Fat raindrops rapped on Tarir-del's helmet in a maddening percussion, and he tugged it off and hung it from his saddle. The wig was heavy and filled with water, and he ripped that off too and tossed it into the mud. Behind him, the others did the same, and the wigs littered the muddy road like small, drowned animals.

Tarir-del wiped his face, the powder smearing on his hand. “Water falling from the sky was a dream for us; did we ever know it would feel so wretched?”

His lieutenant frowned at the miserable landscape. “It brings decay to everything; I smell the rot in the air with every breath. To think that we spent a thousand years trying to get back to this. Perhaps what the remainers say is true: that the echo was a sanctuary, and this was the very hell we escaped from.”

Tarir-del repressed a shudder. He was at least ten years older than the leiutenant and had been alive long before the breaking. His faction was confined to the high places, where the shrieking winds of madness still roamed. “No, this is our salvation; we must master it and ourselves.”

And he would master it by destroying Myam-tal and taking over his network of spies. The suffering of this journey was worth such a prize.

“Rider!” came the call from the rear, and Tarir-del raised a gloved hand to call the halt.

The rider pulled up hard next to Tarir-del, swiftly pulling off his helmet and tossing his ragged wig into a puddle.

“My Lord, two groups came to the village.”

Tarir-del gripped the reins so hard that his knuckles cracked. They were behind them! Had they watched them enter the village? “Describe them.”

“The first were the leybound abominations that we encountered on the road; they number thirty and were led by a tall man in a blue uniform.”

“And the second?”

“Mounted and numbering twenty. They wear green and white tabards. Their leader–”

“Is a tall arcanist with fair hair,” Tarir-del concluded, and the rider nodded.

“Come, we must ride hard. Do not spare the whip; I would kill every horse in the land to reach them!”

“My Lord!” the rider cried. “They are gone. They stayed only moments and went east into the hills.”

Damn this accused arcanist! He had only caught a glimpse of him before that abomination of a woman appeared from nowhere and attacked them, but the man seemed soft, a gentleman of leisure. And now he had joined forces and fled to the hills with these leybound, who had survived two cavalry charges.

Find this and other great novels on the author's preferred platform. Support original creators!

A fat rain dropped into his collar and ran down his back. “Bring me the prisoner.”

The leybound groaned as he was dragged forward. He had walked behind Drone-del's horse all day, and he swayed on the spot, the brand on his chest angry and blackened.

“Water.” His voice was broken. His eyes were down, and he took a shuddering breath.

“Tell me about these leybound,” Tarir-del asked.

“Please.”

“Give him water,” Tarir-del snapped. He had clearly miscalculated the leybounds constitution. If he died, Bimil-pal would demand restitution.

The leybound suckled at the flask that Drone-del held, and Tarir-del resisted the urge to turn away from the pathetic display.

“You have an opportunity to be useful, leybound. Do not waste it.”

“Yes, my lord,” the leybound replied, his head bent in supplication.

Tarir-del felt a savage satisfaction at the display; it was a victory that made even the rank surroundings more bearable.

“The leybound are led by a tall man in a blue uniform. What do you know of him?”

The leybound made a sound of disgust. “He is called Riot. He is a sergeant, the one that activated the hedron; he did this to me.” The leybound raised a hand to the empty eye socket. “He must be the agent sent by the wikkan.”

“Will he serve an arcanist?”

“He is a simple soldier; he will follow orders; it’s all he knows.”

“Take him away,” Tarir-del said.

The leybound resisted. “My Lord. Let me go through the hills. I can hunt Riot and push him through to you on the road. Give me my vengeance, and I will serve.”

He looked like he would barely make it a few miles, but there was a spark of anger when he spoke about this blue uniformed man as his vengeance gave him fire. Perhaps Tarir-del could use that to make him loyal? Loyal to him and a weapon to use against Myam-tal.

The problem was that his own officers were pampered and weak—too weak to be trusted to endure through the hills. And he wasn’t ready to unchain this leybound dog just yet.

“My Lord, I can push them right into your force,” the leybound said.

“I said take him away!” Tarir-del snapped. “Take him away and muzzle him.”

Drone-del wrapped a huge arm around the leybound’s face and dragged him back down the road, punishing him with blows of his fist.

Tarir-del pulled out the map, and the fat raindrops splashed on it. The road that they were on was barely marked. Little more than a washed-out wagon track, but in the hills to the south, all the way east to Morbian, the map showed nothing at all, just a blank space. Death, starvation, suffering? But in there somewhere lay the road to becoming Bimil-pals second in command, glory for him and his house, and ruin for Myam-tal.

“I will go through the hills with a small force. You will take the road to the east, and we will trap them between us,” Tarir-del instructed his lieutenant as he traced the thin line of the road all the way around the base of the hills. “You have two days. I don’t care if you kill every horse and arrive on foot. You will watch the hills, and when they come down, we shall trap them between us.”