WinterofThorns

by Charlotte Boyett-Compo

  He had to do something—anything—and he did the only thing he thought might work. He dropped to his knees.

  “Please,” he said, striving not to pass out for the jolt of his knees hitting the floor had jarred his injured shoulder so badly he felt a trickle of urine run down his thigh. “I will do whatever you want, just don’t take her away from me. Don’t do that, milord. Please!”

  Vindan didn’t respond. He turned his back on Seyzon and started to walk away.

  “Please! Do whatever you like to me but not this! Your Grace, please!” Seyzon called after him but Vindan never let on that he heard. He left the room without a backward glance.

  “Get the fuck up,” Stoneway said. “You’re shaming yourself, man.” He grabbed Seyzon’s left arm to haul him up but the scream that ripped from the younger man’s throat made him release him immediately.

  The blistering torment of having his dislocated shoulder wrenched upward resulted in pitching Seyzon into unconsciousness even as his scream still reverberated through the room. He crumpled to the floor on his side—his injured shoulder to the floor. He never heard the running footsteps of the prince who came rushing back into the room.

  “What the hell did you do to him?” Vindan barked.

  “I think his shoulder is dislocated,” Stoneway said, his face white. “I didn’t know. I tried to pull him to his feet and—”

  “Shit! Take him to the healer!” Vindan shouted at the guard.

  * * * * *

  Much as Jana had at Lavenfeld, Vindan watched the only friend he’d ever known ride away from Wicklow. Arm in a sling, numbed by as much tenerse as the healer dared give him if he was to sit his horse, Seyzon rode between four guards who had been given instructions directly from their prince.

  “He will try to run,” Vindan told Stoneway. He dared not have Arbra take Seyzon back to Lavenfeld for the two were on much too friendly terms. Stoneway had no love for the adjutant general and had been very vocal with his opinion that Seyzon Montyne should have suffered the same fate as Stoneway’s Shire lord, Sir Raymond deVille.

  “Montyne should have had his back beaten to a pulp like my lord’s!” Stoneway had told anyone who would listen.

  “He will run,” Vindan repeated. “When he does, shoot the horse from under him.”

  “What then, Your Grace?” Stoneway asked. He licked his lips in anticipation of the answer.

  “Let him know he cannot, will not defy me ever again without there being stringent repercussions.”

  “Aye, Your Grace,” Stoneway agreed.

  “When you are finished with him, take him to Tunstead in the Ventura Province.”

  “That’s very close to Reivers territory, milord,” Stoneway said with a frown.

  “Aye, it is. Leave him at the Pig and Whistle Inn. The tavern owner is a Reivers sympathizer. Let it be known who Seyzon is. The Selwyns will come for him. Stay close by and when they pick him up, go then to Lavenfeld. Inform the Lady Millicent that her son was captured on the way home.” He looked Stoneway up and down. “Tell her in his haste to reach home he outdistanced you on that brute of a stallion he rides else she will wonder why you were not injured trying to protect her precious baby boy.”

  “Aye, Your Grace,” Stoneway said. His frown was now a merry grin. “I can spin a lie with the best of them.”

  “Don’t kill him, Stoneway,” Vindan ordered. “If he is gravely injured I will hold you personally responsible. Is that understood?”

  “Aye, Your Grace!” Stoneway’s face darkened. “But what if the Reivers hang him as they have threatened to do?”

  “They won’t,” Vindan said. “Trust me, they won’t. They need him alive in the hopes of using him to get to me. Little do they know I want them to hold on to him.” He looked away. “A good long while.”

  “I’ll see to it, milord.”

  “The Lady Millicent will go into action as soon as she knows Montyne has been taken. She will want to leave immediately for Wicklow. Be sure—gods-be-damned sure—Lady Jana accompanies her. Warn the women the Reivers may come for them, as well. Return here as though the hounds of hell were nipping at your boot heels.”

  “It will be as you ask, Your Grace!”

  Chapter Seven

  Every jolt of his horse’s hooves was an excruciating agony to Seyzon but he had to escape. The only way he could do that would be to give Killean its head and let the steed race away, leaving the other mounts in the dust. There was no doubt in his mind the horse could outrun the guards’ nags. Killean was a thoroughbred Rysalian with the temper of a Diabolusian warthog and the cunning of an An Iodálian whoremaster. It was one of the best jumpers in Meiraman and Ventura as well. Allowing the steed to take the bit was a dangerous ploy but at the moment he had no other choice. All he could do was try to stay in the saddle.

  “Are you still with us, milord?” the one called Stoneway quipped. He was riding on Seyzon’s right side—easily within range to snatch Killean’s reins should it be necessary.

  “Aye,” Seyzon mumbled. His chin was on his chest, eyes half-closed for the pain was eating him alive. Every mile they rode added to the torture.

  “Don’t go falling off your pony on us,” Stoneway said then laughed, the other three men joining in.

  “Mayhap we should tie him in the saddle,” one of the men suggested.

  “Mayhap we should,” Stoneway agreed. He reached down to stroke the rope hanging on his saddle.

  They were on a straightway with the dirt road stretching as far as the eye could see ahead of them. To the left were a long undulation of rolling hills. To the right was a meandering stream that cut under the road at a wooden bridge six hundred yards away. Seyzon knew the stream was shallow near the bridge but it was laden with jagged rocks that could damage a horse’s leg.

  He cut his eyes to the left. The hills were his best bet. Killean not only had a powerful stride, the beast was surefooted and could climb a gently sloping hill with ease. The hills he was gauging did not have gentle rises. They would be a challenge to the horse but he had faith in his mount. What he feared was that his body would be forced backward as the steed climbed—making it imperative he have a tight grip on the reins to keep from tumbling backward. With only one good arm, holding on was going to be difficult at best.

  Impossible at the very worst.

  He looked to the stream. Ahead about a hundred yards or so, the stream narrowed into what looked to be a fourteen-foot-wide channel. Killean had been trained to maintain a twelve-foot stride and his jumping skills were excellent. He could easily clear a sixteen-foot span if Seyzon could get him close enough to the near bank. Even though he was hurting so bad he could barely move, Seyzon knew he had to sit deep in the saddle and ride what he had, careful not to take off too far back because then it would be nearly impossible to clear the stream. Should the steed’s hooves hit the far bank at the wrong angle, tendon damage was almost a certainty but that was not the only concern Seyzon had. If he couldn’t hang on, he’d go ass over tea kettle and most likely break something of his own.

  Then there was another possibility. If he over-rode the stream, it might unnerve Killean—making it hard for him to get back control of the animal. Having a runaway horse when you had two good arms with which to rein him in was one thing. Having only one arm capable of doing so wasn’t in his favor.

  And he didn’t need the animal to look down as he flew over the stream. That could also spell disaster.

  The lesser of two evils…

  Either hills or stream.

  Both had dangers lurking.

  But the biggest danger was allowing the men guarding him to take Jana away from him. As long as he drew breath, that wasn’t going to happen. Surreptitiously, he began to shorten his reins then dropped his heels, leaning forward as though to relieve the pain in his shoulder. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Stoneway watching him.

  The man knew.

  Gods-be-damn it, he knew and he was tensing for what he expected to come.<
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  Before the guard could react, Seyzon clamped his thighs tightly to the beast twice, giving Killean permission to run. The beast shot forward like greased lightning. Pulling on the reins, Seyzon aimed the animal for the stream. Behind him he heard shouts and the thunder of hooves following him off the dirt road and onto the rock-strewn scrabble that led at a soft incline to the streams near bank.

  He did not hear the laser rifle skirling to life but he heard Killean’s keening cry as the beast was hit. The steed stumbled, sidestepped like a drunken man then began to topple to the left. His arm useless in the sling, he could not move his body as he wanted to so could not twist away or fling himself from the saddle. He went down with his mount—his left foot still in the stirrup. Killean crashed to the ground and landed on Seyzon’s leg. Despite the pounding hooves racing toward him he heard the bone break in his leg just as his injured shoulder hit the rocky earth. A scream tore from his throat and darkness skittering at the periphery of his vision. The stallion lifted its head and whinnied, its own scream mirroring Seyzon’s second as the horse’s weight pressed down on his broken leg. The last thing he heard was another scream ripped from him before unconsciousness washed over him like a wet blanket.

  * * * * *

  “We got something you might be interested in,” Stoneway told the tavern owner of the Pig and Whistle.

  “I ain’t lookin’ to take on no more new whores,” the man said around the obstruction of a stinking cigar clamped between his teeth. He turned to walk away.

  “It’s someone the border lord will pay you good money to get,” Stoneway called out. “I was told you are his man here in Tunstead.”

  The tavern owner looked around, frowned then came back to Stoneway and the burly guard standing beside him. “Keep your voice down! There are two Ventura militiamen drinking at the bar! I don’t need them suspecting me of trafficking with the Reivers!”

  Stoneway glanced at the men standing at the bar. There were five of them and they all looked deep in their cups. With the tinny music coming from the vid-player and the coarse laughter and clink of the roulette wheel in the corner, the militiamen couldn’t have heard him. Nevertheless, he lowered his voice.

  “Give us a thousand credits and we’ll turn our surprise over to you to hand off to the border lord,” he told the tavern owner.

  “Fuck off!” the tavern owner said. “I wouldn’t pay you a thousand credits if it was Lord Montyne himself you were offering me!”

  “Is that right?” Stoneway narrowed his eyes. “You sure about that?”

  Taking the cigar slowly from his mouth, the tavern owner cut his eyes toward the door. “Are you telling me you have him? Here?”

  “Out behind the tavern,” Stoneway said. “He’s a bit worse for wear but alive and breathing.”

  “If you’re lying…” the tavern owner began then jammed the cigar between his teeth again. “Show me!” He motioned for a burly man standing at the far end of the room to accompany them through the door to the right of the bar.

  The four of them left the taproom, walked down a long corridor that smelled of urine, spent body fluids, unwashed bodies and stale smoke. It was a relief when the tavern owner opened a door at the end of the corridor and fresh evening air flowed over them.

  Stoneway had left the other two guards with their prisoner. He led the tavern keeper and his bouncer over to a horse upon which a blanket-wrapped body was draped, the blanket wound with a rope to keep it in place.

  “He dead?” the bouncer asked. “I don’t like handling dead people.”

  “Ain’t dead. Knocked out,” the guard who had gone into the tavern with Stoneway answered. “Had to shoot him up with tenerse to keep him from screaming his fucking head off.”

  “What happened to him?”

  “Got a broke leg and busted-up arm,” the guard replied. He chuckled. “Didn’t take kindly to being dangled over the nag and jostled like a bag of oats.”

  Leading the tavern owner around the horse, Stoneway reached down to draw the blanket from the unconscious man’s face.

  “Mother of the goddess!” The tavern keeper removed his cigar. His eyes were like saucers in his head. “That really is him!”

  “A thousand credits and he’s yours,” Stoneway said. “What you do with him is your business but if I was a betting man, I’d say the border lord will pay you a helluva lot more than a thousand to get his hands on this one.”

  The tavern owner tossed the cigar away and licked his lips. “Indeed he will,” the man agreed. He stuck out his hands. “A thousand it is, friend!”

  Stoneway gripped the sweaty palm of the other man. “He needs a healer to set that arm and leg so I’d keep him in dreamland until the Reivers can come for him if’n I was you.”

  “Aye,” the tavern owner said. “Most definitely.” He turned to the bouncer. “Take him upstairs to Sarah’s room. Tell her she can have the rest of the night off then fetch Doc Needham.” He slapped an arm around Stoneway’s shoulder. “And you come with me and I’ll get you your money.”

  Drifting in and out of consciousness, his body mercifully numb from the high dosage of tenerse they’d given him, Seyzon could only moan as he felt himself being dragged from the back of the horse. His belly was bruised from the bouncing gait of the animal and he was relieved to be able to breathe more naturally. He had only a momentary respite, however, for he found himself slung over a bony shoulder. His head swam brutally as whoever was holding him swung around and started walking. Grateful he couldn’t feel anything in his extremities, he did feel the impact his head made on something solid.

  “He don’t need a concussion to go with them broken limbs,” he heard Stoneway say. “Be careful with him. That’s precious cargo you’re hauling.”

  “Aye,” someone else agreed. “And worth a lot more than I pay you in ten years’ time.”

  If the man carrying paid any attention to his boss’s words, Seyzon couldn’t tell. Twice more he felt his head slam into what was most likely a wall before he was unceremoniously dumped onto a lumpy mattress that smelled of things he didn’t want to contemplate.

  “What the fuck is this?” a woman demanded indignantly. “Is that a body?”

  “Mercer said to take the rest of the night off,” came the answer.

  “I don’t want no dead body on my bed, Kriegel! I got to make a living on that fucking bed!”

  “He ain’t dead,” the man told her.

  “Then why’s he wrapped up like that?”

  “He’s gift wrapped,” the man said with a chuckle. “A present for the border lord.”

  “Present?” she repeated.

  “Worth a lot of credits too. You watch him ’til I get back with the healer. Leave him wrapped up.”

  “Like I’m going to touch him,” the woman said with a snort.

  The bouncer left her, staring angrily at the man lying in the middle of her bed. She was still glaring at the unwanted body when the healer arrived.

  “He’d better not be dead,” she warned. “If’n he is, Mercer’s gonna buy me a new mattress!” She flounced down in the room’s only chair, crossed her arms and glowered at the healer.

  “Get the blanket off him,” Doc Needham ordered, ignoring the whore.

  Kriegel made quick work of unwrapping Seyzon then stepped back. “Whatcha think of that, Doc?”

  The healer glanced his patient’s face but did not recognize him. His professional eyes went to the strange alignment of the man’s shoulder then moved down to his leg.

  “What happened to this man?” he asked.

  “Don’t know,” Kriegel said. “Don’t you know who he is?”

  “I don’t care who he is. The less I know, the better.”

  “Best put a shackle ’round his ankle when you get his leg set,” Kriegel advised.

  “There’s no need for that. He isn’t going anywhere with a broken leg and arm,” the healer snapped.

  “Just saying,” Kriegel grumbled. “Don’t want him escaping
’fore the Reivers get here.”

  “They’d best hurry or I’m gonna toss him out on his handsome ass,” the woman stated.

  “No chance of him escaping,” the healer said. He glanced at the woman. “I’m going to need your help.”

  “I ain’t doing nothing,” she said with a sniff. “I got the night off.” She cocked her chin toward Kriegel. “Get asswipe to help you.”

  “Fuck you,” Kriegel threw at her.

  “In your dreams,” she returned.

  “Knock it off, the both of you!” the healer said. “Kriegel, get your ass over here and help me! I need you to hold his chest down while I cut these clothes off him. Sarah, you need to come hold his other leg down. I don’t want him kicking me in the face!”

  Grumbling, the woman shot up from the chair and stomped over to the foot of the bed. One look at the man lying in her bed and she blinked. Her mouth dropped open.

  “Fuck me with a rotting stump!” she exclaimed. “That’s Lord Montyne!” She turned wide eyes to the healer. “I’d know him anywhere. That’s the Lord of Lavenfeld, the prince’s friend!”

  Frowning sharply, the healer shrugging. “Then you’d best put your back into it, girl, and help me patch him up. The border lord will want him all in one piece when they hang him!”

  * * * * *

  He sensed hands on him but was so immersed in the heady grip of the narcotic he couldn’t force his eyes open to see who was touching where they shouldn’t have been touching him. That he was naked beneath the ministrations of whoever was with him was of no import at the moment. He couldn’t even dredge up much concern for the way the cold hands were fondling him.

  “He’s hung like a fucking stallion,” some woman said.

  “I’m half a mind to get this hard and ride him like one!” The one holding him ran a hand down his length, tugged then cupped his balls.

  “A cock like that. Shame to let it go to waste,” a third female voice spoke up.

  How many women are gawking at me? he wondered. He struggled to open his eyes but the lids refused to budge. They felt as though they were glued together.