Time doesn’t exactly slow. It’s like it was running fast, and now it’s at the real speed. I can count the stitches on their gloves and the hairs on their fingers. I see the bones in their hands lever as they tighten on the triggers.
This is how I die. Spared from violation only to be shot down like an animal, left to rot in the dirt because my captors don’t have time to abuse me.
A roar behind my head makes my ears ring, and the world goes silent. These little puffs of dirt rake across the ground, and when they hit the cluster of fighters they turn from puffs of dirt to splashes of red. I never understood until this moment how delicate the human body is. The impacts are like smashing a melon.
There’s a spotlight on me. A helicopter slides from side to side overhead, shining a light so bright it makes the sun look like a candle. I scream in stupid animal panic, run through the flaps into the tent and throw myself down.
Melissa has spit out her gag and is sobbing hysterically, praying and cursing and begging for help. She calls out for her mother, for God, even for Brad. More gunfire rips overhead. That gun on the helicopter shoots so fast it sounds like one noise, a steady roar.
Another explosion shakes the dirt.
This is just a tent. They can’t know we’re in here. When I look out through the flaps I see my worst fear. Bullets rake the tent across the path and it collapses on itself, folding in like a house of cards.
Then Brad bursts in, half his face covered in slick blood and sweat. His eyes stand out too white and too wide, and there’s a wet spot on his khakis.
“Shut up and do what I say.”
I do the exact opposite of that. I kick at him as he draws closer, my boot catching him in the leg.
“You stupid twat, that’s the Phoenix Guard out there. They catch us and we’re fucked.”
I just stare at him.
“You mean you’re fucked if you’re caught with us.”
He blinks. “No time. You want to live, you come with me. Otherwise, I gotta get rid of the evidence.”
He shakes a gas can at me. Liquid sloshes in the bottom.
My breath catches. He wouldn’t.
His eyes say he would.
“Fine.”
If he can buy me another ten minutes, I’ll take it. There has to be a chance we can still get away.
He pulls me up and throws a blanket around me. It slips off and he pulls it tighter, and cuts the cords tying Melissa and Danielle’s ankles. Melissa springs to her feet, but Danielle won’t move.
“Burn me,” she croaks. “You fucking bastard.”
“Get up, you stupid bitch,” he snarls, dragging her to her feet.
She finally gets up and he shoves her forward.
“Head toward the rear of the camp. There’s an old goat track that leads into the mountains. If we can get out of sight and get some cover, we can wait it out, maybe recover a vehicle and head back for Solkovia.”
“Where you kill us and dump our bodies,” I say.
“If I wanted to kill you, I’d have done it already. Are you that stupid?”
“If I was that smart I wouldn’t be here, dealing with you, motherfucker.”
“Just fucking move or I swear to God I will blow your brains out myself. Stay low and stay close to the edge of the tents.”
He jabs my back with his pistol and I push Melissa forward. We end up herding Danielle alone, flanking her and bumping her along when she tries to stop. As she walks, her eyes fade more and more until she looks completely burnt out, staring at nothing. She stumbles and falls when another explosion rocks the camp.
There are more of them on the ground now. I can hear shots and see people running. Another helicopter whips overhead, spins, and comes back around, raking the ground with gunfire. Flares and explosions light the night like a thunderstorm, raging wildly overhead.
Brad points toward a twisting, narrow path behind the general’s tent that slopes sharply up into the mountains. Danielle isn’t going to make it on bare feet, but I don’t think Brad cares all that much. He shoves us forward hard.
“Come on, we’re almost there.”
I look over my shoulder and see them.
They’re dressed in black, all of them. Big men in tactical web gear with black berets, moving with mechanical efficiency. They make the “resistance” fighters look like children playing at war. When they spot the resistance men they just shoot them without thinking.
A knot of fighters comes around the tent just as we head for the goat track. They aim their rifles at Brad and he drops his gun.
Danielle screams.
They shoot her. Three times in the chest. She falls down, not like a movie, she just collapses in place, her breathing replaced with a ragged, irregular sucking sound, like someone trying to pull gelatin through a straw. One of the fighters kicks her aside and barks an order at us.
“Move,” Brad translates.
Pushed forward, we head up the goat trail. It’s barely wide enough for us to pass one at a time at first, before it evens out and spreads out wider. The resistance fighters push us all under a rock outcropping and look back.
Brad talks with them, and for a moment the one who looks like he’s leading them listens, then cracks Brad in the face with the butt of his gun.
They start arguing back and forth. I can barely make out what they’re saying, it’s too fast, but I pick up enough words. Three of the six of them want to kill Brad, take us with them, and fuck us before they kill us.
The other three want to kill us now, because we’ll make too much noise.
I scream at the top of my lungs. They all just stare at me before one shoves the butt of his rifle into my stomach again. He points his gun at me.
I’m lucky. He’s one of the ones who wants to use me before they kill me. Instead of shooting me he just sticks his bayonet against my cheek. One move and he’ll slice open my cheek from eye to chin.
The world goes eerily quiet.
Then, footsteps.
Each step is a dull, plodding thud. The blade pulls away from my cheek. I draw back, huddled up against Melissa.
Brad looks down the path.
“We’re all going to die,” he says, with the casual conviction of absolute certainty.
I blink. I can’t believe what I’m seeing. It looks like a man wearing a suit of armor. Not Kevlar and ceramic, black lacquered steel polished to a high mirror shine. He must be seven feet tall from the soles of his feet to the top of the heavy helmet he wears over his face.
The black-clad soldiers follow behind him. He raises a closed fist and they stop, falling back to the path.
All six resistance fighters raise their guns and open fire. The sound is deafening. The response is nothing. The man in the armor just walks forward, ignoring the bullets pinging off his suit.
The fighters turn and bolt.
Something that big shouldn’t be able to move that fast. He breaks into a run and crosses the distance in a blink, heavy metal feet thudding on the dusty ground. The fingers on his gleaming, segmented gauntlets end in sharp steel points, and they bite into one of the fighter’s back like claws. He screams as the armored man heaves him bodily from the ground and throws him like he weighs nothing. He hits the rock hard and falls, leaving a bloody smear.
I stop watching halfway through. When it’s over there are five bodies at the giant’s feet with broken limbs and crushed heads. I can hear him breathing, the sound amplified into a growl as though through some kind of microphone. He barks orders in Kosztylan and his men come rushing forward.
Brad stands up.
“Listen, I’m an American. I’m with the Central Intelligence Agency. I was planning an op against these men to rescue these women…”
The armored man backhands him across the face, casually, like he’s flicking away a bothersome insect. Brad topples to the ground and spits out a mouthful of blood and teeth.
“Fuck,” he snarls.
“He’s lying,” I say calmly. “He was selling u
s to them.”
“You dumb bitch,” Brad snarls through his bloody mouth. “Don’t you know who this is? He’s the crown prince. He’ll kill us all.”
The armored giant turns and looks down at Brad. When he moves, the armor makes little whirring noises, like it’s some kind of machine.
“You will be silent or I will tear your still-living heart from your chest and feed it to you.”
Brad’s mouth clamps shut.
The giant steps closer. I press against the rock. The clawed tip of his armored finger almost touches my cheek, but he pulls it away as if he just noticed the blood coating the steel up to his elbows.
“See to her wounds. Bring them back to the camp.”
“There’s another girl,” I say. “Her name is Danielle. They shot her in the chest.”
“We found her.”
He switches to Kosztylan to order his men. They remove the short shoulder capes they wear and wrap one around me and one around Melissa, and cut the bonds on our wrists. I clutch the garment around my body and hold on to it like a blanket. I start to hobble back down the path. I twisted my ankle and I don’t even remember when it happened.
“I will carry you,” the armored giant booms.
I stumble back when he takes a step closer, looming over me. I feel like I’m looking up at a mountain, shivering and clutching blankets and cloth to my naked body. Somehow he slips his arms under me without touching me with the sharp steel claws on his hands and lifts me up off the ground.
I have no choice but to curl up in his arms. He moves like I weigh nothing at all. One of his men picks up Melissa and carries her.
“Prince Charming,” Brad spits. “He’s going to kill you the same as me. I hope he’s making a good impression.”
“Be silent and I will grant you a clean death,” the giant thunders.
I shudder. His voice rumbles from the armor against my body as he speaks. I feel like a child carried in an adult’s arms.
It’s a shorter trip back to the camp than I remembered.
My God.
The tents are all down. It looks like a giant strode through the camp, taking no care where he put his feet. The canvas and poles are down around piles of bodies. The trucks and generators are burning. The big mess hall is the only structure still standing, if you can call it standing. The back half is smashed in, all splintered wood, torn metal, and shredded cloth.
I turn away and find myself studying the man’s armor. It’s barely noticeable from a distance but up close I can make out gold inlaid into the surface, somehow under the black enamel. It forms the shape of a heraldic phoenix, wings outstretched, with arrows and swords clutched in its claws.
I’m shocked to find women back at the camp, dressed the same as the men, and armed. The crown prince lowers me onto a stretcher and Melissa sits behind me.
They make me hold still as a nurse examines me, and stand in a circle around me to give me some meager privacy as I dress in a plain black uniform like the ones they wear. Melissa changes as well, and hugs me.
“I’m so sorry,” she whimpers. “I’m so, so sorry—”
I shush her as the female guards give me a sharp look.
I can’t take my eyes off him. Two of his guards come from behind and clasp a cape to two points on his shoulders. It’s cloth of gold, so heavy it doesn’t swing or sway when he moves. They carry a heavy steel chair into the ruined mess hall, and he sits down.
The general, Brad, and a few other stragglers kneel in a row along the side of the room. I hold my breath, leaning forward to listen to him speak.
He starts in Kosztylan, but slowly and clearly, with a harsh, aristocratic accent, very precise and deliberate. I can make out enough of it to understand what’s going on.
He’s declared a trial, and the resistance fighters and Brad are the defendants.
He looks over his shoulder and glances at me. I can’t see anything of his face. I only know he’s looking my way because of a narrow slit in his helmet. I can just barely make out his eyes through a smoky material, too hard to be glass.
“You. Come forward.”
Shuddering, I get up and start limping toward him. One of his guards, a woman, slips under my arm and helps me over, and provides me with a folding chair.
“You can’t do this,” Brad spits. “You have no right to put me on trial. This is a farce. You can’t act as judge and jury.”
“You do not need your tongue. You will lose it if you continue to speak.”
Brad shuts up.
“Tell me who you are and where you came from. Do not lie. I will know.”
I shiver.
“You may speak freely.”
“I’m an American. My name is Penny. I was working across the border in Solkovia in an aid camp.”
Oh God, I can’t tell them Melissa was involved.
“The truth. All of it,” the prince booms.
I swallow and look at Melissa.
“It wasn’t her fault,” she cries out, sobbing. “It was me. I was helping Brad bring stuff here. I’m so sorry. Don’t hurt Penny, please don’t hurt Penny, I swear I—”
“Silence,” he booms. “Continue.”
“As she says. I followed Melissa out of our tent and found her helping Brad load a truck with boxes. We didn’t know what was in them. Please don’t hurt her, she thought it was food. She just wants to help people, she didn’t know what this place was like.”
I feel like I’m talking to a statue. I look away from him.
“They brought us here and talked about us in Kosztylan. I don’t speak your language very well but I understood what they were saying. They were going to sell Melissa. That man,” I point at the general, “said he was going to keep me. He already had another girl. Danielle. She’s the one who was shot. He…hurt her.” I can’t make myself say it.
The bearded general calls me a name that doesn’t have a direct English translation. It’s a mix of slut and cunt and it compares me to a female cat.
The butt of a rifle silences him.
“I don’t want to tell what happened when he took me. Please.”
“Did he…?” the question hangs unasked.
“No,” I take a deep breath, eyes closed, “but if you’d arrived a minute later he would have.”
“What is the role of the American man here?”
“He brings weapons. They said something about selling drugs. He didn’t explain it to me. I don’t know any more than that. He left us to be sold or killed. He was going to leave us here.”
It spills out of me with a sudden intensity, until I start to shake.
“I want to go home.”
“I will decide that. I saved your life. Now your life belongs to me.”
I freeze.
Brad laughs. “I told you.”
“I have heard enough to pass judgement,” the prince says, rising to tower over all of us. He turns and barks a single word in Kosztylan.
It means sword.
One of his men marches forward stiffly, like this is some kind of ritual. At the same time, two others drag the bearded general to the center of the room and force him to his knees, kicking him forward until his chest lands on a crate, his head hanging over the side.
Oh my God.
The prince draws the sword from the scabbard. The blade is five feet long and as wide as a man’s hand, the grip big enough for him to hold two-handed in his huge gauntlets.
There’s some kind of connector on the grip. It touches a plate on his gauntlet and the sword starts humming, crackling like a high-tension wire. He steps beside the bearded general.
“I, Prince Kristoff of the House Kosztyla, Crown Prince, sentence you to death by beheading. Speak your last words, have you any.”
The general bellows out a string of profanities, accusing the prince of fornicating with apes and insinuating that his mother is a whore who lies with pigs, among other obscenities.
The prince listens to him for a good thirty seconds then looks at me
like he’s noticing me for the first time. The blade hovers over the general’s neck.
“Take the women out,” the prince commands. “They need not see this.”
Walking outside feels like floating, even limping on a sore ankle. Once I’m outside the tent, I hear it. The general lets loose a string of obscenities, his last words, as it were. Then they cut off.
I giggle. Cut off. Good one, Penny. My laughter breaks down into sobs.
I can hear Brad.
“You can’t do this!” he shrieks, high and thin. “I’m a fucking American! I’m with the CIA! Do you know who I am?”
I turn back and look.
They push him down, and the prince brings the sword close to his face. The very tip touches Brad’s cheek with a hissing pop and I can smell him burning.
“Oh God, please don’t…”
“You plea to God for help now that you reap what you have sown, American?”
Brad just stares at him.
“God will tire of your pleas by the time I am done with you. I, Prince Kristoff of the House Kosztyla, Crown prince, sentence you to death by torment. Take him to the castle.”
Brad is silent for a moment, puffing as the prince takes his sword and sheathes it. Then he screams, his pleas turning into wails and sobs as they pick him up, bind his hands and feet, and carry him out.
“Hang the rest,” the prince says, as casually as he might tell his men to throw out a bag of garbage. “Leave them for the crows.”
Then he turns to me.
“You,” then to Melissa, “and you. Come.”
Melissa stands up, shaking like a leaf.
Surrounded by his men, we walk. He keeps pace with us, moving with ponderous, careful slowness, as if the armor suddenly weighs him down.
He looks at Melissa.
“You will be taken to a hospital. There you will be examined and treated for any injuries.”
Melissa starts to cry.
He looks at me.
“You’re scaring her. Take off your helmet.”
Those black eye slits study me hard, and then he gives the slightest of nods, a movement so tiny I wouldn’t have noticed it if I didn’t hear the tiny whirr his suit makes when it moves. He reaches up and sinks his clawed fingertips into notches at the base of the helmet, and it pops open with a soft hiss.
Player's Princess (A Royal Sports Romance) Page 31