Battle Cry Read Free Page A

again the story of the sword that she carried.
    The leader of that tribe, a scarred older man named Griffin, told them that the news that he had heard from around the farms was all bad. “The soldiers are looking for you Reena. They have been ordered to capture you on sight. As for the rest of us, if we are caught harboring you we’re also to be killed. The Governor wants your head brought back to the city and nothing else. He says that he’s no longer willing to give you any clemency at all.”
    “As if he ever gave me any to begin with.” Reena was angry, and she had every right to be but she knew that she should quell that now. Now was not the time for anger, now was the time for reason. If she was angry she would make a mistake; and the last thing on earth she could afford was a mistake. “Is there any news of my father?”
    “I heard he was taken to the Pit,” Deal said.
    “Are you sure?” Reena’s heart sank at the words. The Pit was a place from which very few ever escaped and those who did left it through the door of death. If her father was there, there was no way to rescue him; it was guarded by soldiers and overseers with long cruel whips and many other weapons. Her father was strong, so he was not likely to die from the work unless they were not feeding him. If the Governor had taken it into his head to punish her father for her escape, then it was quite likely that he wasn’t being fed and that his workload was far more difficult than that of the other people who worked in the Pit. Not that anyone in the Pit had an easy workload.
    “That is just what they say.”
    Reena scrutinized Deal’s face. “That is what who says?”
    “Talon’s parents. I visited their farm a few days ago; they are very afraid, Reena. Their son is still in the city you know; he was supposed to be your last battle but now that you’re gone the Governor is taking his anger out on him.”
    Reena’s spirits sank even further, something she would not have thought possible just a few seconds before. Talon was a friend, and his family had long been allies of the Outlaws. It was not his fault that he was being forced to go against her in the Arena, and he should not be punished because she escaped.
    Lucas asked, “Do you know where any of the other tribes are hiding?”
    The leader of Deal’s tribes shook his head. “No, we haven’t seen anyone. The woods are awfully quiet now, everyone is afraid. We’ve never seen the amount of soldiers that we’ve seen in the last few days. I don’t know how you escaped their gaze, even as far back in the woods as you were.”
    Deal added, “They’re not afraid anymore either. The superstitions used to keep them away but they don’t seem to be working. They’re more afraid of the Governor then they are of the old ghost and haunts that are supposed to be in these woods.”
    Reena sighed. “Then maybe we should just make them afraid again. If we do that, if we run the soldiers away then perhaps we will have a better chance of finding the other tribes.”
    Griffin asked, “Have you gone insane? How would you suggest we make the soldiers believe in haunts and ghosts?”
    Reena said, “I would suggest that we turn them into them.”
    There were murmurs of disbelief and then finally Lucas asked, “Do you know the punishment and the penalty for killing a soldier of the city?”
    Reena met his gaze with a level gaze of her own. “Do you not realize that declaring war against the city means that you will have to kill their soldiers? Why not start now? We have got to rally more people; if we do it properly though they will never know that we did it; they’ll blame the ghosts.”
    “Tell me how you think this can work.” It was Dax who spoke. He was leaning forward, far across the fire, his eyes intent. “It seems to me that the soldiers are all moving towards the other side of the woods; we’ve all agreed on that otherwise we never would’ve chosen this cave for the night or created