The Outcast (Summoner #4)(93)

Uhtred stared at the dozens of soldiers shivering on the floor outside, and the waxen-faced Edmund collapsed in Alice’s lap.

“Come in,” he said, his face a picture of shock.

“About bloody time,” Rotter growled. He hurried to Edmund and lifted the boy onto his shoulder, then barged past Uhtred into the room behind. Arcturus followed, and the soldiers piled in, thanking Uhtred with the exaggerated gratefulness of men on the edge of despair.

But Arcturus was not listening. Because he was staring at a roaring fire, and the heat was the most blessed thing he had ever felt in his life. He fell to his knees and spread his arms, while Rotter laid Edmund out beside him.

“Some warmth and rest will do him good,” Rotter said, brushing the hair from the boy’s forehead. “And some soup.”

Arcturus took a few moments to let the feeling seep to his extremities again, before turning to see Uhtred standing morosely among the men who had crowded into what appeared to be a forge.

Metal tools and implements lay in neat rows on wooden benches, and half-finished weapons and armor were stacked like kindling in wooden boxes around the room. In the center, where Arcturus was now warming his back, an enormous furnace roared within a metal pipe that extended into the ceiling. On the opposite side of the room, a door identical to the one they had just entered from was built into the wall.

“What’s wrong with Edmund?” Uhtred said, hurrying over and kneeling beside the stricken noble.

“He was hurt fighting the orcs, and the summoners couldn’t heal him,” Rotter said. “The skull may be fractured.”

“It may be brain swelling,” Uhtred said, stroking his beard with a worried expression. “The cold from outside has probably helped with that, but he’s too weak to cool him any further. We must give him rest—there’s nothing else we can do for him now.”

Arcturus was finally able to take a look at the dwarf. It was strange, but the dwarf was taller than Ulfr, reaching as high as Arcturus’s chest. His arms were heavily muscled, and his shoulders as broad as two men standing side by side. But despite his beard, he looked young. Arcturus would have been surprised if Uhtred was much older than himself.

“What are you doing here? Did you say he was injured by an orc? And who are all these men?” Uhtred asked.

He was looking furtively at the men around him, as if he was already questioning his decision to let them in. Arcturus doubted he would have, had Edmund not been with them.

Nobody replied to the dwarf; instead Sergeant Caulder slammed the door shut and twisted the metal wheel that kept it locked into place. Then the tired man collapsed to the ground and put his face in his hands.

“We did it,” the sergeant said. “Goddamn but we kept you safe. It’s a bloody miracle.”

Arcturus smiled and hugged Sacharissa close. It was true. They were finally safe.





CHAPTER

55

THEY SAT IN A circle in front of the fire. Arcturus, the nobles, the two dwarves and the three sergeants. As for the soldiers, most lay sleeping, scattered like dolls on a nursery floor. Snores permeated the room as if it were occupied by an orchestra of broken wind instruments. Of the nobles, only Edmund and Alice did not join their war council, instead resting in a makeshift bed of furs and leathers in the corner.

“How’s Edmund?” Uhtred asked as Rotter came back from checking on the stricken noble.

The dwarf was still in a state of shock from what Rotter had told him of the nobles’ escape, and they were the first words he had spoken in quite some time.

“Well enough,” Rotter said, his mouth half-full. “He’s talking normally again, and Alice is feeding him. Thank you, by the way.”

He waved a hunk of bread in the air as he sat down. Uhtred had disappeared upstairs soon after they arrived and had returned with enough bread and cheese to feed a small army … which indeed it had. There was water enough from a tank in the corner, one Uhtred used for dousing when he did his metalwork.

Crawley had been tied to the tank, while Sacharissa kept watch over him. She snarled if he so much as even twitched, so the man lay perfectly still, his eyes darting around the room.

“How’s it going over here?” Rotter asked.

In the center of their circle sat a pair of scrying crystals, and the group had been watching them in relative silence for the past few minutes. Even with two crystals, it was not easy for everyone to see, but the image was clear enough from Arcturus’s vantage.

Valens was on the move with a note that Prince Harold had written. Now the Mite flitted from rooftop to rooftop, observing the streets below.

To Arcturus’s surprise, they seemed relatively calm. In fact, few people wandered the streets at all, and those that did seemed to be in a hurry. It was as if a curfew had been put in place.

The morning light was still barely blushing the horizon, for it was still the early hours. But one thing did seem out of place. The great pillars of smoke, scattered across the sky.

“Something happened last night,” Prince Harold said. “Rioting? Or an invasion from the soldiers.”

“They were told to head to Corcillum,” Sergeant Caulder said. “But who knows what orders they received when they got here.”

“I know,” said the third sergeant. He was seated between Sergeant Caulder and Sergeant Percival, a round-faced man who had barely spoken since they had left Vocans. He had introduced himself as Daniels, but volunteered little more until that moment.