Page 100 of Secrets of Graves and Gold

Julita sighs. I’m starting to think the king only employs idiots. Other than Stav, of course. And even he was pretty idiotic about you for a while.

Alek stiffens on his horse. “Someone else is coming.”

He has a better view than the rest of us. I peer across the terrain but can only make out the slightest hint of a shape that might be a person outside the distant walls of the town.

Stavros stares, twitches his head, stares again, and then lets his gaze slide over the rest of us as if to give his eyes a moment to recover. They rest on me for a beat longer than the others.

All at once, he exhales sharply. “Ivy, pull around your cloak—or the top of your dress—something. Everyone! Cover your mouth and nose as well as you can.”

Even as he speaks, he’s fumbling with his own cloak. He presses a flap of the thick fabric over his lower face.

With a lurch of my pulse, I follow suit even though I don’t understand. As I push the scratchy woolen cloth against my nose, my breath condenses in the thin patch of air left behind it—and my feet stumble beneath me.

The ground feels suddenly, strangely uneven, as if it’s bobbing and dipping like a raft on a river.

I try to concentrate, but my thoughts have started to float away from me. My head is full of clouds.

Julita whips around in the back of my skull. Ivy, what’s happening?

Something Stavros caught on to, but maybe not in time. He staggers to the side before righting his balance.

Alek has tugged the neckline of his tunic all the way up over his nose, but he sways on the horse’s back and has to snatch at its mane to stay on. He leans close to its neck the way Casimir rested before, his hands trembling. “Is that some kind of drug? How…?”

“It’s a trick… the sorcerer-hunters use,” Stavros rasps through his cloak. “Can’t easily confront one of the riven head on. They carry sedatives on them, sometimes traveling with a companion who has a gift… that can carry it long distances through the air. There are a few enchanted tools around… that do the trick too.”

Rheave wobbles on Toast and pulls the side of his cloak tighter against his face. Only Casimir seems relatively unaffected, but he already had his collar up before Stavros’s warning.

He’s adjusted his cloak so it’s more tightly molded to his face. “How did you know?” he asks Stavros in a muffled voice.

The former general’s laugh is dark. “It seems my gift hasn’t completely abandoned me. I looked at Ivy and saw her faint, and I guessed that scenario was the only reason it would happen so quickly. We took precautions… before the full effect could take hold.”

Alek turns his head where it’s resting on the horse’s neck and gives a soft yelp. “Soldiers coming.”

When my head jerks around, sending a fresh wave of dizziness through my body, I spot the blue specks of their uniforms against the greenish-yellow of the grass. “Shit.”

Our pace has slowed in our muddled state. Stavros manages to take command. “Ivy, get on Toast with Rheave. Alek, I’m joining you. Casimir’s the only one in a state to walk at a decent pace on his own. The horses will have to forgive the extra weight one more time.”

I don’t see how we’ll go that much faster, but before I can find the words to debate, Rheave has already jumped down. He wobbles but still manages to scoop me up and heave me onto Toast’s back right by his withers.

The daimon-man hauls himself up behind me. The stallion grunts in protest but clops onward.

Toast might be able to speed up to a trot with the two of us, or even a canter if I really pushed him, but I’m not sure we could stay on. And there’s definitely no way to bring Casimir on as well.

Stavros has managed to swing himself up behind Alek, his massive frame swaying, but their horse is only a little larger than Toast. It’ll be having an even harder time carrying both of their weight for long.

The blue specks in the distance are growing larger, along with the brownish blotches beneath them. They’re on horses too, I realize hazily. Riding much faster than we can.

Can they see us? Great God smite me, I’ve lost all my focus on my magic.

It’s roiling in my chest, where I must have pulled it back inside instinctively. A chill breaks over my skin.

Even with Casimir jogging between us now, there’s no way we can outrun the soldiers. If I could just…

Julita’s voice pulls my thoughts into order. You could make a mirage, Ivy! Send them off after a ghost.

She laughs as if it’s a joke, but I understand what she means. The natural consequence of the invisibility effect I’ve created before.

Yes. Yes, that might be exactly what we need.

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