Graceling (Graceling Realm #1)(73)

“Do you think we could break the tree apart?” she asked. But then from inside the trunk came a small, shaky voice.

“Where is my mother?”

Katsa’s eyes snapped up to Po’s. They searched each other’s faces, uncertain; and then Po sighed, and nodded. Katsa turned back to the trunk. “Your mother is dead, Bitterblue.”

She waited for sobbing, screams. But instead there was a pause, and then the voice came again. Even smaller now.

“The king killed her?”

“Yes,” Katsa said.

There was another silence inside the tree. Katsa waited.

“Soldiers are coming,” Po muttered above her. “They’re minutes away.”

She didn’t want to fight these soldiers who carried Leck’s poison in their mouths; and they might not have to, if they could only get this child to come out.

“I can see that knife, Princess Bitterblue,” she said. “Do you know how to use it? Even a small girl can do a lot of damage with a knife. I could teach you.”

Po crouched down and touched her shoulder. “Thank you, Katsa,” he breathed, and then he was up again, stalking a few paces into the trees, looking around and listening for anything his Grace could tell him. And she understood why he thanked her, for the child was crawling her way out of the trunk. Her face appeared from the dimness, then her hands and shoulders. Her eyes gray and her hair dark, like her mother’s. Her eyes big, her face wet with tears, and her teeth chattering. Her fingers gripped tightly around a knife that was longer than her forearm.

She spilled out of the tree trunk and Katsa caught her and felt her cheeks and forehead. The child was shaking with cold. Her skirts were wet and clung to her legs; her boots were soaked through. She wore no coat or muffler, no gloves.

“Great hills, you’re frozen stiff,” Katsa said. She yanked off her own coat and pulled it down over the child’s head.

She tried to pull Bitterblue’s arms through the sleeves, but the girl wouldn’t loosen her grip on the knife. “Let it go for a minute, child. Just a second. Hurry, there are soldiers coming.” She pried the knife from the girl’s fingers and fastened the coat into place. She handed the knife back. “Can you walk, Bitterblue?” The girl didn’t answer, but swayed, her eyes unfocused.

“We can carry her,” Po said, suddenly at Katsa’s side. “We must go.”

“Wait,” Katsa said. “She’s too cold.”

“Now. This instant, Katsa.”

“Give me your coat.”

Po tore off his bags, his quiver and bow. He tore off his coat and threw it to Katsa. She tugged the coat over Bitterblue’s head, wrestled with the fingers around the knife again. She pulled the hood over the girl’s ears and fastened it tight. Bitterblue looked like a potato sack, a small, shivering potato sack with empty eyes and a knife. Po tipped the girl over his shoulder and they gathered their things. “All right,” Katsa said. “Let’s go.”

They ran south, stepping on pine needles and rock whenever they could, leaving as little sign of their passage as possible. But the ground was too wet, and the soldiers were quick on their mounts. Their trail was too easy to follow, and before long Katsa heard branches breaking and the thud of horses’ hooves.

Po? How many of them?

“Fifteen,” he said, “at least.”

She breathed through her panic. What if their words confuse me?





His voice was low. “I wish I could fight them alone, Katsa, and out of your hearing. But it would mean us

separating, and right now there are soldiers on every side of us. I won’t risk your being found when I’m not there.”

Katsa snorted. Nor will I allow you to fight fifteen men alone.

“We must kill as many of them as possible,” Po said, “before they’re close enough for conversation. And hope that once they’re under attack they’re not very talkative. Let’s find a place to hide the girl. If they don’t see her they’re less likely to speak of her.”

They tucked the child behind rocks and weeds, inside a niche at the base of a tree. “Don’t make a sound, Princess,”

Katsa said. “And lend me your knife. I’ll kill one of your father’s men with it.” She took the knife from the girl’s uncomprehending fingers.

Po, Katsa thought, her mind racing. Give me the knives and the daggers. I’ll kill on first sight.

Po pulled two daggers from his belt and a knife from each boot and tossed them to her, one by one. She collected the blades together; he readied the bow and cocked an arrow. They crouched behind a rock and waited, but there wasn’t long to wait. The men came through the trees, moving quickly on their horses, their eyes skimming the ground for tracks. Katsa counted seventeen men. I’ll go right, she thought grimly to Po. You go left. And with that she stood and hurled a knife, and another and another; Po’s arrow flew, and he reached for another. Katsa’s knives and daggers were embedded in the chests of five men, and Po had killed two, before the soldiers even comprehended the ambush.

The bodies of the dead slumped from their horses to the ground, and the bodies of the living jumped after them, pulling swords from sheaths, yelling, screaming unintelligibly, a mindful one or two drawing arrows. Katsa ran toward the men; Po continued shooting. The first came at her with wild eyes and a screeching mouth, swinging his sword so erratically that it was no trouble for Katsa to dodge the blade, kick another rushing man in the head, pull the first man’s dagger from his belt, and stab them both in the neck. She kept the dagger, grabbed a sword, and came out swinging.