Ricko Daggerheart's Arc

Chapter 5 of 18

The city rose from the dunes at last. Ricko saw its yellow wall break the horizon, tall and cracked, a low drain tunnel yawning near its base. The meeting point lay just beyond. He pushed the lizard harder. Then he heard it behind him: claws on sand, gaining. He looked back. A rider closed the gap. Sun-worn armor, a scarf across one shoulder. Huskar had found a mount and never quit the trail. Ricko's lizard slowed near a cluster of palms and cactus, its flanks heaving. He had ridden it too far, too fast. Huskar's beast was fresh. The gap shrank with every breath. Ricko knew he could not reach the wall in time. He swung down, drew his knife, and turned to face the tracker. Huskar dismounted twenty paces off. "You're the survivor," he said. He drew a curved blade. "One face I never forget." He came fast, low and sure, the way he moved across everything he hunted. Ricko caught the first strike on his knife. Steel scraped. He stumbled in the loose sand. Huskar drove him back toward the wall, patient, closing every opening. A cut opened Ricko's forearm. He gasped and dropped to one knee. The tracker raised his blade for the finish. A shape burst from the drain tunnel. T'Zaro. He moved wrong, one arm clamped to his ribs, blood dark on his red vest. But his other knife flew true. It took Huskar under the arm, between the plates. The tracker froze. He turned, saw the panther, and folded into the sand. He did not rise. Ricko crawled to T'Zaro and caught him before he fell. "You're hurt." "Four guards." T'Zaro coughed. "I only walked away from three of them clean." He pressed a paw to his side and winced. "Found the drain last night. Been waiting for you. Didn't plan on carrying this." He nodded at his ribs. Ricko tore his scarf and bound the wound tight. T'Zaro hissed but let him. "The full moon," Ricko said. "The window. We can still reach the crew. We can still take the jewel." T'Zaro shook his head. "Not like this. I can't climb a wall bleeding. I can't lead men who need both my hands." He gripped Ricko's wrist. "The heist is off. This season. We ride back. I heal. We come again at the next moon." Ricko looked at the yellow wall, so close now, the tunnel that led beneath it. The jewel sat somewhere past that stone. He had come this far. He wanted to scream. Instead he pulled T'Zaro's arm across his shoulders and lifted him. Huskar was dead. The trail was cold. But the window they needed had closed with the panther's blood. Ricko whistled the tired lizard close and helped T'Zaro into the saddle. He turned the beast away from the city, back into the dunes, and rode. A whole season lay between him and vengeance now.