by Sharon Green
The women and girls, who had obviously been watching the exchange between Fallan and the house guards, paled at the snap in the innkeeper's voice and immediately turned back to what they'd been doing. The three slaves, dressed in filthy rags tied around their middles, short, heavy chains, and a good selection of whip marks, also worked at looking busy, two of them shuffling out of the room on some errand or other. The only ones not upset by the innkeeper's threat were the house guards, who finally relaxed from the stiffened, ready position they'd been in, and sauntered over closer to be heard over the unending flow of commands coming out of their employer.
"Were you about to suggest that we await the arrival of the innkeeper, the suggestion was sound," the dark-haired guard told Fallan with a grin. "It is now clear that you are honored guests, and may be offered a cup or two - when the hubbub has finally quieted."
"A cup or two would be well received," Fallan said with an amiable nod, turning his head to watch the frantically hurrying girls and women, who were being commanded to even greater speed by the innkeeper. "A pity this hubbub will be a while in quieting."
The guard raised his brows in doubt before also looking at the goings-on, but Fallan turned out to be right. The hurrying back and forth took forever to be over, and once it was, half the contents of the kitchen was gone. I remembered all the courses I'd been offered at the last inn, and hoped the redhead was hungry. If it had still been me in her place, I couldn't have eaten a thing.
"You wenches may now serve us and take your own fare," Fallan announced in the sudden peace and quiet, stretching where he stood near the house guards. "I will have a bowl of that root soup and a cut of light bread, but first of all a cup of wine."
"Bring wine for all, including us," the dark-haired house guard amended, looking over at the three girls near me and then, last of all, me. Bellna gasped and backed trembling into her corner at that look, and the guard showed a faint grin. "With your permission, Lieutenant, I would have that red-haired one serve me," he said to Fallan without looking at him. "Is she yours or your captain's?"
"Neither," Fallan answered, putting his hand on the man's shoulder while joining his stare. "Her service belongs to the princess, a fact she is well aware of. By cause of that fact, her actions when out of sight of the princess are much like those of the princess herself. Her service to us is clumsy, reluctant and far from pleasing, for she believes the princess will protect her from our wrath. For the sake of your temper, you would be wise to choose another."
"For the sake of my eyesight, however, there is no other choice," the man laughed in answer, still watching me. "Have her fetch our wine."
"As you please," Fallan agreed with a shrug in his voice, but his eyes were a lot less unconcerned. "Fetch two cups of wine, wench, and see that you do so in an acceptable manner. Should you be beaten the princess may well be furious, yet will you still have received the beating."
I tossed my head and turned away from them, annoyed as all hell that Fallan had boxed me up so neatly. If I refused to serve them Fallan would have to beat me, or the house guards would surely get suspicious. The role I was committed to would let me do not a single thing to stop him, which meant that if I didn't want to be beaten, I'd have to avoid it rather than stop it.
I stalked over to the three peasant girls already working on getting wine and food together for Fallan and his men, ignored their smirks, and appropriated two goblets of wine. Since the goblets had been poured for and by someone else that took care of the smirks, but I didn't care if the girls were displeased with me. If they didn't like what I was doing, they could complain to the "princess."
I carried the two goblets of wine over to Fallan and his new friend, not paying any attention to how much was spilling onto the floor as I moved briskly along. Fallan had laid down the parameters of my new role, and the character he had drawn wouldn't have cared if all of the wine had ended up on the floor. The two men watched me approach, Fallan annoyed but the house guard grinning, and I toyed briefly with the idea of seeing how well the two of them would look wearing the wine.
It seemed like a dandy idea to me - just an accident, of course - but I suddenly became aware of the fact that my mind guest didn't agree. Somehow, the Bellna presence had picked up the thought I'd been toying with and had nearly gone into shock over it, then had begun to pour out flash after flash of nearly pure panic. Her attention was focused more on the house guard than on Fallan, and I was reluctantly forced to agree with her conviction that he would not find having wine spilled all over him at all amusing.
As soon as I decided against the accident Bellna's panic calmed a good deal, proving that she was picking up my intentions. I would have enjoyed looking a little further into the new development, but Fallan and the guard were stepping forward and reaching for the goblets.
"Clumsy, as you said, yet commendably swift," the guard remarked, still grinning as he sipped at the wine he'd taken from me. "A wench clearly trainable by one who is willing to spend the time. Does the princess mean to pass the darkness with us?"
"No," Fallan answered after taking a good swallow from his own goblet. "We depart as soon as her meal is done."
"A pity," the house guard murmured, half his face hidden behind his goblet as he drank. Only his eyes remained visible, and the look in them sent a shudder through Bellna, which she helpfully passed on to me. I didn't much care for the house guard either, but Bellna seemed really afraid of him. I faded back as the two men began to discuss employment opportunities available to mercenaries in Narella, and was rewarded with Bellna's sigh of relief. She would have enjoyed staying near Fallan, but with the house guard there she was happier being a good distance away.
The thought of distance brought back my previous thoughts of separating myself from Fallan and his game, which was still a point well worth considering. I stood to one side of the big kitchen watching the three peasant girls hurrying back and forth with wine and food for Fallan and his men, wondering if the damage had already been done.
At that point I couldn't very well go back to the first inn we'd stopped at, but the present inn would do just as well if I could have access to it without Fallan and his group being there. I wasn't worried about the innkeeper believing my story; there was a great deal of difference between peasant and princess on that world, and a few minutes of conversation with the man would prove everything I said.
No, the biggest problem was the question of which of us Clero's men would find and zero in on, me or the coach and the redhead. I was more than well aware of the fact that Dameron's project would be a success whichever way the choice went, but being that practical was beyond me right now. If Clero's men attacked the coach the redhead and the other three girls would die, right along with Fallan and any of his men who tried to stop them.
I was the only one who knew how well-mounted that attack was sure to be, but I couldn't tell anyone, least of all Fallan. Making a fuss at the inn was the only chance I had of drawing the heat away from the others and back to someone who had a chance of surviving it; letting it go on the easy way was something I couldn't live with.
As soon as all the men were served, my three ex-servants began putting together their own meal. I'd been drifting aimlessly around the edges of the kitchen, passing every doorway in it and trying to decide which of them led outside. Two of them did without a doubt, but Fallan's eyes had been on me the whole time I'd been near them, showing he didn't intend to be caught asleep at the switch.
I could have beat out Fallan in any footrace ever proposed, but our little to-do in the tent a short while earlier had shown me I would need overland travel mode to do a real job of it. Overland travel mode lets an agent draw on his or her entire bodily resources, which makes it very draining even when used for only a short while.
During that short while, however, speed and endurance are improved by a minimum factor of five, which makes for one hell of a spectacular show. I could put on that show in the middle of a forest, with no one but insects
, birds, and animals watching, but not in the close environs of that inn. Near the inn I'd have to use normal speed, and Fallan had shown me just how fast he could be.
If I didn't want to take the chance of being run down I'd have to find another way out of that kitchen, one that would keep Fallan unsuspicious until I had a good enough lead. It took two circuits of the kitchen and five minutes' worth of should-I-shouldn't-I, but I finally settled on the doorway the slaves had been using.
A doorway was just what it was, doorless and dim and undoubtedly the access to an attached storeroom. Most storerooms had doors leading to the outside, but even if they didn't they usually had windows. Fallan had ignored me when I'd passed that doorway, which made it a good bet even if I had to loosen a couple of boards in the wall at the back. When I neared it the third time, no one in the room was looking my way, not even the three slaves, which made it definitely the time to go. I took two more steps, then slipped through into the dimness.
Wooden crates, kegs, and sacks almost filled the room, leaving no more than a couple of narrow aisles with which to reach the back. I slipped through the congestion to the second aisle, the one farthest from the doorway, and headed back to see what there was to see. There were large stacks of firewood, sacks of vegetables, boxes of salted meat, cases of wine, kegs of ale, stands of goblets, racks of bone plates - but no doors or windows.
I worked my way all the way back, using the glow of two small lamps on the wall to keep from tripping and killing myself, but it was a waste of time. No doors, no windows, and heavy wooden logs for walls rather than kickable slats. The semi-darkness wasn't even a cool darkness, and when I saw three piles of ragged bedding below three metal rings set into the walls, I pitied the slaves. In full summer that storage room would be an oven, in winter a true refrigerator, but that was where they were probably chained every night. If I could have broken out and left the way open for them I would have done it, but breaking out of a room like that was beyond the resources then at my command. I moved the top of my blouse down a little against the closeness, then turned to retrace my steps out of that dead end.
"An excellent beginning," he said in a very soft voice as I stopped short with a gasp. "I will be pleased to assist with the removal of the entire bodice, therefore you need concern yourself no further. The pleasure will be entirely mine."
"You may not touch me!" I said in an over-shrill voice, that and the heavy fear turning my heartbeat into a thud all through the courtesy of Bellna. The man was the dark-haired house guard, of course, and it was clear that not everyone had been looking the other way when I'd entered the storeroom.
"May I not?" He grinned, moving forward slowly and making me back away. "There are many things one may not do, yet are they done over and again. The princess, I understand, would pout and protest if her favored wench were to be put beneath a man, yet such protest would not occur if she was unaware of the doing. You will give me service on your back, pretty wench, and afterward say nothing of that service, else shall those who count themselves friend to me see that you are taken from your place and sold as a slave. Do you understand?"
"No," I moaned, trembling with Bellna's terror and nearly out of control. There was no need to look around for a way out because there was none; the only way out lay past the man who continued to advance on me. I also continued to back away, shaking my head numbly, and then I struck the wall.
The contact seemed to be the final shock, and my mouth flew open, ready to release the scream of abject terror in my throat, yet the mercenary before me was prepared. As quickly as my mouth opened, so quickly was a cloth thrust in, and then was I taken by the arms and lowered to the filthy rags piled upon the floor.
"Silence is best when engaged in an activity of this sort," he chuckled, lowering himself to one knee above me. "Your moans of pleasure will be lost to me I know, yet one must make sacrifices in such instances. My, my, what have we here?"
His hands had gone into the top of my bodice, and the touch of them upon my breasts was an even greater spur to my terror. He was clearly the sort I had been warned of, the sort who would take my use without leave merely because he thought me a peasant. I reached for the cloth to pull it from my mouth, yet he took my wrists and held them in one large, merciless hand.
"Ah, no, my pretty, you must recall the need for silence," he whispered, grinning well at the fear he was able to see in my eyes. "Far better that we seek what other treasures lie beneath this cloth."
His free hand touched my leg, rose upon it beneath the thin skirt, and then I was back again, Bellna gibbering in fear in her favorite corner. Her panic was still racing through me, sapping my strength and reason, and her relinquishment of control was almost too late. The house guard slid his hand onto my thigh, making my head ring with Bellna's screams, and I just couldn't help myself. I had to do something to make him let me go, even if it blew my role straight out of existence.
The bastard had my wrists pinned but that still left me free to raise both legs and kick him in his face and chest. He released my wrists as he went over sideways at the blow, cursing in surprise as he hit the dirty floor. I scrambled to my feet and pulled the wad of cloth out of my mouth, intending to go over him before he could recover, but the man was no lily with a glass jaw. He pulled himself to his feet almost as fast as I had done, blocking me in with his body again, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.
"So, you would strike at me when my attention was elsewhere, eh, slut?" he snarled, well beyond finding the situation as amusing as he had. "Let us see what you may do with my eyes full upon you - and my hands as well!"
He came for me then with those hands outstretched, ready to close the distance between us in three or four fast steps. Never in my life had I had trouble making decisions, but right now I didn't know what the hell to do!
If I stopped him - which I could do very easily - there would be no accusations of hitting him when he wasn't looking. He'd know a better fighter had settled his hash, but on this planet fifteen-year-old girls just didn't do that to trained mercenaries. I had enough control back from Bellna to just stand still and let him do whatever he pleased, but playing patsy was almost guaranteed to do more than protect my role.
As mad as he was just standing still would also probably get me good and knocked around, possibly to the point of broken bones. I know I'm better than most, but instant healing isn't among my store of talents. Even a bad sprain would likely mean the game for me with Clero's men, but if I put the clown away Clero's men could hear about it and know something was wrong. Whatever I did would turn out to be the wrong move, and as he closed with me I still couldn't decide which way to go.
The first slap told me which way I wanted to go, but an open hand isn't a fist, and I've lived through a lot worse. I stumbled sideways with the force of the blow, gasping involuntarily at the ache in my teeth and the pain in my head and shoulder as they hit the wall. The room swung around for a crazy minute, dark shadows and smudges of light mixing together in a swirl, and then there was a ripping sound as the house guard's hands came together on my blouse then pulled violently apart.
The spinning of the room stopped when a big hand closed hard on my breast, deliberately hard, making me grunt with the pain. I was pulled close to the guard's now-sweating body, his pleasure at hurting me almost thick enough to feel, Bellna's hysterical scream tearing at the inside of my head. I fought no harder than Bellna would have to get myself free, but holding back was getting more and more difficult to do.
The man pulled my head back by the hair and forced his lips onto mine, smothering the scream he expected when his squeezing fingers closed on the nipple of the breast he held. The fear raced through me along with my rage, exploding then coalescing, when -
"Get of a scrofulous muck slave!" came a snarl, and the guard was pulled away from me so suddenly that I dropped to the slave rags on the floor. It was Fallan who had pulled the slob off me, and I sat and panted in an effort to reestablish control while the big
mercenary did what I'd almost been unable to keep from doing. He'd pulled the guard around to face him, blocked a wild roundhouse aimed at his head, then threw one of his own into the guard's middle.
The guard grunted at the strength of the blow, doubled over, then went to one knee with his arms wrapped around himself. I expected Fallan to finish him off, but he turned to me instead, which was a mistake. Fallan took no more than a single step before the guard came up with one that started at the floor, trying to unman his opponent with the blow. It would have done a lot of damage if it had landed, but he didn't know how fast Fallan could move when he wanted to.
Fallan jumped back as the house guard brought himself up from the floor with the missed foul, but the mercenary captain had had to move too fast to keep his guard up. The other man was able to shoot a fast, hard left right into his middle, harder than the one he'd taken.
The fact that I was starting to get to my feet showed that I'd underestimated Fallan as badly as the house guard had. We both expected to see him fold from the punch he'd taken, but it didn't happen. He grunted to show that the try wasn't everyone's imagination, then came back with one of those measured throws from two feet behind him, right into the house guard's face.
The solid, meaty "thwack" sent the house guard straight back and down, to land unconscious even as his hand was starting to reach for his sword. I had time to stare down for a brief moment at the motionless form at my feet and wonder why he hadn't drawn his sword to begin with, and then Fallan was gently turning me to face him.
"How badly are you hurt?" he asked at once, carefully brushing my hair back so that he could look at my face. "How many times were you struck?"