Her reaction was confusing. Should he say more? Or had he said too much already? "It depends."
"On what?"
"On you, whether is this enough for you or not."
"Enough for me? What is this?" Lynett laughed. Ben did not understand whether she was mocking him or not, but her giggle was the sweetest music he had ever listened to.
"Either you're too smart or too dumb." She jabbed a finger at his chest. "But anyway, I love chattering with you, too."
46. SANIA
The sky was grey when Sania opened her eyes. Raising her heavy head, she realized she was lying on her back below a couple of neighboring palm trees. The last thing she remembered was the sight of that wicked Viola vanishing in the horizon with her galloping horse. How had their encounter ended? Now she remembered; it had come out that the wench did not have an antidote for her poisoned husband. Her hopes of saving her husband were fading—if he had not died already.
Wait. That wasn't the last thing I saw. Sania now recalled the nomads chasing her, her horse neighing in agony, and the sky twirling, turning from blue to black when something struck her forehead. Cautiously touching where she had been hit, she whimpered. Her forehead still hurt.
Contemplating the shrubs surrounding the big lake in front of her, she wondered how she had reached this oasis. She knew she was not alone when a horse's whinny came from behind a clump of trees at the edge of the lake. As she tried to push to her feet, her right knee screamed. Blast! What's wrong with my knee? She bit her lower lip, limping forward to see who was there. Stupid girl! What if it was those nomads again? How would she face them? She had better go the other way and sneak out of this oasis before they might discover her disappearance. But how far could she go with her bad knee?
Sania's heart stopped beating when a brawny man emerged from behind the trees, pulling a brown horse by its reins. "Your Majesty." The cold Bermanian knight sent by Masolon looked surprised. "You'd better have some rest for the time being."
Relieved it was not one of those nomads, she held her chest, filling her lungs with air. As her sore knee was not able to carry her much longer, Sania sat on the ground, extending her right leg and folding the other. "Can you tell me what I'm doing here?" She grimaced when she slowly flexed her knee.
"You're alive, Your Grace." He stood with his horse a few steps from her. "You should have seen how you fell off your horse. By some miracle from the Lord of Sky and Earth, you didn't break your neck or back."
"And the nomads? How did you. . ?" What was she thinking? For sure, he had persuaded them to leave her alone.
"They were only four, and I was ahorse." He shrugged. Fearless like his master, she thought, but not as warm as him.
Sania's stomach growled. With the dusty air blocking sunlight, it was hard for Sania to tell what time it was. Just like any other day in the Murasen autumn, sunrise did not look much different from dusk. "Have I been sleeping for long?" she asked.
The slightest of smiles slipped over his face. "The stone you fell on was hard enough to make you sleep the whole day, decent enough not to crush your royal skull, Your Majesty." He took out a handful of black dates from the saddlebag and knelt before her. "You must be hungry."
Hearing 'Your Majesty' reminded her of the queen she should act like. Take the dates, girl. Right now she was not in her royal palace in Kahora. And when she returned to that palace, how would she be addressed? The Queen of Murase? Or King Rasheed's widow?
If she returned to the palace.
"I must go to His Majesty." Sania picked up two dates from his hand.
"Night will fall before we reach the camp of your army. We'll be easy prey for the Ghosts."
Again, she heard their name. That was no coincidence. "Why is everyone speaking their cursed name?"
"I'm not sure what you mean, Your Majesty. But they're back, if that's what you're asking about."
And she had thought that nightmare had gone for good. "What are they up to this time? Not to avenge their dead, I'm afraid. They will not rest until they burn the whole city to ashes." The sweet taste of dates made her hungry for more. She shot him an inquiring look when she took out the seeds from her mouth. The Bermanian knight handed her three more dates. "Thanks." She lowered her eyes when she started eating.
"I saw hares in this oasis," he said, gazing at the sky. "I'd better catch them before it becomes too dark."
While he was getting out of her sight, Sania opened her mouth to yell at him to stop, but she did not. The winds whispering through the trees sounded a bit creepy in this abandoned oasis. She looked around every time she heard the leaves of the bushes rustle, fearing that it might be a stalking wolf, or worse, a leopard.
Where was she? Sania never remembered she had passed by an oasis near Kahora before—particularly in the adjacent eastern and western areas. By all means, she could not be farther than one day from the camp of her army, unless the horse of that knight had galloped at an unbelievable speed. Heading south was not a possible option because of the nomads waiting there. He was taking her north, she deduced, but hopefully, that knight was aware that they would be getting close to the lands of the Mankol riders if they kept going in that direction for long. To reach her husband's camp, they should travel southwest tomorrow. And tomorrow implied spending a night in the open. . . with this man.
Why was that happening to her?
The Bermanian knight returned with their supper, a slain brown hare. "We're not going to eat this, are we?" She grimaced.
"Not before we skin it."
"We?" She could barely bear the sight of blood seeping from the poor hare, let alone holding a blade with her own hand to cut its skin.
The right side of his mouth quirked upward when he carelessly let the hare fall to the ground before he went to one of the bushes and broke some wooden branches. In a few minutes he returned for the second time with grass and wooden branches of different sizes. She watched him make a tinder nest with the dry grass and use his sword to make a spindle from a round thick branch. Then, he cut a groove in a wooden board and started rubbing the tip of the spindle up and down this groove. He gently blew the tinder nest at the end of the groove when it caught an ember at last. In a short while, the ember became fire. Tonight she would be having a roasted hare for supper. A roasted skinned hare, she hoped.
The knight grabbed the hare with one hand, his sword in the other. "You might not like the sight of this, Your Majesty." He looked her in the eye, and she would not argue about it. She would ask him to take the hare away and do his gruesome job out of her sight if it were not for the coming darkness. He would need firelight to ready their meal.
"I'm fine. Do it." It would not be too hard to watch him, she reassured herself. But the moment he started cutting around the hare's joints, she closed her eyes. Maybe she had better test her knee to busy herself until he was done.
"Don't do that," said the knight when she pivoted on her left heel to give herself a push up.
"Don't do what?"
"Don't exhaust your injured knee. Do you mind if I check it for you?"
"It's just a bruise," she hurriedly said. "Tomorrow it will be better if it gets some rest." That was her wish. No need to be touched by some man she barely knew.
"As you wish, Your Majesty." He was smoothly skinning the hare as if he was peeling an orange. She turned her attention toward the flames rising from the tinder nest. The fire, the palm trees, the desert; all reminded her of her last ride with Masolon when they had tried to escape from Murase. She hoped the fate of this little journey would be different from that previous one. Tomorrow she would be sitting next to her husband in his pavilion. She still had faith in Bumar's resourcefulness that he must have found a way to save Rasheed's life.
The Bermanian knight was done with the hare skin, and now he was broiling their dinner, the scent of cooked meat making her swallow. With the tip of his blade, he picked a small roasted piece of the hare and gave it to her. "Don't cut your hand," he warned. Aga
in, she recalled that cursed night, particularly the moment when Masolon had given her the torch and warned her from hurting herself.
The plain hare tasted better than nothing. A few drops of lemon might have made her dinner tastier though. "Tell me, is it King Masolon who gave you that message in person?" She was not sure if he had told her about that before.
"Yes, Your Majesty."
"Are you sure he just gave it to you without saying anything? I mean. . . he must have told you something." What was she doing? She had better eat her dinner with her mouth shut.
"He insisted that no one should know about my mission. Even Queen Rona herself doesn't know."
Queen Rona. Sania cleared her throat when she heard the name of Masolon's wife. "He did the right thing." She nodded. "You shall tell him my thanks when you see him again."
"I shall do, Your Majesty."
Sania took more bites of the hare. "I wonder how a foreigner has become your king." He must be thankful to Rasheed and Feras for banishing him. "Is it true he was the commander of Queen Rona's troops in her war to reclaim her father's throne?"
"Not from the beginning. But his entrance was crucial to bring her victory."
"I see." Sania doubted it was only victory that Masolon had brought to the new Bermanian queen. Why would a queen marry a commander unless she. . ? Yes, say it, girl; unless she loved him. "I heard tales about her beauty." Lying, she managed a faint smile.
"I don't know what the tales say, Your Majesty. But she's one of the prettiest women I've ever seen."
Sania let out a deep breath of air. He must have fallen for her. And why wouldn't he? Did you expect him to continue his life with an empty heart? Anyway, she should not bother. "I'm full." No, she was not. She was just losing her appetite. "I must sleep now to have enough rest for tomorrow's ride."
"I'll stay awake for a while to watch over you. The desert is full of beasts and crawlers, you know." He was not done eating yet.
"For a while? What will we do when you sleep?"
"We pray we wake up next morning." He crookedly grinned.
Sania had a hard time sleeping. More than once she raised her head as she thought she heard something. The fear of desert beasts and crawlers kept her up for an hour or two, but eventually, the dire need of her exhausted body to replenish won. She realized she had fallen asleep only when she opened her eyes, the dusty wind scrapping her face. Looking around, she did not find the Bermanian knight nearby, but the sight of his horse tied to a palm trunk reassured her. He had not abandoned her. . . yet. It will be over soon. Once I reach the camp, I won't be in need for his services. He will be free to go wherever he wants.
He was coming back when she carefully pivoted on both her left heel and palm to stand up. The pain in her right knee was not gone, a bit milder than it had been yesterday though. Putting her leg to the test, she hobbled as she made three steps forward.
"Still you don't want me to check your injury." He approached his horse, holding the saddlebag in one hand, two hares in the other.
There was no need for that, she believed. "Bumar will take care of it. That's why we should start moving now." She stared at the two slain hares in his hand. "Why did you hunt more?"
"Hunt?" He suddenly laughed, and she had thought he could not even smile. "I caught them, just in case our ride takes longer than we hope."
"We are less than one day far from my camp, aren't we?" she warily asked.
"You will reach your destination before sunset if we move now." He strapped the hares to the saddlebag.
She had expected him to say 'before noon'. Anyway, before sunset was better than tomorrow.
"Ready, Your Majesty?" He extended his hand. With her bruised knee, she had no option but to take accept his help.
"Listen, I'm still able to use my left leg." She limped toward the horse and vainly tried to mount it, pivoting on her left foot.
"I beg your pardon, Your Majesty." His strong arms lifted her by the waist, putting her on the back of the horse. He untied the charger before he fluidly swung up into his saddle in front of her. "Hold tight." She had to comply at once as he did not take much time to spur his horse into a full gallop.
They were heading west, she could tell from the sun position in the sky. From time to another she gazed back, making sure no one was following them. At noon, he stopped, suggesting to have one of the two hares for lunch, but she opposed the idea as the time was too tight to skin and roast another hare. "Dates will do," she insisted. Eating the black fruits would not delay them at all.
"I never thought we were that far from the King's camp," she pointed out as they resumed their journey.
"For your own safety, Your Majesty. I wanted to lose the Ghosts in the desert."
"You insist on calling a bunch of nomads the Ghosts."
"A bunch of nomads who defeated the Queen's guards."
The Bermanian knight was right. Whatever she called them, it did not change the fact that they had beaten her soldiers. And if they were not following her for the time being, they would be waiting for her on her way back to Kahora. Her husband's camp was her only haven now.
"Where are we going?" she asked as she noticed they were riding northwest, away from where she assumed the Murasen army was camping. She had no time to waste with her guardian's tricks to fool the nomads who might be chasing her. Sun would fall in a couple of hours.
He gazed at the sky when he muttered, "Crows."
Lifting her eyes up, she spotted a flock of those black birds. "Ye...es." Still she was confused what those cursed crows had to do with her question. "Is this a bad omen or something?"
"One crow is a bad omen. Lots of them mean lots of corpses." He looked over his shoulder. "A battle."
"Can't be. The Byzonts were still at Sergrad, our scouts told us."
"Your scouts told you what they saw three or four days ago."
Merciful Lord! The clash between the Byzonts and her army had started, or more probably ended. Sania locked her arms around her Bermanian guardian as the horse raced the wind. At last she knew where she was when she recognized the Hills of Arkan at the horizon. "The castle of Arkan lies four miles to the west of those hills," she pointed out.
"We're not going to the castle before we know what's waiting for us there." He kept galloping toward the hills.
Noticing that the crows were heading to the castle, Sania did not argue with her knight about the route he had chosen. From the hilltop, they would be able to make sure that the way to the castle was safe. But the horse was not able to maintain his speed uphill, making the way longer than it seemed. If her knee was sound, she would dismount and hurry to the top on foot.
The knight stopped the charger at the hilltop. "A feast for crows down there." He nodded toward what had obviously been a battlefield. The feast he impassively pointed to was an area full of dead bodies on which the hungry crows had landed, picking what they could swallow of human flesh. Sania felt butterflies fluttering in her empty stomach. Luckily, she had not eaten anything this morning except those dates.
"They are all Murasen," muttered the Bermanian knight.
"What do you mean?"
"The dead, Your Majesty." He slowly turned to her. "Now we know who won this."
"No, we don't," she snapped.
"The victors have buried their dead already. All I see down there are dead men in Murasen armors."
"No! This can't be true! Where's Feras? Where's Rasheed? I must go down there and find them!"
"If they're down there, then they're dead already." The knight gnashed his teeth. "We must leave this place before the Byzonts see us." He wheeled his horse to go downhill.
She wished she could jump off his horse. Alright, Sania. Listen to reason now. Going to the battlefield is pointless. What I should do now is go somewhere safe. "We must find a way to turn around the nomads in the south to—"
"Blast!" The knight suddenly pulled the reins of his horse, turning it left.
Sania made a clutch at hi
s torso, barely keeping herself ahorse. "What's wrong?"
"Byzont horsemen." For the first time since she met him, the knight sounded nervous. "They're waiting for us downhill."
47. MASOLON
After Masolon was done bathing, he put on a black leather jerkin over a crimson red doublet. As he was about to meet his vassals, Gramus included, he wore the Bermanian crown to remind them all that the foreigner was their king, whether they liked it or not. That was Rona's advice to him once. But day after day, he was becoming sure of one thing; those Bermanians would only respect who they feared, and they would only fear the strong. A few of them knew anything about the word loyalty, and those even who did were mainly loyal to Rona, daughter and granddaughter of a long line of Bermanian kings. And yet, that was not enough to spare her the stabs in the back. Masolon knew there would be more of the likes of Lanark and Darrison, but the question was who?
The door of his chamber was knocked before Ben entered, clad in a clean, blue woolen tunic. "This is not how it works," said Masolon. "You knock and wait until I give you the permission to enter."
"My first day." Ben shrugged, his hands behind his back. "Should I do it again?"
"Do not be stupid." Masolon beckoned him over. "What is it?"
"A lord called Foubert insists on meeting you before you start your dinner."
"Lord Foubert? Why no one told me when he arrived?"
"The moment he dismounted, he hurried to the palace, looking for you. Shall I let him in?"
"At once." Masolon gave Ben a dismissive gesture, wondering what the urgent matter was. He had been expecting Foubert's arrival with his troops to join forces and march together to Augarin. But not tonight.
The square-faced eastern duke stepped inside, a purple amethyst adorning the hilt of his sword. Masolon gestured to Ben to leave them. "Please, Lord Foubert." He invited his vassal to have a seat. "Something to drink?" He picked up two empty chalices from the table and held the golden pitcher to pour some wine.
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