“Do you really believe they will follow me?” Corwin asked.
“If you show them that you understand them, and take the first step, they will take the second,” Raith said. “Tomorrow they will watch you risk your life to save wilders. You will become more than the Errant Prince in their eyes. You will become our prince. And one day you will be our king. Rime will never be whole when we stand so divided, wilder against magist. But you have the power to unite us.”
Corwin heard his unspoken words—be the king who sets the wilders free, who ends their suffering. Who makes Rime whole again.
He glanced at his tingling palm, the uror brand clear and striking. He lowered his hand, resting it on the revolver belted at his waist.
“We’ll need to work fast,” Corwin said. “We attack at dawn.”
36
Kate
RENDBORNE PROVED TRUE TO HIS word. Once Kate retrieved the secret of the black-powder formula from Signe’s mind, he healed most of her wounds. Those that could be healed, that was. Kate knew without asking that Signe would bear the scar on her face forever, and no magic could put back the shattered bones in her foot completely.
While Rendborne worked on Signe, the golds returned Kate and Bonner to their cages. Neither spoke. Bonner seemed beyond words. Even though Kate couldn’t hear his thoughts with the collar back in place, she still sensed something vital inside him had broken with his father’s death. He seemed ready to lie down and let go. Kate understood the urge. It was her fault Bonner’s father was dead, her defiance that had cost her friend so much.
She fought the feeling back. This was not the end of all things. So long as she could breathe and think and act, there was a chance to survive. She had Signe to thank for the hope still left alive inside her. When Kate invaded her friend’s mind, she found herself being welcomed in, the bright glow of her essence mesmerizing even through her pain. At first Signe’s pain overwhelmed Kate, but then she managed to bear it, and soon she found herself sharing it. It hurt, but the relief she sensed in Signe gave her the strength to endure.
I’m so sorry, Kate thought, sending the words right into Signe’s mind.
Don’t be, her answer came back at once. We must be strong. We must fight.
Signe’s resilience, even now, after all she had suffered, lent Kate strength.
But it was quickly waning—even more so when two golds appeared, carrying Signe between them. Her foot had been bandaged with enough wraps that it looked twice its normal size. Signe seemed to have fainted again, her head lolling. The golds deposited her in the empty cage next to Kate’s, dropping her like a sack of grain. Kate clamped her mouth shut to keep from screaming at them.
Once they were gone, Kate scooted to the edge of her cage. “Signe, are you okay?”
No answer.
Kate pressed her face against the bars, the metal like cold, dull teeth against her skin. “Signe, please be okay.”
“I’m not,” Signe replied, her voice low and sluggish. “But I will be. Once we’re out of here.”
How? Kate bit her lip to keep from saying it aloud, afraid of letting Signe hear her despair.
“This might help us do it.” Signe scooted toward her and held out a key, the kind that would unlock their collars.
Kate’s breath caught, and for a second she was too stunned to move. “Where did you get that?”
“Rendborne is an arrogant fool. He should’ve broken my hand instead of my foot.”
Then Kate understood. “You stole it off the gold just now?”
“Easy as juggling a knife.”
“Signe, I could kiss you,” Kate said.
“Later. We need to get out of here first.”
With shaking hands, Kate took the key from Signe’s fingers. She raised it to the back of her neck and prodded until she found the keyhole. The key slid in with some resistance, but when she turned it, she heard the click of the mechanism unlocking. The collar loosened at her throat and almost fell. She grabbed it and held it in place while beyond the cage a gold walked by. Once he was gone, she lowered the collar, savoring the freedom from its weight. She could sense her magic again, although it was dormant with the late hour. Come morning, though, she would be able to use it again.
Giddy with hope, Kate refastened the collar so no one walking by would notice. Then she edged to the other side of the cage and called for Bonner. He was lying down, his head away from her, face hidden in his arms.
When he didn’t answer, she called again, her voice cracking. “Bonner, Signe stole a collar key. We can escape, but we need your help.”
Still no answer.
“Please, Bonner. We can’t do it without you. Please.”
Bonner drew a loud breath, then slowly sat up. “What do you want me to do?”
The sound of his voice made Kate flinch. This wasn’t her ever-hopeful, ever-optimistic friend but a dark, forlorn creature, alien and unknowable. Ignoring the ache beneath her breastbone, she slid the key through the bars to him. For a second she feared he wouldn’t take it, but then he reached out and grasped it between his rough fingers. A moment later, he pulled the collar from around his neck.
“Will you be able to bend the bars come morning?” Kate said.
“Yes, but we need to think this through. We can’t fight our way free with so many golds, and Signe isn’t walking out of here on her own.”
Kate sat back, her mind racing. Bonner was right. They would never make it out fighting, and the going would be slow with one of them carrying Signe. They needed a way to distract the golds while they escaped. If only Vianne were still here. She could set the place on fire, but she and Kiran must be far away by now.
Blowing out a breath, Kate gazed around the room, trying to come up with a solution. Then her eyes fell on some of the drakes slumbering in their cages, and hope burst inside her.
“The drakes,” she said, struggling to maintain a whisper.
“What about them?” Bonner replied from where he leaned against the side of the cage, eyes closed.
“If you can get their cages open, I can make them attack the golds.”
His eyes flitted open, and she saw the wet redness in them. “Are you sure?”
“Yes. It’ll be just like at Thornewall.” She was certain of it.
“Very well,” he said, closing his eyes once more. “Come morning, we go. And never come back.”
Kate winced, wishing she had some way to ease his pain. “We should try to get some sleep now while we can.”
Bonner mumbled an acknowledgment, then fell silent. Kate scooted to the back of her cage and lay down. Despite her fatigue, sleep was slow to come. Her mind kept replaying the day’s events. She saw Bonner’s father cut down without a thought. She saw the vial of her father’s blood around Rendborne’s neck, and heard Vikas’s gleeful words at the memory of draining his life, and her boast of setting the trap in King Orwin’s mind. Hatred burned within Kate. Yet after a while her thoughts eased enough that she began to drift in and out of consciousness.
But as the hours slid by, she fell into a deeper sleep, only to be hurled out of it by the sound of an explosion. It was like lightning striking a cliff face. The walls of her cage shook, bits of stone and dirt showering her as she lurched upward from her prone position.
“What’s happening?” Kate crawled to the front of her cage.
In the cage next to her, she heard Signe laugh. “I imagine Rendborne just tested his black powder. If my calculations were correct, it didn’t go very well.”
Kate’s eyebrows climbed her forehead. “You lied about the mixture? To me?”
Signe shifted nearer the bars, her scarred, puffy face coming into view. “I told you. I would die before revealing the secret to anyone. Such is the power of Seerah.” She shrugged. “Besides, here is our diversion.”
Kate gaped at her in awe.