DeliveredIntoHisHands

by Charlotte Boyett-Compo

  * * * * *

  Antonia twisted her arms, jerked her legs, but the iron shackles held. Her throat was raw from screaming but since that was no longer possible thanks to the gag covering her mouth, she could let it heal. Tossing her head to the side, she glared at her husband but he was sound asleep, the drug having taken him down into whatever peaceful abode he visited when it was administered. She bucked against the restraints it had taken both Garrick and Marc to snap into place and the bunk beneath her bounced. She growled and whipped her head the other way to shoot daggers of fury at Marc.

  “You might as well calm down, milady,” he told her. “Until he wakes, you aren’t going anywhere.”

  Furious that Garrick had come after her when she’d fled and overtaken her with ease, she had fought him tooth and nail, fang and claw but he’d slung her over his shoulder and carried her back to his tent—screeching like a wounded owl. Flinging her to the mattress, bellowing for Marc to bring shackles, he’d sat on her ass to keep her down until the irons were brought. Easily flipping her over, he and his bastard friend had secured her to the bunk—wrist and ankle—and another bunk brought in for Garrick. She did have the satisfaction of knowing she’d caused the Crimson Lord a helluva lot of pain for having caught her. His retching, moaning, groaning and trembling body had been evidence of that. She’d screamed at him, cursed him until Marc had snapped a gag across her mouth.

  “If it was your intent to cause him agony, you succeeded,” Marc told her. “I doubt one injection will be enough to rid him of this round of headaches.”

  She flashed her eyes in triumph but—truth be told—she felt bad for causing him such excruciating pain although not bad enough to worry about it.

  “I hate you!” she thought at him.

  “Aye, milady, I know you do,” Marc said aloud. “Ask me if I give a fuck.”

  Antonia blinked. He had heard her thought?

  “You are now One with the Blood,” he said, getting up to look out the tent flap. “From here on, it’s best you be careful what thoughts you project,” Marc told her. “Only those who have shared Blood with Garrick can hear you but thankfully there are only three of us—including you—but I don’t care to hear you spout your shit.”

  “Fuck. You.”

  “You’re not my type,” he said and left the tent.

  “Asshole!”

  “Spoiled bitch.”

  Infuriated at his mental dig, she blew out a harsh stream of breath through her nose. Even to her own ears she sounded like a maddened mare.

  Garrick groaned and she turned her head to look at him. He was covered in sweat, his body twitching, and he was digging his fingernails into the sheet beneath him. Watching him suffering even in his drugged sleep, she felt some of the anger go out of her. The goddess help her, she thought, but she loved the man still despite all he’d done. All the deaths for which he was directly responsible. All the families torn asunder and futures wrecked. All the pain and suffering and…

  “Shit!” she thought, glaring at him. She hated what he had become. But there was a niggling worry in her mind that she had helped create the monster he had become. If only she’d stayed at the keep that fateful night, tried to explain to him about Henry Belvoir, mayhap things would have been different.

  He had hurt her brutally that night.

  Not physically. That was something she knew he would never do. Could ever do.

  She thought of the wicked scar on her arm where his blade had sliced her all the way to the bone. The pain of that was as much her doing as his, though. It might have been his dagger but it had been her recklessness of putting herself between two enraged warriors that had caused it.

  No, the night he destroyed Castle Blackthorn, he destroyed a part of her very soul. It was a transgression for which she would never be able to forgive him. Would forever condemn him for his act of vengeance.

  She saw his eyes flutter open and his eyebrows draw together. He was in terrible pain. As she watched, he put a shaking hand to his temple and pressed.

  “Do you need another injection?”

  Her silent question surprised him and he shifted his head toward her. He stared at her with that wounded, agonized expression that said he was walking a fine line between sanity and madness as the pain pounded in his brain. Then his eyes widened and he curled his upper body from the bunk, gagging as nausea gripped him. He was bent over the side of the mattress but nothing was coming up. She knew from what he had told her long ago dry heaving was worse than throwing up and put double the pressure on his head.

  Marcus! she shouted in her mind and saw Garrick flinch.

  The flap fluttered and Marc came in, his face scrunched up with irritation until he saw his friend leaning over the edge of the bunk.

  He needs another shot, she sent to him.

  “Aye, I figured he would,” Marc said as he hurried over to Garrick and put a hand on his friend’s shoulder. “Lie back, Rick. I’ve got a vac-syringe in my pocket.”

  “And here I thought you were just happy to see me,” Garrick mumbled as he lay down.

  “Ha-ha,” Marc said and reached into the deep pocket of his cargo pants for the vac-syringe.” He made quick work of administering the drug and for once made no wisecrack when Garrick complained of the fiery pain shooting through his jugular.

  “Unchain me and let me see to him,” Antonia told him.

  “Like that’s going to happen,” Marc groused.

  “Release her,” Garrick said, his voice thick. “She’s not going anywhere.”

  “Fucking right she isn’t,” Marc said. He snapped his head around and gave Antonia a mean look before coming over to unlock the manacle bands on her ankles. When he undid her wrists, she reached up to snatch the gag from her mouth.

  “Do that to me again and I will cut your balls off, Zoltán!” she warned.

  Marc snorted but moved well out of her way. “You need anything else?” he asked Garrick.

  “A cold cloth,” Garrick replied.

  “I’ll see to that,” Antonia said. “You can go now.”

  One dark brow arched into Marc’s curly hair. “Oh, I can, can I?” he asked with a growl.

  “Out!” she said. “He needs to sleep this off.”

  “You’re the one who caused this!” Marc accused.

  “Get. Out. Now!”

  Garrick’s lips twitched. He closed his eyes and began drifting on the sweet tide of the algés. The last thing he felt was a cold, wet cloth being placed gently on his forehead.

  The last thing he heard was his wife saying, “I’m sorry you’re hurting, Ricky.”

  The nickname made him smile and he took that tender reminder of what they had once had together down with him into oblivion.

  * * * * *

  When he woke the next evening, he knew that second shot had been given an extra boost of what he suspected had been Pairilis—a very potent paralytic to put him down hard. It worked for the headache was gone even if the cotton batting-encased world around him had muted sounds, dull colors and residual numbness.

  “Feeling better?”

  Her soft voice from across the tent pleased him.

  “Aye,” he said, scrubbing a hand over his face, knocking the rag on his forehead askew. It was damp and somewhat cool so he knew she had recently changed it. That she had bothered while he was unconscious made his heart ache.

  “Your asshole friend is having a carriage brought round to take us to Warwyck Castle.”

  “I can sit a horse,” he grumbled.

  “He isn’t going to let you and my guess is he’ll shackle my arm to the seat just for shits and giggles,” she said drily.

  He looked over at her. “When did you start cursing?” he asked with a frown.

  “When I grew up,” she replied.

  “Well, stop it,” he said. “I don’t like it and it is neither ladylike nor socially acceptable in a woman of your rank.”

  “A woman of my rank?” she asked. “Which is what exactly
?”

  “The wife of the Duke of Loghtalid,” he replied.

  “Ah,” she said. “So you’re a duke now.”

  “Have been for five years,” he informed her.

  “Duchess Antonia,” she said. “Has a nice ring to it.”

  He was watching her as she sat behind his desk. She was typing something into his vid-pad and he narrowed his gaze. “Who are you writing to?” he asked. He wasn’t worried about her sending whatever it was she was writing because without his personal password, the message would remain in the draft folder.

  “My mother,” she replied without looking at him. “Now that I know where she is.”

  “You don’t have the addy,” he reminded her.

  “No, but I’m sure you’ll make sure the message reaches her.”

  “I will read it first,” he stated.

  Antonia sighed with exasperation. “Well, of course you will. I never thought otherwise, knave.”

  He blinked. That was twice now she’d used nicknames that she’d had for him long ago. He took a deep breath and his words came out in a rush.

  “Can we start over?”

  She looked over at him, her eyebrows drawn together. “What?”

  He propped himself up on one elbow, turned to face her. “I asked if we could start over,” he said.

  For the longest time all she did was stare at him. There was no expression whatsoever on her face and her eyes held no emotion, gave no clue as to what was going through her mind. At last she answered him but her voice was as impassive as her face was impassive.

  “I don’t know,” she replied. “Can we?”

  “I would like to try,” he said. He looked at her Joining band. “What’s the real reason you didn’t have that removed?”

  She glanced down at her arm but didn’t reply.

  “Do you remember what the priest said when the Band of Devotion was soldered to your arm?”

  She nodded. “He said, ‘This is the outward sign of your union, your link to one another, your eternal reminder that you are now responsible to another for your actions. With this symbol, you will be joined for all time. Let all who witness the placement of these bands know. You are one to another, forever as one, never to be parted by anything, or anyone, under penalty of death.’”

  “And when you were asked to make your vow?” he pressed. “Do you remember that wording as well?”

  Her eyes misted, expression finally showing in the verdant depths. “I said I have accepted Garrick Warwyck as my husband of my own free will, without coercion or duress. He, I have chosen as my own. He and none other.”

  He sat up and lowered his legs to the floor though he kept his hands curled over the edge of the mattress. He smiled gently, his words soft and low.

  “Then we knelt for the Blessing and he told those gathered that we were kneeling before god and man in obedience to the wishes of the goddess. He proclaimed us one flesh, one inseparable entity, until the end of their lives.”

  “I remember,” she said quietly and reached up to wipe at her eye.

  “I love you, Antonia,” he said just as quietly. “I never stopped. I was hurt and angry and I…” He lifted his right hand and spiked it through his hair. “I intensely regret what I did that night. I was so jealous, so bitter over Clay and I let all my issues grow way out of proportion.” He hung his head. “I am deeply sorry I destroyed your home, wench.”

  “I am sorry too,” she said. “I should have stayed and tried to talk to you but I couldn’t face you, Garrick. Not then. Not after you as much as told me you didn’t care if I lived or died.”

  “Mother of the goddess,” he whispered. “I should have my tongue torn out at the root for having said such a thing to you.”

  She came over to him, hesitated for a split second with her hand hovering over his head then threaded her hand through the dark curls. “That would be a waste of a wickedly educated tongue, milord,” she said. “An organ you use exceedingly well if memory serves.”

  He slowly raised his head and looked up at her. She was smiling at him and his heart did a funny little squeeze that made him lightheaded.

  “You need a haircut,” she said, raking her hands through his hair again.

  “Which one?” he asked, his mouth easing into a grin.

  “This one,” she said, plucking one from the thick mass.

  He had not forgotten the teasing banter they used to swap so easily and though he knew there were problems they needed to iron out, he desperately wanted to make a go of their marriage. He wanted his wife back even if it meant going to his knees before her to gain her forgiveness. Humbling himself was not a Panthera trait—nor one that he readily embraced—but if he wanted a life with Antonia, he might need to eat a little humble pie to win her back.

  “Tell me what I need to do, wench,” he said. “I will do whatever it takes to win you back.”

  “You swear?” she asked.

  “On my honor,” he said. He wanted her so badly at that moment he would have cut off his right arm to have her.

  “Then leave Alyx be,” she said. “You’ve won the war. You have me. He lost both. Let it go at that.”

  Illogical anger bubbled up so quickly he thought he would choke on it. He wanted to slap her hard enough to make her ears ring. That emotion must have been displayed on his face for she took a step back from him.

  “How the fuck could you ask me to do that?” he thundered, shooting to his feet.

  “Let it go,” she said and took another step away from him. “Let him go or…”

  “Or what?” he snapped.

  “You’ll lose me forever,” she said, chin raised.

  Nothing she could have said could have pushed his button harder. He threw out his hand, grabbed hold of her arm and jerked her to him. He clamped his other hand around her free arm in a punishing grip.

  “You aren’t going anywhere, wench!” he said. His words were forced through tightly clenched teeth.

  “You might have me physically, but you won’t have me any other way,” she said. “I guess your definition of doing whatever it takes and mine are not the same thing.”

  “He’s a war criminal!” he shouted at her.

  “Aye, but then so are you!” she retorted. “How many people have you killed? How many homes and villages and cities have you destroyed? How many lives have you torn apart?”

  “I did not set fire to a barracks where nearly eighty men were burned alive!” he threw at her. “I did not poison a well then stand back and watch the soldiers die agonizing deaths. I did not capture five young soldiers and have them decapitated for no other reason than to spike their heads on poles to warn his scouts not to take a route that would have led them to an encounter with my troops!” He shook her. “That is my definition of a war criminal, wench. What’s yours?”

  She shook her head. “He didn’t do that,” she said.

  “Aye, he did!” he told her. “And a lot worse things. I have never destroyed one building until I knew there was no one inside it. I’ve never poisoned a well. I’ve never had anyone decapitated or tortured or maimed.” He narrowed his eyes. “Alyxdair Clay has done those things in spades and you would ask me to let him go? Hell no. Even it means losing you, hell no!”

  His shouting had brought Marc back to the tent. The Modarthan was hovering at the entrance with his hand clutching the canvas. She turned her head, pleading with him to deny the accusations. He shook his head.

  “Garrick Warwyck has never told a lie in his life. What he says is the goddess’ own truth, milady,” Marc said. “The things Clay has done goes beyond fighting a war. He and his staff have ventured into the realm of savagery and sadism.”

  “He lied about me having an affair,” Garrick said. “He lied about the supposed divorce. What others lies has he told you, Antonia? I’m curious to know what he has said that would make you call me a war criminal.”

  “I…” She bit her lip, unable to meet his eyes.

  “What did he t
ell you I did that would make you think me on a level with him?” he demanded. When she didn’t answer, he shook her harder than he intended to and she made a whimpering sound.

  “Easy, Rick,” Marc advised.

  “Tell me!” Garrick ordered.

  “Maechin,” she said.

  “What of it?”

  Her chin quivered. “He said you executed my parents and my sister when you heard there was going to be a raid on the prison.” She slowly lifted her head and gave him a look that hurt his soul. “He said you did it to punish me for marrying him.”

  “Son of a diseased whore,” Marc said. “King Cormac knew the Blackthorns had been taken to Modartha for safe keeping. Surely Clay knew it!”

  “Of course he knew it,” Garrick said. “Just one more lie he told you, wench.”

  “I know that now but I didn’t then,” she said.

  “Yet knowing it you still call me a criminal?” he growled.

  “General?” Oran asked from outside the tent.

  “I’m busy!” Garrick shouted.

  “What is it?” Marc asked, looking behind him.

  “The carriage is ready and the guard in place whenever he wants to leave for Warwyck Castle,” Oran reported.

  “Take her to the carriage,” Garrick commanded. “And bring my horse around.”

  “Are you sober enough…” Marc held up his hand when Garrick’s eyes flashed red and he growled low in his throat. “Sorry, wrong word. Are you awake enough to ride? I gave you a pretty hefty dose of algés.”

  “I need the night air to clear my fucking head,” Garrick replied. He released Antonia and pushed past Marc to leave the tent.

  “He’ll calm down,” Marc told her. “He just needs some space.”

  “And doesn’t need to be in the same enclosed space with me right now,” Antonia said.

  “Aye, that too,” Marc agreed.

  Garrick strode down to the river and stood there with his hands on his hips, staring at the darkened woods beyond. The Moon was riding high across the black satin sky and casting a mellow gold light upon the hills north of the greensward. He had the urge to shift into avian form and take to the air but his head wasn’t clear enough just yet. The algés still had him feeling numb and too detached for such an endeavor. Which was a shame for the freedom of soaring would have gone a long way in easing the anger seething through his mind.