Henry had come to find me. He was standing a short distance away from our door, his lip pulled back in anger, maybe disgust. I had never seen him wear such a hostile face—ready for battle. I tried to picture the boys I had grown up with in the dark militia uniforms, but the best my mind could conjure up was the image of Henry’s brothers playing in the mud, hitting their sticks against each other as if they were swords.
The dirt and rocks trembled beneath our feet as the sound of galloping horses and hollering men reached our ears.
“Go now!” My father pushed me toward the wizard. “Go!”
“Saldorra!” a woman screamed, and it was all the encouragement North needed. He surged forward, shoving Henry to the side and taking me by the arm.
“Delle!” I heard Henry shout, and then nothing more. A shroud of darkness wrapped around the wizard and me, and we were falling.
The earth found us again, its jagged rocks and familiar dust breaking our fall. By the time my vision cleared, North was crouched in front of me with my loom and bag at his side, examining the scene in the valley below. The screams from Cliffton floated up to us.
We were in the mountains, but how or why we were there seemed inconsequential. I watched as dozens of horses and men in hideous crimson uniforms overran the village below. They flooded the streets like a river of fire, moving among the scattered homes, encircling the crowd of people we had left only a moment before.
“Did you know?” I cried. “You knew they were coming, you knew they’d—!”
I couldn’t finish.
I was too far away to recognize anyone. The soldiers disappeared into shops and homes, dragging the few lingering villagers outside. Chaos fell like a wall of sand, devouring everything at once. Troughs, buckets, pots, and vases were all kicked to the ground, the precious water inside wasted on dust.
“Why are they doing this?” I whispered.
“Your village has been dependent on Saldorra for bringing you water.” North cast a sidelong glance at me. “The soldiers need to camp here and wait for instructions from Auster about invading our country. They were planning on exchanging the water for the villagers’ silence about them being there, which is why they can’t let the villagers have their own supply. It’s exactly what they did to Cloverton and Westfield. I warned your father last night this would happen.”
“You warned him?” My fists lashed out blindly. I couldn’t tell my anger from my fear. “You were the one who led them here! They’re chasing you! You took that information—!”
“Information that said they would overtake Cliffton and wait out the two-month deadline before invading the rest of Palmarta,” North snapped, catching my hands. “Listen to me! Saldorra is taking over the western villages and blocking all communication between them and the capital so the Wizard Guard and the queen won’t know their soldiers are invading from the west. Auster isn’t responsible for killing the king, and if I can convince the wizards of that, they’ll call our own war plans off! That’s why your father told us to go, because we can tell them! I have the proof they’ll need to believe us—letters, maps, everything. I need you to come with me, though, in case something happens and I can’t get there myself. I need you.”
I shook my head, struggling to pull away. The wind was picking up around us, howling through every crack and crevice of the mountain pass.
“You’re a wizard,” I cried. “Can’t you do anything?”
“There’s nothing you or I could do against that many men,” North said. “Any sign of rebellion and they’ll burn the village to ashes. Westfield already suffered that fate, and I won’t risk more innocent lives.”
“You mean your life!” I cried. “You won’t risk your life!”
I cast my eyes to the familiar landscape below. The villagers remained huddled together as the soldiers continued to rip through the streets, taking livestock, blankets, anything of value. There would be nothing left in a place that already had so little.
What were wizards if they couldn’t protect the powerless? I had heard the story of their inception thousands of times, in temple and at home. In the great competition deciding which goddess would have authority over men, Astraea had granted the chosen people of our country, Palmarta, the magic to defeat the evils of the world, while her sister, Salvala, had merely given swords to her people, the citizens of Auster, Saldorra, Ruttgard, Libanbourg, and Bellun. When only the wizards were capable of defeating the wicked dragons and sinister men, they became Palmarta’s champions. Their purpose was to protect us, even against the worst of odds.
“You said before that you had no choice,” North said. “But here’s one right in front of you. You can go back down to your people and suffer quietly with them, but if do, you really will be trapped there, with no relief. It’ll be at least a month and a half before I get to the capital, and longer before the Wizard Guard can come to help you.”
“Trapped with them or trapped with you—” I began.
“Not forever,” he said. Something hard and unbearable had wedged itself in my throat. “If you help me get to the capital, I swear on everything good in this world that after we deliver the information, I’ll take you anywhere you want to go. It will be your choice.”
It was happening too quickly, with no time for good-byes, for lingering last looks. Was it possible that only yesterday it had rained for the first time in years, that people had been singing and dancing instead of crying and screaming? Now the rain was gone again, leaving behind only a fine gray haze, and the only thing left for me was to go with the wizard.
It was a cruel twist of fate, I thought, finally to have the chance to see the world beyond Cliffton but only in the worst, the most terrifying of times.
“Why did you pick me?”
North picked up my bag and loom, helping me to my feet.
“Why me?” I repeated over the deafening wind. “You could have had anyone!”
“Yes,” he said, taking one last look at the village below. “But I only need you.”
The sun hadn’t fully arched into the sky when we found the first soldier. I don’t know why I hadn’t expected to find them lurking up in the mountain passes, waiting to see if they could catch an escaped villager or a traveler trying foolishly to enter the valley.