“Take her position? What do you mean? Doesn’t the king need her?”
“Of course he does, but the king’s no fool. He knows that every day that Lord Sekah is not in his courtyard that her life is in danger. If Dreyshore could stage a death that seemed believable, then the king would do nothing more but mourn and move on.”
Eva yanked her arm away, elbow crossing across her chest. “Why do I care whether she lives or dies!” Before Ian could respond, she cut into his rebuttal, pointing at him, fingertip nearly touching his nose. “And don’t lecture me about vindication and justice! If I don’t go to help you, then I have neither written her fate, nor have I sealed it!”
Ian pushed her hand away softly, twirling it and holding it in his own, gazing at her. “If for nothing else, do it for me. Lord Sekah and I have been friends ever since we were youths. We played in the courts together, and we were sent out on these raids together. To know that she might be killed, well I cannot bear to think of that.” He let her hand go and dropped his head.
Eva felt her compassion replacing her fury. “I don’t doubt that she’s your friend, but understand my heart. This woman has been hunting me for years. She killed my parents. How could I possibly help her?”
Ian pulled his eyes up to her. “Because if you don’t, then there will be no mercies left for the villages that Dreyshore invades.”
“Mercy!” Eva declared, rekindling her anger. “Blood, death, fear, tyranny!” She counted on each of her fingers, holding them up firmly for Ian to see. “I would certainly not constitute any of those as mercy!”
Ian rested his hand on his belt and pushed his hair out of his eyes. “Is mercy a prerequisite for mercy? Can a woman not be allowed to see the error of her ways by the mercy that you offer her?” He paused a moment, fiddling around in his mouth with tongue. “Have you forgotten that I too was there when your mother was killed...and yet you offer me your mercies with liberality?”
Eva looked to the side, watching the leaves fan in the wind. Ian had caught her off guard yet again. She had silently hated the queen for what she had done, for the lives that she’d taken, but could a person ever be any different? Probably not, but at least the queen should be given the chance. Giving in, Eva needed to hold onto her last hope. “Why should I trust you? What if you intend to take me to her?”
Ian pulled back his vest, exposing the stab wound in his side. “I would rather not go back myself, as you can see.”
Eva folded her arms over her chest, pouting. “I don't see how life under Dreyshore’s command would be much safer for the villages.”
“Because you don’t know him. Sekah is a dutiful woman. She does what is asked of her. She always has. Dreyshore goes beyond his duty. Killing is fun for him, a game. And those whose flesh tastes the edge of his blade are notches on his belt of glory. He thinks of Lord Sekah as too soft. He thinks that she is undeserving of the name Dark Queen.”
“If Lord Sekah is such a darling, then why would she threaten to kill me? Why did she command that Dreyshore....” Her words trickled off as she thought back to that dreadful night when she had nearly been killed, when her scar had been seen, and when the queen had paused only for a moment, giving Eva time to survive. Why had the queen paused? Was it shock or pity?
Ian stepped closer to her, his metal boots thudding in the dirt. “Lord Sekah would speak of you always, how she hated you. She felt that her father cared about you more than he should have. He sent countless men looking for you, to find you. She longed to be the object of his affection, and secretly I think she wondered if he would have sought so intently for her.”
“The king doesn’t care about me,” she scoffed. “He only wants what I have to offer him and his kingdom. He wants to release the Beast within me. That is why I must go to the Black Lands,” she reminded herself. “I must rid myself of this curse so that the king cannot advance his powers any more than he already has. And Dreyshore took me to the queen. He didn’t want to kill me until she gave the order.”
Ian laughed smugly. “Could you not be more foolish? Dreyshore has gotten reprimanded by the queen on many occasions because of his savagery. The majority of the villages that were burned to the ground was because of his unrelenting hand. He spared you because Lord Sekah had threatened his life if he burned another town without her command. Think of Winter Hills. That entire city was spared, and it wasn’t because of Dreyshore.”
Eva looked away, knowing that Ian was right. When she was at Winter Hills, the Raiders had held back their rage when she had turned herself in, only burning the city but letting the people live. Perhaps if Dreyshore had been in command, then the fate of the people of Winter Hills might have been different. “I’m not sure what I am to do,” she said.
Ian sighed, sagging his shoulders. Then he shook his finger at her lightly. “You’ve seen how fierce the Dissenters are. The beasts of this kingdom only get worse. There is no way that you could ever hope to fight them on your own. If you help me rescue Lord Sekah, then I will take you to the Black Lands myself to rid you of the curse that you despise so much.”
With her arms crossed and her head partly down, she peered calmly at him from the tops of her eyes. A smile swept up her lips as peacefully as the breeze that blew between the two of them. She knew that she could not hope to battle any beasts if they were indeed more vicious than the Dissenters, and who knew how many Helions she would have to encounter before she even made it to the Black Lands. The hesitation had left her. “I will go with you,” she said.
“Good. Then we must hurry.” Ian turned and continued speedily to the west, not wasting anymore time than he already had.
Days passed as they traveled through the thick hills, and Eva felt that she was journeying farther away from a peaceful life the further she traveled away from the Black Lands. She had no idea when the next seizure might grip her, and she only hoped that she could contain the Beast within her. And what of the Haunt? She had not heard from it weeks, months even, but she knew that it could not be far from her.
The hills rolled to more hills as the days continued, and Eva was beginning to believe that they would never find the Raiders. The wound in her leg from the Dissenter had only gotten worse. Foamy, yellow puss bubbled out of the four holes on the top of her leg, smelling like three-week-old unwashed flesh. Her canteen was bone dry, and the rim gave off a sour odor that smelled like mildew and spit.
She wished she had grabbed some water from the creek, but there had been no time. The Dissenters would have swarmed on her like a hive of furious bees, shredding her flesh and popping out her bones as they had done to the Beast.
Nearly limping, she hiked along steadily behind Ian, wondering if she would even have the strength to rescue the queen, but quietly knowing that her death was near. Stepping out of the tree line where the hills gave way to a dusty flat plateau, Eva halted, and she was sure that her heart halted also.
Down the ledge and far beyond the grassy plane, behind the seeping vapors of humidity that blurred the green of the trees, Eva could see a black mass snaking along the horizon. These were soldiers, Raiders who were making their way eastward as swiftly as the winds.
The day felt hotter, and cool beads of sweat slipped down her nape, bumping over the ridges in her spine. She closed her eyes and shuddered, reaching forward and touching the back of Ian’s vest, using the tips of her fingers to brace herself from her nausea.
At that moment, the talk of the queen and mercies and justices and vindications all seemed irrelevant. At that moment, she wanted to retreat, to go back and find Wolf and Stasis or to go to the Black Lands, even. She wanted to find her brother or Rufio. She hoped for death, a quick one…at that moment.
The humid vapors yielded a more formidable view of the Raiders who were protected by their sturdy black armor that was somehow so polished that an occasional beam from the high sun reflected back to Eva, blasting her with a ray of fear that burned deep inside of her body like swallowing a mouthful of boiling tea. �
�I don’t think I can do this,” she mumbled weakly.
Ian turned sharply, looking at her from head to toe. “You must. If we are to spare the kingdoms from Dreyshore’s hand, then we have to save her.”
“What if we are to die in the process?” Eva asked.
“We cannot think like that.” Ian turned back to the horizon, but not before Eva recognized the glimmer of hopelessness that latched itself onto his eyes like heavy anchors, sagging them. “With Dreyshore in charge, our kingdom will know nothing but carnage.”
“Suppose you are right?” Eva asked. “What if—”
Ian jerked back to her, hair shaking just above his eyebrows. He held a firm finger up to her, staring past it into her face. “Stop thinking of yourself!” he ordered as powerfully as a commander, voice deeper than before. Then his voice became calm, and he dropped his hand to his side. “Do not feed the doubt that stalks within my heart as well.”
Those words were like the razor sharp edge of a whittling blade, slicing into a particular place in Eva’s soul. Ian was a man, not a god. He was human, just like her. Somehow it seemed impossible. Watching his fearlessness the night that he had protected her when she was with Raiders and watching him boldly slay the Dissenters did not coincide with this part of him — the human part.
It was easy not to follow a god, because gods possessed the privilege of the impossible. But a man, riddled with fears and doubts, well in his core, Ian was no different from her. In his core, he was afraid –- just like her.
Nodding slowly, Eva accepted, and her body trembled from the surge of dread and pre-battle power. “What are we to do?” she asked.
Ian snapped back into his fearless godhood, kneeling down at the edge of the tree line. His leather vest draped slightly over his metal leggings, as he pointed to different places on the horizon.
“We can’t attack too far ahead, or it will alert the ones in the rear. We must wait until the entire army passes, and then we will stalk them from behind.”
“But the queen will not be at the back. We’ll have to fight hundreds of Raiders before we could even get close to her.”
“We aren’t going to fight them,” Ian replied, shaking his head and squinting. “We are going to tail them until nightfall.”
“Then why can we not just wait at this distance and then strike?” Eva asked, confused.
Ian looked down at the ground, silent for a moment. “I hadn’t thought of that,” he said blankly.
Eva was speechless. What was she getting into? If she listened to him, she would surely be dead! “What do you mean you haven’t thought of that?”
Still kneeling with his eyes to the ground, finger dragging in the dirt, he shrugged. “I meant what I said,” he replied, annoyed.
“You intend for us to take an entire army of Raiders with no plan?” Eva cast her newly found feelings of selflessness aside, retreating back to her previous state of not caring about the queen. She flailed her arms forward. “Do you honestly believe that you could strike their ranks and somehow come out and rescue the queen — the queen who still thinks that you betrayed her, might I add?”
Ian shook his head slowly, standing to his feet and tossing a small twig that he had picked up off the ground. “If you knew what Dreyshore intended for her, you would certainly think differently.”
Eva raised her voice and pointed at Ian. “I know what he intends — the same thing that he intended for my mother whom he slaughtered!” Her voice cracked at its peak, nearly reaching a shrill pitch that sent a few squawking crows soaring away.
Ian caught eyes with her, and he bit the side of his lip. With solemn hands, he reached up and grabbed the hem of his vest. “If only that were true.” His gaze fell, and he stepped towards the edge of the plateau. “Dreyshore will certainly kill her, but not before the length of her entrails have been extracted from her belly. Knowing him, he’ll keep her alive long enough to see the last of them strewn on the ground.”
Eva gasped silently, almost feeling an invisible blade in her own belly, though that was not enough to make her march into her death. Her voice was calmer now, yet still resolute. “I’m not going, Ian.” She folded her arms and started away.
As she turned, a smooth wind rushed past her ears, bringing with it the sound of hooves from the ground below the plateau. She whipped around quickly and rushed up beside Ian, staring down at the bottom of the mesa at the grassy meadow.
Her chest tightened, and her eyes could not take in what she beheld. Hundreds of men rode on the backs of horses whose snouts were covered with brass chamfrons.
On their hips, the riders wore their spadroons which dangled stiffly against their boots. In front, rode one of the fiercest of the Strikers, Eva’s brother Edward. His helmet jolted forward with his horse’s strides. Beside him rode the big bodied Rufio, his war hammer strapped to his back.
Eva clenched her chest, feeling her heart beat as loudly as the thuds of the horses’ hooves. She couldn’t take her eyes away from her brother who was undoubtedly riding to his death.
The Strikers had warned that they would attack the Raiders, but Eva had somehow cast it out of her thoughts. The night of dancing in town seemed to sever any notions of war that the Strikers had within them. But at this moment, she could see that she was wrong. The music had kindled the flame of their hatred, and there they rode as swiftly as an eagle in the wind.
Ian braced his hand on the hilt of his blade, jaw muscles tightening. He seemed to say what Eva was thinking. “We cannot let the Strikers do this alone.”
Still longing for an escape, Eva replied, “What can you and I do to so many?”
“We should let the battle determine that.”
Before Eva could respond, she noticed one more rider who was not dressed in the Strikers’ armor. Not far behind Edward, Wolf rode a black stallion, his head pressed against the horse’s mane. I thought Wolf did not involve himself with Striker affairs? she wondered, thought as fleeting as the wind.
If he was with the Strikers, Stasis must have been wrong about him. Something within him made him want to fight. And where was Jahn, the noble coward of a Kibitzer? Nevertheless, Eva had to catch up with them. But more importantly, she had to protect her brother. She could not abandon him to the Raiders as she had done not long ago. “I won’t let him ride to his death,” Eva said meekly.
“Then we must fight with them.” With that, Ian rushed to his left, scurrying down a heavy slope that winded down the side of the plateau.
Eva followed, stumbling over rocks but bracing herself on trees as she hurried down the hill. She touched her waist, blindly searching for her dagger and the Essence that Stasis had given to her.
The two of them raced over the meadow, trailing far behind the horses but keeping pace as they headed towards the smoky, black horizon lined with the onyx armor of the Raiders.
CHAPTER 26
THE CONNECTION
Still chasing behind Ian, Eva kept up her strides. Her leather sleek squeaked with her movements, but she had gotten stronger, and her lungs had been trained to endure more as they gulped down mouthfuls of air and forced them back out in a ferocious panting rhythm, wincing but ignoring the pain in her thigh from where the Dissenter had clawed her.
As they approached the battle, the sound of clashing metal and screams rang out over the field. Arrows arched into the sky and landed swiftly, followed by the dreadful screams of their victims. Men wailed in agony and horses collapsed into frantic whinnies.
The closer that Eva got to the battle, the more afraid she became. The onyx snake on the horizon that had been the Raiders had since turned into a swarm of wasps, slashing their ambushers in body-jerking blows.
What had she gotten herself into? How had Ian convinced her to fight? She let her nervous hand slip down to the round-hilted dagger on her hip, and she pulled it off hesitantly, half-believing that if she did not fight, then perhaps the Raiders would let her live, though she knew that was a lie.
Ian rushed ahead
of her, then he turned and beckoned her with a quick motion, swinging his arm around his shoulder. “We have to find her!”
Shimmering to her senses, Eva caught up with him only to find herself beset by black armored soldiers with silver blades whose edges were drenched in bloody crimson. A Raider charged at her, blade high in the air, screaming, his voice rattling inside of his helmet. Eva froze, dagger hand trembling. The Raider brought the falchion down at her head, and it swooshed through the air.
Eva jumped back, and the blade sliced into the dried dirt, chipping the corner of a stone. Before the Raider could tear his sword from the ground, Eva rushed to him in a panic and pierced the tip of her knife into the back of his neck.
Black fluid flowed from the wound, and the Raider reached back, trying to keep his life from spilling out of him. He dropped to the ground, and his blood got caught in the mask of his helmet, his cries becoming a fading, metallic gargle.
Eva’s eyes shot open, not sure of what she had done, but before she could gather herself, another Raider rushed at her. Her grip tightened on her blade, and she lunged at him, hoping to stab the soft place underneath his helm.
She missed, and a solid black boot rammed into her chest, forcing her shoulders inward and throwing her backwards. Her head banged against the ground, and she could barely open her eyes from the ringing in her noggin.
Through the cracks in her eyelids, she could see the glimmer of the Raider’s metal blade, flashing in the sunlight. Her hand reached to her hip and slung a pouch of Essence at him, then she rolled out of the way.
The Essence was of fire, and auburn specks appeared on the soldier’s black armor. The specks turned to beams of yellow light, and the thin beams sliced through the Raider making a fiery hissing sound as his body cooked inside of his metal tomb.
The Raider smacked his armor wildly, tearing at the latches to disconnect it. Then his body stopped suddenly, and he dropped to the ground. His body clunked in the dirt, and ashes puffed out the cracks in his armor.
The Girl with the Scar (Dark Connection Saga Book 1) Page 26