Chapter 5 Declan
Ayden finally walked away. Spirits, that man made more noise than any human alive.
All I wanted to do was get a little more sleep before we had to trudge through the forest hunting the ever-elusive yellow-tagged deer.
He seemed to think that, because he was awake, the rest of the world should rise to greet the morning. How wrong he was.
I covered my head with the blanket and squeezed my eyes shut. There was a rock poking through my bedroll, but I wasn’t about to move to get rid of it. The last moments of sleep before rising were the most precious.
Ayden’s footfalls faded into the distance, and blessed darkness closed around me.
It didn’t last long. I’d barely drifted off when the snapping of branches brought me fully awake.
“Ayden Fucking Byrne. Were you never taught to be quiet when someone is sleeping?” I shouted from beneath my blanket.
Another set of branches rustled.
Two?
My sleepy brain tried to understand.
As clumsy as Ayden was, even he couldn’t stumble in two places at once. I yanked the blanket off my head and sat up. The metal tip of an arrow greeted me.
“Do not move,” said a voice that sounded more like the grinding of gears than any human.
I blinked away sleep and looked past the arrow.
A man wearing a robe the color of bitter coffee held a crossbow awkwardly in one arm.
His face was covered with an odd mask formed of a snarling bull with white wings where its ears should’ve been.
Only the man’s eyes were visible, and they were stranger than the mask.
I stared, searching for some sign of life, but those eyes were more black and hollow than the deepest pit or cavern.
“What do you want? We don’t have any money. We’re cadets—”
“I want nothing from you. Only silence.”
“Ayden!” I cried out, hoping to guide him to help me.
An invisible hand clamped over my mouth, forcing it shut. I reached up, finding nothing with which to fight. I tried to call out, then stand, but my body betrayed me. It felt as though ropes of iron had been wrapped around my arms, clamping them tight against my sides.
I looked down, desperate to see what held me in place, but there was nothing. No ropes, no bands, nothing.
It was magic.
Terror flooded through me.
Eyes wide, I looked up.
The man hadn’t moved or reacted. He simply stared.
“You will not speak again,” the man rasped. “When my brothers arrive, we will leave you in peace. Follow us, and you will die.”
I blinked rapidly, wishing the dream to end, but I was wide awake.
This was no dream.
Where was Ayden?
A second robed man appeared, his mask with the beak of a hawk and tusks of a boar.
“Where are they?” the man holding me captive asked.
“Behind,” the second said.
A woman screamed. Her cry died as quickly as it had been raised.
A third man entered the clearing, this one also robed. He struggled under the weight of a woman on his shoulder.
“The bitch wouldn’t stop shouting. I made her sleep,” the new man rasped.
“You should have done that long ago,” the man with the crossbow replied.
The man with the woman inclined his head.
So he’s the leader, I thought.
“You two go. I will take care of this one,” the leader said.
The others nodded, then sprinted away.
The noise of their passing had barely vanished when a fourth form appeared in the clearing.
Ayden.
In a smooth motion I thought beyond his abilities, Ayden leaped toward the man with the crossbow and twisted his body so his foot flew into the man’s back, tumbling him forward and sending the crossbow flying into the woods.
Even more remarkable, Ayden landed lightly, immediately ready to strike again.
The pressure around my arms and neck vanished the moment the man was struck.
Recovering quickly, the robed man stood and turned back. Ayden darted forward and slammed a palm into the man’s chest, knocking him back into a tree.
The bastard barely flinched, pushing off the tree and lunging forward with one hand outstretched. “You will be silent!” he commanded.
Immediately, Ayden grabbed his throat with both hands and dropped to the ground. His eyes bulged, and he struggled for air.
I scrambled to my feet and charged the man, but his magic proved far faster.
In a heartbeat, I lay on the ground, only paces from Ayden, clutching my own throat and staring, as we each gasped for precious breath. His face was turning a pale blue.
“You will not follow. Do you understand?” the man asked, more a command than a question.
I nodded frantically.
As quickly as he’d arrived, the robed man vanished into the woods, freeing our throats and taking his magic with him.
It took a moment to recover my breath enough to ask, “Are you okay?”
Ayden’s head rose. Gone was the cocksure gaze. His eyes brimmed with fear as he rubbed his throat.
“I think so. You?” His voice sounded strained, and he winced as he spoke.
“Yeah.”
I tried to stand, but a wave of dizziness kept me firmly on the ground.
“Who was that?” Ayden asked.
“Somebody with a really annoying Gift.”
“I bet our throats will be sore for days.” Ayden nodded. “Have you ever seen robes like that?”
“No.”
“And what was with his eyes? And voice? He sounded more dead than alive.”
I shrugged and tried standing again, this time bracing myself with a palm to a tree.
“His eyes were black, like there was nothing there,” I muttered.
I released the tree and tried taking a step. The world spun, and I began to fall.
Ayden got to his feet and shot forward faster than I would’ve imagined. “I’ve got you. Put your arm around my shoulders.”
I wanted to resist, to pull away, but I was either going to hug his shoulders or kiss the ground.
“Thanks,” I said. “I’ll be all right in a minute. I’m just a little lightheaded.”
“Getting the life choked out of you will do that,” he said, a gentle smile parting his lips. I’d never noticed how full they were, and, unlike the rest of the forest, they weren’t spinning.
“You should sit until your head clears. I doubt we’ll see those men again. I am not sure whether they were running toward something or away from someone, but they seemed intent on getting away from here.”
“Yeah, good idea.” I let him guide me back to my bedroll. “I think one of them carried a woman over his shoulder.”
He nodded again. “She was either unconscious or dead. I couldn’t tell which.”
“Another kidnapping,” I muttered.
Ayden’s head cocked, and his eyes narrowed. “Another? What do you mean?”
I hadn’t meant to say that aloud. “Oh, uh, well—”
“Declan, we’re on a mountainside in the middle of nowhere. The two of us are all we have right now. Put whatever you think of me aside for a moment and talk to me.”
I looked at my hands, then back up. Ayden waited, impatience written on his features.
“Fine,” I said, heaving a sigh. “I overheard a pair of officers talking in the mess hall. I couldn’t hear most of what they said, but the word ‘kidnappings’ came up a few times, and they both looked worried. I got the impression they had just received orders related to something big going on.”
“Kidnappings? Plural? As in, more than one?”
I nodded. “That’s what they said.”
“And you think this could be one of those?”
“I don’t know. Maybe. That kind of thing doesn’t happen a lot. What are the odds this is a coincidence?”
Ayden nodded slowly, his eyes distant as he thought.
“Should we go after them?” I asked.
His focus resolved. “And fight the guy with the Gift to silence anyone who opposes him via strangulation?”
“Fair point. Should we at least go back and report this to someone?”
Ayden thought a moment. “Do you think they would waive the Trial if we did? We would certainly fail the objective.”
I shook my head. “No, they would never do that.”
He shrugged, as if that decided the question.
“What about the woman? We can’t just leave her to them.”
He thought a moment, then said, “We do not know she was kidnapped, only that a man carried her over his shoulder. Perhaps they were helping her, taking her somewhere to receive aid.”
“Is that what you believe?” I asked, nonplussed.
“No. Of course not.” Ayden’s eyes lowered. “But how could we help her? By the time we make it back down the mountain, they could be anywhere, even across the border. The patrols have a better chance of helping her than we do.”
At any point in time, there were dozens of teams patrolling the mountains, senior Rangers armed to the teeth and ready to defend their homeland.
“You’re probably right. They won’t make it past the patrols if they’re up to something.”
We sat in silence a moment, each lost in the implications of our decision.
“We would have to repeat Second Year, too,” I said.
“What do you mean?”
“If we abandoned the Trial to report this, we would be forced to repeat Second Year.”
“Which would place you in the same class as the cadets you now lead, would it not?” His brows rose. “And I would be the one you would blame, consigning me to an entire year of dealing with a pissed-off Declan Rea, more than he already appears to be, though I have yet to fathom why.”
A laugh slipped out, and I grabbed my throat, suddenly aware of how painful laughing would be until the man’s magical grip wore off.
“What’s so funny?” Ayden asked, lips pursed.
“You talk like a proper lord. I mean, listen to yourself. ‘I have yet to fathom why.’ Who talks like that?”
“Well . . . I suppose—”
“See! You suppose?” I chuckled. “I never would’ve thought you’d say, ‘pissed off’ or anything that might offend someone’s sensibilities.”
He rolled his eyes. “I am trained to swim in deep pools filled with sharks. That does not mean I can’t step out of the water and walk about with others.”
I fell onto my back, laughter rumbling from deep in my gut.
“What?” Ayden stood a couple paces away, an annoyed wrinkle on his brow. He planted fists to his hips, making me laugh harder.
“Sorry, it’s just . . . First, you did the lord talk again with, ‘swim in deep pools.’ Spirits, Ayden. How far did they shove the polearm up your arse?”
I tried to stop laughing, but his expression, somewhere between enraged beast and that of a confused retriever, was more than I could take.