Rebecka Evertrue's Arc

Chapter 19 of 66

The horns sounded again on the ridge. Closer this time. Rebecka looked down the throat of the cave to where the back chamber sat sealed behind stone Lark had closed. Her mother and her daughter were in there. Twenty other people with them. If the line at the mouth fell, they would not hear it. They would only hear boots. By then it would be too late to hide, too late to run the smaller cracks that led out through the crystal seams. She walked back to the sealed wall. Lark stood with his glowing wings folded flat against his back. Marcus was checking arrow points at the fire. "I need a way to speak through the stone," Rebecka said. "If we fall out here, they have to know before the raiders find the seal." Lark shook his head. "I sealed it to hide them. Opening a channel undoes that." "Not the seal. A word. One word through, and nothing back." Marcus stood. "The crow." Rebecka pulled the enchanted watchcrow from her pack. It had carried her voice before. It could carry one more sentence. She whispered into its feathers, "They are through. Go deeper. Do not come out." The crow blinked once and settled against her collar, warm, waiting. "Give it to Katia," she said. She rapped the stone three times. A pause. Then Katia's voice on the other side, low. "I hear you." "Lark opens a finger of space. Long enough to pass the crow. Then he shuts it again." "Do it." Lark pressed his palm to the seam. A hairline of light opened, no wider than a wrist. Rebecka pushed the crow through. Katia's hand closed around it on the other side. The light died. The stone was whole again. "If the crow speaks, you take Ninka out through the back cracks," Rebecka said to the wall. "You do not wait for me." A long silence. Then, "I will not wait." Rebecka pressed her forehead to the cold stone. Behind her, Aiyana stood at the fire with her quiver, patient. Rebecka could feel her there without turning. She walked back to the mouth. Marcus set the four arrows at the notch. Lark drew his blade. Rebecka strung her bow and counted her shafts one more time. Seventeen. Outside, the war party crested the ridge road. She could see torches now, moving down the switchbacks in a slow line. Forty, maybe more. The back chamber was blind no longer. Whatever happened at the mouth, Katia would know the moment it mattered. Ninka would be moved before the raiders reached the seal. It was the last thing Rebecka could give them. She had given it. Now there was only the line, and the arrows, and the road coming down the ridge. She raised her bow.