As the guard blinked at his cold words, Aradin upended the bag. Belatedly, the captain tried to catch them, but the cuffs tumbled free of his grasp and clattered onto the neatly swept flagstones of the prison floor. Stuffing the bag back into his sleeve, Aradin flashed the other man a brief smile and strode for the door leading upstairs.
“After all, had I ‘resisted’ my arrest, it would have been the first actual act of law-breaking on my part.”
(Easy,) Teral cautioned him. (Not a word more. Don’t overplay it.)
(I know how I’m playing this,) Aradin said. He heard the captain tossing the cuffs on the table downstairs, and the guard’s boots on the stairs catching up, but didn’t stop. (I’m going to exercise my authority as Saleria’s assistant—or rather, according to prophecy, her Servant—and then hand over all the aftermath details to her, since she knows more about what would be an acceptable punishment than either of us.)
(Let me send word to one of the others to be on standby to fetch her,) Teral offered. (If we have giant treemen stomping around, who knows what else might have been created, or escaped.)
(Agreed. Don’t be gone long,) Aradin cautioned him, for time in the Dark sometimes flowed oddly compared to the living world.
(Three steps, and I’m there; three steps, and I’m back,) Teral promised, slipping out of his Host’s Doorway.
Aradin headed for the street. Most of the townsfolk, trying to crowd their way into the courtroom on the ground floor, ignored him. The merchant who had sold him all those glass flasks, however, recognized him. “Hey . . . Hey! That’s Aradin.” Denisor pushed his way through the crowd. “Yes, it is him—this is the man Nannan says was handpicked by the Keeper to cover for her while she’s at the Convocation!”
Quickening his steps, Aradin made it out onto the street before the tide of citizens overwhelmed him. They spilled out after him, calling out for his help—then skidded to a stop, eyes wide. He didn’t even have to ask why; the creaking of wood behind him and the sobbing breaths of an utterly exhausted young man met his ears the moment the crowd fell quiet. Teral, I need you!
No reply. Spinning on his heel, Aradin flung up one arm, invoking a mage-shield. The treeman wasn’t attacking the Darkhanan. Instead, the massive willow-pine had cornered a shaking, crying Shanno in the damp rubble below the house that must have been smashed and scorched earlier. The willow-pine creature, only vaguely man-shaped because it had two trunk-legs, poked at the faltering bubble protecting Shanno from its touch, and poked again. It didn’t have an actual head, nor any real suggestion of a face, but the way its upper branches were tilted made it look like it was tipping its head in contemplation of what to do with its tormentor.
It curled up several willow branches at the end of one of its upper limbs into a knotted tangle of a fist, and lifted it high, preparing to smash down on that rubbery bubble.
Aradin firmed his will and reached for the resonances of the rift he had attuned to, pushing magic and mind into a single command. “Stop!”
The tree swung its canopy-head his way. It contemplated him for a few moments, then turned back to its target. Aradin bit back a curse—and felt Teral reaching his Doorway.
(Get under the cloak! I have her with me!) his Guide ordered. The treeman lifted its limb high once more.
(Give me your power first!) Aradin snapped back, and pulled on Teral’s own magics, on his attunement. “Stop!”
The tree stopped. Its lesser twigs and leaves swayed, making Shanno shudder, but the thickest sections of the treeman ceased moving. Gasps escaped the watching townsfolk behind him, and a few cheers broke out. Aradin didn’t pause; he knew Saleria was utterly untrained to keep herself alive and breathing while in the Dark, a trick only the strongest Darkhanan Witches could manage for long with their physical, real-world bodies. Spirit form was one thing, but flesh was entirely another.
Flicking up the hood of his Witchcloak, Aradin hunkered down, wishing it was the bigger, all-black cloak back at the Keeper’s house. He did the best he could, however, whispering one of the spells all Darkhanan Witches had to master. “Sonoxo mortori.”
Darkness spilled out of his cloak, shoving aside the daylight. With his back to the happy townsfolk of Groveham, Aradin stepped back once, twice . . . and caught Saleria as she stumbled free, gasping for breath. A mutter dismissed the darkness, leaving her swaying in his grip, clad in the better of her two priest-gowns. She still had a half-eaten chicken-leg in her hand, and blinked owlishly at the streets, the frozen tree-thing looming over the sobbing deacon, and the gaping, crushed hole in the building behind the huddled blond youth.