Page 44 of The Laws of Nature (Heirs of the Empire #3)

Tobi snarls. He fights and struggles, slithering out of the grip of the men who hold him, once or twice, only to be grabbed again, but a moment later he is on the ground.

On his back. His legs are being pulled apart.

He kicks out, getting someone in the face.

He rolls onto his belly and starts to crawl along the ground.

Hands find his legs and haul him back, with laughs and sneers.

He is rolled onto his back again and someone puts their hands around his throat.

Tobi struggles, but the hands squeeze tighter and tighter until Tobi sees stars. He cannot breathe.

Tobi grunts. He’s losing consciousness when someone growls.

“ Ei rill, kushir. ” And the grip on his throat releases.

Tobi gasps for air. As he is rolled over again and hauled up, put on all fours on the ground.

A roused cock is inches from his lips. “ Dekuna ga ?,”a voice says.

The cock thrusts forward, towards Tobi’s open mouth. He turns his head to the side.

His eyes flick to the archers. They are distracted. No longer watching Baby. He glances at her. She is in her cage. She looks wary. She is looking at something. He follows her gaze beyond the light of the Exceli’s torches .

And he sees eyes in the dark. Eyes he’d know anywhere. Harok.

Tobi blinks. For a moment he thinks he imagines it. That he is simply dreaming that Harok will come and save him from this. A hand takes Tobi’s chin and forces his head back into place. Tobi shuts his mouth tight and the head of an Exceli cock bumps against his lips.

“Open mouth,” someone growls.

But Harok cannot be here. Harok is not here. No one ever comes to help Tobi. No one cares enough to come. Even his own mother, who swore she’d always take care of him, retreated into madness and left him all alone. Tobi has always had to fight his own battles to fight for himself.

He had one year, one year as a prince in the Rose Palace before he was cast out to fend for himself.

Someone shoves a finger into Tobi’s mouth, trying to lever it open.

He bites down on it, hard. Skin breaks under his teeth.

There is blood in his mouth. He hears a scream, as the finger is pulled back.

Tobi splutters, spitting out blood. And then, someone hits him hard on the side of his face with a closed fist.

As his head is knocked to one side he looks out into the forest again. And, again, he sees Harok there. It’s definitely him. Tobi would know the shape of him anywhere. Like no one else.

Harok is there watching. Sitting on Embox. Silent and still in the dark forest. Hidden in the trees.

There is a small warm feeling growing inside Tobi. Harok has come. Harok has come to rescue him.

But there is another voice too. Another voice, saying Harok is alone. There are so many Exceli. And Harok is only watching. He has come for Tobi, but perhaps he has decided there is nothing he can do.

Tobi lifts his head and looks out into the dark at Harok again. And this time, Harok’s eyes meet Tobi’s. Harok gives Tobi a single, solemn nod.

Tobi flicks his eyes to Baby’s cage.

Harok nods again.

Tobi knows exactly what Harok is trying to tell him. They have spent so many moons finding ways to communicate without words. It only takes a single gesture. And Tobi simply knows.

Harok is waiting for a moment to release Baby and attack.

Tobi needs to help him.

He needs to distract them, make a moment for Harok to take them all by surprise.

He puts everything he has into one last attempt to fight.

He pulls his arms free from the men holding them in a fast and sudden move, presses down against the earth beneath him and flips his body up, hard.

His acrobatic strength shocks the Exceli that hold him.

He wrenches his legs forward, under his body and forces himself up, onto his feet.

All around him there are cries of surprise.

He is being grabbed again immediately by arms that intend to force him back down.

But before they can, he lashes out. He hits the man nearest to him, hard in the face with a balled fist. It hurts Tobi’s hand more than he expected, but the blow lands true. The man falls back, crying out in pain.

All the Exceli around him shout in surprise.

Someone hits him hard in the shoulder with the hilt of a sword.

It knocks him back down and he falls onto the ground right at Lymok’s feet.

But out of the corner of his eye, he sees Harok, moving fast. He slips down from Embox and races to Baby’s cage, drawing back the bolts, in one quick movement. The door of the cage flies open.

Baby comes racing out, past Harok and towards the Exceli .

Snarling and roaring. He hears screams. The archers try to raise their bows, but Baby is no easy target now she’s free. She is already mauling the Exceli. Attacking them in a fury with teeth and claws.

While they are distracted by her, Harok comes thundering out of the trees on Embox, his huge sword flashes, catching the light of the fat full moon. Two Exceli fall in moments, taking fatal wounds from Harok’s blade as Baby’s claws find the throat of another.

Harok and Baby fight together. A horrifically unstoppable combination of man and beast.

Many of the Exceli and Lymok flee screaming into the trees as they see their men fall.

Tobi scrambles up to his feet, as another man rears back from Harok, clutching his throat, blood pouring down the front of his body.

Harok reaches Tobi and quickly dispatches the man who hit him, with a two handed thrust of his sword right into the man’s belly.

Tobi can feel the anger behind it. As the man falls, slithering off Harok’s blade, Harok grabs Tobi’s arm and Tobi leaps, just as he used to do with Darvo when he was hauled from Baby’s cage at the end of his act. He swings up over Embox’s neck.

Tobi’s world is a blur. He feels Harok tug at the reins and Embox turns. Tobi can hear clashing blades and screaming mixed with Baby’s snarls and the thump of bodies hitting the ground as they charge through the clearing.

“You came for me,” Tobi says, looking up at Harok, tears of relief on his cheeks. He blinks hard.

“ Sho, Suskara .”

Embox picks up speed. They are away from the Exceli riding fast through the forest. But Tobi hears a second set of hoofbeats .

“No,” Tobi says, trying to turn. “Baby, where is Baby?”

As he looks around he sees another horse.

One of the Exceli, riding after them. He recognises the voice when he hears a cry of Ambolk.

Something about Harok. A threat. The words blur, but it is the voice of the Exceli leader Salizi.

The horse is close behind them. Harok makes a rough sound urging speed from his own mount.

But the rider matches the pace. He has a fresher horse. They can’t outrun him. Harok raises his sword.

Tobi turns his head and sees Salizi is armed with a battle hammer.

A great and terrifying block of iron. Salizi gets closer and closer until, screaming out in vicious rage, he smashes his hammer down on Harok’s right shoulder.

Harok bellows in pain as his shoulder shatters with a terrible crunching noise. He drops his sword.

Tobi reaches out, barely understanding what he is doing and catches the sword as it falls from Harok’s hand. He curls his fingers around the hilt. It feels warm. Strange. He has not held a sword in years, but he does not remember it feeling like this.

He wonders, for a brief moment, if perhaps he could fight with this sword.

Salizi raises the hammer again ready for a fatal blow. Tobi looks again at the sword he holds, but as he does so a blur of orange crashes into Salizi.

Baby!

Baby has knocked Salizi right down from his horse. She is ripping at his throat.

With Harok’s sword in one hand, Tobi manages to scramble upright on Embox’s big back.

He glances behind them into the dark forest. No other Exceli seem to be following them.

Tobi turns further to see Harok’s face. It is pale.

His eyes are dark, such a dark blue they almost look black.

He is swaying. His shoulder is a bloody mass of destroyed flesh.

His right arm hangs limp at his side. Tobi takes the horse’s reins.

“Hold me,” he says in Ambolk. “Hold me. Good arm.”

Harok puts his left arm around Tobi’s waist. He can feel Harok’s weight as his body slumps behind him, leaning hard on Tobi’s back.

He’s unkillable, Tobi reminds himself. He can’t die.

He isn’t sure if there are more Exceli around. He cannot be certain they are safe.

“Baby,” he hisses down at where she is tearing at Salizi on the ground. She looks up at him.

Tobi kicks at Embox with his heels and sets the powerful mare trotting forward. Whistling to Baby, to follow.

“Irgorye,” Tobi hisses in Ambolk, fearful to raise his voice above a whisper, “Irgorye where Urynwud? You need healer.”

“Suskara,” Harok slurs back. He seems to be losing consciousness.

“Please,” Tobi says. “Urynwud.”

“Embox,” Harok says weakly. “Embox knows.”

And it seems she does. As Tobi feels the full weight of Harok’s great body slumping down onto his back, Embox keeps going through the forest.

It seems like a long time of riding, fighting to balance both himself and Harok on Embox’s back with Baby trotting beside them, before Tobi sees the lights of Urynwud, candles burning in the windows of the vegetation covered towers.

He did not believe he would be so happy to see Urynwud again.