The Glass Arrow(70)

My gaze slides up and meets his, and for a moment everything else goes away—the city, the birds chirping in the trees, everything. My breath catches. It feels like it’s just us two, like we’re the only ones in these mountains. And I feel it happen—silent and soft as a feather, a piece of my soul becomes his.

“We have to keep moving,” I say, tearing my eyes away. “I’ll walk.”

“I’m fine—”

“I’ll walk.” I need to move my legs again, they’re cramping up. And I need some space. With everything that’s happened, I’m not thinking straight.

I belong to no one. Kiran’s all right, more than all right. I owe him for what he’s done, but that doesn’t make him entitled to own any part of me.

As I move, Daphne’s cheek slides off the back of my shoulder and she jolts awake.

“I need a pill,” she says after a moment. “I’m hungry.”

Kiran’s holding Dell’s headstall, smoothing her forelock over the star between her eyes and whispering something I can’t make out.

“There’s one in the bottle,” I tell her, sliding to the ground. She’s sitting behind the saddle and fishes the dirty, crackling plastic out of the leather bag.

“There’s something all over it.”

I don’t have to look back to know she’s making a sour face.

“Bloodroot,” I tell her. “I found some in the solitary yard and dried it.”

“Of course you did,” she mutters.

Brax emerges from a nearby brush, feathers still stuck to his damp jaw. His tail curves happily. I knew he’d like it out here.

“Daphne is what they call you?” I hear Kiran ask. “Like the flower, right?”

“We’re all named after flowers,” she says tentatively as he checks Dell’s girth.

“Not all of us,” I say. Some of us are named after weeds.

“They got it wrong,” he tells her. “They should have called you Strawberry.”

Her cheeks glow to match her red hair. Mine do, too.

“Strawburries are plants, not flowers,” I say. I don’t know why he’s being nice to her. She hates Drivers.

“You can…” she swallows, and deliberately lowers her voice to a more husky tone. “You can call me whatever you like.”

She moves her leg so that it skims his arm while he tightens the leather strap around the horse’s ribs.

I snort and look to Kiran for proof that she’s being ridiculous, but he’s grinning like a fool.

Brax’s growl distracts me. He’s lowered to a crouch, staring behind us into the shadowed woods. Kiran and I share a quick glance before he unhooks the bow from over his shoulder.

“What is it, Brax?” I whisper, straining my ears.

“What’s going on?” Daphne says.

I lick my dry lips, listening, hearing every bird whistle, every crackling branch. I pull the bow from over my shoulder and notch an arrow. I’ve only got three—the loaded quiver is with Kiran—so I better make them count.

Like thunder from across the skies, the sound reaches me. Hoofbeats. Moving fast.

I look to Kiran. He tilts his head north, in the direction of Glasscaster.

Trackers.

His hand is on my arm then and he’s trying to hoist me onto Dell, but I squirm away.

“You can ride,” I say. “If they see the horse we’re done for. Take Daphne and get out of here!”

“Clover?” Daphne’s voice is thin. Kiran looks at me for a long moment before removing a handful of arrows from the leather quiver over his shoulder and shoving them in my direction.

“Stay high,” he says. “Don’t shoot one unless you can shoot them all.”

An instant later he’s thrown his leg over Dell’s withers, and they’re gone.

*

I DON’T BOTHER RUNNING after them. I make for high land, just as Kiran said. On the way I snag an armful of dead leaves and shake them over my path, walking backwards. I hope it’s enough to cover my tracks. Then I find a high tree, thread my arm through the bow, and get to climbing.

“Hide, Brax,” I order when I reach the lowest branch. He whines up at me, and then lopes away. I wish he would go farther, but I can see him, twenty paces off, ears perked towards the north and the oncoming danger.

They arrive quickly, before the fear has time to poison my blood. Three men on horseback. All Virulent thugs. I can see their X’s from here. I look down on them from my position three stories up, in the split in the tree trunk. My arrow is notched and ready to fly.

I will not be taken this time. Not when I know what awaits me in the city.

One’s wearing checkered pants and has grease smeared on his shirt. The other two are in dark gray, with knit hats covering their hair.

“Prints turn that way,” says Checkered Pants. Looks like he’s the leader.

One of the others dabs at his mouth with the collar of his shirt.

“I should be sleeping,” he grumbles.

“Then go knock off,” counters the third. “I’ll take your share of that reward Gray was talking about.”

“Greer,” corrects Checkered Pants. “The mayor’s going to stretch his neck when he realizes his kid’s favorite toy went missing.”