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down its throat. I step
away, the smell reaching my nostrils.
    I check on Angelo,
who is still huddled a few feet away. This isn’t something someone his age
should have to deal with. That anyone should have to deal with.
    “Something’s
moving,” Charles says.
    “What?” Sure
enough, in the midst of the blood and muck, a large ball starts to open. I’d
assumed it was just the Jo-Bran’s torso, it looked the size. Angelo comes up
next to us and stares, his mouth agape. I want to tell him to go back, to look
away, but I can’t speak.
    The three of us
continue to stare as the ball opens up, gushing more blood and removing
entrails with blood-stained hands. Hands. I take a step forward. Angelo tugs at
my coat, but I brush him aside, needing a closer look. I can see it now, a
woman, covered in blood and guts, huddled in the middle of the snow, the middle
of a decimated camp, shutting out the death and destruction by curling into a
ball.
    “Are you okay?” I
ask, still searching for a face. A few bones pop from the unfurling person but
no words. I hunker down. Then see its face. Her face. Covered in blood, her
hair plastered to the sides of it like a newborn, she meets my eyes with hers
and they cut straight through me, assessing my very soul and weighing out my
fate. Those aqua eyes.

Chapter Nine

 
    Those same eyes
are staring at me now, as Meredith sips her stew. My eyes fix on hers, and I
can’t look away. It’s as if she’s trying to say something, but I don’t
understand the flecks of her irises. And before I can decipher them, we’re on
our feet again.
    Our plod continues
for another few hours, the sun leaning to the west, sinking into sleep. My
captors hiss back and forth, laughing and pushing one another as we go. Goatee
shoves me in the back on occasion, just enough for me to fall on my face, then
be jerked upright be he and the others. I don’t say anything, or do anything.
It’s what he wants. A cat toying with a captive mouse. Unlike the mouse though,
I don’t keep running. I just walk.
    From nowhere, the
Banjankri pick up the pace, something unsettling them. The leader stops every
now and again, searches the horizon, sniffs the wind. I do the same, but can
neither see nor smell anything that sets me on edge. Whatever it is, they look
worried.
    Just as the sun
dips it toes in the horizon, I think I hear it, what’s put them on edge. A
howl. Long and loud and shrill. Not a Jo-Bran. Wolves.
    We’re still a few
hours from the city and will need to find shelter for the night. In the
half-light, I can see the thorn of the Spire, the tip pressing into that of the
sun, popping it. It looks no more than a black pin.
    Goatee forces me
forward, the lot of them starting into a jog. I try to keep up the best I can
but find it hard with the short length of rope binding my legs. After my third
fall, the Banjankri cut the strip and prod me along with a spear in my back.
They don’t press too hard though; they’re too focused on what’s outside our
realm of vision, behind the snow drifts and what lurks in the hills nearby. The
leader holds tight to the hills, searching for some shelter for the night. Even
in this predicament, I wish we were closer to the city, closer to the end, to
be done and over with.
    The head of the
Banjankri is about 100 feet ahead, when he stops and turns to the rest of us
waving wildly with his hands and speaking louder than I’ve heard any of them
before. The rest of us pick up the pace, once again breaking into a run, the
guards talking in excited tones. I think about breaking off, figuring that this
is my chance to escape.
    I wonder if
Meredith would follow, hope that she would. But what could we do? Where would
we go? What if she didn’t? We’re almost to the leader and my chance is all but
gone. I decide to break off. In five, four, three, two…
    A terrible snarl
sounds from a few feet ahead and the leader of the Banjankri collapse under the
weight of a savage wolf. It