring her to you, master?” He was yelling right by Kiri’s ear, setting her ear ringing again.
“No, no,” the untouchable yelled back. “Just kill her.”
Thick, strong fingers clamped onto Kiri’s hair and jerked her head down, exposing her neck. Kiri imagined a blade falling, cleaving her head from her neck. Abruptly she dropped to the ground, using the weight on her hand to shove back with her arms, sliding her legs out behind her.
She heard a sword go whistling past, and the stuttering step as her would-be executioner was thrown off balance. The other, her mother’s murderer, still pressed her hand to the ground, but his grip slipped enough to allow her to twist her hand and deliver a flash of power to his hand.
He cried out and his fingers spasmed. Kiri slipped immediately from his grasp and rolled, trying to get away. She squeezed her hand as tight as she could; the building light in her hand was blinding in the dim cave.
His face full of fury, the murderer threw himself at her, his knee pressing down on her chest preventing her escape while his uninjured hand groped for the sword hanging at his waist. His companion moved in to help, lunging for Kiri’s glowing hand with eyes full of fear, recognizing it for the danger it was.
Gasping for air against the weight on her chest, Kiri fought to focus. Just as the bandit was about to grab her arm she opened her hand and unleashed the light. This time she tried to bend her fingers to focus the power on just the two attackers near her. She was afraid if she wasn’t careful she might bring the roof of the cave down on them all. The bolts hit with a noise as loud and sharp as the nearest clap of thunder she had ever heard. The two bandits were blown away from her with the force of it. Kiri scrambled to her feet, looking around, preparing for another attack. The bandits were lying on the ground; spiderwebs of light crawled all over their skin before finally fading away. The other bandit still on his feet backed away toward the Untouchable, dropped his torch and fled toward the cave’s entrance.
The Untouchable hadn’t moved. His eyes betrayed the first flickerings of fear as he stared at the still bodies of his men. He drew his sword and smiled thinly at Kiri.
“I see I’ll have to kill you myself,” he said. The light from the dropped torch licked at the steel blade from below, making it look longer and more menacing.
“All I have to do is touch you, and you’ll be as finished as your men.” Kiri said.
His grin grew broader. “Haven’t you heard?” he said. “I’m Untouchable.” He moved his sword in slow arcs in the air in front of him. It looked aflame in the flickering torchlight.
Kiri racked her brain. She could think of nothing to do, no way to get past that sword and touch him without meeting the pointy end of the blade. If she was very, very fast she had a chance of getting past him, but she could hear Gilliam groaning on the ground behind her. There was no way she could get past dragging Gilliam, even if he could be coaxed to his feet, he wouldn’t be fast.
The Untouchable approached her slowly, smiling all the way. He could see she was trapped, frozen, and he seemed to be enjoying dragging it out.
There was no way to get both of them out, Kiri decided, but maybe if she got the Untouchable out of the way, then when Gilliam came to, he could get out by himself. She clenched her fist, so tightly she could feel her fingernails piercing the skin, and ran. The world narrowed to just her and the Untouchable, and the light in her hand. It was building blindingly bright, crackling, spidery lines of it filling the air around her hand. The heat was painfully intense, but what was the point of worrying about burning her hand now?
They closed. The Untouchable, his grin gone now, held his sword steadily, ready to impale Kiri on its point. Kiri brought her hand up, ready to press it against him and finish him as her last act in life.
Something whizzed past Kiri, striking the Untouchable’s sword arm, knocking it aside just enough that as Kiri slammed against him with the full force of her run and her hand, now open, pressed against his chest, the blade sliced only through her clothes. The built up energy was unleashed. The blast was white and hot and loud and when it was done, only Kiri was standing. The Untouchable lay at her feet, eyes wide open and staring. Kiri swung around. Gilliam was behind her on his knees. He had saved her life with a thrown rock.