Chapter Thirty-Five. The Air Assault.
Thirty-Five
The Air Assault.
In spite of the galloping speed and my utter lack of purchase, I’ve got to regain my seat if I’m going to help Merc.
Throwing my hand out, I manage to lock a grip on the pommel, and then I don’t know how, but I drag myself back up and into balance on the saddle.
There’s no time to catch my breath, no time to capture the other stirrup.
As if it’s second nature, I haul the horse around and stay fused with my seat. The chestnut bucks and rears as it gets an idea of what I’m going to ask it to do, still I wind a grip into its mane, squeeze my thighs, and dig my heels into its flanks.
The great black bird attacking Merc is a horrible sight, as if all of the shadows in the dry lakebed have coalesced into one menace, but he’s an equal force as he wields the broadsword in a great heave at just the right time.
Sparks flash and scatter as talons meet forged steel, and the bird angles off—only to promptly return.
Merc is ready for it. He twirls around, black leather surcoat flaring out, his raven hair like the great vulture’s feathers.
Another strike, another parry. More sparks.
And I’m still so far away.
The horse fights me, and keeping us on track to intersect the fight is a battle of my own—especially as there’s another round of metal lightning, those viciously sharp talons streaking along the broadsword’s blade.
Heart in my throat, I pray for Merc’s strength as his arms bulge from the effort to hold off the attack.
I have no thought of my own safety as I thunder to him, and also no plan—
The bird swoops down once again, and Merc manages to nick its belly just before he must duck and roll to avoid having his head severed from his spine by a slash of those knifed feet.
A great cry of frustration rings out from the bird, and there’s no pause for Merc to get back up and reset his position.
I can see what’s going to happen. As he rolls over to defend himself, the bird’s going to go for his belly.
And rip him open like what happened to those cows.
I yank back on the reins, and as the horse lets out a whinny of terror, I don’t understand why the black-winged attacker doesn’t seem to notice us.
It only has eyes for Merc—
And that’s when I see the air beast’s feral stare in my peripheral vision. Though I cannot—and will not—get a full picture of its eyes, they seem to be just planes of white in slits of black.
That are locked on the flashing of the broadsword.
The bird is all but blind, and every time the sunlight catches Merc’s blade, it knows where he is. That’s what brought the scourge to us, the frustrated show of toss-and-catch with the honed steel weapon.
I form no conscious thought, and yet I move with purpose: I shove my hand into the pocket of the navy outer coat and take out my little knife.
The one that Merc cleaned and polished for me with such care.
The instant my blade catches the sun’s rays there’s an amplification of light that I’ve never seen before.
For reasons I can’t explain, the composition of polished metal not just reflects them, it refracts the illumination into an explosion of rainbowed colors so brilliant, I have to look away or be blinded—
Though my eyes squeeze shut, I know by the horrible call of the winged predator that its attention has been secured.
That and the way my horse shies away with a violent shove of his hindquarters.
Even without the use of either stirrup, I manage to stay astride, my body absorbing the jolting whirl on a wave that channels the energy from my hips, up my spine, and out of my barely tethered skull.
Then I go low over the horse’s neck and give him his head, letting the gelding thunder away from the bird.
While I hold that little knife over my shoulder.
“No, Sorrel, no!” Merc screams hoarsely as I leave him behind.
Great buffers of wind push at me from the downstrokes of the bird’s wings, my hair whipping back from the galloping speed, shoving forward as my attacker swoops in above me with a great flap of its wings, whipping back again.
At this point, the folly of my impulse becomes clear.
In the next heartbeat, the air beast will be upon me, and I have nothing to defend myself with—
The downward attack occurs, and out of the corner of my eye, I see one of the black talons up close. The claw is nearly as thick as my wrist, and as pointed as an iron spike—
My hair is caught and yanked, my head ripped to the side, my torso forced to go with it. Though I need every hold I’ve got, my hand slips free of the mane and I feel myself getting lifted from the bolting horse—
The knife.
Re-angling my arm, I shove the blade into the tangle of hair that’s been caught, and brace myself for a ragged gnawing to cut through—
Merc has sharpened the knife to such a degree that it slices through the thick rope of locks with no effort from me at all. The instant the tie is cut, the release pitches me backward in the saddle so that my head bounces on the surging rump of the horse.
I also get an upshot view of the bird as it circles and zeroes in on me once more.
Even as I bounce and jostle from the gelding’s violent, panicked strides, I become frozen at the sight above me.
My stomach is what’s going to be ripped open. And as soon as I hit the ground, I’m going to be snatched and carried back to a nest or a feeding spot, my muscles and fat and very bones nutrition for—
Gritting my teeth, I clench all the muscles in my body and drag myself upright against the rush of air. We’re not going to outrun this. Sooner, not later, the horse will either stumble or it’ll slow such that a perfect alignment can be made between those talons and my shoulders—
Even through the roar in my ears, the shattering, careening call is right over me once again, those beating wings creating their own gale-force winds.
Up ahead, there’s a rock formation created by a tumble of boulders bigger than my valiant horse and the nightmare bird combined.
Angling the reins into the side of the chestnut’s neck, I force a reroute toward what once was an island.
As our course is altered, I bring the knife across to my left.
It’s nearly impossible to control any part of my body outside of maintaining my position in the saddle—nearly.
With a similar focus to what saved me from being dragged to death, I bend my knee up and expose the stirrup strap.
As my little blade slices through the hardy leather quick as a gasp, I free what’s trapped my foot from its tether and resolve to never, ever allow the thing to become dull again.
Putting the reflective knife back up over my shoulder—
My arm is gored.
I cry out in agony, but I don’t lose my little weapon.
I also don’t lose my attacker, and that’s the plan.
The bird, showing no signs of fatigue, abruptly switches tactics, angling around and coming at us from the front.
I have another full view of its outstretched black wings, their span such that the whole of the horizon is blocked out, and also of its slashing talons, and its straining black beak—
Waves. The ocean.
All at once, the vision that made no sense first in the moat, and then when I initially sat astride the gelding, returns to me. It’s so vivid, so clear, I can taste the salt spray in my mouth, feel the sorrel horse running free under me—
Reality snaps back into focus and I release my hold of the reins.
With a punch down into the stirrup that remains, I leap free of the saddle, going airborne with a coordination I shouldn’t possess. And as I dive through the air toward the stony ground, I have the thought that this is even more stupid than me going to help Merc in the first place.
That bird wasn’t going to be able to pick up and carry me and a horse.
Just me? Well, that’s lunch, is it not.
Somehow, I roll myself in midair and land in a run, as if I’ve practiced this maneuver—which I most certainly have not.
I keep going with as much speed as I can, the knife with the light show over my head, my legs churning strongly even though I’ve been in the saddle for two straight days.
The stirrup I cut clanks on my ankle, the strap flaps against my lower leg, and I can feel my own blood from where I’m injured at the arm, but these are very minor details as the bird tracks me, not the horse.
I’m easier to catch, but more than that, I have the lure.
I’ve never run so fast. Especially not with one arm over my head—
My feet lose traction all at once and slip out from under me. Just as I go down, I flip around. The bird is making what surely will be its final pass, coming at me like something that is avenging a wrong I once committed.
Reaching down deep into my marrow, I gather the very last of my strength and throw the knife as hard as I can at the boulders that are but three lengths away.
And are the same gray as everything else.
End over end the knife travels, each alternating cycle of handle and blade a mini-variation of what Merc had been doing, the rhythmic flaring what I hope, what I pray, will be enough.
It isn’t. Once again, the black wingspan eclipses all my vision, and the black-feathered scourge comes upon me.
There’s no time to roll in a ball and protect my inner organs. I’m laid out, about to be flayed out—
At the last possible moment, the bird veers away.
And follows the brilliant rippling light.
I roll on my side, just in time to see the knife skittle into a fissure between two boulders. The bird doesn’t lead with its talons this time. The head extends forward and its neck thins out as the wings duck in against the body and its speed redoubles.
So it’s nearly at the velocity of a free fall—
As the winged predator slams into the rocks.
The cracking impact is as loud as its call, the snapping of its spine so violent, the bird’s death knocks the formation out of alignment, and rocks bounce down and travel. Landing in a heap, the beast’s half-hearted flap of one wing is followed by a series of twitches.
And then … the kind of stillness that only a life lost brings.
Panting, dizzy, and in pain everywhere, I think of the balas meat, and know that we’ll have a meal, if we choose—yet I’m saddened at the death, even though it was him or me.
Her or me?
“Sorrel!”
The sound of Merc’s baritone voice is so sweet, I shudder with relief. And I intend on getting up—or at the very least, sitting up—to greet him. I don’t have the energy. I flop over onto my back once more and continue to pant as I look toward him.
He’s running faster than I did, nearly as fast as the gelding, the broadsword sheathed on his back, his arms pumping like he’s punching the air.
With his black hair streaming out in his wake, and his leather-clad body propelling him forward, Merc is the very study of a powerful man in his prime—and not unlike the predator who nearly killed us both.
And it’s good that weapon of his is put away, I think numbly, in case there are more of those birds around.
We need to keep all flashes of light to an absolute minimum.
I try once again to sit up, and fail. So I lie where I am, in this field of gray rocks, that could well have been my grave. Overhead, the sun is so intense it hurts my eyes, yet I can still see that odd and worrisome star—
Merc skids to a halt beside me, gray pebbles kicking up and skipping across my dead-weight legs. As he falls to his knees and takes my hand, I start to smile.
“You didn’t leave me,” I say hoarsely while I search his body for injuries.
“And you should have left me.” Leaning over, he brushes the hair out of my face. “Are you all right, woman?”
As my lungs get tight with emotion, I open my mouth to answer him. Except then, caught up in the moment, I do the one thing I must never, ever do.
I meet his eyes with my own.