Call to Arms (The Girl In The Arena Book 1) (17 page)

That flummoxed her completely. “What do you mean the other direction?”

“I mean I didn’t come from the city past the woods. I came from the city past the desert.”

He had to be lying! He had to be! There was no two ways about it, he could not have come from that direction. Not unless he was even more ancient than he looked, and he looked incredibly old but it had been centuries since anyone had walked from the desert into Aretula, and that was because there was nothing on the other side of the desert. Anyone who said otherwise was a liar, or someone he believed in myths and fairy tales.

“You don’t believe me. They didn’t believe me either.”

Reena knew that she was walking on dangerous ground with this man. “Of course I believe you. Everyone has heard the stories, I just never met anyone from there before. What’s it like? Is it as amazing and fabulous as they say? They say that it will be our salvation.”

Okay maybe she was going too far, but then again maybe she wasn’t. His face changed and tears began to roll down his cracked and ancient cheeks. “It was an amazing land but I will never see it again.”

“Did you get lost in a desert?”

“No, I left that city to come here.”

“But why?”

“Because there I was a criminal. I heard that if a man were to cross the desert, could make it to the city beyond it that he could become a king. The whispers say that happened before.”

Was he talking about Berkeley? He had to be! She asked, “are you talking about Berkeley?”

He nodded his head and clapped his hands, shuffling like a little troll around the floor. “Yes, him. They sent him into exile and he became a king. Or so the legends say. Are they true? Is that what happened?”

“Yes. But why didn’t you just go into the city? It’s only a few days walk from here.”

“Because it took me too long to cross the desert and by the time I did I had forgotten why I started out.”

“You have the sword? The sword it was here with the soldiers, where is it?”

“I remembered!” He clapped his hand into another shuffling little dance around the floor. “I remembered why I was here. Those soldiers, they didn’t believe me. They said nobody could survive in a desert. They say there is nothing on the other side. They swear that I am just a criminal who escaped from their city on the other side of the woods.”

“How ignorant of them.”

He gave her a sly look out from below his heavy gray eyebrows. He held out his hand and she looked down. There on his skin was undeniable proof that he was lying; he had the same prisoner’s mark that she had seen on many of the people waiting to go to the arena. That mark meant that he was a murderer, and that there was no redemption for him.

“You believe me don’t you?”

She wished he was telling the truth, and maybe it all amounted to the same thing. She wasn’t sure. “Yes, I do. I still need the sword though, I need it to… What should she say?” She wasn’t sure.

“Oh, the sword! The sword, the sword, the sword…” He was clapping his hands and stomping his feet. He was turning the two words into an offbeat that was grating on her nerves so badly she wished she could just kill him and be done with it. “Your kingdom for a sword my lady! Is that what you’re telling me?”

“I’m not sure what you’re asking me. Just give me the sword now.”

“Would you like to see the soldiers?”

“You said they’re all dead.”

“They are! I turned them into sculptures, would you like to see? There my art. My pretty pretty art. I love to make art and you, you my dear would make such a good addition to my collection. Hold still my little pretty girl, let’s have a look at your face shall we?”.”

She wanted to vomit. Her throat tightened with acid and her chest felt heavy. Surely he was making that up. “No, thank you. I’m sure they look lovely. Maybe the next time I come but right now what I need is the sword. I need the sword and nothing else.”

“Everyone needs something little missy.” He was no longer clapping and cheering. He had become sullen. There was a homicidal rage brewing right below his surface, she could see it. She just did know how to get the sword and to get out of there without killing him, or having him kill her.

He came at her, his filthy claws hooked and reaching. Reena spun, the knife coming out of her belt so quickly that she did not even register the fact that she was pulling it out. The blade had been soaked in werebane and parted his flesh easily. As soon as it did he began to choke and gasp. His long nails scratched down her arm, leaving bloody furrows behind and she shrieked.

Reena staggered backwards, jerking her knife out of his body as she did so. Blood ran in little freshets down his filthy rope and he clasped both hands to his breast to try to stop the flow. Blood spurted between his fingers. He looked up at her, and all the madness had left his eyes momentarily. “You killed me.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be, I was going to kill you and then put you in my garden little pretty.” He sagged to his knees and into the floor; his blood ran thick and clotted across the old boards and Reena stepped backwards. She did not even want his blood to touch her; she was somehow positive that if it did she would inherit his madness.

She waited and waited but he never got back up. The werebane had done its work as had her aim. This was one death that she did not regret; she could not help that.

She searched for almost 4 hours before she found the sword. When she did find it she could not understand what it was about it that made it so important. It had a long silver hilt decorated with strange figures and writing and it looked old, older than anything she’d ever seen with the exception of the man lying dead on the floor.

But still, what was it about the sword? How would the sword help her to convince the other Outlaws in the woods to fight against the city and its soldiers?

The soldiers might not have ever been able to find her or anyone else but she knew exactly where to look. She had the advantage of knowing the woods like the back of her hand. It did not take her long to find a large camp, one that had a dozen people or more.

It wasn’t that they were not being careful, they were. There was no fire; the children were quiet and huddled into the small sections of the cave in which they were living. The adults were smart enough to keep the tracks hidden and cover anything that they could not get rid of. Still she knew all of those tricks because she had grown up doing the same things.

As soon as they saw her, one of the men came forward. He said gruffly, “I recognize you. You’re Liam’s daughter. I heard your father was taken and so were you.”

“I was taken, yes. I’m the reason the soldiers are in the woods now, they are looking for me.”

A woman behind him spoke in a shrill voice. “You should leave! You should leave before you get us all killed!”

The man turned to her, “hush Heidi. When have we ever turned down one of our own?”

“There’s a first time for everything Lucas. We can’t afford her kind of trouble.”

“I hear she saved a boy from another camp, Deal.”

“So what if she did?” Heidi asked. “She can’t save all of us.”

“Maybe I can help you.” All eyes turned to Reena as she said those words. She pulled the sword out and they all stared at it, their mouse agape. “It’s time for us to stand and fight. Don’t you know that? We can keep running, we have to fight, we have to band together with the citizens of the city who wants the war.”

Lucas stepped forward, “what war?”

Reena said, “There is a war brewing. Several soldiers who are a part of it helped me to escape, and said I could come here and tell you that if you truly want to be free then you must fight. You must stand up against the Law. It’s not enough to run and hide, you have got to fight.”

“What would you know about fighting?” Heidi shouted.

“I know everything about fighting,” Reena did not shout. Her voice was low and soft and because of that everybody listened. If she had shouted they would’ve thought her a distant angry young girl, but her sincerity shone through in her quiet. “I was in the arena. I was forced to fight to save the people that were placed in the arena with me. That’s true. The bully Deal, he could tell you the same thing. The day he was in the arena with me was the day it was his life that I would save if I won. But the gladiator who I was supposed to fight committed suicide rather than face me.” She knew that she was giving them the impression that a gladiator was so afraid of her that he would rather kill himself than fight her. She knew that was dishonoring Kale, but right now she had to get these people to listen.

She lifted the sword high and it shown and glinted, bringing light to every gloomy corner of the cave. “I fetched this sword from the outpost at the mouth of the great desert and I’m going to take this sword back to the city and I am going to fight. I am going to stand against the Law that makes us all Outlaws.

“I’m going to stand against those who say that we must be Culled and that we have no say in our fates. I’m going to fight against those who think it is acceptable to put women in caverns and children in the arena. If you would rather stay here and live out what’s left of your miserable lives running and hiding, always being afraid, then be my guest. Do that, but know that there are people out there dying because you won’t stand for them. In one day you would die because you will not stand for yourself.”

Her entire body was trembling. And it all comes down to this. Would they listen? All it would take would be one person to step forward and then they would all do it, she knew that. The woman, Heidi, clutched her children and moved closer to the back side of the cave. A few other women looked away and more than one man did as well.

“Suit yourself,” Reena said. “I’m going to go find others, true Outlaws. Men with guts, men were like my father. Men who are willing to die to see to it that what is right stays right.”

She turned and as she did an older man stepped forward and said in a hushed and almost reverential tone, “by the gods, I know that sword!”

Reena stopped. Her heart thudded against her chest walls. She dared not tell him that she did not know what the sword was, or why it was necessary that she have it. “What do I tell the others then?”

The old man looked around himself and he looked back at Reena. “Don’t you people know what you’re looking at? Do you not remember any of the legends at all?”

Heidi said, “Just spit it out old man. Nobody has the patience for your games.”

Reena was running out of patience though she never would’ve said so; he was too afraid the man would tell her to spit it out, to tell them herself what the sword was for. There was no way she could do that so she simply stood there, letting the sword flash its rainbow colored lights against the walls of the cave.

Lucas said, “Heidi — enough. Do not speak again. We all know that you’re better sense your husband died, but that does not give you the right to behave as if you can say anything to anybody anytime you like.”

Heidi actually flinched backwards and her eyes darted from person to person. Reena understood instantly what had happened, her husband had died and she had grown bitter and angry and everybody had just let her behave as she wished out of sympathy and pity, and now they were paying the price.

Lucas added, “Tell us Dax, whose sword was that?”

Dax drew in a long and slow breath. He took a step forward and reached a tentative finger out, laying it on the hilt of the sword. He looked down at his finger and kept looking down for so long that Reena was about to scream at him as well. Finally he lifted his head. Tears glinted in his eyes and ran down his cheeks and when he spoke his voice was a horse whisper that trembled and shook.

“Look at it well. Look at it very well, all of you. This sword is legendary; the sword is what created an entire city. This is this sword of a hero, and a man who dared to cross a desert. The sword is the one that belonged to the great man Barkley.

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