Page 115 of Wind Rider

Death threw back His head and laughed. “Storyteller, the more I get to know you—the more I find I have in common with you. I, too, am at my best surrounded by young, healthy lovers. I understand your need, though you are only mortal and therefore can only handle one lover at a time.” The God’s gaze slid to Daniel and He lifted one brow questioningly.

It was Ralina’s turn to laugh. “Oh, my Lord, I prefer my loversmuchyounger. Daniel has remained free of the sickness so that he can keep carving arrows for your army. He and Renard share the same stew, and as they forage for the roots and vegetables together I have found that leaves much more time for me to concentrate on you and your tale.”

Death nodded, His massive antlers throwing bizarre shadows along the beach. “All of this makes sense to me, Storyteller. I grant your favor. Thaddeus, free one of the smaller boats and gift it to Ralina.”

Thaddeus’s face was turning red with anger, and Ralina hesitated just long enough before speaking that his anger became obvious to the God.

“Oh, my Lord, that won’t be necessary. Remember that I said I asked Daniel to repair a small boat I found? It is loaded and ready to launch. I wouldn’t want to take anything from one ofyourWarriors,” Ralina said with syrupy sweetness.

Death laughed again. “You do amuse me, Storyteller.” Then His look darkened. “See that I do not regret granting you this favor.”

“I will not disappoint you, my Lord,” Ralina said.

“Renard, Daniel, you will keep Ralina’s craft near mine at all times. My Storyteller must always have access to her muse.”

The two men bowed deeply as they said, “Yes, my Lord.”

“Thaddeus, you may return to launchingmyWarriors and Hunters.And you should smile more. Your expression is always so dour,” the God said.

The comment almost made Ralina snort with laughter, which she covered in a cough while Thaddeus bared his teeth in a strange semblance of a smile before he bowed and returned to the men waiting for him down the beach.

Ralina and her small group bowed, too, before hurrying to their boat.

“That was well done.” Daniel spoke softly to Ralina.

“You both played along well,” Ralina responded in kind, glancing at the shy young Warrior she was just getting to know. He met her eyes and smiled—and Ralina was attracted to the kindness in that smile. “I’m sorry I didn’t warn you about, well, claiming you as my lover, but I didn’t realize that was what I was going to have to say until the moment it happened.”

“You have nothing to apologize for,” Renard said. “And I certainly do not mind people believing we’re lovers.”

While Ralina was trying to come up with a reasonable response, Death bellowed from His raft, which was already launched and floating just off the beach in the Channel.

“Hurry, we need to get out there next to his raft before he changes his mind,” Ralina said.

Bear and Kong took their places on the ballasts as Ralina settled in the middle part of the little kayak and Renard and his father launched them into the Channel.

As they paddled to Death’s raft, Ralina looked back at her forest. Standing at the tree line were the Tribe members Death was leaving behind. He’d announced five days earlier that only those who took The Cure, and who had something to add to his army, could join Him—effectively deserting any of His People who were ill, as well as the Tribe’s old people and children, who had survived so much. They stood there, silently, watching friends and family leave them. Ralina could see that many of them were weeping, sick with disease and fear and loss. It broke her heart, but she’d spoken to as many as would listen to her, for even a moment, and told them to get north—go to another Tribe—leave the poisoned forest.

Few listened to her. And even fewer refrained from eating meat andwere still healthy, but if only a dozen or so made their way out of the diseased forest, the Tribe lived and perhaps someday Ralina could find her way back to them.

She wiped tears from her eyes and bit her lip to keep from sobbing aloud.

“My People! My army! Today we begin an adventure that will give us the world!” Death shouted. He stood in the middle of His raft, surrounded by the youngest, most attractive of His Attendants. At the oars were a dozen Reapers. Their bodies boarlike, they hunched over the oars, massive muscles preparing to follow their God’s command. Death raised His arm, which held a strange-looking spear. The end of it wasn’t tipped in flint, ready to kill, but wrapped in a rag that looked wet. “But to properly begin anew, we must rid ourselves of the old.” Death dipped the cloth into a brazier that stood on metal legs in the center of the raft. When He raised it again it was on fire.

Ralina opened her mouth to shout a warning, but her voice wouldn’t work. Later she realized that even had she been able to speak it would have been too late. Death had planned too well.

He threw the spear. It sailed above their heads and over the beach to embed itself in a pile of dry pine boughs that formed a semicircular pile of rubbish at the tree line. With an ominouswhoosh,it lit and spread.

And Ralina realized why the forest had smelled like rancid lard. Death’s Reapers had poured rendered animal fat all around the Tribe so that everything—blackened trees, half-destroyed nests, piles of dried pine boughs and forest debris they’d gathered and arranged carefully to circle the people—everythingcaught fire.

Death’s voice carried over the sounds of the screaming Tribe.

“Ah, but every happy tale ends in death—it is natural. And where there is death, there is also a new beginning. Let us be off!”

Renard and Daniel paddled with their backs to the Tribe. Their expressions were mirror images—blank with shock as silent tears cascaded down their faces, making them appear as if they were past and future versions of the same person. Bear and Kong whimpered and dropped their heads, turning away from the horrors behind them.

Ralina wouldn’t let herself turn away. She stared. She watched it all. Everything. Every unspeakable horror. Until they were far enough down the Channel that she could see no more, and even then the Storyteller kept staring at the cloud of black smoke that lifted from the pyre of the Tribe of the Trees. She had to. She was recording everything.

I will survive. I will tell this story—the true story—so that everyone will know what happened here.