Truthwitch (The Witchlands 1)

Iseult spun for the monk’s chest. He jumped backward and skipped onto the carriage wheel. Yet where Safi had expected a moment of distraction, she only got the monk diving at her from above.

He was good. The best fighter she’d ever faced.

But Safi and Iseult were better.

Safi swooped out of reach just as Iseult wheeled into the monk’s path. In a blur of spinning steel, her scythes sliced into his arms, his chest, his gut—and then, like a tornado, she was past.

And Safi was waiting. Watching for what couldn’t be real and yet clearly was: every cut on the monk’s body was healing before her eyes.

There was no doubt now—this monk was a thrice-damned Bloodwitch straight from Safi’s darkest nightmares. So she did the only thing she could conjure: she threw her parrying knife directly at the monk’s chest.

It thunked through his rib cage and embedded deep in his heart. He stumbled forward, hitting his knees—and his red eyes locked on Safi’s. His lips curled back. With a snarl, he wrenched the knife from his chest. The wound spurted …

And began to heal over.

But Safi didn’t have time for another strike. The guards were doubling back. The Guildmaster was screaming from within his carriage, and the horses were charging into a frantic gallop.

Iseult darted in front of Safi, scythes flying fast and beating two arrows from the air. Then, for a brief moment, the carriage blocked the girls from the guards. Only the Bloodwitch could see them, and though he reached for his knives, he was too slow. Too drained from the magic of healing.

Yet he was smiling—smiling—as if he knew something that Safi didn’t. As if he could and would hunt her down to make her pay for this.

“Come on!” Iseult yanked at Safi’s arm, pulling her into a sprint toward the cliffside.

At least this was part of their plan. At least this they had practiced so often they could do it with their eyes closed.

Just as the first crossbow bolts pounded the road behind them, the girls reached a waist-high boulder on the ocean side of the road.

They plunked their blades back into scabbards. Then in two leaps, Safi was over the rock—and Iseult too. On the other side, the cliff ran straight down to thundering white waves.

Two ropes waited, affixed to a stake pounded deep into the earth. With far more speed and force than was ever intended for this escape, Safi snatched up her rope, hooked her foot in a loop at the end, gripped a knot at head level …

And jumped.

TWO

Air whizzed past Safi’s ears and up her nose as she sprang out … down toward white waves … away from the seventy-foot cliff …

Until Safi reached the rope’s end. With a sharp yank that shattered through her body and tore into her gripping hands, she flew at the barnacle-covered cliffside.

This was about to hurt.

She hit with a crash, teeth ramming her tongue. Pain sizzled through her body. Limestone cut her arms, her face, her legs. She snapped out her hands to grip the cliff—just as Iseult slammed into the rocks beside her.

“Ignite,” Safi grunted. The word that triggered the rope’s magic was lost in the roar of ocean waves—but the command hit its mark. In a flash of white flame that shot up faster than eyes could travel, their ropes ignited …

And disintegrated. A fine ash kicked away on the wind. A few specks settled on the girls’ kerchiefs, their shoulders.

“Arrows!” Iseult roared, flattening herself against the rock as bolts zipped past. Some skittered off the rocks, some sank into waves.

One sliced through Safi’s skirt. Then she’d managed to dig her toes in cracks, grab for handholds, and scramble sideways. Her muscles trembled and strained until at last, she and Iseult had ducked beneath a slight overhang. Until at last, they could pause and let the arrows fall harmlessly around them.

The rocks were wet, the barnacles vicious, and water swept at the girls’ ankles. Salty drops battered over and over. Until eventually the arrows stopped falling.

“Are they coming?” Safi rasped at Iseult.

Iseult shook her head. “They’re still there. I can feel their Threads waiting.”

Safi blinked, trying to get the salt from her eyes. “We’re going to have to swim, aren’t we?” She rubbed her face on her shoulder; it didn’t help. “Think you can make it to the lighthouse?” Both girls were strong swimmers—but strong didn’t matter in waves that could pummel a dolphin.

“We don’t have a choice,” Iseult said. She glanced at Safi with a fierceness that always made Safi feel stronger. “We can toss our skirts left, and while the guards shoot those, we dive right.”

Safi nodded, and with a grimace, she angled her body so she could remove her skirt. Once both girls had their brown skirts free, Iseult’s arm reared back.

“Ready?” she asked.

“Ready.” Safi heaved. The skirt flew out from beneath the overhang—Iseult’s right behind it.

And then both girls stepped away from the rock face and sank beneath the waves.

* * *

As Iseult det Midenzi wriggled free from her sea-soaked tunic, boots, pants, and finally underclothes, everything hurt. Every peeled-off layer revealed ten new slices from the limestone and barnacles, and each burst of spindrift made her aware of ten more.

This ancient, crumbling lighthouse was effective for hiding, but it was inescapable until the tide went out. For now, the water outside was well above Iseult’s chest, and hopefully that depth—as well as the crashing waves between here and the marshy shoreline—would deter the Bloodwitch from following.