Robin, who had watched the fight through a knothole and passed out at the sight of Gath ripping out the Kitzakk’s arm, now revived to find her face buried in tangled straw. Remembering gradually what had happened, she pushed herself up and peered out the knothole. A scatter of people had gathered in the yard. Villagers. She hesitated thoughtfully, and clutched fearfully at her throat. Hurriedly, she pushed the ladder down through the hole, climbed down and rushed out of the stable.
Several Cytherian warriors, and a scatter of women who had reentered the village, stood at the edges of the yard watching the mighty victor stagger toward a footpath. His stagger was impressive, but his entrance into the path was not. He missed the opening by a foot, hit the corner of the wall with a shoulder and spun around, taking down barrels, awnings and a stack of buckets before hitting the ground.
Robin raced to him. When she reached him, he was trying to get off the ground without much success. He was crouched face down, shaking, blinking with one eye. The other was swollen closed. Tears swam in Robin’s eyes as she kneeled beside him. She offered him her hand. He took it, obviously without knowing whose it was or even if it was a hand. His nerveless fingers spent a long time before they found a grip.
Using her hand for support, he tried to stand and this time made it to his knees. This put him face-to-face with Robin, and he hesitated, recognizing her. She murmured, “We must stop the bleeding!”
He was taken back for a moment, as if the resonant truth in her words was too much to bear, then said weakly, “We are finished.”
He pushed her away, staggered through the alley brushing its sides, and reached the clearing beyond. He shuffled through Forest Gate and started for the forest. He fell to his knees twice before vanishing within its greenery.
Robin slumped in defeat against the wall in Wagon Yard and several women moved to comfort her. Before they reached her, she jumped up and raced into a side street.
When she reached the small wooden building on the first tier where she had a room, she luckily found her horse and flatbed wagon parked in the stall behind it. She fetched satchels, fire pot and blankets from her room, threw them on the wagon, and hitched up the horse. Leaping into the driver’s box, she shook the reins and clicked her tongue, and the animal trotted down the street toward Forest Gate.
Robin was driving recklessly out of the gate just as Bone and Dirken entered it. They saw her and ducked out of the way, staring in dismay as the wagon plunged across the clearing to the edge of the forest. There Robin reined up only a moment, then whispered to her horse and the animal moved into the forest following a trail of blood.