Wyrms

"Poison and a knife in the back. What a man."

"Enough," said Patience. "This will be dangerous enough without a stupid quarrel over nothing." She spoke sharply, letting her voice carry away some of the ever- increasing punishment the Cra

But she had learned all her lessons well. She kept her demeanor calm, managing to look slightly amused at moments that were far from amusing. She would not break under Unwyrm's twisting grip. She would not let Angel see that she suffered. If she could fool Angel, she knew she was still in control of herself.

The town was not very big, and soon the highway passed between fields of vegetables and orchards, where farmers hoed or harvested among the ruins of old mansions that had once been the pride of Waterkeep. It was part of the cycle of things, in the years of human life on Imakulata. Waterkeep had once been great; it would be great again, or it would disappear entirely, but nothing stayed. Even the religions had their changing fashions, the Keepers and the Brickmakers, the Rememberers and the Watchers, and, only in the last century, the Vigilants in their little hermit huts. They would also fall to ruin.

Nothing lasted.

Except the bloodline of the Heptarchy, which had gone on unbroken, the only institution that endured through all the mille

The colonists on Imakulata were supposed to keep Greek religion alive, though none of them spoke Greek or cared much, in the end, about maintaining the forms of the old Greek church. Nothing lasted except the Heptarchy.

Until now, thought Patience. Now this distant being, this enemy, this Unwyrm tears at me. It is the end of the Heptarchy if he conquers me. And if I keep resisting him, it is the end of me.

Orchards began to give way to stands of wood. Here and there a tiny village interrupted the growing forest, with a few cows on the commons, a few farmers in the fields, and children who shouted at the carriage and ran alongside until they couldn't keep up any longer. Sken cursed them loudly, which delighted them, and Patience pretended to enjoy it, though she was beyond anything but the imitation of pleasure now. Angel, however, stayed glum, urging the horses on at a brisk pace.

Finally, in early afternoon, the trees won out entirely, as the road become closed in with thick underbrush and old giants ten or twenty meters round. It was a perfect place for ambuscade, and Patience felt a new wave of shame at having led them into such danger.

They came to a long straight lane through the densest part of the woods. At the far end of the lane they could plainly see a thick rope stretched across the road, at such a height that it would catch the horses' necks.

"Brazen, aren't they?" said Sken. "They give us plenty of time to see what's coming."

"I'm turning around," said Angel.

At his words Patience felt grateful assent well up within her. But she had learned discipline. And her resistance to Unwyrm had become a madness in her now, as the pain of it became greater. "Go back if you want," she said. "I'm going on."

She had her glass blowgun in the cross beneath her shirt; it and the loop were her weapons of last resort if she were captured. She carried a longer, more accurate wooden blowgun. The darts, all heavily poisoned, were in a pouch. She could handle them safely enough; her father had seen to it she was inured to the most useful poisons before she was ten years old. She swung down from the carriage and strode out boldly toward the waiting rope. Sken cursed, but followed her with a hatchet in each hand. And Angel grimly brought the carriage along after.

"They can kill us whenever they want," he said.

"Watch the trees," said Patience. "The i

"Now I feel better," said Sken.

"The rope is yours," said Patience.

"It's as good as down."

Patience sca

The leaves were sparse enough to allow plenty of light; there was a slight breeze, too, which concealed any signs of movement by the robbers. Patience saw only a couple of men high in the branches. Bowmen, no doubt. But it was not an easy thing to aim a bow to shoot almost straight down at a moving target; if the archers in the trees hit any of them, it would be more by chance than design.

What worried her were the men on the ground, no doubt dozens of them hiding behind trees. They could swarm out from any direction. She slipped a dart into the blowgun and held three in her right hand.

They were still a few meters from the rope when four men stepped out from behind a tree and stood in the middle of the road, behind the rope. They swaggered, they smiled, they knew their victims had no chance. One stepped forward, preparing to speak. Patience knew that as he talked, others would come out and surround them.

So there would be no talk. She blew a puff through the pipe. She had aimed for the throat, but the dart went high and entered his mouth. He stood, transfixed, the dart invisible to his companions behind him. So she had time to load again and shook before they realized what was happening. The second dart struck its victim in the forehead; the first man finally gagged and choked and fell over, writhing from the poison that was already reaching his brain. The other two men backed away, surprised for a moment that the initiative had been taken from them.

Sken moved slowly, but with great momentum, and one blow with her hatchet split the rope. Immediately Angel urged the horses forward, Sken swung up onto the carriage, and Patience jogged alongside, then caught hold.

The carriage bounced over the bodies in the road. She! heard a voice in the underbrush saying, "The boy got'" Tinker. With his mouth."

For a moment it seemed they might be allowed to pass. Then the men began to shout, to scream, and arrows began striking the carriage from behind. Angel urged the horses on, shouted at them, and then suddenly I gurgled and choked. An arrow stuck out of the side of his I neck. Many hands clutched at the horses; the carriage came to a stop.

Patience had no time to worry about Angel. Fortunately the robbers wasted time cutting the horses loose.

Patience ignored the horses and shouted for Sken to do; the same. Sken took the left side of the carriage, swinging her hatchets and spattering blood in every direction.

They backed off from Sken, perhaps hoping an archer would take care of her, but Patience kept blowing darts with deadly aim-at this range, she could hardly miss- and those who weren't killed outright screamed in such agony at the poison that the robbers began to lose heart.

After all, their commander had been killed, they had already lost a dozen men, with some vicious injuries from the hatchets, and every dart that hit home meant another death. They cried out terrible threats and oaths, but broke and ran as the darts kept coming.

Sken had a deep cut in the back of one arm. "I'm all right," she said. "We've got to get out of here. They'll be back, they'll follow us, we've got to keep moving."

"Can you pull the carriage?"

"Better to run; what good will all your money do you if you're dead?"