Book 2 - Chapter 20

Every minute that nothing happened made Noah feel the tension mount. Even though he couldn’t see much through the small holes they’d cut in the sides of the wooden crates he sat in, he could hear the creaking axle of the carriage and the dray beast’s hooves just fine. The sounds grated on his nerves like nails on a chalkboard, forcing him to grit his teeth. As much as he wanted to tune it out, he couldn’t — his pre‑battle anxiety made him overanalyze every noise, wondering if each one signaled the start of a fight.

I’d almost rather this start sooner so we can get it over with.

To distract himself, he checked his weapons again. His trusty crossbow lay across his lap, fitted with a full magazine of bolts. A second magazine was clipped to a custom holster on his belt, with several more tucked neatly into the backpack on the floor beside him, next to his grappling hook and the knife he’d borrowed from Bryn what felt like a lifetime ago.

Once satisfied everything was in place, he moved on to his newest piece of equipment: the bandolier slung across his chest. At the top sat several round metal containers. He’d spent the first few hours of the trip practicing the motion needed to hit the tiny switch that opened them, repeating it until his muscles memorized it and he could do it in less than half a second with his eyes closed.

Below the containers were four holstered darts, each tipped with a deadly toxin Ken had carefully mixed and applied. The knowledge that they could kill him as easily as anyone else had convinced him to add a pair of black leather gloves to his armor. He’d tested them beforehand, ensuring they were thick enough to stop a dart’s point but thin enough to preserve his dexterity.

The final piece to check was his armour. He’d left his student cloak at the visitor’s house, trading it for his travelling coat with the brigandine beneath. When Mara saw his cloth pants, she insisted he take a pair of black padded leather ones instead, giving his legs an extra layer of protection. Before they left, Ken had also insisted they each don black balaclavas so neither his pale skin nor Ciri’s pink hair would give away their position once they were in the forest.

His gear check complete, he sighed and peered through one of the holes in the crate, trying to spot Piper flying overhead. Her near‑invisibility in the darkness gave him the confidence to let her fly free during the trip, but it also made it impossible to keep track of her. After a few minutes he gave up and glanced toward the man driving their carriage.

In many ways, the “guards” Mara had brought reminded him of how Lucien described the special operations soldiers he’d served with on Earth: quiet professionals. Each one was completely unassuming, followed her orders without complaint, and spoke in clipped, efficient sentences. If not for his training with Ken, Noah never would have noticed the expertise with which they’d checked and maintained their equipment before leaving Crownspire, nor the subtle way they carried themselves.

Here’s hoping they’re as good as I think they are.

A slight thud beside him snapped him out of his thoughts. He instantly recognized the sound of scratching claws against the crate’s side and sat up, peering through one of the air holes. When a pair of green eyes stared back at him, he spoke in a low voice.

“Piper? What’s going on?”

She squawked and nodded toward the trees ahead.

“Ambush there?”

She bobbed her head.

He tested the crate’s lid to make sure it would open quickly, then called out to the crate beside him. “Ciri! Piper says the ambush is in those trees up ahead. Pass the word on.”

“Understood,” Ciri answered.

In hushed tones the message traveled forward to the driver. To Noah’s surprise, the man’s posture remained completely relaxed even as he carefully drew his sword from its scabbard. He turned to ensure the carriage behind them saw the motion; their driver nodded subtly before reaching down.

Satisfied the message had been passed on, Noah looked back at Piper. “You’d better get in the air.”

She growled at him, refusing to move.

“No, it’s not that I’m trying to protect you. I want you in the air, watching over us. If one of us gets into trouble, you can swoop in and catch them unprepared.”

She blinked several times, then nodded and launched herself upward again.

The knowledge that they’d soon be attacked somehow calmed Noah’s nerves instead of heightening them. His gaze swept over his equipment one last time, running through a mental inventory. Then he closed his eyes, listening, wondering whether the signal to begin would be subtle, and deliberately slowed his breathing.

“Stop right there!” a new voice shouted from up ahead.

Well, that wasn’t very subtle.

“You’re surrounded! Give us all your valuables or we’ll kill you real slow!” the voice continued.

“Now!” the guard at the front of the carriage barked.

Noah shot to his feet, tossing the top of the crate aside just as the world around him erupted into chaos.

From the carriage behind them, half a dozen guards burst from their crates, hit the ground running, and charged straight toward the bandits in the treeline. Unfortunately for him, he didn’t have time to watch the result, as several more Tollmen charged toward the carriage from his right. The cold rage inside him returned as he leveled his crossbow, took careful aim, and pulled the trigger.

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Aim. Pull. Pump. Aim. Pull. Pump.

The rhythm was automatic. In seconds he emptied his magazine, killing six and wounding two more. As he reloaded, he heard the chime of magic beside him, followed by a strangled cry as another man dropped his spear, collapsed to his knees, and clamped his hands over his ears as if trying to block out an unbearable sound.

“The conduits! Get the conduits!” someone shouted.

Glancing behind him, Noah saw that Mara was well defended. The men charging her were met with a single iron nail sailing through the air. It looked unimpressive as a weapon, but he watched it bury itself unerringly into temples, eyes, and necks — killing instantly before ripping free and seeking another target.

Next to him, though, Ciri was another story. Her face was a mask of concentration, eyes narrowed at the kneeling man, forcing him into a fetal curl. Even though the golden runes and the chime had faded, she was clearly still casting — and therefore vulnerable to the man advancing from the opposite treeline.

Not on my fucking watch, Noah thought, popping open one of the round metal containers on his bandolier.

When he’d explained to Mara a few days earlier that he wanted to make a weapon out of chicken eggs and firevine powder, she’d looked at him like he’d lost his mind. Pulling the fragile egg from the container and taking careful aim, he hoped she wasn’t right. As the man closed to within ten meters, he finally looked up at Noah, confusion flickering across his face at the white orb in Noah’s hand.

Noah whipped the egg as hard as he could, hitting him square in the chest. A cloud of red powder burst outward, blinding him instantly. He clawed at his burning eyes and screamed as Noah reached down, grabbed a second magazine, and reloaded his crossbow.

Aim. Pull. Pump.

Seeing no more immediate threats, he turned his attention back to the fight near Mara. The guards she’d brought proved themselves every bit the “quiet professionals” he’d suspected — carving through the bandits as if they were an inconvenience rather than an enemy. Every movement spoke volumes about their training, something he’d learned to recognize through hours of painful lessons with Ken.

When this is over, I’ve gotta ask Mara why her family needs some of the best swordsmen I’ve ever seen.

A few seconds later, the bandits apparently reached the same conclusion. Almost as one, they broke and ran for the forest. Mara and the guards cut several down as they fled, thinning their numbers even further.

“Don’t follow them into the trees!” Mara ordered, her voice booming over the din.

Noah almost felt sorry for what happened next.

One by one, screams echoed from the forest before being abruptly silenced. Noah tracked them as they moved slowly from left to right, each one a little farther away. Nearly two minutes passed after the last scream before Ken emerged from the treeline, dressed entirely in black with his knife held loosely in one hand.

He nodded to Noah, then produced a pair of manacles from his pocket and jogged toward the man Ciri had held immobilized throughout the engagement. She exhaled and looked down as Ken slid the iron bindings into place before the Tollman could recover from the mental assault.

Before Noah could join them for the impending interrogation, Piper appeared at his side again.

“What is it, girl?” he asked.

She growled, then nodded farther up the road.

“Someone got away?”

She squawked.

He climbed out of the crate he’d been standing in and turned to Ciri. “I’m going to hunt them down. We can’t risk word getting back to their camp. If I’m not back in ten minutes, send help.”

She held his gaze for a long moment, then nodded. “Be careful.”

Piper took to the air as he vaulted to the ground and jogged toward the trees. He lowered his crossbow, trading readiness for speed, trusting that in their panic he’d hear them before they heard him. When they breached the treeline, she landed on a branch ahead, hopping from one to the next to guide him deeper into the forest.

After only two minutes of running, Piper stopped abruptly. Noah raised his crossbow and slowed. She looked at him with wide green eyes, then nodded toward a dense bush ahead. Ken’s training kicked in as he calmed his breathing, listened, and observed.

That’s blood on the leaves, he realized when the shifting canopy let in just enough light. Whoever’s in there is injured.

“Shut the fuck up or I’ll kill you myself,” a voice hissed from ahead.

“I can’t! It hurts so fucking bad,” another voice answered.

“You’re the one who ran into the fucking greysting bush.”

“I didn’t do it on purpose!” the second voice shot back, groaning. “Those people would’ve killed me if I stayed!”

“Who the fuck were they?” a third, panicked voice asked. “They were supposed to be traders, not… whatever the fuck that was.”

“I don’t fucking know,” the first voice growled.

“What do we do?” the third voice asked again.

“Stick to the plan. We stay here two more minutes to see if anyone else survived. Then we go back to Aveyra and tell her what happened.”

Aveyra, Noah thought, gritting his teeth. Sounds like someone I’m going to be meeting later tonight.

Moving slowly and silently, Noah crept around the edges of the bush, trying to find a better angle from which to attack. When he realized he couldn’t, he calmly ran through his options, searching for the best approach. A plan formed as he glanced up at Piper, perched on a branch overhead and coiled to strike.

Locking eyes with her, he nodded — slow and deliberate. She backed up a few steps, an expression that looked dangerously like a grin spreading across her face. When she flared her wings, Noah’s gaze flicked back toward the bandits, his breathing steadying, his focus sharpening.

She struck a heartbeat later, dropping from the trees into the bush. The screaming started almost instantly, and two of the Tollmen bolted straight toward Noah. He pulled the trigger and killed the first without hesitation, pumping his crossbow as fast as he could to sight the second.

He held his fire when Piper scrambled across the man’s head, raking her talons across his neck and opening his jugular. The bandit’s hands shot upward as Piper leapt off, flapping hard to return to the branch she’d occupied moments earlier. Noah’s eyes widened when he saw the man was already bleeding from his eyes, claw marks carved across his face.

Then he pitched forward and hit the dirt.

Noah watched the unmoving body for a few more seconds before creeping forward into the bush toward the only remaining survivor. He followed the whimpering sounds until he found a bandit lying on the ground, deep cuts torn through his brown leather armour and into his arms and legs. The man’s eyes went wide the moment he saw Noah, and he grabbed for the knife sheathed at his belt.

Ken’s training took over. Noah stepped in quickly, kicked the knife out of his hand, and leveled his crossbow. “Move and you’re dead.”

“Who… who the fuck are you?” the man whispered, face draining of colour.

“No.” Noah’s voice was flat as Piper dropped from the trees and landed lightly on his shoulder. “That’s not how this works. I’m going to ask you questions, and you’re going to answer them.”

“A‑and… if I answer them… you let me go?” he whimpered.

Noah’s jaw tightened. “Did you let any of your victims go? Did you let my brother go?”

The look on the man’s face told him everything he needed to know.

“If you answer truthfully, I’ll kill you quickly. If you don’t, I use this crossbow to pin you to the ground and get one of our conduits to heal you while my griffon eats you alive. It’ll drag on, excruciatingly, for a very long time.”

The man gulped audibly. “W‑what do you want to know?”