Page 103 of Arrows and Gems
“Do you think you can help us?” Cap whispered. “Hold them off a little?”
The forester shook his head. “I refilled too many enchantments. I’ll do what I can, but I won’t be making any grand gestures.”
“And Rouge?” Cap asked, his heart sinking.
“The same,” her brother replied grimly. “We really shot ourselves in the foot this time, Cap.”
The glint of moonlight on chainmail caught his eye. Cap swiftly aimed and released, and an anguished cry rent the night.
The guards charged. Cap released arrow after arrow, the twanging of bowstrings nearby alerting him to the efforts of his friends, but it wasn’t enough. The guards didn’t shoot back, but there were too many. Not even Cap could shoot that fast. And his arrows seemed to be missing their marks as often as not.
A strong breeze blew past, whipping his hood against his face as it increased to gale force. He ducked, holding his arrowinstead of wasting it in this wind. As it raced off to curl between him and his opponents, his scalp prickled.
That’s why his arrows kept missing. That was how the General and his men had found them.
But how had no one in Cap’s group felt the magic wind?
Stuffing his bow in its sheath, Cap drew his sword and waited. No sense wasting arrows against the wind gryphon’s might.
The first clash of swords was brutal. Most of Cap’s men were better at archery than blades, and they were sadly outnumbered. He fought with swift strokes, ending each fight as quickly as possible. Even if it meant dealing a worse injury than he preferred.
But it wasn’t enough. His own men were falling, and he couldn’t take out soldiers fast enough to help them. He couldn’t even spare the attention to tell if the guards were taking prisoners or simply eliminating the bandits.
After all, why capture men they planned to hang later?
Jean-haut fought nearby, his staff flying as fast as Cap’s sword. The air tasted faintly of smoke, proof that Rouge was fighting as well. Unless the General planned to set the forest on fire to aid his victory.
A guard leaped in from the other side, and Cap lunged forward before he could strike Jean-haut’s unprotected back. All around him, metal rang and voices, some of them far too young, cried out. Some in pain, some in fear. Others in fierce battle cries.
Maybe Cap shouldn’t have tried to fight the General. What were a few forest dwellers against the full military might of Amitié?
“We can’t beat them,” Jean-haut gasped out, echoing Cap’s thoughts. Cap heard the solid thud of Jean-haut’s staff connecting with a body. “And they have us surrounded. We can’t fightour way past.”
“What do you suggest?” Cap bit out, too focused on the two swords flying at him to glare at his friend. “I don’t fancy being the General’s guest.”
“Nor I,” the forester agreed. “But I promised Marielle.”
Cap felt the prickle in his scalp just before a pair of branches swept down and caught his waist. In a heartbeat, his feet were above his friend’s head. Then he was hurtling away to the south, the branches smoothly passing him from one tree to the next as they pulled him away from the battle and the people that he should have been protecting.
He strained against the branches’ hold, but he couldn’t free himself. Which was a good thing, since he was twenty feet off the ground. But how could he flee while his friends were in danger?
“I thought you said no grand gestures!” Cap yelled angrily into the distance. “This seems pretty big to me!”
There was no answer. There was no sound at all, apart from the creaking of the wood as it followed Jean-haut’s commands. The battle was so far away that he couldn’t even hear it.
The branches finally stopped dragging him, but they wrapped around him, pinning him against a trunk. He would have hacked the branches with his sword, but his arms were trapped at his side.
“Jean!” he hollered, even though he knew the forester couldn’t hear him. “Let me go!”
He struggled fruitlessly for another minute. Then the branches sprang back to their normal positions. Leaving him with no support.
Throwing his arms out, he swiped at the nearest branch. It slipped out of his grasp. Another raced up beneath him, catching his foot. Flinging himself forward, he managed to wrap his arms around the next. His face scraped against the bark as hejerked to a stop, hugging the limb with every scrap of strength he had left.
His sword tumbled to the ground, bouncing off the branches on its way. Not ideal, but better than stabbing himself or falling with it.
He found a place for his feet, then took a moment to hang his head. Jean-haut wouldn’t have released the magic that fast with Cap suspended in the air. Not willingly. The magic had been cut off.
And none of the explanations for that were good. Especially when he’d left Jean-haut in the middle of a battle.
