Chapter Nine

“Hold, Captain Timaos! What is going on here?”

The lanky guard jerked at the authority in the voice, dropping Sula’s hood. The tension released, Sula lost her balance on the saddle and fell hard to the path below. She tried to catch herself, but her arms collapsed beneath her. As quickly as she smacked the cobblestone, she jumped up with a yelp. Blood ran from the cuts and bruises that ran along her forearms and she felt a deep sting in one of her wrists.

Kaleia had turned toward the unknown voice. Another guard sat atop a tall, trotting stallion made his way toward them, two impressive men at his flanks. He was broad in the shoulders. His greying brown hair was cut short above a kind but combat-scarred face. She recognized him as one of Philos’ men in the Divine Guard. In the commotion, Kaleia did not notice Sula’s fall until the bloodied cub had already rose and staggered a few steps away from her tall assailant.

“Kaleia? Is that you?” the kind guard shook his head in his astonishment. “Wall Captain Timaos, don’t you know who this is? What kind of trouble are you giving our leader’s wife? Let her be.”

“Divine Captain Zeteo,” said the experienced guard, all the smugness in his voice falling away, “I have been given orders from the Divine Prince, himself, not to let anyone through because of the fugitives who desecrated the sacred temple earlier today, sir.”

Divine Captain rode closer while his men stayed back. He pulled up a gallop behind the spot where Sula had retreated. She slinked even further away from the group, moving to the edge of the corral. The Divine Captain took no notice of the hooded girl. His attention was fixed solely on Captain Timaos.

“The Divine Prince has lifted those orders. The girl was killed earlier today. By her husband.” He pointed to Kaleia then continued, “And the father, he was hanged for all of Argonia to see. Slung up on the altar of the King.”

The disappointment of the Wall Captain seemed to press the air out of him and drain all of his enthusiasm for pestering Kaleia. “Oh,” he sighed. “I see.”

As for Kaleia, she drew her hand to her mouth in shock. All this time, though well aware of the trouble her brother-in-law had made for Argonia, Kaleia had never imagined Arktos would be killed, or even punished for that matter. As long as she had known the unwavering man, he had never once ceded in any matter. No matter the odds, Arktos fought and Arktos won. It was not in his nature to die. In that moment she could have screamed.

But Kaleia did not have to, for a high-pitched roar—a short, but firm crackle of anguish and accusation—was unleashed behind her. “Liar!”

Kaleia and the guards turned toward the source. Outside the coral, Sula stood at the feet of the Divine King Argus, brandishing a bronze dagger.

Her rabbid irises pulsed, as her pupils constricted and dilated in rhythm with her rapid heartbeat. The dagger felt hot to the touch from the sunny day, but her hands trembled as if they were freezing. Her body quaked, rejecting the poisonous news the Divine Guard had delivered.

The whole of Sula seemed pressed forward on the very tips of her sandals. Kaleia wondered if had a strong breeze blown against her niece in that moment, if the girl would have toppled. If someone had laid a loving hand upon her, would the girl have shattered completely?

Perhaps by divine providence a strong breeze did not blow against the cub at that moment and no one about was near enough to lay a hand on her, but rather the wind whipped up at her back, propelling her forward just in time to escape the oncoming rush of the mounted guards at her back. She leaped almost through time and space, faster than a ravenous tiger pouncing upon a startled hind. In a matter of moments she had reached the Divine Guard and plunged her dagger deep into flesh. However her dagger did not pierce the captain, but his stunning stallion.

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Sula drove through the poor beast’s neck, staining its silky black breast maroon. The wild girl was not spared the cascade of blood. It covered her bare forearm and drenched the shoulder of her cloak. Luckily her tunic underneath avoided the hot crimson. Still rivulets ran down her elbow and to the cobblestone below leaving her queasy. As the horse fell, its weight buckled its knees, and bucked its rider to the street, all of Sula’s resolve to fight drained away with the color of her cheeks.

Worse still, the Wall Guards before her and Divine Guards behind her had drawn their weapons. Without turning to face them, Sula felt the mounted guards’ pursuit. She could smell the dirt kicked up from their hooves on the churning winds. She could hear their hellbent galloping closing in on her. There was something else too, something familiar, something wild.

Before Sula were two paths, two threads woven by the Fates. She could charge ahead, straight into the guards of the wall and try her luck at cutting through them to the salvation beyond. But in doing so she would risk Kaleia getting caught up in the commotion. She would sooner give herself up for dead. Besides, there was no escape there. Even if she made it through the gate and out of the city of Argonia, she would still be an open target on the road, even easier to ride down and skewer.

So, Sula made the only real choice. The little cub made a dash for the stone wall. As she leapt the corral, she felt the nose-steam of one of the stallions on the back of her neck and heard the thunk of a sword sticking into the fence, just beside her hand. She scrabbled through the green field that spread out between her and the wall. The faster her sandals dug up the turf, the further away the walls seemed and the higher they rose.

As the guard pulled his sword free from the fence, another jumped his steed over. Before Sula had made even a quarter of the distance, both guards were again on her heels, so close she could almost feel the stinging reflection of the sun off their blades. The crazed child leaned forward, desperate to move faster.

For a brief second she looked back trying to catch a glimpse of her pursuers, but in doing so, she stumbled. Before she had fallen completely, she caught herself by digging her palms into the dirt and lurching off again and again. Halfway, the child’s muscles began to wear thin and her mouth began to foam from the strain. Sula looked more beast than girl.

Yet for every ounce of effort the child gave, the pursuing steeds had ten pounds to spare. The guards fell upon her and slashed at her. Though close, the girl’s crawl kept her a hair’s width out of range of their swords. They had no choice but command their stallions to trample the girl.

“Hyah!” One of the guards barked. At the whip of his reigns, the stallion lurched, galloping faster than its legs could handle. Sula yelped at the pounding of its hooves. The last of her resolve failing her, Sula fell into a roll and waited to join her father.

But death did not come for the cub. At the last possible moment when one more step forward would have fell hard on her chest, stealing away what little breath she could catch, the stallion reared up. With a frightful cry, the horse staggered away. In a second Sula was back on her hands and feet, crawling wildly for the wall.

She did not stop to wonder what had come to her aid. If she had any hope of escape, she did not have time to wonder. But whatever had saved her, it did so without faltering, for as she came to the wall and began to clamber up its impossibly steep incline, digging what was left of her nails into whatever gaps she could find between the stones, the guards’ pursuit ended. With that weight removed, Sula found herself flying up the wall like a golden-coated timber marten climbing a pine tree to reach its nest.

It did not take long before she reached the top. Pausing only to catch her breath, Sula took one last look over the land she had called her home. She saw the towering roof of the Water Goddess’ shrine as well as the spires of King Argus’ palace and the dark shadows they cast over the blighted city. She wondered if with a little effort she could make out the Altar of the King and the lifeless body of her papa hanging from it or if—as was the case with her own reported death—the Divine Guard had been mistaken. She shook the thought from her head.

Below, Sula found her aunt, crumpled on her back at the bottom of the corral fence. The cub could not distinguish the wrinkles of worry webbed across Kaleia’s forehead but could hear her shouting even from this distance which meant she was safe—or as safe as she could be in the presence of so many guards. Sula gave her a last, guilty smile. She knew her aunt would not see it.

As she sat, straddling the wall with her knees, Sula knew that this land would never be her home again. As long as she lived, she would never be safe here. Gone were the nights of lying in her papa’s arms by the fire and sharing the stories of the stars. Her father had told her once that the stars never looked quite the same when he was away as they did when he was home. She had not believed him. She would soon learn.

Sula turned away from her prison of a home and toward a more oppressive freedom. Hoping not to dwell on it, the cub wasted no more time. She scaled the other side of the wall and plunged into the overgrowth of trees below.