Warlords Rising by Honor Raconteur Page B

than two of them, I’d have
grabbed those instead.” Nolan inclined his head toward the doorway. “What’s our
plan for out there? Becca, want to go first again?”
    “I can? But it won’t be as much of an advantage as it’s all
open air outside. I can only give you enough clearance to get out the door
without a fight.”
    “That’s enough,” Nolan assured her.
    Trev’nor propped up his bars against the table, making sure
they weren’t going to accidentally set something on fire, then found cuffs for
the guards. He didn’t check if they were alive or dead. He didn’t want to know
that yet. Shad, Chatta, Aletha, and Garth had all taken lives in the line of
duty. He knew that. They’d been very frank about how rattling and awful it felt
afterwards. Right now, they couldn’t afford to be sick or have any hesitation.
So he just made sure they couldn’t cause trouble if they woke up again, and
stood. To Becca, he said, “We’ve got your back, go.”
    She didn’t so much open the door as kick it aside and stride
through. Trev’nor and Nolan were at her heels. In the few seconds it took to
clear the doorway, Trev’nor kept his bars held high in a guard position. But it
turned out that everyone outside was so stunned to see three slaves come out
that no one knew quite how to react.
    Becca took advantage of their hesitation. She rushed toward
the nearest group of slavers and attacked with such savagery that one would
think she was a starving wolf.
    Trev’nor swore aloud and raced to her, spinning and putting
his back to hers, making sure that nothing could attack her from behind. He did
leave enough distance between them that she didn’t accidentally brain him,
though. Just in case. Nolan moved with him, positioning himself on her other
side, forming a triangle.
    “Move as a unit!” Trev’nor yelled to them over the clangs
and shouted orders of panicking slavers. If they tried to go their own
directions, they’d be cut down in short order.
    Trev’nor had never gotten a good headcount, but he knew that
the ratio of slaver to slave was very unequal. He saw just how disproportionate
it was when slavers and guards started pouring out into this narrow courtyard
they were in. There were far more slaves than guards. It made sense, after he
took a second to think about it. Even slavers had to sleep and the Night Watch
would have fewer guards. People rushed him from all sides, and he had to focus
to guard his right even as he attacked with his left, but he still got a rough
idea of what they were up against. If there were more than twenty men in there
with them, he’d eat his boots.
    Shad had stacked the three of them up against worse odds
than this during their training. Was this really all that had been holding him
back in there? Twenty men that weren’t particularly well trained in combat, and
having their magic sealed off? Granted, they’d had little information about
what they were up against the first few days. But still, they could have moved
sooner than this. They should have. He let out a bloodcurdling war cry and
watched them flinch back.
    He couldn’t watch his friends, couldn’t turn to check on
them, but he kept his ears open, and Becca’s chains never faltered. They constantly
whirled through the air or hit something with a hard cracking sound. Nolan’s
breathing was a little ragged, but steady, his borrowed sword clanging against
others’. Those sounds let him know that they were alright and it gave him the
strength to fight that much harder.
    An arrow of magic and fire whizzed past his nose, barely an
inch away, and Trev’nor flinched and rolled in sheer instinct. He came up ready
to roll again, head snapping from one direction to the next as he tried to spot
his attacker. There, in between the guards. Trev’nor wasn’t sure in this dim
lighting, but the man looked familiar, one of the magicians the guards trusted
to keep the rest of the slaves in line.
    Staying low, he put on a burst of