JiRu Black Iron's Arc

Chapter 4 of 4

The warhorse carried JiRu up the stone road toward the gate. Jax rode behind him, head low, her face hidden by a hood. The black armor sat heavy on JiRu's shoulders. He had a disguise. Jax did not. The new guards would count two riders and only one soldier. He felt her breath on his neck. "One uniform won't pass two people," she whispered. "We need another." The road leveled near a cottage set off the paving. A young soldier stood there alone. He wore the warlord's gray plate, a dented helm pushed back on his head. He was filling a water skin from a barrel. His horse grazed nearby. His sword leaned against the wall, far from his hand. "That one," JiRu said. "He's careless. We take his armor for you." JiRu slowed the horse and lifted a hand like a man greeting a friend. The soldier looked up. "Late shift?" he called. He was Marcus Vrell, and he smiled, glad for company. "You're the first face I've seen all day." He walked toward the road, trusting the black armor and the warhorse. JiRu slid from the saddle. He kept his voice easy. "Gate changed yet?" "Any moment," Marcus said. He stopped a pace away. Then his eyes moved to Jax's hood, and his smile dropped. "Who's that? Scouts ride alone." His hand twitched toward the wall where his sword leaned. JiRu moved first. He drove his shoulder into Marcus's chest and knocked him off the paving. They went down on the grass. Marcus shouted once. JiRu clamped a hand over his mouth and pinned his sword arm flat. The young soldier bucked and clawed, strong with fear. Jax dropped from the horse. Her staff cracked across the back of Marcus's helm. His body went slack. "Hurry," she said, already pulling at the buckles. "That shout carried." They stripped the gray plate fast. JiRu tied Marcus with the cord from Jax's belt and dragged him behind the cottage. Jax pulled the armor over her leather and jammed the dented helm low on her brow. The gray plate hid her shape. From ten paces, she passed for one of the warlord's men. "Now we both ride through," JiRu said. He wiped grass from his hands and climbed back into the saddle. Then a horn blew above them, long and flat, from the direction of the gate. A second horn answered farther off, down toward the river. Jax froze with one foot in the stirrup. "That's not the shift change," she said. "They found the drunk one on the bridge." She swung up onto Marcus's horse. "They're searching the road now. Every man they pass, they'll count." JiRu looked at the gate ahead and the horns behind. They had two uniforms now. They had also run out of time. "Then we don't walk in slow," he said. He turned the warhorse toward the gate. "We ride in before the search reaches it."