by Sara Hubbard
Butterflies danced wildly in my stomach as he reached up and stroked the back of my hand with his own. “You forget I’m to be married.”
“And that’s what you want?”
“No. It was never what I wanted.”
“What do you want?”
I laughed. “This.”
Remmie frowned. “I’m not sure I understand.”
Of course he didn’t. How could I communicate to him that I’d seen and lived more in the last few weeks than I had in my entire life? I wanted more travel, more adventure. How ridiculous was it for me to have to be kidnapped to realize my dreams, and also…to find a man I cared for. “Nothing,” I said with a smile. “I’m just glad I got to see more of this island, that’s all.”
“And what of your fiancé?”
“Who knows? Perhaps he might not have me after all this trouble. But even if he did, I’m not sure I could accept him anymore, no matter how much the town will disapprove.”
“That’s important to you?”
“Yes and no. Yes, because my family will be devastated by it and everyone in town will torment them.
“I’d kill anyone that tormented you.”
I raised my eyebrows at him. “Thanks, but I don’t think that will be necessary.”
“If you should change your mind…” Remmie said with a small smile.
“You’ll be the first to know.”
He looked up at the sky as if lost in thought. What occupied his mind? I wanted to know.
“I won’t allow them to give you to the king,” he said, out of the blue. “No matter what the gypsy says.”
I took his hand in mine and turned our hands over so my palm was facing down. When I stretched my fingers, he did the same. My hand was so small in comparison; my fingers barely reached past the edges of his palm.
“I know that,” I said, “but that’s not what troubles me.”
“Your father and brother and fiancé?”
“Yes.”
“I already told you I was sorry. What more can I do?”
“Could you ever allow yourself to care for someone who broke your father’s leg on purpose? And if you did, wouldn’t you feel incredibly disloyal?”
He attempted to let go of my hand, but I refused to let him. Not touching him made the nagging pain in my chest and my heart hurt all the more.
“I should have just reasoned with the others and convinced them to let you and your family go.”
I shook my head. “Would they have listened?” I frowned at him, feeling very doubtful. Nole wouldn’t have agreed to it. “And who knows what James would have done if you’d allowed me to leave?
Things might have been worse. Nole was still set on my being taken to the king at that point. He might have sided with James.”
“No, never. We are all brothers in arms. We would never turn on one another, and James was an outsider and a spy.”
“Yes, but who’s to say what James would have done to my family and me if you turned me loose. He might have separated from you and the others and killed my brother and father. He wouldn’t have let it go; I think we both know that for certain.” I spoke the truth, but it didn’t erase what Remmie had done to my family, and it didn’t ease my conscience. No matter how desperately I wanted it to.
With that, we passed several wordless minutes together, my hand still in his. I looked up to the heavens and begged the gods to help me work through my feelings and to watch over my family. I also prayed for them to watch over my savages—Remmie, perhaps, more than the others.
“Why didn’t you keep running, Isame? What made you come back?”
“I had every intention of leaving. I knew there were monsters in the mountains and I said nothing. I planned on escaping, but when it became reality, I just couldn’t force myself to leave you. I would have hated myself if you and the others were killed. It would have been my fault. As much as I wanted to hate all of you for taking me and hurting my family, I just can’t. I’ve become…fond of all of you.”
“All of us?”
“Yes. All of you.” Some more than others.
I shivered as Remmie inched closer to lean against my legs. His body heat and my feelings for him instantly warmed me from the core out. I sighed without meaning to. The wind ruffled the hair that had fallen from my braid, and an owl hooted from a nearby tree. I half smiled at the sound of the men’s snores radiating from the barn; the noise comforted me somehow.
“I need you to promise me something,” he said, his eyes locking onto mine.
I nodded.
“Do what I say without question until this is over.”
I furrowed my brow. I didn’t want a man to have such power over me, especially this man who already had more power over me than I wanted to admit. I knew I should say no.
“Please,” he said, surprising me.
“Why?”
“I’ll keep you safe. That’s the only thing that matters to me right now.”
The desperation in his shimmering eyes softened my heart and when I opened my mouth I couldn’t force myself to say no.
“Don’t make me regret it, Remmie,” I warned him, but a feeling in the pit of my stomach told me that I would.
Chapter 14
AFTER A FEAST of eggs, and armed with a dozen bottles of rum punch, we headed for Lipsis. My parents barely spoke of Lipsis, so I had no idea what to expect. I imagined a port town would be rather big and industrious, quite dissimilar from Haevene, but when we arrived I could hardly make the comparison in the dark.
As we approached it, the tops of the buildings made the town look like an uneven wall of black.
Gray smoke curled from chimneys to meet the clouds. The smell of fish and saltwater filled the air so completely that I could taste them. Rows of streets were aglow with fat, blazing torches, and the faint candlelight in windows hinted at life. Since the boat we would travel on did not set sail until the morning, we followed the noise of laughter and music, certain it would take us to an inn.
The music led us to a poorly constructed two-story wooden eyesore. It looked more like a falling down barn than a pub or an inn. The wood was rotting in parts and was blackened from a previous fire.
The dented door was wide open and the sound of drums, a flute, and bagpipes flooded through it and filled the streets. An old man hiccupped as he crawled along the mud at the base of the building. “Lost me hat, I has.” He reeked of feet and sweat.
Otis looked down at the man, frowning. “Looks promising.”
Was that sarcasm?
Cockroaches scurried about the hay on the floor inside, skittering under the tables and between our feet. There were a half dozen tables—all occupied—and a bar. A patron laughed and spewed whiskey from his mouth, igniting the candle in front of him. A crimson flame punched up toward the ceiling before settling back down to its normal size and regaining a faint orange hue.
This was the savages’ idea of promising?
To my surprise and absolute dismay, Nole secured four rooms on the second floor. One for each of the men—but none for me. I had hoped that the men trusted me enough by now to afford me my own room, but I was going to be sharing again. I wondered how they could risk everything for someone they still mistrusted.
Some of the men laughed loudly as a couple of them threw fists at each other in the corner. One of them collapsed to the floor, and a big, burly man grabbed the other man’s arms and dragged him toward the door. I’d never seen the likes of this place before and I hoped I never would again. The men here seemed so dissimilar from the men at home. I never realized until now how sheltered my life had truly been.
We weaved through the crowd in single file. I felt several pairs of eyes on me and I rounded my shoulders and folded my arms across my chest. Though all I wanted was rest and food, tonight it seemed I’d have to suffer through the noise and the chaos of drunken men. We impatiently waited for a table until Nole and the others decided they would surround one and stare down the locals un
til they got up and left.
“You need to work on your manners,” I told them.
Nole raised a brow. “Should we have stood around and waited?”
I glared at him and, after realizing he was completely serious, I nodded.
“An interesting suggestion. But no, I think not. We’re hungry and they weren’t eating. They can stand and drink, but it would be difficult for us to stand and eat,” he said innocently.
I shrugged and let it go. I hadn’t the strength to argue at lengths with him over his manners. I was too tired and too sore. It had taken us almost twelve hours of walking and six bottles of rum punch to get to Lypsis.
“Welcome to the Lion’s Den,” said the female server. “We have roasted pork and potatoes.”
I didn’t see the kitchen but the cockroaches were enough to put me off of the food.
“We’ll have five, and some ale too,” Nole said before I could decline.
The server curtsied and left us, but not before giving Nole a shy smile. She was pretty, young and curvaceous with high cheekbones and porcelain-smooth skin.
The savages talked and laughed and I tried to keep up with the conversation, but after a while the noise and the smoke made my head hurt, and my mouth felt as if I’d been chewing on sand.
“I’m going to get some water and some air,” I said, speaking over the noise.
“Are you ill?” Remmie stood when I did.
My stomach fluttered just thinking about the flash of concern in his eyes. “I’m fine. I’ll be back in a minute.” I patted his arm before walking away. When I looked over my shoulder, he still stood. Otis pulled him back down to a sitting position and slapped him on his back before his gaze broke away from mine.
The man behind the bar wore giant hooped earrings and had black tattoos of skulls and bones on his arms. He was pouring ale for another customer when I sauntered up to him. The customer leered at me and licked his lips, but I tried to pretend as if I didn’t notice. I prayed he wouldn’t talk to me. I didn’t think I had the energy for small talk.
I asked the man behind the bar for some water, but he didn’t respond. I wondered if he’d heard me. I shouted at him. “Water! Please.”
The barman nodded and turned to grab a mug. As I waited, two gentlemen came up on either side of me and stood so close that I had to cross my arms across my chest to fit in between them. It made me uncomfortable. As I tried, without success, to move, a hand planted firmly on my back.
“What’s a lovely lady like you doing in a place like this?” one of them asked me.
I wondered the same thing myself. “I’m here with friends. The savages over there.” Surely, mentioning the Daentarry would make the men leave me alone.
“Those men right there,” said another, pointing to my captors, who were already throwing back ale and had forgotten all about me.
I frowned.
“Cheer up, lass. You can count on our undivided attention.”
“Does it not scare you that I’m in the company of savages? Are you not afraid that you’ll anger them?
“Not me,” said one.
“Me neither,” said the other.
“Please excuse me.” They refused to move. “I said, excuse me.”
The bigger one, with black eyes and matted brown hair, raised his arm and let me pass. I immediately made for the side door. I could have gone back to my friends and I probably should have, but the place was so crowded I could barely breathe in there and the noise made my ears ring. When I stepped outside, I took a deep breath and drank in the salty smell of the ocean. The men from the bar blew through the doors behind me. They each grabbed one of my arms and dragged me along the street.
“Let me go!” I screamed as I flailed. I was now being kidnapped from my kidnappers. How often does that happen? I wiggled and screamed. They stopped and one of the men pulled me tight against his chest. The knife he pressed to my throat was so sharp I felt heat where the blade touched my skin before warm blood trickled down to my collarbone. My entire body tensed.
“Be quiet or we’ll kill you now,” the one who held me whispered into my ear. His thick, low voice made the hair on the back of my neck rise. Carefully, I turned my head to meet his beady brown eyes. He wasn’t much bigger than I was, but I could tell from the strength of his grip that I couldn’t overpower him.
He grabbed a fistful of my hair and sniffed. “You smell awfully pretty.” He lowered the knife and spun me around, crushing his lips into mine, trying to force his tongue into my mouth. I bit it until I tasted blood. He pushed me away and ran one of his hands across his mouth. Blood dripped down his chin and, after seeing the blood dripping from his hand, he glared at me with pure hatred. “You bitch!”
I cocked my fist back and swung, making contact with his jaw. Not smart and so unlike me, but I was done playing the victim.
I had to stall. Soon my Daentarry friends would come looking for me. They would tear through the streets until they found me. As I considered this, the shorter one slapped me with such force that he knocked off my feet and I landed on my back several feet away.
I propped myself up on my elbows and shook my head. The pain in my jaw sliced through my face and neck. The music from the inn boomed and so did the crowd. Remmie and the others would never hear my screams.
“They will kill you,” I said to the men, loudly. Ironically, I was more concerned about their lives than mine. Whatever scars they inflicted on me would soon fade into nothingness. These men would never recover from my friends’ anger. Soon they would inflict unmentionable pain on the two men who’d hurt me.
The bigger one stomped over to me and punched me in the stomach, then the face. I drew my knees up and covered my head with my arms. Another blow. A fire ignited inside of me and I began punching and kicking and screaming like a madwoman. I doubted I caused much damage, but I wouldn’t go down without a fight. I felt the skin of my cheek tear down to the bone and I screamed out in pain, prompting the man to hit me harder than he had before. Two blows to my skull and one to my chest.
I lay on the ground, arms splayed, when someone pulled the man off me and threw him to the ground.
My friends. Finally, they’d come to save me. When I lifted my head, I gasped. The man who’d rescued me had curly red hair and green eyes. It couldn’t be. He was dead.
James.
Blood splashed the wall of the pub as James pounded the man over and over again. Bones crushed and snapped under James’s fists. I almost vomited from the sound. The man’s blood sprayed on me, entering my mouth. I coughed and spit it onto the dirt.
The man tried to fight James off, but he was much too fast for a feeble human. I wanted to move over to them, to jump on James’s back to stop him, but I was covered in gashes and blood, and I could barely move my limbs.
The other human looked on, wide-eyed. A dark circle of urine appeared at his feet. “Run!” But he didn’t move an inch. I don’t think he blinked.
As the large human lay dying in the dirt, James withdrew a dagger from his belt.
“No!”
He drove the dagger straight into the man’s heart. After a quick gasp, the life in the man’s eyes dimmed. James dropped him to the ground. I couldn’t move. I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t do anything but stare.
Like a crouching cat, James snapped his head in the direction of his remaining prey. He wiped the sweat from his brow and pointed his dagger to the smaller human. “Your turn.”
Like a cannonball, he zipped through the air and into the man’s midsection. The man fell backward, his head meeting a rock with a crack. James leaned over from where he landed to snap the man’s neck with one swift twist. The crunch traveled straight through me and my stomach lurched into my throat.
I scrambled to my feet, every ounce of my pain forgotten as fear and shock overcame me. I reached the pub’s side door when James grabbed my hair and yanked me backward. My shoes fell off and fine rocks sliced through my feet. A trail of blood followed behind me.
“Thought you were rid of me, did you?” James growled.
“You’re dead. Remmie killed you.” I held onto my hair so he wouldn’t rip it from my skull.
“You saved me,” he said. “Or should I say, your blood saved me. And now that I’ve had a taste, I think I might have to keep you for myself.” He turned a corner into a dark alleyway and threw me to the ground. He wrapped his thick arms around my neck and crushed me with the weight of his body before sucking at the open wound on my cheek. I shook my head, trying to stop him, but he pressed my head down with his forehead. I grabbed the sides of his face and tried to push him away, but I might as well have been trying to move a mountain. Desperate, I dug my fingernails into his eyes.
“Argh.” He clutched at his eyes and cursed at me as he fell backward. He reached out, waving his hands through the air to find me. Fueled by adrenaline, I shot to my feet and ran to the inn, calling for Remmie, for Nole. For anyone.
Before I reached the inn door, I fell into warm, thick arms. “James,” I managed before I collapsed against him. “He’s alive.”
Chapter 15
I WINCED IN pain as Remmie attempted to scoop me up. I felt as if I had been crushed by a boulder.
All of my bones felt that they might break from his touch. Every ounce of me felt beaten and a red haze clouded my eyes. With unfailing tenderness, Remmie gently cradled me into his chest and lightly kissed my mutilated face.
“Gods!” Nole’s gaze flashed to my face. Fine wrinkles appeared around his eyes as he frowned in sympathy. A flush rose from his chin to his hairline and his eyes turned hard as stone. He lightly draped the cape over me and my face before I heard a thunderous splintering of wood.
I dreamed of home. I could feel the warmth of my sister lying next to me. I could smell the bread baking in the oven pit. I could hear the sounds of my mother and father bantering back and forth, in a way that hinted at their deep-rooted affection and intimacy. As the corners of my mouth curled into a smile, I patted the space around me, searching for my sister’s tiny, warm body. We had shared a bed since she was a baby. Then, I came to a halting realization: none of it was real. And yet, the thoughts that filled my head as I slept were more real to me than the life I currently lived. In what world would a young woman cooperate with the men who had abducted her because she came to think of them as friends? In what world would she worry about what could happen to them and their families should she not be delivered to their king, as promised? No, this life was far from realistic.