Lena Marsh's Arc

Chapter 17 of 24

The bell above them kept ringing. Boots came down the stone stair. Hild stopped outside the bars with two guards behind him. He looked at Lena the way a man looks at a stain on his coat. "You made this difficult," Hild said. He adjusted his spectacles. "A writ. A trial. A quiet banishment. I offered you a house. You chose a cell." "There are fae in the woods," Lena said. She stood up. "They followed us to the ridge. They have our scent. They will not stop at the tree line." Hild smiled the small smile she hated. "Miss Marsh. The bell rings for many reasons. A fire. A stray cow. Your imagination is not one of them." "Then send a man to look," Nell said from the wall. Flat. Hild did not turn to him. "I do not take orders from a half-blood in irons." Linny stepped to the bars. "Send one. If she's lying, hang us tomorrow. If she's right, you'll want us out of this cell." "Everything is a bargain with your family," Hild said. A scream tore down the stair. Not a man's shout. A man being opened. Hild's face changed. One of his guards drew his sword and ran up the steps. A second scream came, shorter. Then a wet sound and nothing. "Governor," the remaining guard said. His voice had gone thin. Hild stared at the stair. His hand shook against his coat button. "You need us," Lena said. She pressed her palms to the iron. "Iron dulls on them. Nell knows the woods. Forge has cold-iron blades in the guard room upstairs, taken off us at the ridge. I can bind them with thread. You cannot. Your men cannot. Open the door." "If I open it you run," Hild said. "If you don't open it, you die in this cellar," Forge said. "And so does every person in the square above us." Something heavy struck the door at the top of the stair. Wood cracked. Hild's mouth worked. Lena watched him weigh it. Without the village he governed nothing. He was a man in a suit in an empty house. He pulled the key ring from his belt and threw it through the bars. It landed at Lena's feet. "Our weapons," Nell said. "Guard room. Second door." Hild's voice was low. "Go." Lena turned the lock. They ran up the stair past the body of the first guard, past a broken door, into the estate hall. Forge kicked open the guard room and threw Nell his knife, Linny her blade, took his own hammer. They came out the front gate into the square. Crystal Moss Square was on fire. A thin creature with too many joints dragged a woman by her hair across the cobbles. Something with antlers stood on the well and watched the houses. A boy Lena knew by sight lay face down at the baker's step. Lena pulled the silver needle from her coat lining. Her hands were not still now. "With me," she said.