Mud splashed as Shardon spun around, Rygel’s hand on his sword. Arianne lost her grip on his arm. Wheeling her Rufus, she tried in vain to stop his wild careen forward. Her hand reached for his shoulder as Shardon stopped, a foot from Sabella.
Rygel’s expression alarmed me. His flattened eyes, clenched jaw, rigid lips skinned back from his slick teeth spoke of murderous intent. Kel’Ratan swiftly nudged his stallion to Rygel’s flank, ready to halt any potential attack on Sabella. Arianne urged her Rufus to his other side, her tiny hand gripping his collar.
“Do you know how much I want to kill you right now?” he all but screamed. “I should kill you for what you’ve done.”
“Rygel, she’s under my protection–” I began.
“Go back to the hell you spawned from, bitch. I’ll kill you right now, blast your heart into–”
Sabella smiled. She lifted her head, exposing her naked throat. “Please. You’d be doing me a favor, though I couldn’t expect such kindness from you.”
Whatever Rygel expected, it wasn’t that. Cursing under his breath, he stared hard at the muddy ground, his face once more averted. Kel’Ratan relaxed a fraction, yet remained on guard and his hands ready to scoot his horse between Rygel and his prey. Arianne’s hand didn’t drop from his jacket, however, and her glorious eyes narrowed with concern.
“I refuse Her Highness’s offered protection,” she went on softly. “I’ve done great wrong. If my life will heal the harm I have done, please take it. It’s yours.”
Rygel groaned, covering his face with his hands. “Gods, I want–I can’t–”
I jerked my head, a silent command for Kel’Ratan to stand down. He nodded, reining his horse back. He knew as well as I that had Rygel truly wanted to kill her he’d have done it by now. Arianne, neatly edging Rufus closer to Shardon, seized his hands in hers and dragging them from his pale, agonized face. He turned to her, drawing his breath in ragged gasps and dropped his face into her shoulder.
I sought to distract all attention from him. His emotions laid bare for all to witness, he didn’t need anyone save Arianne see his soul opened as well.
“How did you happen to come here?” I asked her, my voice soft.
Sabella glanced up at me, at once understanding my intent. She curtseyed again, her brown wool trailing in the mud. “I escaped Brutal and his vile soldiers when my last rapist fell asleep. Tuco found me starving and shivering in a back alley of Soudan. He cared for my wounds, gave me food and a night’s shelter. He offered to take me with him to mine gold, he and his friends.
“He’s good to me,” she added earnestly, her blue eyes sincere. “He treats me well. I’ve food and a little money. I’ve warm shelter from the mountains. I can’t complain. My life could be far worse.”
“Tuco owns you?” Rygel snapped, half-turning his head toward her. “You’re a slave?”
Sabella smiled. “In all but name. I willingly entered into this contract, however. One must pay for one’s sins.”
“Sins–” Rygel began, choking.
“Do I not deserve such after what I have done?”
“What you deserve is–”
Shardon took Rygel away before he could break further, his chin on his chest and his eyes squeezed shut. The pair stopped just outside the ring of my boys, near Left and Right. Oddly, Arianne didn’t follow after him this time, but sat in her saddle alternating her confused and worried gaze between his back and Sabella.
“I never truly thought I’d see him again,” Sabella said quietly. She offered up a short, humorless laugh. “I’d be a liar if I said I wasn’t surprised to find him–alive.”
“Alive?” I asked.
She nodded. “After what Brutal did to me, I didn’t think Rygel could survive Brutal and tros both. Thinking of him dead weighted my conscience, though I prayed he lived and I might speak to him again.”
“Apparently your petitions have been answered,” I said simply.
A small frown crossed her scarred brow. “Odd. That the gods might answer one such as I.”
“Your Highness?”
Past Kel’Ratan, Witraz and Yuri, Rygel’s wan, pale face appeared over his shoulder, though he still had his back turned to me. “Might I see you for a moment?”
Kel’Ratan scowled at Rygel’s obvious breach in protocol. Vassals didn’t ask their liege to come to them. Perhaps this situation didn’t require the usual conventions, I suspected, but instead needed compassion and tolerance. I certainly didn’t mind attending on Rygel at this particular moment.
Waving away Kel’Ratan’s annoyance, I reined Mikk between his horse and Witraz’s piebald, brushing my cousin’s bristly cheek in passing. Rygel had hunched his back, his wheaten head down, his fingers nervously playing with Shardon’s reins.
His face rose a fraction as I halted beside him, then hid when he turned away, his hair sweeping across his cheek.
“I’m so sorry, forgive me,” he said, speaking fast, his words running together. “I can’t–I can’t–ask this of you in front of–in front of her–”
“Peace, brother,” I said softly. “It’s all good.”
At my words, his breath gusted out on a short gasp, as though they were the last he’d expected. He drew in a ragged lungful of air and relaxed a fraction. At last he found courage enough to offer me a lightning glance from his bloodshot eyes. Waiting, I took in the scene, the protective stance of my boys and Tor, the townsfolk clearly not interested in fighting. Under me, Mikk sighed down his nose and swished his heavy tail.
Many of the locals paused in their activities to stare and whisper. Now the drama had evidently ended and no one would be killed, folk returned to their pre-drama errands. Several more people shrugged and muttered, walked away and pulled their donkeys behind them. Tuco and his pals argued over the ‘tax’ they’d just earned with several other villagers. No doubt they felt that such a ‘tax’ should be shared equally, despite Tuco and his pals placing their lives on the line to obtain it.
Out of earshot of the others, Rygel bent his wheaten head toward me, his amber eyes in agony. “May I–” Rygel choked, coughed, turning to shove his mouth into his shoulder.
I waited, patient, already knowing what he’d ask. Rygel never could hide his emotions, nor his thoughts. In this, he was as transparent as a piece of glass. I even felt pleasure, and pride, in his plan. To grant him his privacy, I turned in my saddle and dug for the gold Federates. Tuatha, balanced on my pommel, whined low in his throat. Damn, I hoped they weren’t at the very bottom.
They weren’t. Midway down, my fingers found the leather bag of gold coins Brutal had given me, in a place and time so very distant from here. Extracting five, I closed the bag and retied my saddle bags. Unlike Rygel, Shardon bent his head past his massive shoulder to watch me, his liquid brown eyes grave. I winked at him.
Facing forward once more, I found Rygel had recovered some of his composure. His wan and very pale face appeared haunted, his eyes shadowed, his cheeks gaunt as though he’d been starved for weeks.
“Will this be enough?” I asked, holding open my fingers, the gold resting on my palm.
He dragged his eyes up to mine, his mouth opening then closing. His throat bobbed in a convulsive swallow. “Princess–”
“No worries,” I replied lightly. “What is one’s soul worth?”
Leaning out of his saddle, he kissed me quickly on the cheek. “Will you do it?”
“Of course. What about a horse?”
“I’ll take care of that right now.”
As he closed my right hand over the coins under Tuatha’s black nose, he nodded, once to me, relief etching his wan face. As Shardon took him at the trot back through my boys, I walked Mikk toward Tuco and his mates. The townsmen, discovering me at their backs, parted, melting from my path with uneasy mutters. Tuco still argued with four other men, ignorant of my presence in their midst.
“Tuco?” I said, gathering his attention.
He glanced up, suspicious. “What is it
?”
“I wish to buy Sabella from you.”
“Buy her?” he exclaimed, his eyes growing hot. “Don’t be ridiculous, you can’t buy her, I need her. Without her, I’d not get the money I get from selling her services–”
With my right hand filled with the coins, I raised my fist to allow them to trickle into my left. Gold tinkled, making music that filled every ear within hearing. From my left, I poured them, a gold river, back into my right. Tuco’s mates, and the townsfolk, leaned forward, greed filling their expressions.
Tuco’s eyes cooled immediately. His jaw dropped. Drool slid from the corner of his mouth to line his chin.
“You were saying?” I asked sweetly.
“I, er–”
“I’d suggest this in my hand would buy Sabella’s services for years. This, and the toll we already paid you, would make you the richest man in town. Wouldn’t you agree?”
Tuco only nodded, his gaze never leaving the gold in my hand.
“Once you accept this, her debt to you is paid in full?” I asked, withholding the Federates.
“It is,” he replied, his voice hoarse.
“She is free?”
“She is.”
I tossed the coins toward him. “You made a wise bargain, Tuco,” I said somberly, watching him all but dive headlong into the muck, frantically gathering up the Federate money. “We could’ve taken her from you by force. You know that, don’t you?”
Tuco rose from his knees, now dripping mud and knuckled his brow. “Indeed, I do, my lady. I do thank you.”
“Good.”
Turning Mikk, I trotted him back to Kel’Ratan, Arianne and Sabella, his hooves splashing up thick, viscous mud. Arianne had dropped from her saddle, up to her ankles in the nasty, cold mire. She and Sabella were deep in conversation, Arianne’s hand holding Sabella’s.
Interesting. What could those two be talking about? Rygel, forgiveness and repentance? Knowing Arianne as I did, probably. My only question was how did they bond so bloody fast?
Kel’Ratan watched my return with a bristling mustache and somber blue eyes. “They accepted, I take it?” he asked.
I nodded. Sabella turned her face toward me, her mouth opening and her blue eyes wide. She eyed Tuatha’s dark form on my saddlebow, obviously wondering about a wolf pup in my lap, but avoided asking the question. Arianne stood beside her, also gazing up, yet her eyes smiled as though she knew my mind.
She most likely did, too, dammit. Can’t I have any secrets?
Sabella ventured a question I admired she had had the sand to ask. “You escaped your betrothal with the Crown Prince, Your Highness?”
“He’s the High King now,” I answered. “Lionel is dead.”
“I’d not heard,” Sabella replied, her voice small. “As you see, we’re quite isolated up here.”
If she didn’t know about Brutal’s hunt for me, then most likely the town didn’t, either. I shook my head slightly at the relief in Kel’Ratan’s blue eyes, the pursing of his lips beneath his thick red mustache. “Yes,” I replied to Sabella’s question. “I escaped my marriage. After I see some things done here, I’m going home.”
“I don’t blame you,” Sabella replied, her voice soft. “He’d have killed you, you know this?”
I smiled. “I know.”
Rygel squelched through the mud, emerging from behind Yuri, Yuras and Tor. He led his saddled black gelding. Bulging saddlebags hung, tied over the cantle, and a full waterskin swung from the pommel. Shardon followed in his wake, his reins tangled in his thick silver mane. Sabella’s eyes widened upon seeing him and the horse, uncertain, afraid.
Bloody hell. She’ll need some gold, too.
Yet, before I dug out more coins, I watched as Rygel glowered down at Sabella.
“He’s not a gift,” he said tersely. “He’s a loan. I want him back.”
“But–”
“You’ll get word of me and where I am. Ride, now, to a town called Doneta, in Arcadia. It’s at the foot of the mountains, a hundred leagues from the border. Find the man named Josan–he’s an innkeeper at a place called the Golden Ox. Tell him Rygel is calling in his marker.”
“But–”
“Shut up and listen,” Rygel hissed, near anger. “He’s to give you decent employment, and a place to stay. If he does this, his debt to me is paid in full.”
Sabella took the gelding’s reins. “Does this mean you forgive me?”
“It does not,” he replied stiffly. “I, too, must find redemption for the evil I’ve done.”
I caught a lightning glance toward me before he scowled down at her. “This is one way I might start. If you seek to make amends, you may ride now, into a new future. The gods’ll guide you, should you wish to make peace with the evil you’ve done.”
Sabella stared down at the leather reins in her hands. “Will you ever forgive me?” she asked without looking up.
Impatient, angry, clearly wanting rid of her, Rygel glanced anywhere but at her bowed head. “Perhaps. One day, maybe. Be off with you, now.”
Turning sharply away, he vaulted aboard his saddle. Shardon took him away from us, toward the north end of town. Keeping his back to us and his head down; only Arianne might know what he thought. I knew he felt pain, yes, grief certainly, but while magnanimity might hurt the receiver, it certainly offered the giver much needed respite. Rygel’s agony receded a fraction: I felt it.
Suddenly courteous, Kel’Ratan slipped down from his saddle and assisted Sabella onto the black gelding. As he settled her into the saddle and adjusted her stirrups to fit her, I dislodged Tuatha again to dig more Federates from the deep depths. Ten coins gone and yet it hadn’t deflated the bag by very much.
I reached across to clasp her hands with mine as she gathered up the reins. Sabella glanced up, surprised. I jerked my head southward, smiling a little.
“Take that pass south,” I said quickly. “It’s not difficult and this horse is a good one. He’ll take you safely to Arcadia.”
“Your Highness–” she began, but I cut her off, as much as Rygel had.
“Just listen. At the end of the pass lies a river and the desert. There you’ll find the Jha’fhar tribe of the Mesaan. Tell Li, their Clan Chief, that I, Ly’Tana of Kel’Halla, wish he resupply you with food and water. And that he is to guide you on the road to Arcadia.”
“He’ll do all this?”
I smiled. “He will. Go on now, girl. Take these.”
I opened her palm and slid the coins in. “Keep these in case of an emergency,” I said, my voice low. “May the gods bless you with safety, succor and the salvation you seek. Go.”
Before she could respond, I slapped the black’s rump with my reins.
Like any good horse, he obeyed. He loped away from the group before Sabella suddenly reined him around. She’s at least a decent rider, I thought as she trotted Rygel’s black to me and Kel’Ratan. Arianne had remounted and walked Rufus away, toward Rygel’s bowed and shaking back. With the rest of my boys in a loose circle around us, none of them were close enough to listen.
With her voice pitched low, only Kel’Ratan and I heard her words. Tears filled her eyes as she watched Rygel. “In between rapes, the Prince beat me, badly. I miscarried of his child.”
I sucked in my breath, catching Kel’Ratan’s wide, astonished gaze. I’d no doubt whose child she carried, and now spoke of. Neither did Kel’Ratan.
Her tears flowing freely, she went on, not wiping them away. “Who knows?” she said softly. “I might have found redemption through his baby.”
She lifted her tear-steamed face to mine. “Tell him or not, the choice is yours.”
With that, Sabella wheeled Rygel’s gelding and struck in her heels. Striking a lope, Sabella’s pale face appeared briefly over her shoulder as he carried her away southward, up the hill we’d descended less than an hour ago.
Kel’Ratan and I watched her ride away in silence. The courageous black horse carried her up to the top of the hill,
his neck flattened with the effort. I knew he’d find his way to Li’s village and safety. In his turn, Li would care for them both before sending them, laden with goods, onto the path that would take them to Arcadia. Far beyond the reach of either Tuco or Brutal.
“Will you tell him?” Kel’Ratan asked softly.
I smiled. “I think Rygel could spend the rest of his days not knowing Brutal killed his child. Don’t you?”
Kel’Ratan began to nod, before his blue eyes suddenly sharpened on me.
“You gave her your blessing,” he said, his tone accusing as the black horse carried her over the hill and vanished, galloping down the far side.
I smiled, spreading my thumb and forefinger apart, less than an inch in between. “Yes,” I replied, my voice conspiring. “Just a little one, and don’t tell him.”
Rygel hadn’t watched her departure. Silent and as still as Shardon beneath him, Rygel hung his head. At the far end of town, he grieved for the love he lost, the vengeance he cast aside and the pride he sought. In setting Sabella free, perhaps he now might find healing within his own soul. I certainly hoped so.
Sitting back in my saddle, I called up my boys with my glance. “I think these horses need water,” I said, my voice content. “With a well so handy, we might need an hour or more to water our mounts.”
Before Kel’Ratan could ask the obvious, I grinned. “Just to make sure Tuco and his pals don’t ride Sabella down after our backs are turned. Not that I don’t trust him,” I said, quirking my brow.
“Of course you don’t,” Kel’Ratan snapped. “You’d be a fool to trust him.”
I leaned close to my cousin, all but squashing Tuatha. “Am I a fool?”
Kel’Ratan’s mustache bristled. “Yes.”
He grinned suddenly. “But we love you anyway.”
Winter’s Ghost
Chapter 9
“Do you feel strange, Darkhan?”
The storm had stopped during the night, and the mid-morning sun burned away the late clouds. Sunlight reflecting off the snow made me squint, trying to cut the glare. After scraping the piled snow off tumbled boulders in a wide meadow, we lay soaking up the sun. Tashira had insisted this place was too good to pass up and munched on cold grass.
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