The Mercenary's Bounty

by Kristen Banet

“Are you saying I should go to Varon?” She curled a lip at the idea. She liked the priest, but he was with Nevyn. She wasn’t attracted to him and they couldn’t communicate well yet, either.

  “No, but maybe ya should try it with Mat or a future member of yer mayara when yer ready. Just don’t start playin’ that game with ‘em until ya have set some rules down. I’ll tell Matesh to do the same, or ya can.”

  “You know, I’m glad I have you,” she admitted softly. “You’re the only person giving me this sort of advice.”

  “Ya need someone who understands,” he replied. “I do.”

  “Do you want to talk about anything else?” She could only imagine what he was holding back.

  “Where did ya go today? Ya went into yer head and missed a lot of Mat and I trying to talk to you. I noticed, and I’m pretty sure he did too.” Bryn’s hands nearly lulled her into relaxing until that question. “I told ya where I was, what I was thinkin’ about. Turnabout is fair play.”

  “You know, nothing bothered me in the pits.” She took a deep breath. “It’s beginning to bother me. The old wounds feel like they’re reopening, and I’m trying to hold them closed. I thought I was over all of it.” She swallowed on some emotion. “Now I’m free, and what do I get? All these things keep coming back. I never let them drag me down when I was in the pits. Never. Why now?”

  “Because ya finally have time to deal with them.” Bryn’s hands moved to her back and shoulders. “Ya finally have the space to deal with them. There ain’t nothing wrong with looking back and realizing that ya were hurt. Yer life was awful. Maybe it’s time to address it.”

  “Address what?” She scoffed. “I protected myself. I was the strongest Andinna in the pits, Bryn. What they did to me doesn’t matter anymore. I’m free. They can’t take that from me.” For the first time in a very long time, tears threatened her eyes. She tried to keep it buried, but the conviction of her words didn’t match the way her heart felt. “I wanted you to talk to Rain, not me. I don’t want to give you all of this pain. This pain doesn’t matter.” She hadn’t wanted to load him with her nightmares. “Sometimes, it feels like I’m drowning, just trying to keep my head above water. Not often, but…” Mave swallowed. The old pain would come rushing back without warning, and she would struggle in silence.

  “It’s like a bad storm that comes fast and out of nowhere.” Bryn explained it so well. “It’s fine. Ya can use my raft. Mat will always help ya. The Company will always help ya.” He reached out again and this time, he didn’t just grab her hand. He wrapped her into a hug. “Just like ya offered me stability during the storm. Ya just need to get better at tellin’ others when ya need that help to stay afloat.”

  She tentatively wrapped her arms around him and eventually held him tightly. Her hands shook a little. “Thank you.”

  They held each other for a long time, as the sun continued to dip and the firelight was all they had.

  “We should get back to the group,” he finally said, gently pulling away. She could only nod, letting him go. “Ya know, it goes both ways.”

  “What does?” she asked softly.

  “Ya think yer a burden, but yer not. Ya help me too.” Bryn smiled and it was sweet. It was kind and gentle in ways she didn’t understand. “When ya convinced me to sleep during the storm? It was the best sleep I had gotten the entire trip. It might be the best sleep I’ve gotten in the last decade. Thank ya for that.”

  He began to walk away at that, forcing her to move back to the group with him. She found a seat next to Mat, who didn’t question why her evening stretches had taken so long. The Company, if anyone had been watching, could have seen what happened. None of them said anything, none of them teased or jeered or called her or Bryn weak for needing comfort.

  She began to realize none of them ever would.

  21

  Trevan

  Trevan practiced against the dummy full of straw, knowing there was nothing else he could do except keep his training sharp. The sun beat down on him, every second draining his energy. It was only the afternoon training. He was still going to need to make it through dinner and the evening training.

  And then I’ll need to find a place to hide. It’s been five days since they cornered me for a beating. They’re probably getting antsy again.

  Trevan didn’t have much hope that he would be able to avoid them forever. Eventually, the Andinna were going to turn their sights back on him, but thankfully, they’d had new gladiators for the last couple of days to keep them preoccupied. He’d seen it as a guard. Newcomers were always hazed and harassed in the beginning. He just hoped one of them would end up causing more trouble and keeping the heat away from him for just a little longer.

  As the only Elvasi in the pits as another slave, it was all he could hope for. A little more time.

  He beat the wooden training sword into the dummy harder. At least he could heal nearly as fast as the Andinna. They took their healing sleep for granted. Elvasi had the same, but the Elvasi weren’t made for war and combat the way the winged warriors were. He could heal much faster than a human, but bruises didn’t always disappear overnight for him. He still had evidence of the last beating he’d gotten.

  Why don’t they just kill me?

  Trevan asked himself that a lot. He knew the Empress was cruel. She wanted him to suffer. She wanted him to break under the weight of being a slave, unprotected from those who had all the right to hate him. He just wasn’t sure why the Andinna hadn’t killed him yet. Were they told not to? Were they toying with him? Were they hoping he would gain a shred of hope at surviving, then end him?

  He had no hope of escaping. He had no hope it would end any time soon. He wasn’t even sure why he was training so hard.

  He leaned against the dummy at the end of his forms, out of ideas about what to do. The lenasti ignored him, yelling at the Andinna. The guards whispered at him, some cursing his name. They would beat him again soon, and he didn’t have much of a chance at hiding from them. They could just order him to stay still and there wouldn’t be much he could do about it.

  He’d always thought the Champion had been alone in the pits, but looking back, he realized she had kept herself that way. The lenasti, the trainers, they had liked her a little. She was still a slave, but she was a well-behaved one, and the best gladiator in the pits. She brought them glory. The guards who had been around as long as him, they knew her as the one who didn’t cause them trouble, unless they caused her trouble. It was amicable on their end.

  He was alone. They all hated him. Andinna, Elvasi, it didn’t matter. He couldn’t even be well-behaved to get into anyone’s good graces. He was a pariah, and they treated him as if he was the shit under their boots, something they were always trying to wipe clean, but couldn’t.

  “Everyone! Gather around!” a lenasti roared over the grunts and arguments of training. “The Empress has decided that monthly games shall proceed as normal. We’ve drawn up a schedule for two days from now.”

  Trevan straightened, wondering if he would be forced to fight. He didn’t join the group of Andinna gathering around, staying behind them all. He knew if he got much closer and accidentally bumped one, it would start a brawl, one he would lose.

  Truthfully, he wanted to get chosen. He couldn’t fight back against the beatings, but maybe on the sands he could win once or twice and they would start leaving him alone. It was really the only hope he had. Maybe, in a couple of centuries, he would earn a room.

  Maybe.

  He only had one example of how an outcast could survive the pits, and it was her. Maevana. He’d never even said her name to her. She had always been the Champion to him, since before he even found himself a guard in the pits. He didn’t know if how she did it would work for him, but he could try. He wasn’t sure why in the end, since he was going to die sooner or later, but he was going to try.

  The lenasti continued to call out numbers of fights and by the end, Trevan’s number was never called. Not a single me
ntion or reference to him.

  No. I need to fight. I have to. If I never fight, they’ll never know I can, and it’ll always be a fucking shit-show down here.

  The Andinna began to disperse and Trevan avoided them to go to the lenasti. The older Elvasi looked up from his parchment and glared. “What, slave?” There was a bitter, venomous anger in the question.

  Trevan did as he’d learned over the last month. Keeping his eyes down, he swallowed the fear. “Sir, I wasn’t chosen to fight?”

  “No. Maybe next time.”

  “Sir-”

  A crack echoed over the now silent training area. Trevan hissed as a whip sliced open his back.

  “You heard him,” another lenasti snapped. “Move along, slave.”

  Trevan bit back his own anger. He backed away, and once he was out of range of the whip, he turned and walked down the stairs into the dining area. Like many of the slaves, he had on only breeches, meaning every Andinna and other slave in the room could see the angry, bleeding line he probably had across his back now.

  “I wonder if he thought he could whine to some other Elvasi,” an Andinna commented to another. “Stupid pointed-ear bastard. That’s what he gets.”

  “It’s nice to see the Elvasi are bastards to their own people, too.”

  Laughter. Trevan’s world was full of laughter. The cruel, mean kind. He took a bowl from a human slave. The short-lived slaves weren’t nearly as cruel. He had the bowl filled with slop and went to the one place he could safely sit in the room.

  Over the centuries, many had tried to claim the small table in the corner just to piss off the Champion. Now, none of them did. It was the only place he could sit. Once, they had claimed it was where she would watch them, spying on them for the Empress. Now, it was a place where they could all keep an eye on him.

  He sat down quietly and began to eat quickly. He knew he was safe in the dining hall and had no intention of leaving when he was done with his food, but he knew if he didn’t eat it fast enough, one of them would steal it. The guards didn’t allow it between the Andinna, but there were no rules when it came to him.

  The Andinna had free rein to do whatever they pleased to him, and there was no one and nothing to stop them.

  Trevan finished his meal, and when the bell rang, he waited for the Andinna to go up into the training area first. He went up behind them and went back over to his training dummy, where none of them would bother him.

  He noticed the lenasti were still ignoring him. They always did.

  That’s why they didn’t choose me to fight. They’re ignoring me. If I don’t fight, I can’t get killed, and my pain down here will only continue, probably just the way the Empress wants. It’s all a part of the punishment.

  With that realization, Trevan gritted his teeth. He beat into the dummy, working harder.

  He had work to do. He had to find a way to change the game and get into the Colosseum so he could prove himself.

  22

  Mave

  They could see the mountains by the beginning of their thirteenth day on the road. They had been moving faster than planned. Alchan hadn’t liked being on the road and moved them harder than he’d originally wanted to. She didn’t mind.

  “We’re almost there,” Alchan called out. “We’re going to be in the village by tomorrow night. If all goes according to plan, we’ll get a few weeks to rest before the mission.”

  Mave smiled. At least there was that. A small break from the road. A blessing, really.

  The cart lurched into movement and the Company was back on its way for yet another day on the road.

  Bryn sat next to her, his summer-sky-blue eyes on the road. For two weeks, they had been friendly, always on the cart next to each other, save the times when Mave practiced riding on Mat’s horse. That had started a few days after the trip did. Every day in the afternoon, she rode the horse for a short time, learning the way of it. She could manage a little more every day. Between that, her Andena, and her wings, she felt like she could catch up faster than anyone thought she would.

  When Mat rode around, handing out jerky for everyone, she chewed on it, not bothered anymore by the spice. She didn’t have much of an appetite, though.

  “Rain!” Alchan called out at the front of their caravan.

  “Yes, sir?” Rain called back, standing on his cart and receiving a glare for it.

  “Sit,” Alchan snarled and quickly cut it off. “Later today, probably before we bed down, I want you to fly ahead. Get some rest now so you can fly all night. You’re fast enough, I think you’ll beat us to the village to let them know we’re coming.”

  “Of course, sir.” Rain smiled, nodding. He climbed into the back of the cart and bedded down. Mave wondered just how fast his wyvern actually was, but didn’t want to bother anyone with the question.

  “That’s interesting,” Mat commented. “Sending Rain instead of you, Bryn.”

  “Rain’s fast as hell in his wyvern form,” Bryn replied, chewing on his piece of jerky.

  “Good point,” Mat agreed. They continued riding, everyone quiet. Mave found herself staring at the mountains a lot. As they drew closer, she grew more excited. She felt like they were calling her. They had spent two weeks on roads near forests, farms, and through one tiny human village, but this…They were nearly to a place where she felt like she would feel at home. The flat lands didn’t make her excited the way the mountains did.

  It was late afternoon when the front group stopped. Mave stood up, curious to why.

  “What’s going on?” she asked, trying to see what stopped Alchan and Luykas in the front.

  “Don’t know,” Mat said. “Let me go find out.” He rode away, going towards the front.

  It was Alchan who roared what was going on. “The road is blocked! Everyone off the road! We’re going to bed down here for the night. You too, Rain. We’re still too far out for me to send you along.”

  Mave sighed, jumping off the cart. Bryn was groaning to himself as he led the horses and cart off the road. She eyed the blockage at the front of their group as the rest of the carts got out of the way. It was like a storm had knocked down three trees in succession onto the road. Branches and other debris were everywhere. It would take the rest of the afternoon and evening to make the road clear enough to travel. At that point, they would be exhausted. She saw the wisdom of Alchan’s order. They would need the rest after this.

  “I can help,” she offered as those on their own horses jumped down. Leshaun appeared next to her, using his cane. He was moving slower each day they were on the road, but the only complaints she heard from him were joking. He never asked anyone to slow down for him, just joked about old knees and a weak back.

  “Are you sure? The big young men can handle it.” His comment was mild, but she bared her teeth at it.

  “I can help.” She wasn’t some simpering female. She was in the prime of her life and well built.

  “We need all the hands we can get - these things are huge.” Luykas smiled at her, nodding. “Matesh, you too.”

  “Yup.” Matesh sighed and began to walk his horse off the road, grabbing the leads for Alchan’s and Luykas’ horses as well.

  She moved to the trees, frowning. The size of them was impressive. They were thick enough to go to her waist on their sides the way they were.

  “We’ll clean up the small debris first,” Alchan said, walking to stand beside her. “I want you on the branches while I get a group on the first tree.”

  “I can help with the trees,” she said, narrowing her eyes at him.

  “You can help with the next two. There’s a lot of work to be done.” He didn’t seem to care about the way she was growling at him.

  She started moving the large branches out of the road as most of the Company surrounded the tree. Rainev and Brynec were helping her and Leshaun was nowhere to be seen, likely with the carts and horses. The branches could have been small trees, if she didn’t know any better. Most were bigger than every ma
le in the Company.

  “Skies, what kind of storm hit to knock these damned things down?” Rain groaned, pulling a branch off the road. She half-threw hers into the underbrush and out of the way.

  “No idea. Ya would think the patrols from the village would have seen ‘em and handled it.” Bryn shook his head. “Lazy pigeons.”

  “Patrols? You mean the Andinna in the mountains?” She grabbed another branch, pulling it across the dirt. The males were now moving the tree out of the road. She could see all of them were getting red-faced from the exertion.

  “Aye. They should be keeping the road safe and clear for us to come back. We’re the only Andinna who ever leave the mountains regularly. They probably think we weren’t coming back from the Empire.” He chuckled darkly. “Alchan is going to give ‘em hell for this when he gets the chance. Especially since we’re bringin’ a female back. All those males in the village are going to regret not makin’ the trip easy on ya.” He winked at her, making her shake her head at the antics.

  “They’re going to get really excited over you,” Rain added, grinning. “You’ll see. A new female that they haven’t had to deal with for a few centuries? You’re going to get all sorts of male attention.”

  “No thank you,” she said softly, throwing another branch off the road. She didn’t need or want any more male attention than she already had. She didn’t even mean that in the sexual sense. She was constantly surrounded by males all the time, and it had been that way since she was thrown into the pits. Why would she want more? “Let’s just get back to work.” She didn’t want to keep worrying about how life was going to be when they were in the village or the males she didn’t know yet.

  It was slow work. A lot of the smaller debris was easy, but plentiful. The large pieces began to get heavier. She and Bryn had to move one branch together as the Company finally moved on to the second large tree trunk.

  “We’re going to need more hands on this one,” Luykas called out.