Shadows Return - Lynn Flewelling [152]
When Seregil judged they’d gone far enough to confuse the trail, they struck north and east for a while to finish the job. It lost them miles and time, but hopefully any pursuers wouldn’t come looking in this direction.
As the night dragged on, Seregil’s silence continued. His past had come between them again like an unwelcome shadow and now he was a dark, driven shape in the dark beside Alec and the bond was silent.
They stopped a few times to rest and feed Sebrahn. Perhaps the rhekaro picked up on the tension between them, for as soon as he was let out of his sling, he settled close against Alec’s side and wouldn’t be moved. When Seregil offered to carry him, he clung to Alec like a squirrel.
Before Alec could say anything, Seregil turned and strode off again, setting a brisk pace.
Almost as if he’s trying to run away from something, Alec reflected sadly. And knowing Seregil as he did, he probably was, if only from his own feelings.
CHAPTER 44
The Parting
SEREGIL DIDN’T MEAN to shut Alec out; he just didn’t know what to say.
As the night waned, the way grew more barren rather than less, with no signs of habitation, and everyone’s concentration was taken up with not breaking an ankle or falling into a hole. By dawn their food was gone, and the water skin was just half-full. Alec took his hunting sling and left an unwilling Sebrahn with the others.
Hunkered down in a dry gully, Seregil settled with his back to a rock—well away from Ilar, even though Alec wasn’t there to see—and regarded the restless rhekaro with some concern. “I thought we were beginning to get along, you and I?”
Sebrahn squatted where Alec had left him, eyeing them both with apparent wariness.
“He’s very attached to Alec, isn’t he?” Ilar remarked. “How are you going to manage, back in Skala?”
“I have no idea.”
“Perhaps he could be of some use to your queen?”
Not in the mood for conversation, particularly that one, he tried to ignore the man, but it seemed Ilar needed to talk.
“You and Alec…Are you still angry with each other?”
Seregil rested his head against the rock behind him. “I’m not mad at him. He’s young. It’s hard for him, thinking of me having others before him. Especially you.”
“I could talk to him.”
“Don’t.”
“Then you should.”
Seregil gave him a meaningful glare. “Keep on like that and I’ll drop a rock on your head while you sleep.”
After that, Ilar kept his thoughts to himself.
When Alec returned empty-handed, they set off again, looking for better cover. There weren’t even rocks large enough to shelter under, much less trees.
“No wonder the Plenimarans are always trying to take someone else’s land,” Alec muttered, shading his eyes as he scanned the distance.
“I hear it’s like this all the way—”
“Oh hell!” Alec was staring hard at something in the distance ahead of them.
There, not a mile away, a long plume of dust traced a trajectory in their direction, straight as a bowshot. Seregil had been expecting this for so long, it was almost a relief. “Could be nothing, just traders or something. All the same—run!”
“Run where?” Ilar cried.
Seregil knew there was no point in going back the way they’d come, so he struck out west. “Just keep going. Maybe we’ll find something.”
But they didn’t and now they could make out the shapes of horses, coming on at a gallop, and hear the distant baying of hounds.
Seregil cocked his head, listening. “I guess they do keep dogs, after all.”
“Bad luck…to kill…a dog,” Ilar panted.
“I’ll risk it. Sounds like they’ve got a scent.”
“It took them long enough,” Alec muttered, holding Sebrahn’s legs to keep the rhekaro from falling out of the sling as he ran.
They ran for all they were worth, but it was no use. Within minutes, Seregil looked back over his shoulder and saw a pack of riders following the hounds and heard the sound of a hunting horn.
“We might as well save our strength,” said Alec, stopping to watch their pursuers.
“What are you saying?” Ilar quavered. “If they catch us…”
Seregil cast a longing look south. In the distance, the dark blue ocean mocked him, hopelessly