Page 12 of Swords of Soul and Shadow
The word poured ice water into her veins. “Soldiers?”
He pushed her back into the tent. “Grab your pack. We’re leaving.”
“But what about the others?”
“Blast it, Hallie,” Niels growled, grabbing her pack. “Let’s go.”
But if it was Correa, she could do something. She could fight. “I can help.”
Niels shoved the last of her effects into her pack, including the portrait of her and Jack, and pushed the bag against her chest. He eyed her. “No, you can’t.”
Smoke from the flashpistol blasts scalded her nose. She dug her fingernails into her palms. Her cheeks flushed, and frustration bubbled in her blood. How dare he discount her. She threw her pack aside and snatched a shard of glass. She wasn’t sure if she was going to use it as a shiv or make herself bleed to harness whatever power she’d just awoken, but she was going to fight.
The noise in the cavern made her head ring. Between the pistol fire and screams, she could barely concentrate on what was before her.
Niels grabbed her shoulders. “I promised your Pa I’d take care of you.”
“The Cerls are looking for me.” She tried to shove past him, but he was a boulder in her path. “Forme.People are going to die because I’m here.”
She didn’t know it for certain, but it was entirely too coincidental that soldiers had found them here only now,monthsafter the Stoneset survivors had settled in the cavern. Hallie was the reason they were here. She was certain of it.
She wouldn’t let Niels or anyone else stop her from trying to make it right.
He squeezed her shoulders hard. Hallie kicked his right shin. He swore loudly and grabbed his leg. “What did you—Hallie!”
Hallie twisted away, breaking his grip. She lunged toward the tent entrance, but she wasn’t built for speed or fighting or—well, anything, really. Not as she was.
Niels grabbed her forearm and pulled her back. He looked her straight in the eyes as she tugged. “If they really want you, they’re going to have to fight their way through me.”
They wouldn’t get the chance. She’d fight him first. “Unhand me!”
She could do this—she could dosomething. She’d brought the whole fort down on their heads at Achilles, for stars’ sake.
All she had to do was spill enough of her blood.
Niels looped her pack’s strap over her shoulder this time, his hand still clenching her forearm. It was beginning to hurt. She twisted and yanked, but he held firm. “Stop it and listen to me. We’ll take the tunnel toward Ravenhelm, then circle back.”
Something hot and searing andawfultore through her middle. She doubled over, shoving her own hand into her mouth to muffle her cry. Niels yanked his flashpistol from where he’d stuffed it into the back of his trousers and whipped it toward the tent entrance. “What? Where are you hit? Did they—”
“I’m not hurt.” Hallie clutched her stomach, bracing herself until the heat abated some. She wasn’t sure what had triggered it, butsomethingwas trying to get her attention. It felt just like before, when the Lord Elder had given her the image ofthe archway, but…stronger. Much stronger. A tidal wave, not a ripple in a tide pool.
Ravenhelm. She needed to go to Ravenhelm.
But the soldiers were attacking here. She needed to fighthere.
“What’s wrong?” Niels asked, his voice slightly frantic. “Don’t lie to me, Hal—”
A tall, barrel-chested man ripped back the tent flap. The canvas screeched as it tore. The pistol in his hand leaked blue smoke, the muzzle poised and ready to fire directly into Hallie’s skull.
Everything froze. The only movement came from the sparks popping and fizzing in her peripheral vision, though she could not say where they were coming from—only that they were there. Maybe she’d been hit after all, only by an electropistol, not a flashpistol.
The intruder’s uniform was dark blue and filthy. Ragged holes, streaks of dirt, and dark, blotchy stains decorated the front.
Blood. Enough that the uniform must have been stolen off a dead man. Nobody could have survived after losing that much blood, nobody could have survived…
Survived what Hallie had done to the fort.
Oh stars. Nausea turned her skin clammy, chilled with guilt, even if the man in front of her was clearly alive—and threatening her with a Cerl pistol, besides.
