The Sweet Far Thing
Under the heavy layer of smoke, they are able to find their small boats. They board them and paddle out to the river and away from the ruins of their once beautiful homeland.
Philon rides to the edge of the water, and Gorgon brings us closer. “The Winterlands creatures came. They rode fast and hard.”
“How great is their army?” Kartik asks.
“Perhaps a thousand strong,” Philon answers. “And they have a warrior with the strength of ten.”
Kartik kicks the ground. “Amar.”
Fowlson narrows his eyes. “Amar’s fightin’ for those creatures? I’ll cut ’im apart.”
“No,” Kartik says.
“’E’s not one of us anymore, brother. Let ’im go,” Fowlson says, and it is almost kind.
Asha pulls a body from the river. The creature is injured; she vomits water as we pull her onto Gorgon’s ship. It’s Neela.
“Let me alone,” she croaks, seeing Asha’s hands on her arms. The creature shifts from her dusky lilac form to Asha to me to Creostus and back to herself effortlessly. It’s as if her body cannot control the function.
Asha’s voice is firm. “You were the one who killed the centaur, weren’t you?”
Neela coughs up water. “I do not know what you say. You lie.”
Philon’s eyes gleam in understanding.
Asha will not let go. “You put the Hajins’ poppies in his hand so that we would be blamed.”
This time, Neela does not try to deny it. “What of it?”
“Why did you do it?” Philon demands. The blaze from the forest flickers shadows across the high planes of that extraordinary face.
“We needed a reason to go to war. You would not have gone without it.”
“So you invented a purpose?”
“I did not invent it! The purpose has always been! How long have we lived without magic of our own? How long would you let them deny us? They hold it all. And the filthy Untouchables were put above us! But you would not strike. You have always been weak, Philon.”
Philon’s eyes flash. “You wish it so deeply you would kill one of our own?”
Neela struggles to sit. “There is no progress without cost,” she says defiantly.
“The cost is too great, Neela.”
“One centaur for the rule of the realms? It is a small price to pay.”
“We might have been alert to true danger rather than chasing shadows. And now we are without a home. Our people dead. Our integrity ruined. Before, we had that at least.”
Neela shows no remorse. “I did what was necessary.”
“Yes,” Philon says grimly. “As I must now.”
Neela shakes and shivers; her lips turn as light as the skin of grapes.
“She’s suffered a terrible shock,” I say. “Someone must stay with her.”
“Let her die,” Philon says.
“No,” I say. “We can’t allow that.”
“I shall stay with her,” Asha says, volunteering.
“What if the Hajin kills Neela?” one of the centaurs asks.
Philon’s answer is as cool as those glacier-like eyes. “Then that is the price she pays for her crimes.”
I look to Asha for some reassurance that she will not harm Neela, but her face betrays no emotion.
“I will stay with the shape-shifter,” she repeats.
“Will you safeguard her, Asha?” I ask.
There is a moment’s pause. She bows her head. “You have my word.”
I let out the breath I was holding tightly.
“I will care for her even though I do not wish to,” she adds, orange flames dancing in reflection in her dark eyes. “And when you make your choice, Lady Hope, we Untouchables would have a voice in it. We have been silent too long.”
We gather our numbers, small though they are, perhaps forty in all. Philon and the forest folk take what weapons they have. It isn’t much—a crossbow, two dozen spears with blades at each end, shields, and swords. It is like trying to take down Parliament with only a thimble of gunpowder. I dearly wish I had that dagger.
“What is our best approach?” I ask.
“They ride toward the Borderlands,” Philon says.
Felicity gasps. “Pip.”
“You can’t save her,” Kartik says.
“Don’t tell me what I cannot do,” Felicity snaps.
I pull her aside. We stand by the water where two small boats still sit. “Felicity, we must get to the Winterlands as quickly as possible. We can see to Pip later.”