Sanctuary - Lynn Abbey [224]
Leorin had told the truth about one thing: He wasn’t the man he’d been the week before. That sheep-shite fool would have charged across the stream, attacked the Whip, and gotten himself killed before Bec was home free. The man Cauvin had become stood his ground, and said—
“Untie him.”
Not one of the boy’s captors twitched toward the knots, but Bec recognized Cauvin’s voice. “Cauvin!” he shouted. “Don’t listen to them, Cauvin! Don’t believe them! I didn’t tell them anything!”
Cauvin kept his attention on the Whip. “I said, untie him. He’s free now.”
The Whip cocked his head to one side. “What is it about children,” he asked with gentle malice, “that makes strong men weak? They’re untempered … unfinished. They can always be replaced, and so pleasurably.”
“No answers until he’s free and out of here.”
The Whip sighed. “Unbind him.”
Bec blinked when the blindfold came off. He spotted Leorin. “Furzy feathers! Cauvin, what are you doing here with her?”
“Never mind.” Cauvin opened his arms. The boy scampered over the floating bridge. Cauvin hunched down, embracing him face-to-face. “You get out of here—now!” He spoke softly, even though he knew the froggin’ Hand could hear his thoughts if they wished. “Put your left hand on the passage wall behind me and keep it there—except when you come to a cave with water in it. Then, feel for a rope and hold on tight as you cross the stream. Got that?”
The boy frowned so deeply that the cut on his forehead began to weep. “Cauvin? Cauvin, you can’t stay here. Not with her? Cauvin, you’ve got to come with me.”
“Once you’re in the temple, run straight to the stoneyard. You hear me?”
“Cauvin—Don’t you know who these people are? You can’t stay with them! Grandfather—”
“Grandfather’s dead! They made a mistake when they took you, Bec. They want me. I’ve got to stay; you’ve got to leave.” Cauvin gave his brother a good shake and shove toward the passage. “Put your left hand on the wall and run. Don’t stop running until you’re in the stoneyard.”
“But—”
“Get going!”
Bec stood firm. Cauvin backhanded him across the face. The boy staggered and crumbled. When he stood, his mouth and nose were bleeding and tears streamed over his cheeks.
“Cauvin …”
“Frog all, Bec—run!”
Bec whimpered, then—finally—he ran.
“Grandfather, is it? How touching,” the Whip purred, when Cauvin faced him again. “And you’re the witch’s son?”
Cauvin shook his head. “No witch. The Torch made me his heir.”
“Priests don’t transform heirs, Cauvin. Only witches can do that. If the Torch made you his heir, the question is: Did he make you into a witch, too?”
A part of Cauvin wanted to shout that froggin’ sure he wasn’t a witch, except he wasn’t sure at all, so he said nothing.
The Whip laughed. “No matter, Cauvin. Witchblood is sweet on the Mother’s tongue, but the Torch’s soul is what She’s hungered for.” He turned to Leorin. “Sorry, Honey, but—you can’t have him, not as a lover or a weapon against me. Take them both.”
The spear-carrying man at Cauvin’s back surged, and though Cauvin was willing to trade his life for Bec’s, he couldn’t trade it meekly. The best knife in the world was no match for a five-footlong spear. Cauvin seized the torch from the spearman’s partner, kicking him in the gut as he did. Then he brought the flames to bear on the knuckles of the spearman to thrust at him. The Hand howled as he dropped his weapon and ran for the stream.
Cauvin had a heartbeat to savor his victory as Leorin lunged for the dropped spear, but rather than stand beside him against those who wanted to sacrifice them both to the Bloody Mother, she leveled the barbed point at Cauvin’s breast—or tried to. The beating she’d taken in the Unicorn left Leorin unable to hold even a light weapon steady. She’d have been useless as an ally and wasn’t a threat as an enemy. Cauvin easily wrenched the spear out of her hand, but by then it was too late. The two other spearmen with their torch-carrying partners on the Whip’s side of the stream had crossed the floating bridge, and the two on