Tzadok ignored them, refocusing on The Green One.
She was his.
Whoever she was, whatever secrets she held, whatever she could do…
She was his.
And there wasn’t a man in The Wasteland or the world below who could take her away from him.
He stepped closer to her, looking down at her in amazed confusion.
He had just sacrificed his relationship with the Coastal People for her. A feud which would probably lead to war, and which couldn’t possibly have come at a worse time. Baseland was invading the Grizzwood from the north and these new Brightlighters were encroaching on The Wasteland from the west. Tzadok’s people were going to be trapped between two armies which were much, much larger than his own. Now was a time when the people of this land should be joining forces against those common foes, not warring amongst themselves over oddly-colored women.
The other clans were already angry with Tzadok and this would just provide them more fuel for their fires. It would cause even more people to fear him and join with those dedicated to his downfall.
He’d just made considerably more enemies, in a world where he’d never had fewer friends.
But at the moment, all he could think was how pretty The Green One was. Feminine and soft and excitingly exotic.
Also dangerous and almost certainly hiding a dark secret, but… so, so beautiful.
Simply looking at her was exhilarating. Made his heart beat faster in warning of her unseen powers and… well… desire.
He wanted her. He wanted to understand what made her so extraordinary and unique, both in appearance and in presence. Wanted to know what she could do. Wanted to watch her do it. Wanted to know how she could just somehow… stroll through a battle without being killed or killing anyone. What kind of incredible power would grant someone the confidence to do something like that?
And he was not at all embarrassed to admit… he wanted her body. Wanted to explore her. Wanted to touch something so truly special and delicate.
She was a particularly appealing puzzle.
Kobb stepped next to him and looked at the captured dark-haired soldier woman he’d just Claimed as his soulmate for life, in a moment of sheer madness. He made a face and gestured to her with his hand. “What am I going to do with a little girl? Why did I do that? What was I thinking?” He asked Tzadok morosely. “Where am I even going to put her? I have one room and one plate. That’s about it.”
The young warrior woman glanced up at him and it was instantly apparent she recognized that she was looking at her new master. She sensed it somehow and glared at Kobb with a palpable hatred. Tzadok had never seen anyone hate anything so violently, so quickly. The girl’s eyes blazed like those of an enraged tigress, and she kicked at Kobb viciously, swearing in her own language.
Kobb pivoted nimbly to avoid the strike and the woman’s boot instead struck Volo, directly in the groin. The man let out a pained whimper and collapsed to the ground in a heap.
Everyone ignored him.
“Well… at least she’s stout-hearted.” Kobb added, obviously trying to look on the bright side of the fact that he now belonged to some kind of demon she-cobra. “That’s something.”
“Ditch her fast.” Tzadok advised his uncle, taking a step away from the rather scary wench before she could attack him too. “Just shove her back down the road towards her people and tell everyone at home that a bear ate your ‘poor beloved Keeper of Heart’ or something.” He tried to resist rolling his eyes. The whole thing was ridiculous.
Kobb spread his arms out. “I can’t!” He protested. “The road to their kingdom is along the coast, and if Hawser gets his hands on her, he’ll take even more delight in mistreating her now.” He shook his head. “No, we have to hang onto her until the matter with the Coastal People is settled. Which means you need to patch things up with them as quickly as possible.”
Tzadok thought about Hawser’s hands on The Green One, and his jaw clenched. “I wouldn’t count on it, Uncle.” He told him coldly.
He wanted to see Hawser and all of his kin dead now.
Every goddamned one of them.
“This was unwise.” Kobb admitted softly to himself, in a truly rare moment of uncertainty. “You’ve started something here which is very dangerous for you. We need to fix this. We need to fix it before it spirals out of control and destroys us all.”
“The Green One is mine.” Tzadok reiterated, in case that were in doubt. “I’m not sending her back to her clan, no matter how little danger there would be on her journey. I don’t care if they live east of the Coastal People or in the next goddamned hut from mine.” He pointed at himself. “She belongs to me. I will put every man in the world into a shallow grave before I give her up.” His voice lowered dangerously. “And I will smile as they die.”
Kobb shrugged, unwilling to argue the point. “Then we need to find some other way to soothe hurt feelings and wounded pride, Nephew. We are not acting from a position of strength at the moment. Your enemies will use this incident against you and turn more of our people to their side.”
“’Use this incident.’“ Tzadok scoffed. “Pfft. My enemies barely have enough wits to wipe their own asses, Uncle.” He rolled his eyes. “I do not live my life in fear of the day they finally grow the balls to attack me. I look forward to it, because it means I can finally slay them.”
“When they come, they won’t come as Challengers.” Kobb warned darkly. “They will not give you warning or a chance to fight. They’ve tried that before and it never works. No, this time they will kill you before you even have a chance to recognize what is happening.” He shook his head. “Honor is the first casualty in all wars.”
Tzadok rolled his eyes again, putting on a show of confidence which he wasn’t certain he felt.
His uncle was almost certainly right. As always. But that didn’t change Tzadok’s opinion.
The foreign warrior woman continued to struggle against her bonds, somehow managing to get her shackled hands from behind her back, and was now trying to pick the locks with an arrowhead she’d found somewhere.
His uncle silently watched the woman for a moment longer, then shook his head in disbelief, obviously feeling sorry for himself and his newfound lot in life. He started to simply stroll away, without bothering to stop the girl’s escape attempt. “I sure got myself into it this time, didn’t I, Tamsen?” His uncle had a habit of speaking to his dead sister for some reason, believing that Tzadok’s mother, like all Lords of Salt, continued to guard The Wasteland from the Land of Ghosts. “I bet you’re laughing your ass off right now.”
Tzadok ignored him, remaining focused on The Green One.
She was looking at the ground for some reason.
He looked at her feet too, trying to determine what was so fascinating. Seeing nothing, he reached out to redirect her gaze up at him. He wanted to see what color green her eyes would be. It was the curiosity of an explorer, discovering some strange new land.
He’d never seen anything like that girl. She was… hypnotic.
Her skin was warm and soft and smooth. Touching it made his heart beat even faster, his body stirring in excitement.
As it turned out, her eyes were a very light green. Almost white, which was quite striking against her beautiful richly-colored skin. Meeting her gaze caused him to grow even harder.
To his surprise though, her eyes were filled with… fear?
What did she have to be afraid of? The battle was over and she’d come through it without even needing to use her might.
He had the sudden impulse to reassure her in some way. To tell her not to be afraid. …Which was utterly ridiculous. He’d done nothing wrong here. He was acting entirely in the right, discounting his argument with Hawser. She’d have to be insane to fear him. And besides, she was obviously powerful in some hidden way. She’d have to be. Because no one who looked like her could just stroll through a battlefield unless she possessed serious skills in death-dealing.
Tzadok still would have slayed an army of her bodyguards for just one look at her though.
She was…
She pulled away from him suddenly, starting to breathe quickly again. “Please…” She said in Adithian, then switched to his own language, the single word coming out in a strange and outlandish accent, “don’t.”
His mouth fell open in shock.
Kobb stopped dead in his tracks and spun around to gape at her.
“Did… did you hear that?” Xiphos gasped. “This one speaks something other than foreign gibberish!”
Tzadok firmed his jaw.
Yes. Yes, she did.
He knew that she was somehow special. That she was hiding something.
The woman was obviously an important part of his enemy’s war machine. Quite possibly its architect.
And now she was his.
Oh, yes. She belonged here.
He just needed to figure out why.
Chapter Three:
Barbarian Wisdom
So, Tandy was now a slave, apparently.
That was another first for her résumé. She could now legitimately claim to be a teacher, a translator, would-be conqueror, and current slave.
If she weren’t so terrified and doomed, she’d almost be having fun in an odd sort of way. The whole experience was so utterly bizarre that it was difficult to remember that it was actually happening. Plus, on a more serious level, the quickest way to learn about a language and culture was to be thrown into it, and that had certainly happened to her today in the most direct way possible.
She’d be completely fluent in Wastelandi in days.
If she wasn’t killed first.
Which remained a distinct possibility.
Almost a certainty, really.
Since she’d been kidnapped by the Wastelandi gentlemen, they’d taken her up onto the plateau with their men, riding across the salt most of the day. At the moment, they were sitting inside some sort of temporary camp.
Just where they were going was anyone’s guess, but Tandy found that matter of little importance, since she had no say in the destination and she had so much else to do.
They were speaking to her in their language, which required her full concentration to understand. Most people probably would have been more focused on escape, but Tandy was an accredited interpreter. It was a matter of professional pride that she talk to these men, if for no other reason than to become more accomplished in conversational Wastelandi. The ‘Galland League of Diplomacy and Interpretation’ required nothing less!
It was a truly remarkable opportunity.
She could be the first to really publish an in-depth study of the language. Not that the people of Galland would approve… in fact writing such a thing would almost certainly result in a trial of some kind. But greater knowledge was always a good thing.
Sacrifices needed to be made in the name of scholarship sometimes.
The older gentleman sitting next to her held up his hands to calm down The Wasteland Butcher. “You can’t scream a flower into blooming, Sister’s Son.” He said serenely in Wastelandi, the prefix at the end of the title designating that the sister in question was dead. “The bud will open when it is ready, not when you are. I have told you your entire life that you must learn patience. Your temper serves you well in battle, but not in conversation. Anger simply frightens the timid and further angers the angry.”
She was fairly certain that at least one of those uses of the word “angry” was a synonym with the same root, but she wasn’t yet experienced enough in the language to differentiate the words.
“Who screams!?!” The Wasteland Butcher screamed. “Myself?” He slammed one huge hand against his own broad chest, producing a sound she would normally associate with someone hitting a stone wall with a club. “I am not screaming, Mother’s Brother! I merely talk to…”
She frowned, trying to figure out the meaning of the words which finished that thought.
She held up her hand, to halt the action. “Pardon me, what does that mean, please?”
“Please” was not a word in conversational Wastelandi. It would be seen as weak begging, unbefitting a warrior. So she borrowed the word from Adithian and hoped they understood.
“It is a color.” The older man informed her, trying to aid in her understanding because he seemed to be a helpful soul. He repeated the word, like that would make it clearer somehow. “Like… like grass. The color of leaves.” He explained. “Cave spiders.”
Ah. Green …probably. She wasn’t entirely sure about the spider, but leaves and grass were generally green. Except when they weren’t… but they usually were.
Which meant the term translated as something like: “The Green Thing.”
Super. That was apparently her name now.
She held up her hand again. “It’s ‘Tandy,’ actually.” She told them. “Technically, ‘Tandrea,’ but no one really calls me that…” She laughed nervously. “Except one of the other professors at the Academy? But I think that was just because she didn’t like me.” She began to fiddle with her clothing. “It was… it was one of those things where she used my full name to show that we weren’t friends and thought herself better than me, like,” she took on a screeching tone to imitate the woman, “’Tandreaaaaa’ whenever she wanted something. Drove me crazy.” She bobbed her head, then noticed that she was babbling. “But… but she’s dead now.” She whispered, feeling suddenly self-conscious about the fact she was still talking, yet somehow powerless to stop herself. “Umm… executed for… something.” She ran a finger across her throat and made a cutting sound. “Gone.”
The men continued silently staring at her like she was some bizarre experiment come to life.
She cleared her throat nervously. “Umm…” She shifted in her seat. “’The Green Thing.’” She repeated with a nod. “That’s…” She let out a sharp panicky laugh. “That’s fine. You know… Close… close enough.” She shrugged, like her name was a trifling thing. “No need to worry about...” She fell silent before finishing the sentence.
They stared at her in confusion for a moment longer, then immediately went back to their argument. “All I am communicating, Sister’s Son, is that sometimes a gentle hand is needed when dealing with delicate things. If you break them, they will remain broken.”
The Wasteland Butcher loomed over the older man. “Are you saying that I am not ‘delicate,’ Mother’s Brother?” His voice sounded hard and cold as iron.
“Gracious, no!” The older man let out a bark of laughter. “You are the contrasting (unknown word).”
She squinted, trying to keep up. She raised her hand. “Definition? Please?”
“I just said he was…” The older gentleman trailed off, unable to find the right synonym she would understand. He snapped his fingers at the Butcher to prompt him to supply it for him. “Help the girl out, Sister’s Son. Be useful to your woman.”
The Wasteland Butcher made a vague hand gesture. “A… a…” He put his hands together to form the shape of a mouth filled with sharp teeth, and opened and closed it several times. He made a weak and oddly endearing little “Roar” sound.
“Ah.” She nodded in understanding. “In Gallandish, we’d say that you’re a ‘
“No matter what you call him,” the old man pointed at her, “I’m sure that’s what he is, in any language.” He nodded in certainty. “I fault my sister. The Lord of Salt is parent to The Wasteland, and doesn’t have time to fenestrate the infant flatbread he is biologically the mothers of.”
She frowned, fairly certain that she’d misheard that, or that it at least sounded better if you were fluent in Wastelandi.
The Wasteland Butcher had had enough of the conversation and prowled towards her aga
in in the small interior of the tent. “Who were those people!?” He demanded. “Why are you here!?! Why don’t you look like them!?! How many more are coming!?!” He paused. “Why are you here!?!” He repeated, sounding frustrated.
“Excellent.” The older man nodded. “Yelling. That should do the trick. Brilliant stratagem.” He rolled his eyes. “Why didn’t you try that sooner, Sister’s Son?”
She continued to sit in silent terror, every muscle in her body locked.
The older man seemed to recognize that she was uncomfortable. “There is no need to get overset, (presumably a word meaning something like ‘little girl’ or ‘small slave’). He is loud as a sandstorm, but he will not harm or defile you. He has honor. You are safe, I give you my word.” He bowed his head in formal greeting. “I am called Kobb, The Thirty-Two Hundred.”
She frowned, trying to calculate both the number and its meaning.
“It is a long story,” Kobb explained, recognizing her confusion, “best left for another day.”
The man was older than the other Wasteland warriors Tandy had seen, appearing to be in his mid-forties, maybe? By no means “old” but certainly a testament to his strength, since he’d survived in this awful place for so long, comparatively. But had he not specifically called The Wasteland Butcher his nephew, Tandy still would have guessed that he was the man’s older brother, since there was only ten or fifteen years between them. Standing half a head shorter than his companion, he was heavily muscled beneath his coarsely woven robes. His dark hair was now streaked with grey at his temples and he wore it in a simple ponytail rather than the long and intricate style favored by his nephew. His face had a weathered appearance, not from age but from experience. He wasn’t a handsome man, his features were too square and almost sinister for that, but he had a distinguished and authoritative look about him. His voice was deep and crackled, like he’d spent too many years yelling and was now forever hoarse. But you listened when he spoke, because everything he said seemed… wise.
Captive of a Fairytale Barbarian Page 6