Tonar frowned. “Well, of course,” she said. “We’re Markswomen.” She dismounted from her horse and Kyra followed suit.
A middle-aged woman in a green embroidered dress and black waistcoat stepped forward and bowed, placing her right hand over her heart. “I, Aruna Kalam, headwoman of the clan of Kalam, am honored to welcome you,” she said, her voice trembling. “We had expected only one Markswoman—we are indeed fortunate to receive two.”
The emphasis on fortunate was not lost on Kyra, although Tonar did not appear to notice it.
“Greetings, Aruna,” she said. “I bring you Shirin Mam’s blessings, and thanks for the beautiful fillies you sent us last year.”
Aruna gave a strained smile. “No more than our duty,” she said. And still that break in her voice, as if she was deathly afraid.
“Talking of duty, I am here to do mine,” said Tonar. “Who has committed a crime so grave that it calls for a Markswoman? You did not give the Mahimata any details, beyond requesting my presence. While I am glad that you asked for me, you must remember that I will show no favor. Bring forth the accused, present the evidence, and read out the sentence.”
Aruna swallowed hard and unfurled a parchment. Behind her a knot of six elderly women, whom Kyra took to be the council of Kalam, twitched and trembled. A wave of tension swept over the entire crowd, as if they were holding their breaths, waiting for something terrible to happen.
Please, Kyra prayed, let it not be Tonar’s mother or father or brother . . .
“For the crime of killing my son, Asindu Matya,” read out Aruna in a shaking voice, “I, Darbin Matya, do sentence you, Tonar Kalam, to death.”
Tonar stared at Aruna slack-jawed, but Kyra had already begun to move with the headwoman’s first few words. With an almost audible click she sensed the trap close, and lunged at Tonar, throwing the Markswoman hard on the ground. A hail of arrows ripped through the space that Tonar had occupied, and vanished harmlessly across the grassland. A couple buried themselves in a yurt opposite. Kyra rolled off Tonar, heart pounding, her blade flashing green fire in her hand.
People screamed and dropped to the ground, trying to crawl to safety away from the Kalam camp as more arrows flew through the air. From somewhere came a wordless, frustrated shout and the sound of running footsteps.
Tonar rolled fluidly up from the ground, spitting grass and mud. “Behind the horses,” she barked, and Kyra obeyed, although her heart clenched at using the horses as shields. They scooted across the ground on their elbows and crouched behind the horses. Rinna and Dvoos, Tonar’s black gelding, stood calm and motionless amid the chaos. From underneath Rinna, Kyra spied a large, powerfully built man throw a lighted torch at one of the yurts. Oh no. There could be people inside.
Kyra focused her anger to a pinpoint of pure rage and unleashed it at the assailant in a burst of Inner Speech.
“Put out the fire,” she commanded. “Rescue anyone who is inside.”
The man hesitated, his mind blocking her, and Kyra realized he was out of her range. She streaked from her hiding place, pulse racing. An arrow grazed her shoulder and she stumbled, caught herself, and pushed forward again, this time staying low to the ground.
The blood thundered in her ears. She summoned the Inner Speech once more, putting all her force into it, her muscles straining and aching with the effort.
The man tried to resist, but this time, she broke through his defenses. He lurched forward and beat the flames out with his coat, thrusting aside the burning wood of the doorway to crawl inside. A Kalam man and woman followed, ripping aside the smoking canvas of the yurt to reveal the precious ones trapped inside: over a dozen little children, huddled together, their faces terrified. A man stood over them, holding aloft a wickedly curving sword, looking angry and bewildered as his compatriot—acting under the bonds of Inner Speech—tried to wrest it away from him. The hostage keeper.
Kyra’s breath caught. She didn’t stop to think. Her blade flew from her hand and buried itself in the sword-wielder’s throat. Blood gushed from the wound and spurted over the children in a hot river as they screamed in panic. Kyra ran toward the body to retrieve her blade, hoping the children were uninjured.
She and Tonar had to put an end to this now. Kyra kept the bonds of Inner Speech tight over the man who had tried to burn the yurt, although her head felt like it was splitting in two.
Tonar, meanwhile, had not been idle. She had thrown her blade at the lead archer, stopping him dead in his tracks. The blade embedded itself in the middle of his forehead, and his bow fell uselessly to the ground. She darted forward to retrieve it while simultaneously using the Inner Speech to fell another attacker.
Kyra reached the remains of the smoking yurt as the Kalam adults began carrying the weeping children away. She bent and closed her fingers over the hilt of her blade, yanking it out from the mess that was the corpse’s throat.
Later, she would wonder who he was, and why he had chosen an outlaw’s path.
But not now. Now there was only the fight.
She ducked behind another yurt, ignoring the cries of pain and fear around her. Four down, she thought. How many left?
She sensed, too late, a malevolent presence behind her. A noose slipped around her neck—which was still sore from having been squeezed by Maidul Tau. Kyra’s katari dropped to the ground. She gasped and brought her hands up to her throat, trying to tug the thin, silken rope off. But all she did was tighten it even more. Panic fogged her thoughts as the noose cut off the supply of blood to her brain.
“Die, scum of Kali,” hissed a woman’s voice behind her.
It was the name of the Goddess that galvanized Kyra’s fading strength. She drove her elbow hard, behind and up, and connected with the woman’s groin. There was a gasp of pain, and the hands that held the noose momentarily lost a bit of their desperate power.
That moment was enough. Kyra gripped the hands and twisted up the fingers, breaking several with an audible crack.
The groan turned to a scream and her assailant stumbled back. Kyra sprang up and delivered a hard back kick to her chest, then spun around and followed it up with a front kick to the throat. The woman tumbled to the ground, blood frothing from her mouth.
Tonar appeared behind the yurt in a half-crouch, her face nearly unrecognizable in a twisted snarl.
“Any more?” she hissed.
Kyra grabbed her katari and massaged her neck, trying to breathe normally and still the fierce roaring in her head. “Not that I know of. Let’s check the camp.”
They circled the camp twice, throwing aside the canvas of the yurts, kicking open the wooden-frame doors. All were empty; the Kalams had fled to safety farther up the grassland where their horses were grazing.