We’ll never be friends again. The thought put a sick, empty feeling in my chest. There was no apology that either of us could offer that would ever tear down the wall between us. We’d done things to the other that neither would ever forgive. Each of us had made choices the other would never really understand or condone. ‘We’re done here,’ I said, as I finished binding his hands behind a tree trunk. I didn’t bother promising to send someone from town to free him and the others. If Pan’erath didn’t already assume I would, then it’s not like he’d believe me just because I said so.
‘You sure we shouldn’t kill him?’ Reichis asked, looking down from a tree branch.
‘Of course I’m sure,’ I snapped.
For once, the squirrel cat didn’t seem offended. He just looked down at me with something that, in a less homicidal creature, might have been sympathy. ‘He’ll never let go of this, kid. You can smell it on him.’
‘I’m not going to smell him, Reichis.’
The squirrel cat hopped down to the ground and sniffed at Pan’s face. ‘Too bad, because if you did, even dumb as you are, you’d sink your teeth in this one’s throat before you ever turned your back on him.’
‘Time to get moving, kid,’ Ferius called out.
I looked around and saw the way she was wiping sweat from her brow, the way her hands shook. Exhaustion and injury were taking their toll. Pan had killed her horse, leaving us with only mine. ‘Take the horse,’ I said. ‘Bring Shalla to my parents. My mother can heal both of you.’
‘I’ll be fine, kid. I just—’
‘You’re not fine!’ I shouted. ‘Nobody’s fine. Shalla’s barely breathing and you can barely stand. So take the damned horse and get my sister to safety.’
‘Okay, kid. Okay.’ She locked eyes with me. ‘And what about you?’
I set about picking up as many of the steel cards as I could find. ‘I’ll come soon.’
‘You’re going after Ra’meth,’ she said. It wasn’t a question.
Reichis crawled up my side to sit on my shoulder. ‘Damned straight we’re going after him. If I can’t taste the flesh of these skinbags, then I want the guy responsible for all of this.’
Ferius cocked an eye at the squirrel cat. ‘Is he bragging again? His kind do that a lot, you know.’
‘Tell the stupid Argosi to—’
‘Shut up,’ I said.
The two of them looked at me, startled. Contrary to what they both thought, I wasn’t even the least bit interested in pursuing Ra’meth. I’d learned my lesson. I wasn’t the young Jan’Tep hero going off to defeat his enemy in a glorious battle. Ra’meth was one of the lords magi of our clan. He was vastly more powerful than Pan or Ra’dir or the others. He was also smarter. He’d managed to outwit my uncle and the Sha’Tep and everybody else, all so he could line things up perfectly to make himself clan prince. Now all he had left to do was to stand before the council and tell his lies and cast the blame at my father’s feet. Would that be enough though? My father had a lot of supporters on the council. Could Ra’meth really be sure they would all elect him then and there? Or would he need something else? One more act of courage, he’d told me. A great gift for our people.
It didn’t matter. None of it mattered – not my fear, not even Ra’meth’s plans. I couldn’t let him become clan prince. I had to stop him before he got to the council chambers. I turned to Ferius. ‘I need you to do this for me,’ I said. ‘I need you to get Shalla to my parents. They’ll believe her, and that will give them time to prepare for whatever comes next.’
She reached out a hand and gripped my shoulder. ‘You’re tough, kid. You’ve proven that. But you can’t go after a mage like Ra’meth by yourself.’
‘Leave the skinbag to me,’ Reichis growled.
I translated. Ferius, surprisingly, didn’t crack a joke. Instead she bowed her head to the squirrel cat. ‘Anyone can see that you are a fierce warrior, a skilled hunter and a wise scavenger,’ she said, with an odd formality to her voice. ‘But the skinbag in question will have other mages with him. They are too many, and you are too few.’
Reichis gave a little snort in reply. There’s something really disturbing about a squirrel cat snorting dismissively. ‘Too few?’ He sprang off my shoulder onto her back and then started running down the path. ‘Come on, kid. Let’s go get the rest of my people. Then we’re going to really tear those hairless sons of bitches apart.’
The squirrel cat kept up a furious pace as we raced along the forest paths, skirting thick copses of trees and running across clearings where the terrain suddenly dipped wildly. Reichis moved like water flowing down a winding stream – his feet finding the perfect route under fallen trees and over rocky outgrowths. I couldn’t keep up.
‘Stop,’ I gasped, knocking my shoulder against a tree as I slid to an awkward halt.
The squirrel cat turned to look back at me. ‘What? Why?’
Sweat was dripping down my face, stinging my eyes. I’d accumulated a dozen more bruises and scrapes in the past half-hour. ‘I’m going to be dead before Ra’meth even gets the chance to blast me, that’s what. Give me a minute.’
‘We’re almost there. Just tough it out.’
‘No,’ I insisted, still trying to get my heart to slow down.
Reichis cocked his head. ‘You know, I really wonder some days why my people ever feared yours. It seems to me you can barely get your arses out of bed without having a heart attack.’
‘Just …’ Why can’t I catch my damned breath? ‘Just give me a second.’
The simple truth is, my people aren’t especially strong physically. Most things that matter we do with magic. Even the Sha’Tep use objects spelled by clan mages to ease their labours. We’re really not a very tough people, I guess.
‘Listen, kid,’ Reichis said, sitting back on his haunches to scratch at the fur under his chin, ‘when we get to my people, let me do the talking.’
‘Since I don’t speak squirrel cat, how was I supposed to do it in the first place?’
He gave a little chortle. ‘Yeah, but my people aren’t dumb like yours, so even if you can’t understand what they’re saying, they’ll understand you just fine. So when negotiations start—’
‘Negotiations? You mean to tell me the rest of your pack are going to want to get paid?’
Reichis looked up at me as if I were dim. ‘Kid, everything comes at a price. We’re squirrel cats, not dogs. We don’t work for bones and a pat on the head. Think it through, would you?’
‘Fine,’ I said. ‘So what are they going to expect in return for helping us?’
The thin line of his lips twitched a bit and I realised I’d just stepped into a trap. He launched into a remarkably complete list of every shiny, valuable object in my house and, in fact, half the other houses around town – things I’d never even seen. According to Reichis, squirrel cats spend quite a bit of time ‘casing’ locations.
‘You realise I can’t promise things I don’t own,’ I said, when he was finally finished.