He was sitting up, blood still running down his face, which was contorted in a mixture of hatred and pain. Panic took her. She turned and ran.
She sat down in a brake of tall trees. It was a place of great natural beauty, the stream falling through a series of musical, lacy cascades into sunlight and leaf-shadow dappled pools. At this stage Shael only saw it as a place to hide. After a panting rest she began to take stock: What did she have, besides a black eye, a ripped skirt, a next-to-useless dagger, and a pie that she'd yet to find a chance to eat? What should she do now? Shapstone lay far behind. She'd seen no signs of the Morkth pursuit. But he was still after her. She shuddered. At least . . . she thought he was still after her. She hadn't seen him behind her for a while.
This side of Shapstone had been sparsely farmed, mostly just sheep-grazing lands, and the Morkth had burned the only two cottages she'd seen so far. So where should she go?
The sharp crack of a breaking stick, audible even above the water music, cut through her reverie. He had succeeded in following her. And his face, now a mask of scratches and dried blood, was flushed with pursuit . . . and triumph. "Thought I didn't 'ear you, little Princess!" He spat the last word out. "Those I'm goin' ta sell you to won't care what shape you're in. It'd make a good story for the alehouses. I'll be the man that finally screwed the world's ultimate royal bitch! I'm gonna make you suffer!"
Shael shakily held the dagger in front of her. She dropped the pie, her other hand fingering her bangles nervously. Suddenly she was aware of intense cold under her sweating fingers. This was what she'd felt in her apartments when Lord Blis had grabbed her. The picture of that scene leapt through the window of her mind.
The corpses fell and tumbled between them. Almost as an afterthought the majordomo's severed head popped out of thin air, and bounced against the man's legs. The deserter and would-be rapist staggered back. For a moment they stood frozen. Then he swore, his voice rising in sudden fear, "Motherfu—!"
Shael didn't stop to see what would happen next. She was already running when the air was hammered with a terrific booming sound. The leaves shook. Looking over her shoulder she saw a Morkth platecraft dropping stonelike onto the spot where she'd been a minute before. The terrible purple flare of their weapons drove her to dive deep into a bramble thicket, and to burrow down into it, too frightened even to pull away from the myriad needle points that pressed at her flesh.
It was perhaps half an hour later when she slowly began to extricate herself from the brambles, with much tearing and scratching. The birds were singing again and it seemed as if nothing had ever disturbed the tranquillity of this spot. She crept cautiously back to where she had been.
He would never chase her again. Not with a fist-sized hole seared through his chest. At the same time she could not take any of his garments to replace those he'd torn. The clothes had been very thoroughly taken apart, including every possible stitch and seam. Even his boots had been dismembered. A few coins from a slit-open neck pouch lay beside him. The other bodies too had been similarly searched. The sight of Blis's purple-mottled body was nearly too much for her. She turned away, and looked down at her bracelets. It was that one, she was sure. The one she didn't like very much. It was the old-looking one with its snaky double helix pattern and that chilly black stone, the stone with the oil-on-water surface which seemed to shift as she looked at it.
With sudden insight she realized that this was what the Morkth had been looking for. It was this bracelet that had had such unpredictable magiclike effects. But to use it was to summon the Morkth, too.
She picked up the pie, miraculously still intact, and walked away. There was much to think about, but she wanted to do it elsewhere. An hour later she was seated with her back to the wall of a burned-out shepherd's hut. The place had been fired, but not looted. Looting was not the Morkth way. The roof had burned, as had some of the rude furniture. But the moldy blanket from under the stone shelf had not. She would have something to sleep under tonight. There was food. Now to eat, and then sleep. The thought of food shut out all other ideas, even the horrors of the past twenty-four hours.
Shael bit into the pie with the sort of greed that she had never shown for even the most rare of sweetmeats. The crust was crumbly and rather stale, but the inside was full of tart fruit. She was more than two-thirds through it when she recognized the purple juice dripping off her fingers. She gagged. It had been almost inevitable. Bilberry preserve was common hereabouts.
She was hungry and more pragmatic the next morning, after an amazingly good night's sleep. She'd tossed and turned on the finest feather beds before. Now a few armfuls of heather and a smelly blanket had seemed wonderful. She brushed away the tiny black ants that had been making the most of her discarded dinner, and ate it herself. Sleep and food had done much to restore her mind's tone. She sat and looked at the bangle, thinking.