Chapter 48 Ginger
Ginger
We made a horrible, terrible, awful mistake.
The Kings men manhandled Shade’s body like he was a sack of flour. They hogtied him on the back of a horse, before tromping off back through the Barren Lands.
The whole display was dreadfully violent. I fought the urge to vomit.
Chaos was left in his wake.
After the show of defense, how Shade willingly sacrificed himself to protect the town, and how the knights handled him so roughly even though he was clearly submitting…
We were horrible. Horrible, evil folk.
Not as evil as the King and his men, but we had subjected Shade to their whims.
The knights on their horses galloped away faster than should have been possible. Were they aided by magic of their own?
“That was fucking grim,” Fiella mumbled somewhere behind me.
“Very harsh,” Kizzi agreed.
I practically vibrated with tension. So much fear, anger, confusion welled up inside me and threatened to burst.
Tandor set a reassuring hand on my shoulder. “They won’t be able to kill him,” he said.
“You don’t know that,” I whispered. They hadn’t seen the way he had almost drowned.
He wasn’t invincible.
“The King isn’t a murderer, surely,” Redd added.
“We don’t know that, he might—” Fiella started to explain, but Kizzi slapped a hand over her mouth to shut her up.
I was grateful for the interruption. I had enough fears on my mind, I didn’t need any more.
Tommins paced back and forth, running a hand through his mane of hair and tugging sharply at the ends. He murmured quietly to himself.
A nudge at my leg stole my attention. I glanced down to see the grumpy black cat glaring up at me with knowing green eyes. “Hi, Chicken.” I bent down to stroke his back but he hissed and swatted.
He didn’t want pets, then. He wanted to show me something.
Kizzi noticed. “Were you chosen by a cat, too?” she asked.
“Not really, I think he wants me dead, if I’m being honest. But he keeps turning up.”
“They’re annoyingly smart, those cats. My Sookie saves the day more often than I care to admit,” Fiella added.
“Last time I followed him…” I trailed off, disturbed by the memory.
The cat scurried forward, in the direction of the Barren Lands.
“I know, buddy. We can’t follow him. He had to go,” I said.
The cat growled, low and menacing.
“He’s already gone,” Tandor said to the cat.
The cat spared him only a glance before returning to stare at me intently.
I sighed. “We can’t follow him,” I insisted. “It’s too late. He’ll have to find his own way out.”
Tommins’ head snapped in my direction. “Maybe it’s not too late.”
The cat meowed loudly.
“What do you mean?” I asked. My hopes threatened to flare in my chest, and I squashed them down.
“This was a mistake,” the mayor said vehemently. “We shouldn’t have turned over one of our own.”
“But he’s not one of us,” I argued, but that felt foolish.
“Isn’t he? He’s been here for a while now. Sure, he’s not the friendliest, but he is always here. He contributes. He supports our businesses. Fates, he’s even Mister Moonvale,” Fiella insisted.
Murmurs from onlookers agreed with the sentiment, adding even more reasons why Shade was one of us.
“He buys a tea from me every single day.”
“I catch him cleaning up the town square in the middle of the night, sometimes.”
“Those critters seem to like him.”
“One time, my son’s kite got stuck in a tree and he got it down with his shadows. And he only grumbled about it a little bit.”
My chest squeezed. I hadn’t realized how much Shade’s presence had wormed under everyone's skin, and not just mine.
Tommins raised a hand, silencing the crowd. “We must be smart here. I refuse to put anyone at risk.”
Kizzi spoke up. “With all due respect, Tommins, we should have a choice.”
“Rescue mission?” I suggested.
Tommins met my gaze. He nodded slowly. “Volunteers only. This is risky—it could be life or death. And we need a plan.”
“I’m going,” I said immediately.
“I wouldn’t miss it,” Kizzi added.
Tandor readily agreed.
Fiella and Redd joined too, unwilling to allow the injustice or to allow any excitement to happen without them, I wasn’t sure which and it didn’t matter anyway.
By the time the crowd had finished considering, we had thirty adults willing to go after Shade.
We crammed ourselves into the pub to commence planning.
“The first issue is transportation,” Tommins said, hands clasping a glass of water. “There are only a few horses in the stables. And we know walking the Barren Lands is dangerous, even during the milder times of year.”
“Did you see how fast the King's horses were?” Fiella asked. “There had to be something magical about that, right?” She looked to Kizzi for confirmation.
She nodded her head slowly. “They smelled weird, too. Like some sort of spell.”
“A speed spell?” I asked. That sounded simple enough.
She tapped her fingers mindlessly. “Something like that. Maybe an endurance spell. Or an energizing tonic. It’s hard to guess, really.”
“They went in the direction of Sunhaven,” someone added. “That’s only a three day’s walk. Quicker if we don’t stop.”
Tommins looked to Kizzi. “Do you have anything that could keep us going for three days?”
“Safely?” she asked.
His mouth pursed. “I assumed that was a given.”
Kizzi grumbled, “Just making sure. That limits our options.” Her satchel twitched on her lap, and she rested a hand on top of it. Hex must have been inside.
Tommins looked at her sternly. “What do you think?”
“I have an idea or two. I’ll get with the coven together, I’m sure we can manage something.”
“What if we can’t catch them?” I asked.
“They don’t have much of a head start, and they seem to require a lot of breaks. If we continue hard and fast, we should be able to catch them when they stop.”
“And if we don’t?”
Tommins' gaze softened. “Then we keep trying. We’ll follow him all the way to the mountains, if we must.”
My shoulders slumped.
We could do this. We would find him.
And we would get him back.
“I can fly,” Tommins added. “I can catch them, if walking isn’t fast enough.”
The room went silent for a moment, and then questions broke free.
“What the fuck?”
“Dude, since when?”
“Well, he is a gryphon, after all.”
Tommins explained, “Since magic returned to the realm, I’ve found it easier to shift.” He gestured to his shoulders. “I have wings, you know.”
“Have you always been able to fly?”
“Sure, but it took too much effort. I saved it for emergencies. It’s easier these days.”
“I have so many questions,” Fiella said.
Tommins merely shrugged. “It doesn’t come up much.”