Page 8 (1/2)

I feel tears prickthe heartstone around my neck I say what Jack always says Nuthin’s impossible, I says Unlikely, but not i I learned since last we met

An much more besides, I’d say Her shrewd brown eyes is readin irl cairl no more

Lemme help you, I says I hand her to her feet an we stand there We take a long look at each other

Tall an lean an weathered an tough An so strongly alive an wise Mercy was like soreen paradise, hidden away deep in the woods A handsoh cheekbones, cropped white hair an dark brows Now her flesh clings to her bones Her ed to her knees

In body, she ht be less But in spirit, she’s somehow old

We thought you was dead, I says

I nearly was, she says Soe just as as about to cross it But I thank ’em just the same Gave me the chance to slip uard Not to oes to collect the shortbolt froround where it fell, I says, Yer welcome My pleasure

She turns, startled It was you? she says

Me an sootta rendezvous with ’eues north Yer coather my stuff as I’m talkin The scattered weapons an sack

I’ll do my best to keep up, she says If I slow you down, you leave ht of her arms, bloody where Nero attacked her Sorry about Nero, I says Are y’okay?

I’ll survive, she says I’ve had worse Thin white lines, the scars of a whip, criss-cross her sun-tough skin

How’d they git hold of you? I says

Later, she says Let’s ht still be about

She readies her shortbolt fer action an I do the sarabs my barksack an shoulders it Kills my protest with one fierce look I ain’t dead yet Lead on, she says

I whistle at Nero We set off at speed, alert to any sound, any moveht soon after they’d all split up Hijacked by the mist, tricked by the terrain, he ambushed hie, there they were Three Tonton, their firesticks aimed at his heart

He braced himself for the shot The flare of the muzzles The impact The oblivion, swift and sure He was calm Blue calm He felt a beat of wonder at that

But no shot came Death, his choice To turn and leap and cry out for life as he pedalled the air to the rocks below No blue calagged, they led hiue or so, he reckoned They stopped in what he took to be a clearing He was round

They waited The four of thean to lift The day warmed itself on his skin Ti, hauling hi untied