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Chapter 2:  The Evil Plan


The seven men were dressed well, and their horses were top-quality. Tarilenea, who loved horses, had to stop herself from climbing down and touching their silky coats. She looked at Lark, and raised her eyebrows. These men were either nobles or very wealthy merchants--she could smell their perfumed soap from the branches of the tree. Lark wrinkled his nose and grinned. Then he looked at her with wide eyes.


"Sneeze!" he whispered fiercely. Tarilenea looked at him angrily.


"No!"


Lark held his hand over his mouth and closed his eyes, but a small sneeze could still be heard. The men instantly sat up straight and very still, listening. Tarilenea and Lark hugged the branches holding their breath, scarcely moving. Then the first rider relaxed, and so did the men behind him.


"Ok," he said in a gruff voice to his followers, "I think this place is clear to camp in tonight. Then tomorrow we can travel the Great Road South to Corus, where we will meet our Lord. On the way we can carry out more of our lord's plans for the--" here the big man chuckled, "goodwill of Tortall."


Tarilenea and Lark glanced at each other quizzically as the man continued briskly, "Tamir, you ride ahead and find a good place to set another trap. Set up a fire but do not disturb this place any more than needed. We might have to leave quickly without covering our tracks."


The men dismounted and tended to their horses, then built a small fire and ate some provisions. While Tarilenea and Lark watched sleepily, the men unrolled sleeping bags and lay down next to the dying embers. They all soon began to snore softly except for the sentry, who stood guard, half-sleeping, at the fire. Tarilenea gave Lark an apple and he ate it thankfully, careful not to drip juice on the men below them.


Tarilenea whispered in his ear, "When I give the signal, we begin climbing down. Quietly!" Lark nodded, and finished his apple. He put it in his pocket and put his arms around the trunk of the tree, edging downwards slowly. Tarilenea put her pack on her back and started descending after him, careful not to break off chips of bark which would give them away.


When Tarilenea was halfway down the tree and beginning to feel confident that she and Lark would get away all right, she heard a muffled yell. Looking down, she gasped. A man had his hand over Lark's mouth and was holding him down!


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Tarilenea recognized the man who had captured Lark as Tamir, the man who had been sent out to scout a new place to "set another trap." She watched in shock as Lark was dragged away, his eyes big and scared in the firelight. Tarilenea's fingers clutched at the tree angrily as she saw the man tie Lark's hands behind his back and tap the sentry on the shoulder. Together they gagged Lark and sat him down. Then Tamir got the leader of the men up, and they conversed quietly, while shooting glances in Lark's direction. Lark didn't look at Tarilenea; he knew that the sentry was monitoring his every move. Instead he sat, eyes cast on the ground, miserable and quiet.


Tarilenea felt tears under her eyelids, and bit her lip angrily, for there was nothing she could do. She silently tried to make herself as comfortable as possible so she could stay up to make sure they didn't do anything bad to Lark. She took her dagger out of her pocket and held it tightly in her hand. She had never hurt anyone before, but if they were going to threaten her best friend then they would have to deal with her dagger.


She drowsily kept an all-night vigil as the sentry watched Lark. When she saw the sun coming up over the mountains, the men started to get up. One by one they saw the new captive, but didn't show any real interest in him. They went about their duties, and during breakfast their captain made a short speech.


"Tamir found this boy last night as he was coming back from scouting. We do not know who he is, but we will bring him to our Lord for questioning. He might be a spy for the king; whatever he is, our Lord will get the truth out of him."


At this remark there were scattered snickers, and Lark glanced uneasily at the men. The leader continued as if he had not heard, this time addressing Lark.


"My name is Nigel, and I am the leader of this company. You will march when we tell you to and eat when we do. There are not many extra rations though, so you will have to make do with an empty stomach until we get to Corus."


Nigel turned to his men, shouting "Mount up! We start riding now! Tamir tells me he found a good place in a small town up ahead. We will stop there to do our work. Remember," he added, fixing a pin to his jacket which showed that he belonged to King Alan's army, "we are the King's soldiers riding back from the Great Southern Desert." He nodded to a man wearing a cloak, who Tarilenea had noticed earlier as looking very old and weathered to be traveling in this band of young men. "Sebastien, get ready and do not use your Gift. You will need it soon. Tamir, put the boy on my horse. He will ride with me."


The men mounted their horses after putting out the fire with dirt and brushing their tracks out with a branch. Tarilenea thanked the Gods that it was summer; they could not see her in the leafy foliage of the tree. After she saw the last rider gallop off, she shimmied down to the ground and ran into the center of the clearing, whistling in the bird call which her horses recognized. After a few minutes she heard them thundering towards her, ungroomed and sweaty but serviceable. She smiled at them.


"Moonshine and Streak, we have work to do."


She rubbed some dirt onto her clean face, mussed her hair and donned one of her more grungy cloaks which she had brought along in case she needed a disguise. She also gathered a small basket of mushrooms which were growing under some of the trees. If Nigel's band captured her, she could pretend to be a peasant girl riding back to her village.


Tarilenea grabbed Moonshine's mane and swung herself over the horse's back, whistling as she did so. The girl and the two horses flew out of the clearing, their manes flying back in the wind and her eyes staring level and strong at the horizon.

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