Song of Blood & Stone (Earthsinger Chronicles #1)(28)
The cold daylight of early afternoon greeted them at the end of the path, and they left the mountain behind, stepping back onto familiar territory.
But all was not well.
Acrid smoke assaulted his nostrils. The Keeper beside him clutched at her chest and sank to her knees. Alarmed, Jack searched out the other armed Keepers, all of whom looked equally affected. Their faraway expressions indicated they were using Earthsong.
Anxious murmurs rippled through the Lagrimari. He offered aid to the collapsed woman, but she brushed him off. Unease gripped him as he rushed to Jasminda’s side.
Seeing her eyes well with tears, he grabbed hold of her shoulder. “What’s happened?”
She shook her head and pointed through the thicket of trees. Just a few hundred metres away stood the Lagrimari settlement of Baalingrove, where he’d first met Darvyn.
Or at least that was where it used to stand. Thick smoke now billowed from that direction, and Jack’s gut filled with lead.
“I can feel them dying,” Jasminda whispered, looking toward the smoke in horror.
He tried to convince the elders to stay behind, near the caves, to let him and the armed Keepers investigate, but they wouldn’t be persuaded.
“We go together,” Gerda told him simply, and would say no more.
“People are dying. There is danger near,” he said.
Turwig patted his arm. “There is danger everywhere, son. Who’s to say it won’t find us here, as well?”
With a shake of his head, Jack led the way, two of the Keepers at his sides, their rifles drawn. An armed Lagrimari on Elsiran land would be trouble, but his warnings fell on deaf ears. He did have authority here, though these people did not know it, and the fact that he had no idea what they were dealing with set him on edge. Pistol drawn, he exited the thicket for his first glimpse of what remained of the settlement.
He had last been to Baalingrove only a few weeks before. As always, he’d been struck by the living conditions of the settlers: makeshift wooden shacks with leaky tin roofs, tiny patches of garden, no running water, no electricity. The men survived mainly due to the kindness of the Sisterhood, a charity comprised of devoted followers of the Queen, who provided food and supplies. Neither the Prince Regent nor the Council saw fit to do any more, and the Elsirans as a whole preferred to pretend the settlers didn’t exist.
If he’d been a betting man, he would have wagered the place couldn’t look worse than it had when he’d left, but he would have lost. Now, charred husks replaced the shacks. Gardens lay scorched with the white crystals of what he guessed to be salt coating the barren earth. More than one blackened body lay smoldering in the dirt. He looked back at the children, wishing they weren’t seeing this, but the mothers made no move to hide the eyes of the young ones. They took in the gruesome sight without comment.
“What happened here?” Jasminda said from just behind him.
He had only an inkling, but before he could respond, angry voices rent the air, shouting in Elsiran. He couldn’t make out the words but recognized the heavy borderlander accent. Gunshots rang out.
“For Sovereign’s sake, get the children back!” he hissed.
He shared a glance with Rozyl, who pursed her lips and made a hand signal to one of her crew. The man peeled off and helped direct the mothers and children to squat behind the wall of a mostly intact shack.
Jack and the armed Keepers remained on the main path, along with Jasminda and the elders.
“Go with them,” he told Jasminda. She merely rolled her eyes and cocked her pistol.
The voices came from the edge of the settlement, on the other side of a grouping of smoldering lean-tos. As they approached, gunfire continued to pop and the shouting grew louder. Jack saw movement from the corner of his eye; a Lagrimari woman was huddled with two children behind the wreckage of a building. She was not part of the group that came through the mountain with him. Her eyes grew wide when she saw him, confusion crossing her features as she took in his companions.
Rozyl bent to speak with her. “What happened here?”
“There was some trouble in the town, I think. A girl went missing. Her father got it in his head that one of the settlers took her, and a mob of farmers came here to search.” The woman’s eyes kept darting to Jack. He took a few steps back, aware that, to her, he must look like one of the men who attacked this place.
“Are you injured? You should try to get to safety.” Rozyl’s voice was softer and kinder than he’d heard it before.
“My boy’s back there. He wanted to fight with the men. I can’t leave him.” She pointed toward the battle.
“Not even for the safety of these little ones?” Jasminda said. The solemn faces of two boys, each under five, stared up at them.
“We made it out together. I won’t lose one of them now.”
Jack’s heart stung for the woman. “Are you a refugee?” he asked. She shrank back at his voice, her face twisted in fear. Her gaze, full of questions, shot to Rozyl.
“He’s—” Rozyl looked back at Jack and shrugged “—with us.”
The mother’s expression was still rigid with suspicion. “We crossed with ten others three days ago, but I don’t know what became of them once the fighting started.”
Jack broke away to investigate, only dimly aware of the others trailing behind him. A turn in the road revealed a makeshift barricade erected out of pieces of tin, planks and boards, wheels, furniture, and other miscellaneous items. It was flimsy but blocked the mouth of the dirt road.