She would wait until the middle of the night.
Then she would strike.
49
KILLIAN spent his last hours thinking.
His thoughts twisted and turned as he dwelled on what he could have done differently. He pondered the secrets the old man had promised to reveal but never did. He wondered if he was ready to die.
He thought about Ella.
She would never know what had happened to him. Did she even care? A girl like her, she would probably have found herself a strong lover by now, someone to see her through this terrible war. Killian wished he could see her one last time.
This was his last night, the guards had told him. He had been deemed a troublesome prisoner. The guards hadn't bothered to hide what would be done with him — why hide it from those who would soon die anyway? With the morning light they were going to take him out and slice his throat. His blood would sluice into a special well, and when it was all drained out of him they would toss his corpse into one of the huge vats. Killian's body would provide the fuel that powered the enemy's war machine.
Perhaps he'd been too arrogant, too confident of himself. When Killian had seen Evrin on the cart with all those other prisoners, back near Seranthia, he'd followed them to this camp. He had been looking for Evrin and now he'd found him, and Killian could hardly restrain himself. It was all about to be revealed. He would find Evrin, they would escape the camp, and Killian would help Evrin with his quest, while Evrin told Killian who he really was.
His mind so fixed on his objective that he could think of little else, Killian had scouted the terrain before deciding he was ready to break into the camp and free Evrin.
The defences had been stronger than he'd expected, or perhaps he was simply unprepared. He hadn't even had a sword; it was just him and his skills with stealth, his strength and his agility.
He had clung to the bottom of a goods cart to get in, then let go when the guards were distracted by a commotion in the yard. He'd hidden behind the base of a guard tower, getting his bearings and deciding on a search order to be executed when the camp went to sleep, when he realised what the commotion was.
At the same time Killian saw the cause of the tumult, and recognised that the fleeing man in a scraggly white robe was Evrin, he'd felt a sword prick under his armpit.
So close; but not close enough.
Evrin had made it out, but his rescuer had not.
Now, after living in the camp on starvation rations; after a failed escape attempt, with three guards killed, two gravely wounded, it was Killian's time to die.
He almost wished they hadn't told him. The knowledge made Killian's last night torture. Somehow it both dragged interminably and was going much too fast for his liking.
Killian wished he could have a chance to fight, but his legs were manacled, tied by a chain to a sunken stake, and his hands were bound together. He was to spend his last night in the small hut where they put those who were destined to die.
With nothing better to do, Killian decided to work on the stake. He knew that even if he made it outside the guards would simply beat him until he couldn't think and then tie him even more tightly, and he wouldn't get far with his legs manacled and wrists bound.
Yet Killian decided to try anyway. It was better to die fighting than to give up all hope.
~
IT WAS nearly the middle of the night and Killian's ankles were bleeding freely as he pushed the stake away from him, and then pulled it towards him, again and again. The blood trickled down into the hole, but the moisture seemed to actually be helping, creating a loose mud. Killian's wrists were bruised and the skin was red and torn, but he kept at it, pushing, and pulling, pushing, and pulling…
He stopped, breathing heavily, and decided it was time to try to get the stake free again. He squatted down with his hands clasped around the pole and he slowly tried to stand, feeling the veins throbbing in his forehead as he pulled on the stake.
He could feel it coming! Killian groaned with effort, stifling the sound, until he finally felt the stake slide out of the earth, and he stood up to his full height.
His legs were still manacled, but he could now hold the chain in his hands. Positioned at the end of the chain, the stake now made a handy weapon. His wrists were still bound, but Killian had been a thief and an acrobat. He could still move; enough to take some of the enemy with him at any rate.
Killian retreated to the hut's far wall, as far as he could get from the door. He tucked his head into his shoulder, and with the clumsy gait his manacled ankles gave him, he ran at the door.
Killian knew how to move so that all of the power in his body was directed to his hands, or his feet, and this time he put all of his power into his shoulder.