by S. J. Smith
Abby showered and dressed quickly. She had nowhere to go, but she couldn’t stay in bed, naked and smelling of him and their love-making. The sooner she washed Trevor Miles out of her memories the better.
He would only break her heart.
Still damp from the shower, she ripped the sheets off the bed and marched to the washing machine. The urge to throw them away was strong, but they were her favorite sheets and she wasn’t irrational. If she threw them out because they reminded her of Trevor, she might as well burn her entire apartment to the ground.
And that wasn’t going to help anyone.
She dumped a heaping cup of soap into the wash and slammed the lid. She was so angry she wanted to scream.
What was he thinking? Didn’t he realize that he was her entire world and she didn’t want to live without him?
He said he loved her, but she didn’t see how that could be. How could you love someone and still choose a game over a long life with them? Abby didn’t know, but she doubted that Trevor did either. He was going after what he loved without worrying about the consequences.
Abby straightened up the apartment, cleaning up the dirty dishes they’d left and making sure that everything was where it belonged. She threw away any evidence of Trevor in her life, dropping it into the trash and tying up the bag. She placed the bag in the dumpster and took one more turn around her apartment.
Everything was back to normal and as it should be. Tomorrow, she would go to work as usual and forget that Trevor had ever been a part of her life.
It was settled.
So why was she still so angry?
*****
Abby paced the floor, her anger overwhelming her.
“What the hell is he thinking?” she said out loud to the empty apartment. “Maybe he wants to die.”
She was so angry. They had a good thing, and he was willing to just give it up for a stupid game. Hot tears threatened, but Abby pushed them back. If Trevor Miles wanted to end his own life doing something stupid and pointless, that was his fault.
But she couldn’t let it go. She couldn’t just walk away from the greatest love she’d ever known. She had to be there. Maybe, if something happened, she could save his life. What better way to use her skills than to save the man that she loved?
Or maybe nothing would happen and he would be fine. Not every game ended in a head injury, right?
“Yeah right. Don’t be naïve, Abbryana,” she admonished herself. “Something will happen, it’s only a matter of time.”
Decision made, she packed her doctor’s bag and headed to her car. She might not be able to stop him from playing, but she didn’t have to sit back and watch him lose his life if she could stop it.
She threw the bag into her BMW X5 and slid behind the driver’s seat. She wanted to race there, but it was hockey season, which meant the city of Blaine was blanketed in snow and ice. She was racing to save a life. She couldn’t risk losing her own in the process.
Abby tried to remain calm, thankful for the SUV’s handling in the icy conditions. She eased the accelerator down, tiny snowflakes flinging themselves silently against her windshield.
She got to the rink quicker than she expected. She jumped out of the car, shoes crunching in the fresh snow. Abby’s breath crystalized in the air before her. It was freezing, and she wasn’t dressed for this. It didn’t matter, she was on a mission.
She paid for a ticket, stepping through the doors and looking at the clock. Her heart sank. It was already the third period. The game would go on until someone won, and she wouldn’t have a chance to talk Trevor out of playing if he wasn’t already injured.
She stepped carefully down the stairs of the center aisle, ignoring the whispered hisses of the people she blocked as she went.
She couldn’t see Trevor. What number had his jersey read when he was admitted to the hospital? She couldn’t remember and she kicked herself for forgetting something so important.
But, with so many white men with almost the exact build of Trevor, it was going to be impossible to pick him out of the team.
Defeated, she took her seat to watch the rest of the game, setting her doctor’s bag on her feet rather than the sticky floor.
What did people see in this experience? It was loud, the floors were sticky with eons of spilled soda and food and it was cold. So freaking cold.
Abby was miserable, but she focused on the task at hand and tried to push the rest out of her mind. Being cold was the least of her problems right now.
She watched as the puck was passed from man to man, marveling at how such hulking men could be so light on their feet. They ducked and weaved through the mass of shoving bodies, gliding along the ice as if the skates were merely an extension of their bodies.
Abby got caught up in the beauty of it. The sound of the skates cutting the ice and the clap of sticks slapping together was mesmerizing. Abby found herself enjoying the game even while she desperately searched the men, looking for Trevor. He had to be here somewhere.
A timeout was called and the crowd booed. Abby didn’t know what had happened, but it didn’t matter. The men were skating to their respective coaches, removing helmets as they went.
This was her chance to spot Trevor!
She jumped out of her seat and rushed down the stairs. Her eyes were locked on the men as they came to the railing in a line to speak with the coach.
Abby moved until she was close to where they were filing by, but she still didn’t see Trevor. Had he been taken to the hospital already? Had something happened to him on the road?
Their fight flashed through her head and Abby’s stomach knotted. Would the last thing she said to him be the last thing he heard? How would she live with herself?
“Abby. Abbryana! Over here.”
Was she hearing things?
“Abby! That’s the wrong team.”
Abby looked up and down the rink to the other team’s box. It was Trevor shouting at her from behind the bench. Abby couldn’t believe her eyes. What was he doing there?
She worked her way over, ignoring the angry words of people as she passed down the row. There was no one on the ice, she didn’t know why people were yelling at her to sit down.
Abby finally reached Trevor, surprised to see that he wore his jersey and a pair of jeans and sneakers.
“Did you get hurt?” she blurted out.
“No Abby. I didn’t.”
“Then why are you not on the ice?”
“I did a lot of thinking, and it turns out, you were right. I talked to the coach and he’s hiring me as his assistant. No one knows yet, but Coach is retiring at the end of the year. When he does, I’ll take his place.”
“So that’s it? You’re just giving up playing?”
The relief she felt was clear. Trevor smiled tenderly at her through the plexiglass.
“I’ll never forget what you asked me before I left.”
“‘Are you going to choose love or the game?’” Abby remembered.
“And I realized. I didn’t have to choose. I could have both.”
“You can?” Abby teased.
“I can. After all, choosing to play meant I could lose you. And a life without you, Abbryana Ferris, isn’t really a life at all.”
THE END
Bonus Story 31 of 40
Dragon’s Oath
Brida's father and his people had been at war with their neighbors for as long as she could remember, at least the past twenty years if not longer, and things were not balanced in their favor. Lord Ulric had not seen fit to educate his daughter in the ways of war, but she knew her brothers well, and she had learned more than perhaps Ulric wanted over the course of her childhood. The last few battles had taken a particularly hard toll on their people, and one of Brida's brothers, Edmund, had been grievously injured. She herself had been moved from place to place in Ulric's constant attempts to keep her from the hands of his enemy. Now they had finally returned to their keep, but only because Ulric's troops had be
en decimated and he had recalled his men and his generals to the center of his domain where they could try and find some new tactic to push back the invaders.
Brida had been tasked with making sure that her brother was well taken care of, which consisted of her mostly tending to him herself and having the servants fetch her what she needed. He seemed calmest when she was the one at his bedside, and she hardly had anything else to be doing. Ulric had gathered all of his commanders in the great hall, including Edmund and Brida's eldest brother Eldric, and they had been in there for the better part of the day. Brida wasn't even sure they had eaten. She had bread and ale brought to try and get Edmund to eat something, but when he refused she ate it herself.
She saw no solution, but perhaps she simply didn't have the same mind for military matters that the men in her family did. Still, to her it looked like the easiest thing to do would to be surrender and give the invaders what they wanted. Things were grim enough to start, and now there were rumors of tall fair-haired barbarians raiding along the shores in the south. It was hardly the time to be squabbling when simple diplomacy could resolve matters. After all, Ulric had the perfect bargaining chip. Brida was young still, and unmarried. There had to be someone her father could marry her off to in order to stop the hostilities before his people and his family were completely wiped off the face of the earth.
Edmund groaned, his face contorted in pain, and squirmed on his bed. Brida shushed him and smoothed his dark hair back from his face. By the time he had been returned home infection had already set into the wound on his leg. The healer had done the best he could to treat it, and the wound was looking far better than it had, but he was in the throes of a fever, constantly in and out of sleep and in so much pain it made Brida's heart ache. She motioned for one of her ladies to bring the bowl of water and wet the rag that lay draped over the side, squeezing out the excess before dabbing sweat off of Edmund's brow. He calmed eventually, settling back into his restless sleep and feverish dreams.
She sat back in her chair and muffled a yawn with the back of her hand. She had been awake almost all night making sure that Edmund's thrashing didn't re-open his wound and the lack of sleep was catching up with her. She hoped that her father's meeting would be over soon so that she could switch places with Eldric and let him watch over their brother for a while. By the way things had been going so far she doubted that would happen any time soon. Sure that Edmund was asleep, at least for the moment, she rose from the chair and stretched her aching back, bracing her hands and letting out a long sigh.
“I'll return,” she said to her maid. “I need to walk the needles from my legs. Watch over him?”
The maid silently took up Brida's chair, her needlework in her lap. Brida slipped quietly from the room, leaving the door open only a crack, and paced down the familiar stone hallways of her home. Her footfalls were soft but still they echoed off the walls. Her journey took her down to the ground floor where her father and brother were convening with their council, the heavy doors to the room pulled shut and two guards standing to attention outside them. They let Brida pass with no challenge, one of them pushing on the door until it opened just enough for her to squeeze through and into a room full of angry, shouting men.
She found her brother quickly. Eldric was standing to the side, his arms crossed over his chest, an annoyed, frustrated look on his face. He spared her a brief glance as she came to stand beside him and sighed.
“You look happy,” Brida said.
Eldric snorted. “They can't stop arguing long enough to make any progress. This one says we do this, that one says we do that. It's infuriating.”
“What are they fighting about now?”
“A suggestion made by Captain Alfred. Half of them think it's ridiculous superstition and the other half think he's a witch for suggesting it.”
Brida looked across the room to where their father sat silent and motionless at the head of the large table, listening to his commanders bicker around him. “Suggesting what?” she asked.
“That we find the wizard, that hermit that lives up in the mountains, and give him whatever he wants for his aid.”
“He must be dead by now,” Brida said.
Eldric shrugged. “I think Father will try anything at this point,” he said. He scuffed the toe of his boot against the floor. “How's Edmund?”
“The fever should break soon, hopefully. After that only time will tell. Will you sit with him soon?”
“When I can,” Eldric replied, “though at this rate I may never get the chance.” He sighed again and shook his head. “I wish Mother were still here. She could silence all of these fools with a single word.”
“So can Father,” Brida said.
“When he chooses,” Eldric replied, “but it seems he's content to let them squabble.”
Brida sighed and looked around at the arguing men. "I don't see what they think some old man in a cave can do, to harm or to help."
"They say he has great power," Eldric replied. "That whole armies bow before his might. It would be exactly what we need, if the tales are true."
"Peasant superstition," Brida said.
"Perhaps," Eldric replied, "but for the past half hour I have heard them speak of nothing else." A scowl overtook Brida's face. She shook her head in disgust.
"Come," she said, "I'm tired and need to rest. Father won't miss you if you look after Edmund for a while."
Eldric was quiet for a moment, leaving only the echoing shouts of the military council to fill the room. Finally he nodded. "Very well. I suppose I can do more good there than I can here. They haven't listened to a word I've said this entire meeting."
Brida slipped her arm around her brother's. "Edmund will be happy to see you if he wakes," she said. "He's most calm when I am at his side, but I imagine you'll be just as good."
"Thank you for your vote of confidence, sister," Eldric replied.
A soft laugh escaped Brida's lips. One of the soldiers standing by the door pulled it open for the two of them to depart, and once they were through closed it behind them, thoroughly muffling the sound of fighting coming from the other side.
"Peace and quiet at last," Eldric said. "I was starting to get a headache."
"They have to stop eventually," Brida said. "They can only waste so much time fighting with each other before the enemy is at our gate."
"They might as well already be," Eldric said. His face had darkened. "The reports our scouts are bringing back are nothing but trouble. At this point I would be happy to take a bet on this sorcerer of Alfred's, no matter what the cost. Better to be penniless than be a slave."
Brida squeezed her brother's arm, no words of comfort coming to mind. They retraced the steps Brida had taken from Edmund's bedroom and parted outside the door. Brida lingered, watching her brother take a deep breath and tug his tunic straight before entering. The room was mercifully quiet. She waited until she heard Eldric's heavy sigh and the creak of the chair as he settled before walking down the hall to her own chamber, thankfully shutting the heavy door behind her. She had no need of her maid to prepare her for bed, simply loosening the ties of her dress before curling up under her blankets. Her maid would be more useful helping Eldric care for their brother.
Sleep came easily and lingered for quite some time. Brida reckoned it was nearly dinner time when she finally woke up, if the growling in her stomach was anything to go by. The fact that no one had rushed in to wake her said that Edmund was still well, or as well as he could be, likely still asleep with Eldric by his side. Her maid was still missing as well. Brida rose and laced herself back into her dress, quickly brushing the tangles of sleep out of her hair and going to seek out her family. When she opened her door Eldric was standing on the other side, his fist raised as though he had been about to knock. He had changed into clean clothes and left his sword behind, and had shaved and brushed his hair back from his face as well. He gave her a tired smile.
"They've finally stopped fighting," he said, "and
Edmund is well. Sleeping."
"Is he still feverish?" Brida asked. She automatically took her brother's arm.
"A little," Eldric replied. "Your girl reckons it will break by tomorrow morning."
"That's good to hear," Brida said. She spared a glance into Edmund's room as they passed by the door, seeing her tired maid sitting at his bedside, her needlework in her lap but her hands still on the needle and thread. The girl deserved a break after this day. "And did the council reach a decision?"
"They have," Eldric said, but seemed reluctant to say anything more.
"And?" Brida pressed.
"And, they have agreed to seek this sorcerer out, and pay any price he wishes if it means he will grant us his aid. I will ride out tomorrow with a contingent of men, as Father's representative, to win him over to our side or to die trying."
His words left a heavy weight in the pit of Brida's stomach. "All will be well, brother," she said, dropping her hand to his and squeezing his strong, callused fingers, "and you will come home safe, with or without this man."
Eldric smiled, but it didn't reach his eyes. "I'm starved," he said instead. "I was afraid they would continue to argue all night. Though if this plan doesn't work we'll be right back where we started."
"I have every faith in your ability to negotiate," Brida said.
"I'm glad you do," Eldric replied. "I must admit I've been beginning to doubt myself."
"Father has much on his mind," Brida said. "He doesn't mean to disregard you."
"I know," Eldric said. "Still, it frustrates me."
Brida squeezed his hand once more and pressed her cheek to his shoulder.
The doors to the great hall stood open, and instead of angry shouting filling the air Brida heard gentle conversation over the music the minstrels in the corner played. The scent of food only made Brida's stomach voice its hunger more adamantly. She let her brother lead her to her seat and pull out her chair, then waited for him to take his place next to her before she began to fill her plate and trencher while Eldric poured her fine wine imported from Frankia. Their father sat quietly at the head of the table, a world of worry in his eyes. She hoped that this plan of Captain Alfred's would work, if only so she could see her father and brother's smile again. As hungry as she was, the food on her plate lost its taste.