Crashing among the undergrowth, Kettle saw flickers of motion between the trees, and not in the direction the bolts had come from. At least five attackers then!
Under the canopy the light was so poor that it would leave most blundering, but pushed into darkness as she was Kettle had no problem seeing. She scurried around the bole of the thickest tree on knees and elbows, a throwing star in each hand.
They came fast, silent, knives in both hands, weaving between the pines with hunska-speed. Kettle was faster. She rose, launching herself to her feet from her knees, spinning both her stars towards the nearest two attackers, waiting for them to get almost close enough for blades. At a separation of three yards and driven with the speed of a hunska full-blood Kettle’s throwing stars allowed no opportunity for evasion. The left one would hit the closest woman somewhere in the neck; the right one would take the other woman in the right eye. Kettle was more accurate with her right arm.
Kettle fell backward, ripping two of her knives from their hidden sheaths over her upper arms—not her best pair for close work but the easiest to reach. She let herself drop since it was likely to be the last thing her opponents expected. Unseen attacks could be coming her way and the only defence was not to be in the place they expected her to be.
The first of Kettle’s remaining attackers came at a flat sprint, daggers bared, showing some skill and remarkable night vision by avoiding tripping on any root or briar. Kettle could see the confusion in the man’s eyes as she fell away from him. Her outstretched foot hit his knee. He toppled forward, blades stretched out towards her, the pain from his shattered joint not yet having reached his brain.
Kettle, her back thumping into the forest floor, extended her knives, points reaching for the falling man. She thrust between his arms, pushing them wider with her elbows so that his daggers drove hilt deep into the soil, missing her shoulders by an inch on each side. Her own blades punched into his neck, grating over each other as they met in his spine.
Both knives came free with a spray of blood and Kettle rolled aside. She was clear before her victim had dropped half the remaining distance to the ground. She saw the last two attackers closing as she twisted onto her front, facing them. Both were fast, and both had abandoned their crossbows in favour of swords. If they weren’t hunska Kettle could have got to her feet and brought them down with throwing stars, but their speed promised they would hack her to death on her knees if she tried that. Hunskas would very rarely be shadow-weavers, though. They would see little but confusion in the forest gloom. Kettle banked on their blindness and rolled to use the nearest tree as cover.
Both ambushers veered unerringly towards her. Prone, the advantage of Kettle’s greater speed was considerably lessened. One ambusher swung to split her head but branches blocked the arc of his blade. The other, wise to the limitations of a longsword in woodland, thrust to skewer her. Kettle rolled onto her back again, bringing her knives up to deflect the thrust. She barely managed it and the blade sliced through her coat before driving into the ground.
In desperate straits, Kettle focused on the only opponent she could reach. Taking advantage of the momentarily trapped sword, she sliced one knife across the wrist of the hand holding it. The other she stabbed up into the man’s groin.
The last attacker stood revealed as his companion doubled up, an ugly grin on his face, the point of his sword less than two feet from Kettle’s chest. On her back, arms extended, she knew she had no real chance to avoid or deflect this thrust. But she gave no space to fear or regret, only gathered herself to try.
At the back of Kettle’s mind Nona knew the nun had no hope. The man had moved with the speed of a half-blood at least. Nona, unable to help, or leave, or even scream, tensed for the blow. She would share the pain. It would be the last thing she could ever do for Kettle.
Nona knew that, even for those without hunska blood, at the sharpest edge of things the world would slow to a crawl. It might not offer you the opportunity to act but the inevitable happened slowly. Nona watched the point of the sword. It filled Kettle’s vision, finding glimmers in the gloom. She watched the killer’s face, met his stare, and knew those eyes would see the death of one of the few people she treasured and of her last hope.
When the man’s face began to distort, bulging outwards, Nona could make no sense of it. When blood suffused his skin and began to erupt from eyes, nose, and mouth, both Nona and Kettle stared in vacant disbelief. Suddenly, as if their terror had released its hold on time’s flow, the face exploded and a red fist emerged from the tumbling gore.
Moments later Kettle was on her feet facing a figure so wrapped in shadow that even her dark-sight struggled to make out any detail. The pair of them stood for a moment in silent regard. Kettle became aware of the moans from the groin-stabbed man by her feet, and of his hand reaching into his jerkin. She stamped on his neck, breaking it with a detachment that startled Nona. Her gaze never left the figure before her. “Who are you?”
The darkness smoked away by degrees. The newcomer stood of a height with Kettle, clad in a range-coat.
“Sister?” Kettle cocked her head, staring into the midnight still gathered beneath the hood.
The figure made no reply, only stepped back, shaking the blood from her fingers as the last of the shadows left her.
“Zole?” Kettle saw it before Nona did.
Zole pushed back her hood. She looked at her hand in distaste and wiped it on the nearest tree. “I do not think there are any others close by.”
“Zole? What are you doing here?”
“Following you.” She blinked as if the answer were obvious.
“Why?” Kettle glanced around at the trees that pressed on all sides, as if expecting more novices to emerge.
“Because you are following Nona.”
“How do you—” Kettle abandoned the question in favour of “Why do you want to find Nona?”
“We planned to visit the ice together.” Zole almost shrugged, turned away as if embarrassed. “She is the Shield. I am not supposed to lose her.”
“I didn’t think you believed in all that Chosen One stuff?” Kettle crossed to the first two attackers and stooped to recover her throwing stars with the aid of a knife.
“I do not.”
“Why then?” The second star came loose with a wet noise.
Somewhere behind Kettle Zole spoke in a voice almost too quiet to hear. “She is my friend.”
28
NONA CLUNG TO Kettle’s thoughts, refusing to let them slip. The surge of tension that had dragged her along their thread-bond now seeped away but a dark cell waited, and sickness, and boredom, and fear. She wanted to be with Kettle, out in the world, hunting down those who had captured her. Also, there was Zole.
Between them Kettle and Zole had dragged the supposed woodsman from the trail and off into the woods, taking him in the opposite direction to where the bodies lay.
The union between Kettle and Nona was weakening. Nona could no longer hear Kettle’s thoughts or touch her memories, but she could watch through her eyes, feel through her hands, and listen with her ears. It was enough.
Night had fallen and Kettle had made no fire but both she and Zole wove shadows well enough to see in any natural darkness. Kettle secured the man to a tree using cord from her pack. She sat him with his back to it, hands tied behind the trunk. His head flopped on his chest. The throwing star had been coated with a resin based on the boneless brew that rendered its victims limp and unable to move. She removed the star from his biceps and bound the wound.