Amara crouched beside Bernard in the wavering light of his woodcrafting as another patrol wound slowly through the forest and away from them. As the last of them went out of sight, she murmured, "Have I mentioned how attractive you've been, the last several da-"
Bernard moved suddenly, and his hand clamped gently over her mouth. He let out a soft breath that nonetheless conveyed a warning, and Amara fell silent. The forest sighed around them, the thickening leaves rustling in a low breeze. She saw nothing, heard nothing. She turned to Bernard, her face set in a question.
He touched a finger to his lips. Then, his eyes unfocused, he raised his bow.
Amara stared at him, hardly daring to move.
Bernard glanced down at the ground beneath him, and she saw his face grow intent. His lips moved.
The earth suddenly rippled out from him in a circle-not a violent upheaval, but a single, rippling pulse, as if someone had struck the ground with a large hammer.
Bits of dust and old leaves leapt up from the ground in a low shower. Not twenty feet in front of them, some of the bracken struck against something solid but unseen.
In the same instant, Bernard's bow bent and thrummed. There was an immediate, ugly sound of impact, and then a man appeared, dressed in leathers and bearing a bow of his own. Bernard's broad-headed, thick-shafted arrow protruded at an angle from the man's back.
Bernard moved, a single bound that took him most of the way to the other man, and Amara could see that he had dropped his bow and drawn his hunting knife from the sheath at his side. The other man straightened, turning, but before he could cry out or bring his own weapon to bear, Bernard was on his back, and bore him to the ground. Amara watched as, with brutal efficiency, Bernard reached around with his knife and cut his throat.
Bernard held the other man down, grinding his face into the dirt until his struggles ceased half a minute later. Then he straightened, slowly, his head up, eyes focused in the direction the rest of the patrol had gone. After another full minute had passed, Bernard turned to Amara and nodded once, beckoning.
Amara turned behind her. "Sire."
Gaius came out of the woods behind them, moving more easily than he had since the first days of their journey, though he still carried the walking staff. The First Lord moved up to stand beside Bernard and looked down at the body. He touched the fallen man's powerful bow with the end of his staff.
"A Knight Flora," the First Lord said quietly. "Like you."
"Never served as a Knight, sire," Bernard said, shaking his head. "Centurion in the auxiliary cohort."
Gaius glanced at him. "Mmmm. But obviously you had the skill for it."
Bernard shrugged. "Knights in my Legion… seemed a little full of themselves, sire. Didn't feel like spending all my time with them."
Amara walked up to stand beside her husband, still somewhat shocked at the suddenness of what had happened. She had seen violence before, but she had never seen Bernard engaged in it against another man. She knew he had been a soldier, in his past, but for some reason she had never pictured him killing in such a way. For a moment, his idle chat with the First Lord seemed wildly inappropriate-but only until she saw the faintly sickened expression in his eyes.
She touched his elbow. "Are you all right?" she asked.
He nodded without speaking. Then he looked at his bloodied knife, knelt down, and wiped it clean on the man's clothing. When he rose, his voice was rough. "He'd heard us. Or sensed us somehow. I could tell he had stopped right about there."
Gaius grimaced. "You had little choice, then. Even if he hadn't seen through your veil, he'd have circled back and picked up our trail."
Bernard nodded. "And the way he was trailing their normal patrol means that he was expecting to catch us moving after they had passed." He looked up and met Amara's gaze for no more than a second. "They know we're out here and that we've got some woodcraft on our side if they spared someone like him to look for us."
"How long before they notice he's missing?" Amara asked.
Bernard took a deep breath and nodded to himself. "As long as possible." He turned to the body, and rapidly went through the man's pockets and a small belt pouch. He discarded everything he found, shook his head, then touched the ground with his fingertips, murmuring under his breath. The earth quivered, and then the body began sinking into it, as if into very soft mud. Within a minute, it was gone from sight altogether, leaving nothing but an oblong, rounded patch of bare earth in its wake.
At Bernard's direction, Amara and Gaius helped him scatter more of the detritus of the forest floor over the bare patch, and he went over it himself, once they were done, until he was satisfied that they had concealed it. "All right," he said afterward. "A man like this, if he'd found our trail, might well take off and follow it alone for a time. Even if the patrol noticed he was gone within the hour, they might not think anything of it if he doesn't show up until the end of the day."
Amara nodded. "It makes sense. What do we do about it?"
"We make a better pace," Bernard said. "As fast as we can, for as long as we can. I can cover our trail pretty well for an hour, maybe two. The farther we get before we start leaving tracks again, the longer it will take them to find our trail using a standard search pattern."
"We've most of the distance still ahead," Amara said. "A couple of hours- even a full day's lead won't be enough. They'll catch up long before we get to Kalare."
"We don't have to beat them to Kalare," Bernard replied. "We just have to beat them to the swamps. No one's going to be able to track us through that." He looked up at Gaius. "We've got to pick up the pace, sire."
Gaius nodded, his expression sober. 'Til manage, Count."
Bernard turned to Amara. "I've got to walk behind us to hide our trail. It's going to take much of my attention. Do you think you've learned enough to hold a straight course?"
Amara swallowed. Over the week they'd been traveling, Bernard had been improving upon her rather rudimentary fieldcraft as they marched and in camp at night. She would never have believed how difficult something as simple as traveling in a straight line could be, once one was surrounded by miles and miles of forest. It all looked the same. The sun was often hidden by the canopy of leaves and branches, assuming it was a sunny day in the first place, and that old chestnut about moss growing on the north side of the trees was entirely unreliable.
As it turned out, there was a great deal more simple know-how than furycrafting involved in navigating overland. That was to be expected, she supposed. The vast majority of Alerans lived in steadholts in the countryside, and few of them possessed anywhere near the talent Bernard did in even one form of furycrafting, much less two. Amara had formed a habit of learning new skills, thanks to her Cursor training, but the lessons had served mostly to make her acutely aware of how much she didn't know.
She had little choice, though. There were only three of them, and even if Gaius had the necessary skill-which she doubted-he would have difficulty enough simply holding the pace.
"I've had a good teacher," she said quietly, nodding.
Bernard gave her a small smile. "All right. Find your points of reference, and let's turn a bit more to the east."
Amara took a deep breath and returned his smile with one she hoped did not look as nervous as she felt. Then she lined up a tree behind her with one in front of her in the direction they wanted to move, and led the way.
They were able to maintain a surprisingly good pace over the next hour. Amara broke into a relaxed lope whenever the ground was smooth enough to warrant it. Though Gaius's face grew lined with discomfort, and though he still favored his leg, he was able to keep up. Bernard followed along several yards behind them, frowning down at the ground and only occasionally looking around him.
After that, though, their pace began to suffer, and more because of Bernard than the First Lord. The woodsman's jaw had locked into a stubborn clench, and he shambled along with heavy feet, like a man bearing an increasingly heavy burden. Gaius noticed Bernard's discomfort and frowned at Amara.
She grimaced, just as worried as the First Lord, but she knew what Bernard would say if she suggested they rest. Amara shook her head in a negative, and kept going at the best pace she thought they could sustain.
By the time the light began to slant steeply through the forest and darken into shafts of sunset amber, Bernard was barely managing to keep himself moving forward. Amara began looking for someplace out of sight where they could rest, and found it in a broad ditch where a stream had evidently shifted its bed. Gaius slipped down into it with a grunt of discomfort, but Bernard was shaking with fatigue when he tried to climb down and nearly toppled headfirst into the ditch.
Amara managed to steady him, and he promptly sat down on the ground, leaned his back against the side of the ditch, and dropped his head forward in exhausted sleep.
"How far did we come, do you think?" Gaius asked quietly. The First Lord was vigorously rubbing his bad leg.
Amara saw it jerking and twitching in a cramp, and winced in sympathy. "Since he began covering our trail? Perhaps eight or nine miles. It's excellent time, considering."
Gaius grimaced. "Nothing like a nice walk to make one appreciate flying, eh?"
"True enough, sire." She moved to him and withdrew her flask from her pack. She offered it to the First Lord, and Gaius accepted it with a nod of thanks and drank thirstily.
"Not precisely my question, though," Gaius said. "How far have we come, in total? I've been a tad distracted myself."
Amara settled down on the ground beside him, the better to keep their murmured words as quiet as possible. "Let me think. It has been nine days since we set forth, of which we have been on the move for a little more than seven." She mused over the terrain they had passed, adding the figures in her head. "Somewhere between one hundred thirty and one hundred forty miles, sire, or so I should judge.
Gaius blew out a breath. "I confess, I thought we would make much better time."
"We're past some of the more difficult terrain," she said. "From here, the hills should become considerably gentler until we reach the swamps." She scratched her nose, and waved away a buzzing midge. "Call it another six or seven days to the swamps. Then our pace will slow dramatically."
Gaius nodded. "The last thirty or forty miles will be the hardest."
Amara glanced down at his foot. "Yes." Gaius caught the direction of her gaze, and arched an eyebrow. Amara felt her face flush. "Meaning no criticism, sire."
"I doubt you could give me more than I've already given myself," Gaius said, his tone light. His eyes, though, darkened a few shades, and his hands tightened into fists. "Hiding from a few squads of searchers. Running until the Count has half killed himself with effort. If we were close enough to Kalare, by the great furies, I'd…" He cut himself off, and shook his head sharply. "But that's not yet, is it?"
"No, sire," Amara said quietly. "Not yet. But we'll get you through."
Gaius was silent for a long moment. When he spoke, his voice was weary. "Yes. I expect you will."
Amara frowned at him. "Sire?"
He shook his head. "It isn't that time yet, either."
Something in his tone alarmed her, and she felt her frown deepen. "I don't understand."
"That's as it must be for the present," he said, and leaned his head back against the wall of the ravine. "Rest for a bit. We should try to rouse Count Calderon before long. Cover more ground before nightfall."
"Are you sure you're ready for that, sire?"
"I'd better be, Countess," murmured the First Lord, and closed his eyes. "I'd better be."