Page 3 of A Tower of Half-Truths
The trellis held her weight, and her feet met solid ground once more. There was no time to pause and catch her breath, however. She followed Neldren and Itri across the back garden. As they wove around spindly bushes and barren patches of soil, they encountered no guards, no hounds, no Fennick.
They reached the stone fence, where the final member of their crew, Ellice, peeked through the hole she’d made earlier. Even in near-darkness, her red hair was vibrant as a lighthouse beacon. She threw a hand signal: the way forward was clear.
Itri climbed through the hole first. As Mavery and Neldren stood and waited, a hulking figure stumbled across the garden. With its broad shoulders and plodding gait, Mavery knew at once it was Fennick.
“You there! Stop!” cried a distant voice, gruff and unfamiliar.
A second figure chased after Fennick. This one was much smaller and carried a rifle. It stopped and aimed said rifle at Fennick.
“Fuck me,” Neldren groaned. He trudged toward Fennick and the guard. The breeze carried a hint of ash as Neldren raised his arms. Tendrils of darkness coiled around his limbs. He swung his arms forward and loosed those tendrils upon the guard, who began to yelp as his entire body became engulfed in shadow, but his voice cut out at once.
Mavery grimaced. She knew what the man was feeling. Or, more precisely, what hewasn’tfeeling. Being caught unaware with no sense of light, no sense of anything, there was nothing left but to give into that all-consuming void. And that’s exactly whatthe guard did. When Neldren pulled the shadows away, the man lay unconscious on the ground, his limbs splayed at unnatural angles. It wasn’t far off from how Mavery had looked after her first attempt at a shrouding spell.
Neldren clenched his fists as Fennick shuffled closer, favoring his right leg while grasping his left side.
“Thanks, Nel. I—”
“You idiot!” Neldren barked. Fennick came to a halt. “All that racket you made, you’re lucky it was only one guard. And you better not’ve killed that hound. Anything happens to those beasts, we forfeit the payment.”
“I know, but the buyer only mentioned the guard dogs,” Fennick said through gritted teeth. “Said nothin’ about the others.”
“The others thatyoushould’ve noticed!” Neldren shook his head. “If I didn’t know any better, I’d say you bungled this job on purpose.”
“C’mon, Nel. Don’t…” Fennick squeezed his eyes shut as he took a shallow, rattling breath. “Don’t be ridiculous. ‘Sides, I didn’t kill the hound. Just choked it out.”
“For your sake, you’d better hope—”
Footsteps and voices echoed from around the corner of the manor. It was difficult to discern what they were saying, or how far away they were. Not taking any chances, Neldren turned on his heel and jogged toward the fence.
“Move!” he hissed. “Before the rest of them catch up.”
His lithe figure slipped through the hole, joining Itri and Ellice on the other side. Before Mavery could follow, the sight of Fennick up close gave her pause. Dark blood saturated his shirt, oozed between his fingers. His tan face had turned pallid. His sandy hair, saturated with both blood and sweat, was plastered across his forehead.
“I’m fine,” he muttered; he’d no doubt heard Mavery’s gasp. “Just a graze, is all.”
Before she could argue with him, Neldren ordered the two of them to hurry up. Mavery tossed her pack through the hole, then pulled herself through. The hole was only three feet off the ground and just as wide, but Fennick couldn’t manage it. He winced as hetried to lift his leg, then lowered it with a shake of his head.
“Stand back,” Ellice said, pushing up her coat sleeves.
She crouched and placed her palms flat against the wall, just below the hole. The smell of saltwater filled Mavery’s lungs—a hint of summer cutting through the sharp, wintry air. Cracks appeared in the stone wall. Though Ellice was a mender, destruction magic came just as naturally to her. A chunk of wall broke free, and Neldren pushed it out of the way.
Fennick ducked as he walked sideways through the enlarged hole. His hand briefly slipped away from his abdomen, revealing a gash roughly the size and shape of a hellhound’s maw. Blood gushed, spattering the dirt at his feet. Mavery shuddered and had to glance away. She usually had an iron stomach when it came to this sort of thing, but Fennick’s wound was enough to test her limits.
Neldren and Itri replaced the slab, then groaned as they hoisted another into the original hole. As Ellice seamlessly mended the fence, Fennick swayed on his feet. Mavery rushed to his side.
“Here, lean on me,” she said.
He slung an arm around her shoulder, and her knees buckled beneath his weight.
“All right,” Neldren said. “Let’s move.”
He and Ellice fed a little of their magic into their lanterns and held them aloft, casting globes of warm light on the forest floor. Mavery did the same to the lantern on her hip, though it only illuminated her feet.
Neldren took the lead, his black ponytail whipping behind him as he hurdled snow-dusted roots and felled trees. They were only a mile from the closest village, where they would regroup with their contact and collect their payment. The trek to Roven’s estate had taken all of twenty minutes, but Fennick’s injury now made that pace impossible. Neldren, Ellice, and Itri trudged forward, stopping every so often to let Mavery and Fennick catch up. Mavery’s bad knee sent stabbing pains up her leg, but she clenched her teeth and focused on pushing ahead. Letting Fennick use her as a crutch was enough to keep him moving, albeit slowly. But before long, even that wasn’t enough. He stopped, untangled himself from her grasp, and leaned against an oak tree.
Neldren turned to Mavery. “Can’t you heal him?”
“Even if I could, patching up a wound this severe would probably kill me.”
