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She waved her arms again, opened her hand, and showed him the sugar before tossing it to him.
Lyslee had obviously been watching closely. She gave the arrow a twist and a hard pull just as Alloo snatched the sugar lump out of the air with his hungry snout.
He yipped a little, but was too busy smacking his lips and tongue around his treat to complain.
“Good boy,” Lyslee told him, patting the thick pelt and then wincing as she stepped away.
Kian frowned.
The Grummish were tough, and proud of it. If Lyslee was wincing, that meant her leg was sprained, maybe even broken.
In his mind, he couldn’t help calculating how much worse off the convoy was now that it was down by one Grummish fighter.
“Was it a trap?” Kinsley asked, hopping out of the sled to join them.
“Sure was,” he said.
“Same guys as last night, do you think?” she asked.
“Definitely,” he told her.
“How do you know?” she asked. “And where are the rest of them?”
“Maybe they didn’t want to fight two Grummish guards and an Invicta dragon,” Lyslee quipped, with a big smile.
“She’s right,” Kian said. “That’s almost certainly what it was.”
“That, or they’re exhausted from digging,” the deputy put in as he and the sheriff headed over.
“How are the dogs?” Kian asked.
“Miraculously fine,” the deputy told him with an expression of real relief. “Bear okay?”
“Got his feelings hurt,” Lyslee said. “But he can still pull.”
“You’re not in fighting order, sister,” Avril said, her lips a tight line.
“I’ll live,” Lyslee said, shrugging.
“Are we going to see more of this as we go?” Kian asked the sheriff. “Is this normal for a run to the pole?”
“It’s not so bad, really,” the sheriff said, frowning and scratching the back of his neck. “It’s small. Costs us time, that’s all.”
“They’re intending to wear away at us then,” Kinsley said suddenly. “Make it so we’re running out of resources to finish the journey? So we’ll abandon the cargo?”
Now that was solider-level thinking. Kian had already been assuming it, but he wouldn’t have expected an innocent Terran girl to piece it together so quickly.
“That’s not going to happen,” the sheriff hissed, taking a moment to clean the road dust from his badge. “The cargo stays with us. We’re not rewarding them for bad behavior.”
For the second time in an hour, Kian found himself feeling mighty curious about what could be in that load.
“There will be more traps,” Kian said instead of asking. “More petty attacks. They will always be one step ahead if we stick to the main route. Is there another way?”
The sheriff shook his head, but he was looking down into the valley below them.
“Why not take the valley?” Lyslee asked. “What’s wrong with it?”
Sheriff Barr rocked back on his heels with his thumbs in his belt, a thoughtful expression on his face.
