Fearless

by Jennifer Jenkins

  Laden shot to his feet, his chair flying behind him. He pounded his fist on the table, the power of his strike sending an echoing boom to every corner of the tent. He’d once told Zo the only way to reason with a Kodiak was through shouting and dramatics. He slipped into the role like a natural. “Your terms with the girl do not demand immediate action. I will not lead my men to be slaughtered because of your Kodiak impatience!”

  The Kodiak’s face and neck turned crimson as he glared at Commander Laden. “Will you, or will you not help me, Commander?” he said each word with determined precision.

  Zo looked between the men, knowing whatever Commander Laden said next would determine her fate.

  Laden sat back into his chair and rested his forehead against steepled fingers. “I will help you, but first you must help yourself.”

  “What do you mean?” Ikatou’s brow sprouted rows of lined skepticism.

  “I need to you lead a team to the Caves and convince Chief Murtog to join us.”

  Ikatou scoffed. “We left because he wouldn’t move against the Ram in the first place. When his wife was killed in the raid that took my family, he stopped fighting. Stopped caring about anything. Those who stay only do so because of their promise to support and defend their chief.”

  “Are you and the others who left the Cave considered traitors and oath breakers?” asked Laden.

  Ikatou stared at him for a long moment, apparently shocked by the question. Laden made it his business to understand the customs of all of the clans. It was one of the reasons he’d managed to form the Allied Army.

  “We should be called oath breakers,” Ikatou finally said. “The chief is too overcome with grief to issue the order, but my people see us as such, just the same.” He cleared his throat. “The shame is … heavy.”

  Laden walked over to the Ikatou and said, “Convince your chief to join us at the Allied Camp. If you can get him to come here, I will formulate a plan to free the Nameless.”

  Ikatou shook his head. “It will not be easy.”

  “It is the last hope of your clan, my friend. Murtog has a soft spot for feminine charm. I suggest you take Zo and Raca with you on your journey.”

  “Me?” said Zo. “I just got here. Tess and Joshua need me.”

  “Exactly,” said Laden. “And this is how you can help them the most right now.”

  As ashamed as she was to admit it, Tess and Joshua weren’t the first people to come to mind. The idea of leaving Gryphon, after they’d finally been reunited, made her physically ill. The trek to the Kodiak Caves was only a few days’ journey, but it didn’t lessen her anxiety over the separation.

  She opened her mouth to protest further but was interrupted by one of Laden’s guards entering the tent. “Sir, a fight on the training fields. The Ram.”

  Laden cursed and stepped toward the tent flaps. He turned back to Ikatou saying, “You will leave in two days’ time.”

  Zo ran out of the tent after Laden and into the blinding sun. She gathered her cumbersome skirt into a fist and sprinted toward the training fields. What was Laden thinking, having Gryphon spend his first day out among the Allies without protection? A string of insults tailored for Laden built on the tip of her tongue as she ran through camp, dodging tents and fire rings, to get to the training fields.

  She literally ran into Eva as she raced onto the trampled practice field.

  “He’s not here,” said Eva. The Ram woman’s hand traveled to her stomach as if to soothe her and Stone’s unborn child.

  “Where is he?” Zo panted.

  “Stone took Gryphon to the Healer’s Tent,” said Eva. Her hair was cropped short around her head, accentuating her pronounced Ram nose. “I was just coming to find you.” Zo hadn’t seen Eva since leaving the Nameless in the wilderness. They’d escaped the Gate together. Survived the wilderness together. And though Zo didn’t particularly like the Ram woman, they shared the complication of falling in love with the enemy.

  Laden arrived at the field, greeted by two of his lieutenants. His handsome face distorted with fury. She took off in the direction of the Healer’s Tent, leaving the sound of Commander Laden’s clipped orders in her wake. The Commander ruled the Allies with absolute authority. Whoever broke his order would be punished without question.

  The Healer’s Tent stood larger than most to accommodate three rows of beds. Zo rushed into the patched buckskin and wool structure to find Gryphon lying in the farthest bed from the flaps, in the back corner. He wasn’t alone. Three other men lay in beds on the opposite side of the tent, near the flaps.

  Stone stood as a sentinel at Gryphon’s feet with thick arms folded across his chest. The large Nameless leader answered Zo’s questions before she even asked.

  “He was attacked. Did his best not to fight back, but eventually lashed out.” He nodded in the direction of the other men in the tent. One sat on a bed hugging his elbow to his chest, sweat beading on his brow. Millie was bandaging another’s chest while a third lay unconscious.

  “I’m fine,” said Gryphon from behind Stone. “You’re making it sound worse than it was.”

  Stone stepped aside and Gryphon offered Zo a painful smile. His left eye was swollen shut and bruises were already peeking out from the sleeves of his shirt.

  “They beat him soundly,” said Stone. “Don’t let him tell you otherwise. He passed out for a solid five minutes after a coward took a wooden broadsword to the back of his head.”

  Zo didn’t waste a moment. She lunged for her kit and removed the knife she kept hidden in a sheath on her thigh. “I can take things from here, Stone. Thank you.”

  Stone nodded and ducked his head as he stepped out of the tent.

  Gryphon eyed the knife in Zo’s hand. “You planning to finish the job your clansmen started?” He smiled weakly.

  “Not funny,” said Zo. She took hold of the bottom of his shirt and cut a vertical strip in the front. After setting the knife down, she took hold of the fabric on both sides of the cut and tore the shirt open, leaving Gryphon’s chest bare.

  He blinked with his one good eye. “Most women would wait until we were alone, but I can see you want to waste no time.” His attempt at a wink was as pathetic as it was endearing.

  Zo wasn’t in the mood to hear his efforts at lightening the situation. “Lie down,” she ordered, pushing him back onto the waist-high bed so she could better examine his injuries.

  “Just a few hard hits. Nothing I can’t survive.”

  Zo shook her head and walked her fingers around his muscled chest and ribcage. At any other time, the sight of Gryphon without his shirt would have burned her cheeks, but he was hurt, and in a way, it was her fault.

  Every few inches her fingers touched a spot on his skin that made Gryphon release a sharp exhale and ball his fists. Upon further examination of each rib, he actually cried out in pain.

  “Those bloody cowards,” said Zo. She reached for her kit and found Tess at her side. Tess handed Zo her favorite concoction of oils and herbs without a word. Zo nodded her thanks and applied the medicine before placing her hand over each broken rib and offering a blessing.

  Her hands warmed as the familiar words—words handed down from her own mother—passed her lips. The pull of the energy stirred in her stomach and swelled up through her chest, down her arms, and out through her hands. She took his pain and willed the body to heal, pushing her own energy into him to speed the healing process. The healing energy never used to travel through her with such speed and power.

  When she and Gryphon were attacked by Gryphon’s old mess captain, and Zo was faced with the likelihood of losing Gryphon forever, she’d somehow managed to tap into a new pool of energy, something that she’d never known existed within her. When she drew from the pool, it felt different from the healing her mother had taught her, powerful in its depth and frightening in its ability to drain her own energy.

  “You’re shaking.” Gryphon reached out and placed a h
and on her cheek.

  Zo caught her breath, savoring Gryphon’s gentle touch, before she placed her fingers over the swollen tissue around his eye. Heat flowed through her hand as she channeled her love for him. She pressed her free hand onto the bed for balance and let the remainder of her energy flow into him.

  When she dropped her hand, her fingers were so cold she could hardly bend them. But the swelling around his eye had vanished, and even the dark bruise that had formed was replaced by healthy pink tissue.

  He watched her in stunned silence, all attempts at humor lost in the intensity of the moment. Taking hold of her hand, he pulled it to his lips and kissed each finger.

  Zo leaned her head against his shoulder, sharing some of the warmth she’d just given him. Did he feel her love during the healing? She certainly had. It blinded and consumed her, and left her heart sputtering and gasping for renewal.

  “Tess?” She lacked the breath necessary to speak louder than a whisper. “Will you … ”

  Her little sister nodded. “I’ll tend to his bruises.”

  Millie walked over and frowned at Zo. She’d somehow found herself sharing Gryphon’s narrow healing bed, resting in the wing of his protection, half asleep. She hadn’t remembered burrowing into his side. Her eyes fluttered open and shut. She was barely able to stay awake as a strange and distant pain grew in her stomach. A contracting pain that made her shudder along with the cold.

  “What manner of healing was that?” the old woman asked Tess, her voice muted and distant.

  Zo’s position shifted as Gryphon inched off the bed and slid his arms beneath her knees and back. He lifted her as though she were a child. She tried to protest against his exertions, but knew his ribs were strong and whole. She had felt them shift and mend under her hands during the healing. Somehow.

  Gryphon carried her into the adjoining Women’s Tent and laid her down in her own bed. She let her fingers slide the length of his firm chest, let her eyes flutter open and linger on his handsome face as he leaned over her semi-unconscious form to kiss her forehead and then her lips.

  “I love you, too,” he whispered in her ear. The warmth of his breath against her skin carried her into a dream-filled sleep where fiery pain lanced her abdomen and spread through her veins, radiating to every corner of her body.

  Millie’s distant question tumbled through her semi-conscious mind.

  “What manner of healing is this?”

  Trapped in her pain, Zo had to wonder if the concern in Millie’s voice was actually foreboding. This new level of healing—whatever it was—hurt.

  Gryphon stared down at Zo, tears invading his vision. He brushed them away—one thought plaguing him, staining the beauty of the moment.

  How will I ever leave her?

  Twenty-two days remained before the scheduled meeting. Twenty-two. How would he explain his decision to Zo in a way she might understand? It was one thing to torment himself, but after feeling Zo’s healing hands upon his body, upon his face, he understood, like never before, just how much his absence would distress her.

  She loved him. There was no room to question her feelings when the velvety warmth of her love and compassion ran through his very veins. With her touch, the fierce pains of his body had faded to almost nothing—replaced with achingly sweet light.

  He pulled the blanket bunched at the bottom of her bedroll up around her shoulders before small hands tugged him away from Zo’s sleeping form.

  “Let her rest. You still have bruises I need to mend,” said Tess.

  Millie frowned over Tess’s shoulder but didn’t say anything to contradict Tess.

  Gryphon walked back into the Healer’s Tent in something of a daze. Tess worked on him in silence, except when she murmured her quiet blessings. The flow of the child’s healing touch was like a babbling brook compared to Zo’s fast-paced current of power.

  When she finished her work and began clearing away supplies from Zo’s kit, Gryphon asked, “Is everything all right, Tess?”

  Tess’s tiny lips pursed and she looked away.

  Gryphon sat up from his bed and frowned. “Are you mad at me?” The girl had hardly spoken a word to him since he arrived yesterday.

  Slamming the medical kit on a table filled with other supplies and bandages, Tess blurted, “Why do people always have to leave me?”

  Gryphon blinked. “Excuse me?”

  Tess sighed. “I’m tired of being left behind. My parents. Zo. One day Joshua will leave to go fight some war. Gabe left us under the tree and you will leave me too.”

  “How do you know?” Gryphon asked, his throat dry.

  “Because that’s what people do. I hate Zo.”

  “No you don’t.”

  Tess perched her hands on her narrow hips. “I want to hate her. It would be easier. She lied to me, Gryph.”

  “She was just protecting you.”

  Tess sighed, her anger waning. “Sometimes I think protecting means lying.”

  Gryphon tugged at Tess’s arm and pulled her to sit in his lap. “Sometimes we have to leave to protect those we love.” He thought of his best friend Ajax, his wife Sara, and their newborn child. Then he considered the lives of the other brothers in his mess. The shame and dishonor that would befall their families if their Ram citizenship wasn’t restored. Gryphon had no choice but to leave, for their sakes.

  But I’m a liar, too.

  Tess sat lost in thought for a long while before she finally nodded to herself and said, “I think if you really loved someone, you wouldn’t leave them behind. When you leave, you choose something else instead of them. It isn’t fair.”

  She swatted a tear from her cheek, her bitter tone contradicting her innocence. “One day I will be the only one left, because everyone will choose someone—or something—instead of me.”

  She sprang from his arms and ran from the tent.

  Chapter Eight

  Zo and Raca sat with a group of Nameless women assigned to help in the Healer’s Tent.

  Not Nameless, but Freemen.

  She mentally chided herself for forgetting the distinction. They all gathered around as she showed them how to treat a number of basic wounds. Laden had asked her and Millie to teach them so they might be useful if the Allies ever confronted the Ram in battle.

  Since women were not permitted to fight, those not training to assist healers were assigned to work in the new Freeman district of the massive camp, tending fires and grinding bushels of raw grains into flour for bread. Another group dug the remainder of last year’s crop of potatoes, carrots, turnips, and onions from the ground for stews. There was wool to be woven and clothes to sew, men to train and rules to establish for the newest members of the Allied Camp.

  Because many of the Freemen had lived most of their lives as Ram slaves, Stone, their leader, didn’t take to the idea of them merging into the other clans. Zo learned that upon the Freemen’s arrival, Stone was appointed chief of the Freemen and helped his people find their own identity apart from the Allies.

  “Have you seen him today?” Raca asked Zo once the women were all busy cutting bandages from sun-bleached wool.

  Zo looked up from her work and frowned. “Who?”

  “Gryphon.” Raca chewed on her bottom lip. “I hear he was badly beaten in the training field yesterday.”

  Zo studied Raca from the corner of her eye. She knew the Raven chief’s daughter had formed a friendship with Gryphon while they were travel companions on the journey to the Allies, but the concern in her voice made her suspicious. “I worked on him yesterday. I understand, beyond some sore muscles, he’s doing fine.”

  Zo, on the other hand, ached all over. Gryphon’s healing had fatigued her more than usual, and when she woke in the morning, pain lanced throughout her body, especially her stomach area. She’d changed her clothes with the speed of an old woman and, before pulling a clean shift over her head, noticed strange, deep bruising around her ribs.

 
; Gryphon hadn’t come to see her yet today. Laden probably had him busy with assignments. She doubted he even knew that she would be leaving for the Caves in the morning.

  “I worry about him,” Raca continued. “My brother tells me Laden demoted two of his lieutenants, and that he publicly punished the Wolves who joined the attack against him. If the Wolves disliked Gryphon before, they hate him now.”

  The horn signaling midmeal echoed in the distance. Most of the Allies ate with their own clans, but Zo, Joshua, Tess, and the few emissaries to Commander Laden shared the Meeting Tent at mealtime.

  “Laden doesn’t tolerate any form of dissention in his camp,” said Zo. “He’s always been strict of character, even when I was a little girl.”

  Raca’s eyes grew wide. “You’ve known him for a long time then?”

  “Almost as long as I can remember. He and my parents were close.”

  Zo stood on tiptoe, hoping to spot Gryphon in the crowd of men.

  “Some disagree with Laden’s punishments,” Raca whispered at Zo’s side. “Because the attack was made against a Ram, they don’t feel like the Wolves should have been punished so harshly.”

  “Zo!” Joshua’s pitch-changing voice reached her through the crowded buzz of chatter from the men whom, she recognized now, were not headed toward their camps for midmeal, but instead to the southern portion of camp.

  Zo saw the boy’s red hair pass through the crowd before materializing in front of her. Out of habit and instinct, Zo pulled the boy into a hurried embrace. Spending the past months constantly worried about the people she loved forced such behavior.

  “The Raven Clan. They’re here!” Joshua returned Zo’s quick embrace.

  Raca squealed. “Finally!” She raced off in the direction of the rest of the camp while Joshua took Tess by the waist and hoisted her onto his shoulders. She giggled in delight as he and Zo raced after Raca to witness the arrival of the Raven Clan.