Redemption (20 page)

"You are kind," Winona replied, "but I think your words are merely warm thoughts on a cold night. The others do not like me. I know that, and I accept it, but I certainly do not expect them to protect me. I cannot imagine any prince putting his life in danger for a scout. That is not the way life works."

Talot stared at the young woman in the darkness. Her face was beautiful, but he could detect a bitter curl to her lips. He shook his head with sadness.

"You have not taken the time to know the people that you travel with," Talot said softly. "These princes are not who you think they are. I have been in battle with these men, and I can tell you that they would not hesitate to endanger themselves to save any member of this group."

"I do not think you are lying," Winona chose her words carefully, "but I find what you are saying hard to believe. Princes do not unnecessarily endanger themselves. If one of them took a risk, it was because there was no other choice."

"Tell that to Sandar when next you see him," smiled Talot. "He begged Prince Antion and his father to abandon him when he was wounded in Borunda. They both refused to leave him behind although they knew that it placed their lives in great danger. Or ask him about the time that the three princes snuck into Captain Xero's camp to scatter their horses and strike a blow against the enemy to make them more cautious."

Winona frowned in disbelief.

"Or ask Monte how we entered Goodland to confront the attackers of a poor merchant," Talot continued. "Ask Jared how Antion and Derri chased killers through the forests of Capri to save Jared's father. Winona, I do not follow Antion because he is a prince. When I first met him, he did not mention that he was a prince. In fact, he hid his identity so that he could travel the Land of the Nine Kingdoms without announcing his arrival. Prince Umal and Prince Derri also traveled as mere merchant warriors. Your thoughts regarding these men are wrong."

"And I should believe you?" Winona retorted, the soft tone of her voice betraying the harsh challenge of her words. "You are one of them."

"Guilty," chuckled the giant. "You should not take my words as proof of the quality of these men, but neither should you judge them by ancient tales of other princes. Watch them closely as we travel. Observe what they do and how they do it. When you have taken the true measure of each of them, then judge them by any standard you wish. You will not find them lacking."

Winona locked eyes with the giant and slowly nodded. "I shall do as you suggest," she promised. "I have found nothing to endear me to your princes, but your words are not the first to reach my ears in their behalf. I will observe them and give them a fair hearing, but do not expect me to sing their praises as you have. I have no use for royalty even if they do turn out to be human like the rest of us."

* * *

The sun sat high in a cloudless sky, and rivulets of melting snow wound through the valleys created by the huge snowdrifts. Prince Umal and Winona were prone near the summit of the largest dune of snow in the area as they watched the Borundans ride by. Only after the Borundans were out of sight did either of them speak.

"Derri was right," sighed Prince Umal. "I counted one hundred besides the officer."

"And ten of them will come back this way tomorrow?" asked Winona. "Why can't we just flee now and be done with it?"

"It is early in the day yet," replied the Odessian prince. "If they travel an entire day, then ten will return tomorrow, but it could be as early as today if they only travel half a day. If we were to flee right now and the patrol came back in an hour, we would not be able to rest at night. The Borundans would chase us until they caught us. Derri's plan is to lower their number by ten and give us at least a half day's head start."

"Whittling off a small group makes a good deal of sense," nodded Winona, "but can't we just avoid them altogether?"

"Can you make our tracks disappear?" asked Prince Umal. "If not, the Borundans will discover them. There is no direction that we can go that will avoid all of their patrols. The last place we want to engage the bulk of the Borundan force is on this frozen wasteland. We need to get into the forests south of here to have any chance of survival. Let's go report what we have seen."

Prince Umal and Winona rose and slid down the hill to their horses. A few moments later they arrived where the group was hiding.

"One hundred plus an officer," reported Prince Umal. "They are definitely Borundans, too."

"Today or tomorrow?" Prince Antion asked Prince Derri. "Which do you think is more likely?"

"It is early in the day," mused the Salacian prince. "I suspect that they started before sunrise. I would guess that the patrol would come back today, but I can't be sure."

"If they follow the same path back," interjected Prince Umal, "we could attack them near here. I noted some positions from the lookout that would make for a good ambush."

Prince Antion glanced around at the members of the group before replying. "Set it up, Umal. I want Jared somewhere safe, preferably at the lookout point where he will be far from the battle. Have Winona stay with him as his last line of defense. If the Borundans don't arrive by sunset, we will gather back here and wait for the morning."

"None of them can be allowed to escape," interjected Prince Derri. "If just one of them gets away, we will have Borundans breathing down our necks as we race southward."

"None of them will escape," promised Price Umal. "Mount up and I will direct each of you to an appropriate spot."

The Odessian prince directed Winona to take Jared up to the lookout spot and then began assigning the others spots for the ambush. Winona and Jared stretched out in the snow and watched the preparations being set. The men took special care to make sure that their tracks were not easily detected as they got into position.

"This will be over quickly," Winona commented with admiration for the placement of the archers. "The Borundans will not know what hit them."

"I do not care for these battles," sighed Jared as he slid down so that he could no longer see over the summit. "Even when they look easy, there is always a chance that things will go wrong. Let me know when it is over."

Winona shrugged and let Jared move away from her. She was intrigued by the preparations as she visualized the Borundans riding into the ambush. As she looked to the west, she suddenly saw the Borundans in the distance. Her eyes flashed back to the ambush zone to see if everyone was ready. Satisfied that Prince Umal had finished in time, she returned her attention to the approaching Borundans. She had expected to see them riding slowly and looking for tracks, but the men were racing eastward at a gallop.

"They are coming too fast," Winona said with concern. "They will rush right through the ambush zone without much chance for anyone to aim at them."

Jared wiggled his way back to the top and peered over the summit. "We must warn everyone," he said with urgency as he started to rise to his feet.

Winona quickly wrapped her arms around Jared's legs and toppled him into the snow.

"Let me go," scowled Jared. "Our men will never get them all. We must warn them quickly."

"All you will accomplish," Winona said sternly, "is alert the Borundans to our position. It is not only our people that will see you. The enemy will see you, too. There is nothing that we can do to help the others. There is no time."

Prince Antion sat in the snow half way up a snowdrift waiting for the Borundan patrol to come by. He was not in a position to see the track to the west, but he could see the summit of the tallest snow dune where Winona and Jared were hidden. The prince was watching when Jared rose to his feet and raised his arms. When Winona pulled Jared down, the Arin prince rose to his feet, an ill feeling rushing though his body. He moved cautiously around the snowdrift until he could see to the west. The prince's mouth hung open in surprise as he saw the small Borundan column racing towards the ambush zone.

"Trouble coming!" Prince Antion shouted, knowing that the Borundans would not hear him over the noise of their horses. "I am going to slow them down."

At the summit of the tallest snow dune Winona released Jared and peered over the edge. She was too far from the Arin prince to make out his words, but his shout alerted her to some change in plans. She stared uncomprehendingly as the Arin prince slid down the snowdrift he had been hiding on and stood in the middle of the narrow valley between two large snow dunes.

"What is he doing?" gasped Winona. "The Borundans will see him for sure."

"He knows that," Jared said anxiously. "He is trying to make the enemy slow down so that our archers can kill them."

"But he will surely die," retorted Winona.

"If these Borundans are not killed," countered Jared, "we will all die. If just one of them escapes the ambush, a hundred men will descend on us within the hour. We will never survive such an attack."

"But the prince will die," repeated Winona. "Surely he knows that?"

"He knows," Jared said. "He has sworn to protect me so that I might stand against my brother. He is doing the only thing he can do to keep his promise."

"Your power is worthless without Antion," Winona snapped. "Zinan will crush you."

The Borundans rounded a distant snowdrift and began galloping down a long straightaway towards the Arin prince. Winona heard the Borundans shout when they saw the prince standing in the middle of the trail with his sword drawn. The Borundans immediately slowed as they tried to identify any threat to themselves. Winona ignored the Borundan riders and stared intently at Prince Antion.

Jared continued to watch the Borundan closely. Their heads swiveled in every direction as they looked for anything out of place. He could well imagine their confusion at finding a single, horseless man standing in their path with his sword drawn in an endless wasteland of snow. The Borundans stopped completely as their eyes scanned the surrounding snowdrifts. Jared ducked his head down so that they would not see him. As he turned to make sure that Winona's head was also hidden, he found the woman passed out beside him. His brow knitted with concern as he pulled her body away from the edge and turned her over. Her heart was still beating, but her breathing was shallow. He wondered what to do.

A shout from the Borundans distracted Jared, and he scrambled back to the lip of the summit. He watched in fear as the Borundans charged towards Prince Antion with their swords drawn. They were halfway to the Arin prince when the first bowstrings sang out in a melody of ambush. The last four Borundan riders toppled from their horses, but the others continued charging towards the Arin prince.

A blur of movement behind Prince Antion caught Jared's eye. He turned to see Prince Umal on his Odessian beauty charging up behind the Arin prince. The Odessian prince's horse leaped into the air and sailed over the Arin prince to land directly in front of the charging Borundans. His scimitars slashed out on both sides of him as another volley of arrows raked the enemy.

Two Borundans managed to get around the Odessian prince and converged on Prince Antion. The Arin prince turned and slashed his sword deep into the side of one of the riders, but the other Borundan slammed his sword into Antion's back. Unfazed by the attack, Prince Antion pivoted and drove the tip of his sword into the second Borundan. A deathly silence fell over the trail as Prince Umal sheathed his scimitars and rode up next to the Arin prince. He dismounted and inspected Antion's back.

"You are not bleeding," Prince Umal frowned.

"You sound disappointed," quipped Prince Antion. "He probably hit me with the flat of his blade."

"Your furs tell a different story," retorted Prince Umal as he spread the cut furs wide and examined the Arinite's skin. "They have been sliced by a sharp blade. You have quite a welt, but your skin is not broken. I have never seen anything like it."

"I was lucky," shrugged the Arin prince. "Gather their horses. We need to get away from here as soon as possible."

Prince Antion turned to see the others leaving their hiding spots and converging on the Borundan bodies. He sheathed his sword and hurried to where he had hidden his horse. He mounted his Odessian beauty and rode up the large snow dune to find Jared kneeling over Winona. He dismounted and knelt by Jared's side.

"What happened to her?" Prince Antion asked.

"I don't know," answered Jared. "I think she fainted as the battle began. I don't know what to do for her. I would heal her, but I do not sense any ailment."

"Did you use the Talent on me today?" Prince Antion asked, his eyes focused on Jared's face.

"No," Jared shook his head. "Why would I draw from you with no reason to do so?"

"I was just wondering," Prince Antion shrugged as he lifted Winona and rose to his feet. "Help me get her on my horse. We need to leave this place quickly."

"What if she is seriously hurt?" frowned Jared. "We should not move her until we are sure."

"She will be fine," promised Prince Antion. "She needs to rest, but this is not the place to do it. I will ride double with her until she wakes up and can ride on her own."

Jared helped the prince get Winona situated and then ran down the hill to mount his own horse and took the reins of Winona's horse. Within minutes the group had reformed at the scene of the ambush. The dead Borundans were draped over their horses, and Prince Umal had roped all of the enemy horses in a line.

"What is wrong with Winona?" asked Monte.

"She fainted," answered Prince Antion. "What are we doing with the bodies of the Borundans?"

"I will take the bodies further to the east," the Odessian prince declared. "We might as well make the Borundan army go the full half-day's ride to find them."

Prince Antion nodded thoughtfully and turned to observe the ambush area for signs of the skirmish. There were pools of blood on the ground and tracks were everywhere. His brow creased heavily.

"I will take care of it," Talot volunteered. "When I get done the area will be covered with a fresh layer of snow with multiple tracks going through it. Unless they are looking closely, they will see nothing."

"You can't possibly eliminate it all," stated Sandar. "They will follow your tracks instead of Prince Umal's."

"No." Talot shook his head. "The Borundan patrol was in a hurry before they got to this point. Prince Umal will keep their herd riding swiftly. The Borundans should not examine any tracks closely as long as they can still see their own horses galloping eastward. Besides, I will also gallop eastward when I am done. I will meet up with Prince Umal before rejoining the group."

"That is the best plan we are likely to come up with on short notice," Prince Antion nodded with acceptance. "Where are we headed, Derri?"

"We will have to angle southeast," replied the Salacian prince. "There will be another patrol heading southeast from their new encampment, and any other path would see us discovered by them. If Umal and Talot head due south when they are done, they will come across our tracks."

"Let's move," ordered the Arin prince.

Prince Derri turned and started the group heading southeast. Everyone except Prince Umal and Talot followed in single file at a slow pace, leaving as little tracks as possible so that Talot's task did not become overwhelming. After they were a fair distance away from the site of the ambush, the Salacian prince picked up the pace to put some distance between them and their pursuers. A couple of hours into the trip, Winona suddenly woke up. She was disoriented at first but she soon realized that Prince Antion was holding her. She frantically tried to pry his hands away from her waist.

"Be still," Prince Antion said softly as he removed his arms from around Winona. "I was only holding you to keep you from falling. How are you feeling?"

"Drained," Winona answered coldly. "My head hurts and my stomach is cramped. Where is my horse?"

"Jared is bringing it up behind us," answered Prince Antion. "In a few moments I will call a halt and you can reclaim your mount, but I would like to know what happened first. Why did you faint?"

Winona looked as if she was contemplating jumping from the prince's horse, but she made no move to do so. Prince Antion sighed with frustration.

"You confuse me," he said softly. "I suspect that you used the Talent in some way to protect me this morning, but I do not understand how or why. Must you be so hostile towards me that you cannot explain it?"

"What makes you say such a thing?" Winona asked guardedly. "I have never claimed to know anything about the Talent."

"No you haven't," agreed the prince, "but I am sure that you are a wielder of the Talent. The way you scale sheer walls is only one reason for my suspicion."

"What are the others?" she asked.

"Orro demanded your participation in the sessions," answered the prince. "He had decided long ago that you would accompany us on this journey, and I often wondered why. As our journey will take us far from Harangar, it was not because of your scouting abilities in the mountains. Nor was it for your skills with weapons, although I am certainly glad to have them available. What did Orro order you to do?"

"Orro's communications with a person are private," retorted Winona. "If he wanted everyone to know what he was saying, he would not talk directly into your mind as he does. You have no right to ask about what he said to me."

"I do not wish to argue with you, Winona," sighed the prince, "but I have every right to ask. My life is given to the task of safeguarding Jared until he meets with his brother. I want to know about anything and everything that can affect that effort."

"Why did you stand in the middle of the trail today?" Winona asked. "Surely you must have known that you would die from such a foolish move? Did it not occur to you that Jared would have no chance of killing Zinan if you were dead? He needs the extra Talent that you carry within yourself."

"Jared will need an extra vessel of Talent to kill Zinan," agreed Prince Antion, "but that is not my concern. My concern is keeping him alive until he gets to the point of needing the Talent. If I had not acted quickly this morning, we would have all died. I did what I had to do to keep Jared alive."

"But you would have died," snapped Winona. "You just don't get it, do you? Your foolish actions could have doomed this entire mission to failure. Jared needs you to succeed."

"No, he doesn't," declared Prince Antion. "While I am filled with the Talent, and I am sure that its use is intended to aid Jared, my death will not result in failure. I truly believe that the Talent would manifest itself in the body of another. The Talent is using me as a vessel to aid Jared in his quest, but I am not the important one here. Jared is. The Talent could just as easily fill Prince Derri, or Monte should I die. Why it chose me as its host is beyond my reasoning, but I am not what is important to this mission. I will do whatever I must to keep Jared alive, including putting my own life at risk."

Winona's mouth opened to respond, but her voice was absent. Her eyes clouded over with confusion as she digested the prince's words. Prince Antion shook his head with his failure to get the woman to open up to him. He raised his hand and signaled for a halt. Almost immediately Prince Derri slowed the pace and halted the group. Winona immediately slid off the saddle and moved to her own horse. As soon as she was situated, the Salacian prince started the group moving again.

As the day wore on, the snow cover thinned and the forests of Hyrem sprouted in the distance. By the time the group reached the first trees of the forest, the sun was beginning to slide towards the western mountain peaks. The group stopped at the edge of the forest for a meal. Less than an hour later, Prince Umal and Talot arrived.

"I sent their horses north," announced the Odessian prince. "Talot and I found a frozen streambed and followed it south a ways. It is likely to delay the Borundans a few hours more."

"Excellent," grinned Prince Derri. "Take a short rest and then we will continue into the forest."

"I will rest when we camp for the night." Talot shook his head. "Our time is better spent in the forest than out here."

Prince Umal nodded in agreement, and Prince Derri gave the command to mount up. It grew dark quickly once they entered the forest, and Prince Derri called a halt within an hour.

"We can have a fire tonight," he announced, "but it will probably be the last one for a few nights. Once the Borundans get on our trail, we will have to maintain cold camps."

Monte immediately strode off in search of game while Talot got a fire going. Prince Umal and Sandar tended to the horses, and Winona helped Jared prepare a meal.

"What happened to you this morning?" Jared asked softly. "You had me worried."

"It was nothing," smiled Winona.

Jared did not believe her words, but he shrugged and returned to preparing the meal.

"Do you think that the Talent would inhabit another body if Prince Antion died?" Winona asked without preamble.

Jared frowned for a moment and then nodded. "I suppose it would," he answered, "but I would prefer not to dwell on such a thing. Prince Antion has become much like a brother to me. I would miss him much more than the Talent he carries within him."

"But you would fail with your mission without his Talent," Winona pointed out.

"I would," nodded Jared, "but my task is not one of my own choosing. I never asked to be allowed to save the world. I never requested the Talent that I have been given. I often wish that I did not have it. It saddens me to think that good people must die to allow me to do something that I have no true desire to do. It is easy to develop a hatred for the Talent and everything it has bestowed upon us. It is using all of us as if we were some small markers in a children's game. I wish it was the Talent that died, and not the people it affects."