I was too scared to scream as Rex, a giant of a man with a beard and hands the size of anvils, let go of my mouth and passed me over to Kai. He wasn’t as large as Rex or the others, his muscles more leanly honed, his face all planes and angles, but he was every bit as intimidating.
“Your pick, General,” said Kai, indicating the horses to Hob. He then picked me up with ease and went to sling me over one of the horses.
“No, please,” I hissed, almost frantic as I remembered my painful journey here. “Please let me ride upright. I won’t try to escape. I swear.”
Kai looked at my face for a moment – he was a young man, not much older than me, with bright green eyes that shone even in this light, and boyishly handsome features.
“Fine.” Without letting go of my arm, he swung up onto the horse and then pulled me up after him. I sat in front of him sidesaddle, his arms around me. “With me, General.”
Kai kicked the flanks of his horse and we set off at a gallop, Hob just behind. As I looked back, I saw the huge Rex passing a spear to Taka and then unfastening a massive axe from across his back. The last thing I saw was what looked like an easy dozen of the camp’s guards descending on them.
“They’re outnumbered,” I gasped to Kai.
Kai nodded. “Wouldn’t be fair, otherwise.”
Hob looked over his shoulder. “They’re following.”
“They must have had horses elsewhere,” muttered Kai. “You know where you’re going, General?”
Hob frowned. “I’m not leaving you.”
“It’s our job to get you away, General,” said Kai. “We don’t get paid if you get killed.”
“You don’t get paid if you get killed, either,” the older man shot back.
Kai laughed. “You’d be surprised the lengths we go to for money. None of us would let a little thing like death get in the way of payday. Besides, I have no intention of dying.”
Hob nodded. “Good luck, young man. And thank you. I’ll see that Lord Krius rewards you handsomely.”
“We’ll take you back if he doesn’t,” grinned Kai.
The older man nodded, unsure if Kai was joking or not, then raced ahead of us as Kai wheeled his horse around.
“You comfortable there?”
“You’re going to fight them?” I quavered.
Kai shrugged. “Well, it’s either that or they kill me. Or, I let them catch Hob. Sooner or later, they’ll find out who he is and then he’s a dead man. We’ve only got one shot at this.”
“Or you don’t get paid,” I said with a frown.
“You say it like it doesn’t matter.”
“How are you going to be able to fight with me sitting in front of you?” I asked. Suddenly, the fear of finding my way back home alone seemed far less significant than the thought of being cleaved in two by an axe during a battle. “Aren’t I in the way?”
“Nice try,” Kai grinned amiably. “But you’re not going anywhere.”
He reached back over his shoulder and I felt the muscles of his chest move against me. The churning of fear in my stomach was joined by a fluttering of something else. Before I could think too long on it, Kai drew a bow from over his back, then reached down to a quiver that hung at his waist to retrieve a handful of arrows.
“Hold these.”
Seconds later, four horsemen, illuminated by the high moon, came charging up the rough path after us, drawn swords in their hands. Kai notched an arrow to his bowstring and in a single fluid motion, drew back and released. The arrow shot through the air with a sound like the tearing of moonlight, and I saw the lead rider cry out and drop his sword as the arrow strafed across the back of his hand. Surely that couldn’t have been what Kai was aiming for? No one was that good a shot. The riders pulled up, seeing Kai and me ahead of them.
“That was a warning shot,” Kai called out as he notched another arrow. “You only get one.”
But the second rider obviously liked his chances. Kicking his horse into action, he made straight for us. Kai’s arrow hit him in the middle of his chest with a solid ‘whunk’ sound, knocking him back out of his saddle, one foot still caught in a stirrup. His horse charged on, galloping off into the night, dragging the corpse of its former rider behind.
“Nobody else has to die,” announced Kai.
The other riders had moved together and were conducting a conversation in low whispers.
“At this point,” Kai called over, “someone is probably using the phrase ‘he can’t get all of us’. May I remind you how little comfort that will be to the ones I can – Oh, damn it.”
The riders had broken, going in different directions to confuse Kai and spread his fire, all wheeling about to converge on us. Kai drew and fired like lightning, his arm muscles as taut as his bowstring, his aim flawless. Two more riders fell, dead before they hit the dirt. But this gave the third time to reach us and I screamed as his sword swung at me.
Before it could connect, Kai had pushed me over backwards, so I fell to the ground while he launched himself off his horse’s back to grab the final rider, dragging him from his saddle. They rolled on the earth together. All I could see in the darkness was a blur of limbs as the two men struggled. The rider’s sword flashed in the darkness as he waved it about, trying to free his arm from the grip Kai had on it. Then, there was a sharp abbreviated cry and a figure extricated itself from the tangle of limbs.
Kai wiped the blood from his hands as he looked down at the man on the ground. The dead rider had an arrow stuck in his chest that Kai had thrust there, the shaft broken from the force with which he had rammed it into his attacker.
“Damn,” Kai muttered as he looked. “Those things cost money. What’s your name?”
“Keira.”
“Be a good girl, Keira, and go fetch the other two arrows. I daresay the first one is long gone now.”
I looked at the corpses and barely suppressed a shudder of horror. “But… they’re in the bodies.”
“They’re still good for another use. And be careful how you pull it out. Don’t break the shaft – as the High Priest said to the Vestal Virgin.” He laughed to himself as he went to secure the horses.
I probably could have run off there and then. In the dark, he might not have found me. But I would have been as lost as I had been when this whole wretched adventure started, and if Kai, Taka and their friends didn’t find me, then the guards from the chain gang still might. I wasn’t sure whose prisoner I was better off being, but one thing did occur to me; in all the time I had been with the chain gang, Taka was the only one to ask my name. Kai had, too. It was a small thing, but at least they saw me as a person.
I made quick work of the unpleasant task and came back with the arrows as instructed.
“You’ll get a horse now,” Kai said with a satisfied nod as he took them from me. “Which will at least save one of us carrying you. Up you get.”
Again, I wondered at the strength in Kai’s wiry frame as he picked me up with ease and placed me on the horse’s back.
“Now, I’m sorry about this, but I don’t feel like we can trust you.”
With the reins from another of the horses, he bound my hands together and then secured them to the saddle itself. He then fastened my horse to his own.
“Simple rules, Keira; do as you’re told and don’t try to escape, or you’ll be punished. Understand?”
Oh, I understood. I’d been told much the same my entire life. Obeying was another thing entirely…
“What are you going to do with me?” I asked, almost afraid of the answer.
“Whatever Taka tells me to,” said Kai, simply. “For now, we just need to get ourselves out of Lord Vulpus’s territory and--” He stopped short, his head flicking to the right as if he had heard something. I listened and caught the sound of hoofbeats. More guards?
Kai swung up onto his horse. His bow was in his hands in less than a heartbeat, an arrow notched the string, his keen eyes trained on the direction from which the sound came.
>
But then his lips broke into a smile.
“Ho!” he called into the night and an answer came quickly, followed by three horses carrying Kai’s three comrades; Taka, Luca and Rex. Rex smiled on seeing us, Luca sneered on seeing me, and Taka just looked like Taka – calm, collected, unreadable.
“The general?”
“On his way. Some guards followed us.”
Taka nodded. “There’ll be more once they’ve put the fire out. We need to get moving.”
“We’re bringing her?” There was a snap of derision in Luca’s voice.
Taka cast a look at the younger man. “Yes. We can hardly let her go when there are Vulpus guards about. She’s heard too much.”
“You’re going to let sentimentality slow us down when we should be heading for our payday. What if they catch us while we’re busy nurse-maiding her? You’re putting our lives at risk for the sake of some slip of a girl.”
Taka nodded. “I know. Come on, we’re not wasting time discussing what’s already decided.”
But Luca wasn’t done yet. “You and she were in the camp awhile together. Did you have a thing together? Good, was she? Worth risking our lives for?”
For the first time, I saw a flash of anger in Taka’s mild features. It was gone as quickly as it had arrived but Luca clearly saw it, too, as I saw his head drop a little.
“We don’t leave young women to die or who knows what else because it’s convenient,” Taka said, his voice controlled. “Time was when I wouldn’t have to tell you something like that. I look forward to seeing that Luca beside me again. Until then, I cannot for the life of me understand why we are still talking about this, when my decision has been made.”
He tugged his horse’s head about and set off into the night with Rex hard behind him. Kai gave a yank on the tether that tied our horses together and we both rode in pursuit, with a coldly furious Luca bringing up the rear.
We traveled in silence, but two terrifying questions blared loudly in my mind with every passing mile.
Exactly how badly did he want me out of the picture? And had I just gone from a miserable situation to a deadly one?
Chapter 4
Morning broke, bright and beautiful across the mountains, the sun’s light stealing through the crags in lancing rays. It was only then that we stopped riding. I practically fell from my horse when Rex came to help me down.
“Sorry.”
“Just watch yourself,” he replied gruffly, leading me by my tether to an alcove in the rocks. “Get some sleep. We’ll be moving on soon and we can’t be waiting on you.”
“You don’t have to take me with you. You could just let me go.” Luca clearly didn’t want me there and I was still a captive, in constant danger. Homesickness rolled through me in a soul-crushing wave and I blinked back hot tears. I had no idea where home was anymore or how to get there, but in that moment, I’d have risked anything to get there.
Away from rough-handed men who despised me.
Away from the misery of being tied and tossed around like a sack of parsnips.
Away from it all.
But Rex said nothing in reply as he tied my tether tightly around the branch of a scrubby bush.
I tried to sleep, but it was hard with the fear of what might happen to me next beating at the inside of my skull.
Who were these men? Worse than the ones I’d escaped? And what might they do with me next? Taka seemed to have a conscience, but the others…I wasn’t sure.
Though I tried to shut the sound out of my mind, I could hear them talking as they sat cross-legged in a circle, and could not help listening in.
“You really think they’ll still be following us?” asked Rex. “As far as they’re concerned, this was a jail break. A pair of thieves getting away from a chain gang.”
“A pair of thieves with friends who could fight off every guard in the camp,” pointed out Luca. “That’s suspicious.”
“Luca is right,” nodded Taka.
“And when they start wondering about that,” Kai went on, “then they’ll start wondering what was special about those two prisoners. If they’re smart, then it won’t take them long to find out that they had General Hob Soro on their chain gang, and didn’t even know it. As long as we’re still in their territory, then they’ll keep coming for us.”
“Which is what we want them to do,” added Taka.
“Why?” asked Rex, his voice a deep rumble.
“Because if they’re following us, then they’re not following the general,” explained Taka. “They don’t know we’ve split up. For the next few days, we’ll leave a nice clear path that a blind man could follow. We’ll lead them in circles and make sure the general has time to get back to Lord Krius.”
“Then we go to see his Lordship,” said Luca, pointedly.
“Oh yes,” smiled Taka. “He owes us a lot of money. And he’ll have more work for us.”
“Which means more money,” grinned Kai.
“We just need to stay out of their way for a few more days,” said Taka. “That should be more than long enough. Just hope the general hasn’t gotten himself captured again. And if he has, then one of you can be on the inside this time, I’m done with hard labor and prison rations.”
There was a smattering of laughter.
“What about her?” Of course, that was Luca. I shut my eyes tightly, pretending to be asleep.
“What about her?”
“She’s a liability.”
“Not if we keep an eye on her. It’s only for a few days.”
Luca scoffed. “Maybe these two buy that, but not me. You keep saying we only have to keep hold of her till we’re out of Lord Vulpus’s land but, then what? What’s to stop her going back and telling them who we are?”
“So what?” asked Rex. “They’re not going to risk going into enemy territory to pick up a few mercenaries.”
“They’re not going to hire them either, though,” said Kai, starting to see Luca’s point.
“Exactly,” snarled Luca. “See the big picture, Rex. We work for the highest bidder. Unless you want to join one of these damn armies – sign your name on the dotted line and swear allegiance to Lord Dead-In-A-Week. Lord Krius has work for us? Very nice, but what happens in a month when he’s killed in battle? What happens when Lord Vulpus has work and we can’t take it because we didn’t have the balls to do what’s necessary? She’s just some girl.”
“That’s the point.” It was always a relief to hear Taka’s level voice – he was my captor, but also my only advocate. “She’s just a girl. We don’t do that.”
“Well, we should damn well start.”
“I said it last night, Luca, and I’ll say it again; there was a time when you wouldn’t even dream of…”
“People change.”
“Not always for the better. And they change for a reason. When she was alive…”
“Well, she’s not!” Luca’s roar could have started avalanches. “Don’t you use that as a stick to beat me with – don’t you dare.”
There was a brief pause before Taka spoke again. “Her name is Keira, by the way.”
“Why does that matter?”
“I don’t suppose it does. I just thought you should know.” He sighed. “I understand your point, Luca. But she’s got no love for Lord Vulpus, she was as much a prisoner there as anyone else. I don’t see her going back.”
“What if Vulpus takes her village?” asked Kai, less vehement than Luca, but perhaps changing sides.
“What if we all get killed tomorrow?” Taka shook his head. “You can’t live your life on ‘what ifs’. There’s money waiting for us with Lord Krius. A damn fortune. And work, too. Enough to make us another fortune. What’s the old saying? All you need to be happy in this life is money and a good fight – everything else you can fight for or pay for. Now, get an hour’s rest. I’ll keep watch.”
As the men lay down, rolling their cloaks about them to sleep, my own exhaustion finally caught up with
me and I slipped into a dreamless slumber.
It seemed like only a moment later that I was shaken awake by Rex.
“Time to go.”
I was put back on my horse, my hands tied to the saddle once more, and on we rode. We travelled at a more steady pace now, as we went higher into the mountains, which was just as well as, with only an hour’s sleep to my name, I was starting to sway in the saddle. The route we took seemed designed to lose ourselves, and hopefully those following us, as well. I assumed that we were going in the opposite direction to that which Hob – the general – had taken last night, drawing the guards of Lord Vulpus – whoever that was – in the wrong direction. Seemed like a risky strategy to me but my companions clearly knew what they were doing.
As morning ticked over into afternoon, we stopped again for food and Rex made a fire.
“Is that safe?” I dared to ask. “Won’t someone see it?”
“That’s the hope,” said Kai. “Keep them coming after us, ever upward.”
“What if they catch us?”
“Then they’ll be sorry.”
We ate, but what we had apparently represented the last of our supplies. I could almost feel Luca’s angry gaze on me when he talked of ‘rations not going as far as they should’. After lunch, I was once again tied up and told to get some sleep while they discussed the food situation.
“There were rabbits further down,” commented Rex. “Think I saw a goat, too.”
Taka nodded. “We’ll go hunting.”
“We’ll go hunting,” corrected Luca. “You still haven’t slept.”
Taka shrugged his acknowledgement.
“What about her?” I heard Kai ask.
“She’s asleep. She’s tied up. She’ll be fine,” replied Taka. “The girl’s not going to run off in the middle of the mountains – we’re miles from anywhere and the Vulpus troops will be out looking for us. Besides, I think she trusts us. Or, at least, trusts us enough not to do something stupid. And I’ll be here.”
Her Mercenary Harem Page 3