Easy to tell himself that, but hard to convince himself. It was a matter of faith, he supposed, and he just didn't have a lot of faith in anything or anyone, when it came right down to it.
Not even in himself.
And the consequences of refusing to pay for his magic were not to be considered…
IT was a relief, coming down off the hillside, to strike a real road at last. It wasn't what Kellen would have considered a road at the start of their journey, but after so long traveling through the Lost Lands, even this narrow beaten track—obviously going from Somewhere to Somewhere, and frequently used by someone—was a welcome change, providing sure footing for horse and mule. The only thing that marred Kellen's relief was that he still hadn't seen any more clear signs of Endarkened Taint in their surroundings—although that wasn't altogether surprising, since there wasn't much around them to see besides rocks and a little sparse grass. It was hard for either grass or rocks to go awry in any noticeable way. How warped would grass have to get before he'd notice the Taint?
I suppose it would have to be purple, or something.
There hadn't even been birds in the sky.
Up ahead the trail forked. One branch led down, into a broad valley, while the other curved off and away around the side of a rocky hillside. Either could have been the right road.
But there was a third path, almost invisible, a narrow goat track leading up over the crest of the hill at right angles to their present course.
You will know what to do when the time comes.
Certainty descended over Kellen like an invisible cloak. This was the moment the Wild Magic had prepared him for. Now was the time to pay his Price.
"Which way?" Jermayan said, reining Valdien to a stop.
"This way," Kellen said, pointing toward the hill.
"Don't be ridiculous," Jermayan scoffed. "It goes almost straight up— and probably back the way we came, besides. The animals will never make it, and—Kellen! Come back here!"
But Kellen wasn't listening. There. There! Something—someone — needs me. Is in trouble! He couldn't have turned aside from the path now if he'd wanted to. And he didn't want to. "Come on," he said to Shalkan. "We've got to hurry."
He didn't know where the sudden sense of urgency came from, but the unicorn accepted it without question. Shalkan bounded up the goat track and lunged along it, as surefooted as the goats it was meant for. Kellen clung to the saddle, ignoring Jermayan's frustrated shouting somewhere behind him.
They reached the top of the hill, and Shalkan broke into a bounding run. Kellen didn't know where they were going, but the demand of his obligation drew him onward, and he followed it without hesitation.
In the valley ahead, there was actually some healthy-looking vegetation, trees, a stream—not lush, by any standards, but far more livable than the country they'd been passing through. Shalkan bounded over the stream, and headed up the hillside, following that goat track around the curve of the hill, and a small stone hut appeared up ahead, just under the crest of the hill, on the lee side—a shepherd's croft, undoubtedly, the sort of crude construction of stone, mud, and thatch that the natives of the Lost Lands might build.
It was the first he'd seen—after their encounter with the Centaur-shepherd, he and Jermayan had steered well clear of any possible locals— but it didn't take any great act of imagination to figure out what the hut represented, and what sort of inhabitant it had, especially with the small herd of agitated goats milling and bleating in the stone pen beside the door. The only question was, why had the magic drawn him here?
Who was it that was in trouble?
Shalkan slowed from his bounding gallop to a fast trot as they drew closer, caution overtaking urgency.
Then, shattering the silence, ringing out across the valley, came screams. A woman's screams, coming from inside the hut.
Kellen didn't have to think twice. He kicked free of the stirrups and vaulted from Shalkan's back, running toward the door of the hut.
The hut was small and dark, but enough light came in through the tiny windows to allow Kellen to see that someone large had someone else—the woman who had screamed, almost certainly—trapped in a corner of the hut, savagely beating her with a short club. That was enough for him. He crammed himself inside—there wasn't a lot of room, and three people seriously crowded the tiny hut—and grabbed the man's arm before he could land another blow.
If the shepherd was surprised to have his beating interrupted by a knight in full armor, he wasn't surprised enough to keep from attacking Kellen. He swung his club savagely at Kellen's head, and only Kellen's helmet saved him from a nasty concussion. The club was thick wood, wrapped in bands of black lead. It was a deadly weapon, meant for killing, and the blow rattled Kellen's teeth and left his ears ringing.
There wasn't enough room here for Kellen to draw or use his sword, but he had his fists, and his armored gauntlets, and plenty of muscles from Jermayan's sword-training and his time in the Wildwood. And he'd taken—and given—enough beatings growing up back in the City to know what to do in a fight.
But this wasn't the place to try.
He wrestled the man around, then rammed his shoulder into the bully's gut and shoved, carrying them both outside. They tumbled over together, but the man was swift, strong, and agile, and scrambled to his feet as quickly as Kellen did.
Now Kellen had room to pull his sword—
No.
Blade against club, however deadly the club—no.
He waded in with his armored fists. He took a good pounding—and he added several new dents to his armor, with corresponding bruises beneath—but at last Kellen was able to finish the fight with a solid blow to the gut, followed by a cracking—and heartfelt—punch to the shepherd's jaw.
The man toppled over like a felled tree, measuring his full length on the ground. He was unconscious, and would stay that way for some time, Kellen hoped uncharitably. But he was alive. Which he would not have been if Kellen had pulled his sword.
Kellen turned back to the hut, to the shepherd's victim. He had to bend down a little to get in through the door, and in the dimness, all he could see was a huddled female shape in the corner. She was completely muffled in a long dark cloak of homespun with a deep hood. Kellen lifted her gently, hoping she didn't have any broken bones. At least she was alive as well. A few moments later, and she wouldn't have been.
He carried her out of the hut, seeing without any particular surprise that Jermayan had finally elected to follow him. The Elven Knight dismounted and came hurrying forward just as Kellen lay the woman gently on the ground and looked up toward him, about to explain what he'd found when he reached the shepherd's hut.
But to his shock, Jermayan's face contorted with horror and anger, and the Elven Knight drew his sword and lunged forward, intent upon attacking the woman Kellen had just rescued.
"No!" Ignoring his aches and bruises, Kellen jumped into Jermayan's path, grappling with him. A quick glance over his shoulder showed him that the woman was awake and moving, crawling weakly away. There was something not quite right about her face, but Kellen didn't have time to figure out what. Jermayan was far stronger than he was, and determined to free himself from Kellen in order to reach her.
He held tight to the wrist of Jermayan's sword-hand, and held him like a wrestler trying to force his opponent out of the ring.
"Don't you see what she is?" Jermayan shouted in his ear. "She's a Demon! I've got to kill her!"
No. If he was sure of anything at the moment, Kellen was sure of that. The Wild Magic had brought him here. The Wild Magic was Anathema to anything Demonic, if Jermayan and Idalia were to be believed. So whatever this looked like, the woman couldn't be a Demon.
He had to believe that…
"Think!" he urged Jermayan, holding the struggling Elf's sword-arm in a vise-grip. "If she's a Demon, why was she letting that lout in there beat her to death?"
"To trap us, you fool!" Jermayan shouted in exasperation.
Kellen finally managed to get the leverage he'd been seeking, twisting Jermayan's sword-hand so that he had to let go of the blade or—even in armor—end up with a broken wrist, and with a well-placed shove, sent Jermayan sprawling. When Jermayan hit the ground, he lost his grip on his sword, and it went slithering away over the wiry grass.
But Jermayan didn't give up. He struggled to his feet once more, obviously deciding that Kellen had to be dealt with before the Demon.
Kellen risked another wary backward glance. The woman was sitting with her back to the hut now, watching both of them with an expression of terror on her face. Her skin was the rosy-red of ripe cherries; her short curly hair a darker shade of the same red, and her ears were as pointed as an Elf's. Pale gold horns sprouted from just above her slanting eyebrows and curved back over her head. Her eyes were the same yellow-gold as a cat's, with the same narrow slitted pupils.
He looked back barely in time to block Jermayan's attack. He knew Jermayan didn't actually want to kill him, and unfortunately there were few things you could do to a man in a full suit of Elven plate armor short of that. But suppose Jermayan managed to knock him unconscious, or tie him up somehow? What would happen to the woman then?
Then Jermayan slammed into him, knocking him to the ground. As the two men rolled noisily over and over, Jermayan's fingers scrabbled for the straps of Kellen's helmet. Kellen gritted his teeth. If Jermayan could manage to get his helmet off, it would be fairly easy for the Elven Knight to knock him senseless.
"Stop it. This has gone on long enough." Shalkan's voice wasn't loud, but it carried, and there was a power in that command that shocked both of them into quiet. For a moment Kellen and Jermayan stopped fighting to stare at the unicorn.
Shalkan paced over to where the woman huddled against the side of the hut and lowered his horn until it touched the side of her face.