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“Do not speak of my brother, you filth!”
The Spade peered at Dinah with fascination. “Just as spirited as I remember yeh! Now shut that privileged mouth and listen to what I say. I’ll need yeh to promise that you won’t try to run from me, otherwise I might have to give you a matching scar. And unlike me, you aren’t pretty enough to make it charming.”
Dinah sat back, her legs collapsing underneath her. The Spade wiped his face with his sleeve and tossed Wardley’s sword into a nearby bush. He then dropped his sword down to waist level, his keen eyes never leaving Dinah’s face. Her eyes met his and there was a moment of silence where they stared at each other. He stroked his goatee, peppered black and gray.
“I’m here to aid yeh. You can’t make it very much longer without my help. Yer father and the Cards will find yeh. Maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, but they will. And when they do …” The Spade pursed his thin lips and drew his finger across his neck. “Your father is a king entirely without honor.” His eyes focused sadly upon the wood behind her.
Dinah stared at him, not understanding what he was saying. He wants to help me? She followed his eyes to the side, giving the impression that she was considering his speech before bolting off to the right. She almost made it past the edge of the boulder and opened her mouth to yell for Morte but before she could, the Spade caught her around the waist and flung her roughly to the ground. Dinah’s still-healing fingers vibrated with pain, and the Spade reached forward and boxed her on her right temple, which left Dinah’s head spinning. Blood seeped into her ear.
“Oh, fer gods’ sake …” The Spade picked her up and easily propped her back underneath the rock overhang. “We’ll try again. My name is Sir Gorrann. I’ve been a Spade in the Cards service for thirty years, and I am here to help yeh, if you will just settle down and stop behaving like a wild bear, damn yeh.” Dinah was having trouble breathing, and the world spun around as her hearing slowly returned. She was unsure of what was happening. He gave a loud sigh.
“It makes me unhappy to treat yeh so, but until you stop tryin’ to run, it’ll just be beatin’ after beatin’.” He settled down next to Dinah on a tree stump and pulled off his black gloves, flexing his hands. She laid her forehead against the ground, her hands curled protectively over her head.
“I can’t … I can’t … think.”
“Aye, you’ve never been hit before, have yeh? More reason that you need help to survive. I can teach you many things, Princess. How to cover a track, how to fight, how to find food.”
“I know how to fight,” mumbled Dinah.
“No, yeh don’t. That handsome stable boy might have taught yeh a few things, but fighting wasn’t one of them.”
“Wardley?” At his mention, everything in the world seemed to stop. “What do you know about Wardley? Is he alive?”
“Ah, now yeh want to talk.” The Spade dusted off his black tunic, adorned with a glossy black Spade symbol. “Tell you what, Princess—I’ll make yeh a deal. Yeh stop trying to run, and make sure that horse of yers doesn’t impale me on one of his bone spikes, and I’ll tell yeh everything yeh want to know about Wonderland and what’s happened since yer … departure.”
Dinah blinked in the rising sun, her eyes trained on the Spade’s face. “I remember you. You left the gate open that night. You could have shut it, but you waited. I saw you. You paused …”
The Spade gave a quick nod. “That I did. Now, we best be on the move. If we stay here, the king’s Cards will be on us in less than an hour.”
“How do you …?”
The Spade gave a low whistle, and a reddish-brown mare approached on gently trotting feet. Dinah frowned. Morte would definitely not come if she whistled.
“Answer me this, traitor: Why are you not with the king?”
The Spade gave a snicker as he mounted the mare. “Let’s just say that I have my own interest in helping yeh. But that’s not for yeh to worry about yet. Before I’ll answer any questions, I need yeh to straddle that black thundercloud and ride.”
Dinah climbed unsteadily to her feet. “How long?”
“How long fer what?”
“How long until you answer my questions?”
The Spade gave a laugh. “I’ll answer one question each time the sun sets. Now, we really must go.” He had her just where he wanted her, she was sure of it, but what else could she do? She could no more stop breathing than turn away from knowing Wardley’s fate.
“How is it that you know what they are doing if you aren’t with them?”
The Spade had already begun riding into the trees, which were looking ever more whimsical on this side of the Twisted Wood. “I know because I’m the king’s best tracker, or at least I used to be. They are tracking yeh even now, and after yer close call last night, I’m sure yeh know what that means. They will rush in like water, surrounding yeh from all sides. The darkness won’t hide yeh again, not with the trees thinning out the farther east we go.”
Dinah wiped her face on the heavy black dress. “That was you. You told us to hide.”
“Aye. And if I hadn’t, yeh would be headless right now, since yeh were determined to fight an entire army for one single moment of revenge. I hope I can teach yeh to think about the consequences of yer actions, to control that fury.”
“My father murdered my brother.”
“Not the first, I imagine, to be wronged at the hands of the king, vengeful bastard that he is, but that’s a discussion for another time. We must move.”
From the depths of the Twisted Wood below, she thought she heard the faint blast of a trumpet. They were still looking for her, and if she stayed, they would find her. The Spade was right. There was no choice. She pushed her hair back from her face and glowered at the Spade. “Fine. Let me get Morte.”
“Oh, is that his name? He’s a ripe, ferocious animal that one. I’ve seen him in battle. Killed a dozen Yurkei right in front of me.”
“You should ride him. He loves new riders.”
The Spade chortled. “I don’t think I’ll be doing that today, Princess.”
“Don’t call me princess anymore,” she snapped quietly. “My name is Dinah.”
He tipped his head in her direction as his brown steed disappeared under a clump of mossy green trees. Dinah stood still for just a second, letting the breeze rush over her. There was a new chill in the air, and she realized with a start that from the top of the rock outcropping, she could see the faintest outline of the Yurkei Mountains, once far on the horizon. The trees in the valley below groaned hungrily in the breeze, and she saw several of them reach out to welcome the clean, frigid air. In the azure sky above, a red-feathered hawk dived again and again into the wood, searching for food, spiraling with deadly efficiency as it sailed above the trees. Its feathers rippled like fish scales, and she watched as the flaming colors danced over its small form.
Something silver winked from the bird’s neck in the morning light. She squinted. A collar. Dinah felt her breath catch in her throat. That was a tracking hawk. It was not hunting rodents, it was hunting her.
Dinah threw the filthy wool cloak over her shoulders and began to climb out of the rocky nest. Morte slumbered above, his spiked hooves pressed out in front of him. Dinah cleared her throat. He did not stir. She coughed again, loudly this time. One of his black marble eyes popped open, and he watched Dinah as she began to weave her way up the forest trail, following the Spade. She walked for several minutes before she spotted Sir Gorrann up ahead, his horse meandering through the wood as the Spade hummed a soft tune under his breath. He gave Dinah a smile as she came up the path behind him.
“I think I saw a tracking hawk.”
“Indeed you did. His name is Bew, and he belongs to one of the king’s trackers, Sir Fourwells.”
“Will he find us?”
“Not now that yer with me.” The Spade raised his eyes, taking in the trees and the increasingly rocky landscape. “We won’t have to flee long. I doubt the king will lead them out of the Twisted Wood. If they don’t find yeh here, they’ll probably head up to Ierladia, to pay a very unpleasant visit to yer mother’s family.”
“Why wouldn’t they follow us?”
The Spade leveled her with an exasperated gaze.
“Because we’re getting close to Yurkei territory, and because your father isn’t comfortable ’round these parts.”
The Spade blinked in the sun before reaching down and yanking a tall piece of wheatgrass to put into his mouth. “Yer just as smart as they say.” The ground gave a slight tremor as Morte appeared at the end of the trail, his colossal body reflecting the bright sun as he climbed toward them with alarming speed. Sir Gorrann’s mare took a step backward, almost tripping over an overturned branch. Even she knew better than to trifle with a Hornhoov. Sir Gorrann’s face paled.
“Gah, he is massive! Can yeh control him?”
Dinah gave a shrug and picked up a stick to fling angrily into the trees. “Not really. I wouldn’t touch him if I were you.”
Before she could release the stick, the Spade’s hand, nails black as soot, clamped onto her wrist. “No throwing sticks. No touching anything that yeh don’t have to. Don’t throw, don’t kick, don’t shuffle yer feet or run yer hands along the trees. It’s going to be hard enough covering his tracks”—he motioned at Morte, who was munching on some tiny yellow flowers that popped open like bubbles when he crunched them—“without yeh leaving yer scent and marks everywhere. Yeh might as well have left a royal red carpet behind us!”
They walked until the sun was high in the sky, breaking for a quick lunch beside a stream. The Spade pulled some dried meat and a small wrapped cheese out of his pack. Dinah’s mouth watered at the sight of the cheese, but she forced herself to look away and appear happy with her stale bread. She didn’t want anything from this man.
“Give me yer boots,” he ordered gruffly, and Dinah obeyed. He rinsed them out in the stream, taking care to scrub the soles with diligence. He handed them back to her. “Step lightly. Try not to tramp around the wood making as much noise as possible like yeh’ve been doing.” Dinah watched in fascination as the Spade fastened two low-hanging pine branches to his belt so they dragged behind him. He pointed to the stream. “You and the horse need to walk in the stream fer the next few miles. This is where I plan on losing them fer good.”
It was easier said than done. Getting Morte to follow her into the ankle-deep stream was incredibly difficult. Eventually he was lured in by the large piece of meat Dinah had grabbed in the farmer’s house. Morte didn’t like the water on his spikes, although it was clear they needed it—swirls of dried blood colored the water when he finally stepped in. They followed the stream as it flowed uphill. Everything flowed uphill now—the land, the flowers, the plants. Dinah quickly sweated through the heavy black dress. Walking in the stream was difficult. Several times she stumbled. Her ankle caught on seaweed, rocks, and much to her horror, a silver-and-rose-striped snake. After a few miles, the Spade ordered her to leave the stream and walk in only her socks. He shuffled behind her, erasing their footprints. Every once in a while the Spade would lick his finger and hold it in the air or stop and tilt his head, listening for something inaudible to her own ears. Then he would correct their tracks, step by step. At one point, he made Dinah climb a tree only to climb back down on the other side. She protested loudly, until the Spade drew his sword. She grumbled all the way up and all the way back down as Morte watched her with amusement.
Several times Dinah would begin to talk only to be shushed by him, and once, without warning, the Spade pushed her down into a bush, laying his body on top of hers, followed by several branches and brush. Dinah let out a shriek and pushed against him with all her might, fearing he wanted to defile her in a way she had only read about, but his hands had only cupped her mouth. Dinah struggled until she saw the red shimmer of the tracking hawk above, dancing in and out of the tree branches overhead. She fell silent, though she was certain that the hawk could hear the loud poundings of her heart. After a while they hiked again through the bleached trees, until dusk fell and the wood turned dark. Dinah felt as though she were wandering through a gathering of ghosts. The Spade stopped abruptly and pushed his ear against the ground. After listening for a few seconds, he hopped to his feet.
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