Page 55 of Halfling
It was foolish to run through the forest in the dark, dangerous even, but she hadn’t a choice.
Her halfling needed help.
The sky was a dark, muzzy velveteen when she skidded out of the forest into the clearing. Stars sparkled over the homestead they’d passed earlier, warm light spilling out of the farmhouse windows and a column of smoke coiling from two chimneys. A two-story log home, it dominated the clearing.
It wasn’t what she was after. No, Sorcha ran straight for the barn.
“Not stealing, just borrowing,” she muttered to Darrah as she eased the barndoors open.
A wave of warmth and fresh-smelling hay overtook her as she slipped inside. It was dark, the sleepy shuffling of animals overloud as her eyes adjusted. Through the meager light from a window, she was able to find an unlit lantern.
She knelt with it and took off her pack. Hanging Darrah around her neck like Orek did, she dug through a pocket to find her flint.
Darrah chittered in her ear as she worked. “I know,” she soothed, “I know. We’re going back for him.”
Between the dark and her trembling hands, it took torturously long to finally light the lantern. Careful not to let any errant hay catch, she quickly captured the oil and light inside the glass and stood, holding it aloft.
Little pinpricks of light caught in the somnolent black eyes blinking back at her; two horses, four goats, a mule, and three cows. From deeper in the barn, she heard the scrabble of roosting chickens.
And standing at the back against the far wall, just what she needed.
A farm wagon. One big enough to carry a halfling.
She choked back her cry of relief and hurried to look for tack. She piled everything she’d need in front of a big bay gelding. In the low light, he was burnished a warm russet color. Using a handful of oats she found in a sack nearby, she coaxed the horse out of his stall and hitched him to the wagon, the familiarity of the act lending her speed even though her whole body trembled.
Sorcha led the horse to the front of the barn to pick up her pack and put it in the wagon.
Then there was nothing else to do but throw the barndoors open and ride out into the night to get Orek.
Yet she stood there, pivoting on her heel and worrying.
It wasborrowing,she intended to come back and return the horse and wagon.
Maybe she should leave a note.
She peered around the barn again, her breaths coming shallow and panicked.
She didn’t have anything to leave a note.
She didn’t havetimeto leave a note.
Growling at herself, Sorcha opened the barndoors, hung the lantern from a shepherd’s crook, and swung herself up into the seat. She was about to take the reins and crack them when a long shadow fell over the threshold.
“What do you think you’re doing?”
A man stood at the open barndoors, an untucked shirt gaping open over his chest. He held an axe between his callused hands and wore a scowl on his face, shadowing his eyes and carving lines in his unshaven cheeks.
A woman hustled up behind him, a shawl draped around her shoulders. She held it closed at her throat with one hand while holding up a lantern with the other. Moonlight shone through her translucent shift, framing her legs in a glowing blue.
Sorcha’s heart sank into her stomach.
“I’m sorry,” she said, holding up her hands. “I’m not stealing, I swear. I need this wagon.”
“Taking what doesn’t belong to you is stealing,” said the man, scowl deepening.
“I know—I know how this looks,” she babbled. She climbed down from the seat to stand beside the wagon. “My friend and I were attacked and he’s wounded. I can’t carry him, I need something to bring him—please, I just need to bring him. He’shurt.” Tears escaped her eyes, and Sorcha held back a sob, horrified as more words and tears bubbled out of her.
“He told me to leave him but I can’t leave him, he’s been so kind to me and he was protecting me and I just don’t know what else to do, please, I don’t know what to do and then I remembered seeing your home when we passed earlier and I thought you might have something to help—please, he needs help, I have to get back to him.”
