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I stood there, watching her go, trying to make sense of what had happened.
And what I had done wrong.
Damn Lightens.
This woman was driving me crazy. I needed to get out there, get away from them and all their stories and songs and every other bit of crazy that was infecting me. And soon. I needed to find my blades. Tonight. I was done.
At least now I knew something that I hadn’t before. My magic was at full strength.
And now I had a knife.
Chapter 37
Caspyn
Lyani had gone right to Ryndle when we had returned, both of them staring as they talked from the other side of the camp. I only looked at them once before I returned to the small stained tent, fingers flexing and aching to rip the practically useless thing to shreds and be done with this place.
I didn’t much care what Lyani and Ryndle had to say, they could talk and gossip all they wanted. I had spent too many years working to stop the Queen before the Red Wave. I was not selfish. If she couldn’t see that then…
“Gah!” I growled and pulled the edge of the tent, shoving it to the ground. Why did I care what she saw of me? Why did I care what she thought of me?
Why did I even care?
She was a Lighten. She believed in Goddesses and Sisters and some voodoo about the magic of Okivo. She knew nothing of magic.
I didn’t care what she thought of magic.
Once we were on the road, I would force Ryndle to tell me where my blades were, and then I would be on my way.
Rolling the tent carelessly, I bunched it up and stormed past a group of children who were prancing through the now cleared field and threw the bundle of canvas in the back of the wagon with all the others, the piles of dirty canvas growing as other Lightens came behind me, laughing and singing as they packed up their campsites, all of them piling their tents and bed rolls in a huge tower in the back of the storage wagon.
The wagon that was always full of canvas and supplies, all of it piled high and heavy. Even when everyone’s tent was pitched in the evening there were always extras, old folds of canvas and wool blankets that were either left behind from Lightens who had grown some sense and left this endless march, or for people like me that were trapped there.
Piles of canvas. Tools, boxes of dry goods and supplies. All of it covering everything.
Covering the floor.
It was the perfect place to hide something that you didn’t want found.
I stood there, horses nickering as they were bridled, the laughter of children echoing over everything as more and more tents were placed on the pile before I turned toward where Ryndle and Lyani were talking, crowded together as the bustle of the camp parted around them. Now they were looking at me. Lyani looked worried; her hands fisted in her worn skirts. Ryndle, however, stood smiling with a knowing grin that left my fingers aching to wipe it from him.
I contemplated tearing the canvas from the pile to see if my knives were really there, or simply storming over there to demand their return. I didn’t get a chance to make my decision before the screaming started.
Sounds of fear and panic echoed through the camp, the screaming of horses and sheep mixed with the calls of children and adults as what looked to be close to fifty men poured in between the wagons, all of them armed with rusted and worn swords and daggers drawn as they sliced at any Lighten who crossed their way.
The world slowed down as they cut through those who had been packing the food wagons, blood splattering over the ground as the unarmed Lightens fell one after another.
“Caspyn!” I turned at my name, Lyani screaming as she ran, hair and skirts flying. “Caspyn! You have to do something!”
“Do what?” I howled, even though I knew. I knew what I needed to do. I knew what I had promised her back at the river town.
Even if it meant there would be no hiding what I was anymore.
“Fight them!” Lyani screamed as she reached me, her hands firm as she pressed me against the wagon, the sounds of screams nearly on top of us now. “You fix it. I don’t care how. Save them.”
She wasn’t crying. There wasn’t even a touch of fear, only the look of pain and anger that I had seen when she had accused me of being selfish, when she had predicted that this would happen. Because of me, because of what I had done.
Because of my selfish need to win and show off my control.
