Asunder

by Tanya Schofield

  “Well I’m sorry we had to meet like this, Miss Nia, but as my mama - may her soul rest peaceful - used to say, better now than not.”

  “I’m pleased to meet you,” she replied. “I’m sorry I ran into you, I wasn’t feeling well.”

  “If you’ll pardon me noticin’, you still look a mite sickly. Would ye like to sit down? The Inn is right here …”

  Melody shook her head, glancing at the sky. It wasn’t dark yet, but it would be soon, and she knew there was no way she could sleep in the Inn, not with the smell that had driven her out into the alley. She had done what she was meant to do, and she wanted to be gone before the guards closed the gates.

  “Thank you,” she said, "but I’m just leaving."

  Brody Douglas frowned as she stepped past him, heading for the gate. “Leaving? It’s nearly dark, Miss Nia, and surely ye heard about the curfew.” He caught up with her, resisting the urge to grab her arm and turn her back to face him. “Where are ye heading?”

  “Along the river,” Melody said, still walking. “North.”

  “That’s my path too,” Brody said, and it wasn’t entirely a lie. Anywhere she went was where he was going. She was meant to be his, whether she realized it or not. “We can head out together in the morning, if ye like. Safer to travel together, there’s talk of danger in those woods.”

  Melody shook her head. “I can’t stay here,” she said. “Safe travels to you, Brody Douglas.” She picked up her pace, and the limping man let her go.

  Despite the guards’ suggestion that she would be safer in town, Melody passed through the gates and took a deep breath. She should have eaten, she knew, but there would be plenty to forage for when she reached the river’s edge. It would do her good, she thought, if she could keep it down.

  “Miss Nia? Miss Nia!”

  She looked over her shoulder to see Brody Douglas waving at her from the back of a smoke-colored horse.

  “Forgive me, Miss Nia, I just couldn’t let ye come out here alone, not with what they’re saying is out here. My old mama - may her soul rest peaceful - would switch me til’ sundown if I didn’t do the right thing, and she’d tell me that keeping you safe is the most right thing I could do."

  Melody looked up into his earnest face as he drew the horse to a walk beside her. He was at ease in the saddle, and there was something comforting about the steady rhythm of the horse’s hooves and the creak of the leather.

  “I guess we may be safer together,” she allowed, remembering the things that had followed her outside of Foley, and halfway to Silmirra. Though what Brody Douglas might do against such creatures, she didn’t know. Still, he was friendly.

  Men are never just friendly. She could almost hear Jovan’s voice, warning her against the stranger, but she set her jaw against the imagined advice. Jovan wasn’t here, offering to keep her safe against monsters in the dark.

  “That’s what I said,” Brody grinned. “There’s no tellin’ what might be out here, and better it find me than you. My old mama - may her soul rest peaceful - used to say Brody, you got to be mindful of the girls now, they’re not so strong like yer brothers and yer daddy, they need lookin’ after.”

  He regarded her with wide, undemanding eyes. “If you don’t mind me sayin’, Miss Nia, you look like you could use some lookin’ after.”

  No, she thought as a wave of dizziness made her stumble and lean on her staff, I need to stop feeling so sick.

  “I’m all right,” she said instead. “I’m simply tired, I’ve traveled a long way.”

  Brody immediately swung down from the horse. “Look at me ridin’ while ye walk!” His distress was obvious. “My mama - may her soul rest peaceful - would straight tear my hide up if she saw me actin’ so selfish and stupid. Come on, then, Miss Nia, up ye go. This old girl will be glad of the change.”

  Melody frowned, uncertain.

  “Have ye ridden before, Miss Nia?”

  “No,” she admitted.

  Brody’s smile was infectious. “Easy as fallin’ down,” he assured her, pointing at the saddle. “You just hang on there, then I’ll give ye a boost. Jus’ swing yer leg over and yer done. Ready?”

  The process wasn’t as awkward as Melody feared, and Brody willingly carried her staff while she clung to the horse’s mane.

  “There, that’s better,” he said, settling into a pace that favored his limp but kept them moving towards the river. “Let me know when yer ready to bed down, Miss Nia. Maybe when we reach the water?”

  “That would be nice,” she replied, stifling a yawn. The gentle sway of the horse’s gait and her own exhaustion were making it difficult to stay alert - Melody hoped the river was close.

  Brody Douglas looked up at his love blinking sleepily in the saddle, the woman he had dreamed of, the woman who was destined to be his soulmate, and knew he would do anything for her.

  If it meant not getting a nice soft bed in the Inn and sleeping wrapped in his cloak beside her, then that’s what it meant, and that’s what he would do. It didn’t matter that the clouds were rolling in, that there would almost certainly be rain by nightfall. She was so pale, she looked so weak … and she was in danger, he could sense it. He would protect her, he swore silently. He would look after her. Someone had to.

  24

  “Here we are, Miss Nia,” Brody Douglas said softly. The girl had fallen asleep while they traveled, leaning forward with her fingers curled in the horse’s mane. He’d slowed their pace some, keeping the mare’s gait even to help balance her. She’d looked like she needed the rest.

  Rain pattered gently on the leaves above as Brody eased her off the back of the mare, and somewhere in the distance a wolf howled, eerie and low. She didn’t wake. He paused, looking down at the sleeping beauty in his arms. Her pale skin seemed to almost glow in the darkness. “Don’t you worry, now. I’ll watch over you.” He spoke only just above a whisper.

  Brody’s eyes were soft and loving as he laid her limp body on a patch of moss under a sheltering tree. He brushed back a brilliant curl of red, then laid the tenderest of kisses on her forehead before adjusting her bag and her cloak. He thought perhaps this was better than he could have dreamed, now that it was real. He sat beside her, almost afraid to touch her, determined to keep her safe from the danger he knew she was in.

  Lothaedus waited.

  He had not intended to give Brody so much control over the body, but the trade-off had been worth it. The girl had trusted him and his limp and his open smile. She had accepted his company… and now she slept, helpless at his side. The Hunter Captain would have to wait until the lovesick fool in control was asleep before he could reclaim the body and do the job he had been sent to do, but he was a patient man.

  The girl might have evaded him if she hadn’t collided with him outside the Inn. He had not expected the change in her hair, but she could not disguise her small stature, or the unusual red-gold of her eyes. Garen had described the girl perfectly, he thought. She was as lovely as he said. That she spoke without the drastic effect the Chancellor had recalled came as a surprise, but it was no matter. It would make no difference when she was dead.

  An hour passed, then two. The rain had not let up, and Brody’s head began to drop against his chest. No danger had come while he watched, and his own exhaustion caught up with him, overtaking his desire to protect her. He laid beside the beautiful girl he had been dreaming of for so long, adjusting his cloak to cover them both. He fell asleep to the sounds of the wind and raindrops in the leaves overhead.

  When Brody was finally gone, close to dawn, Lothaedus took back the body and sat up, careful not to disturb the girl beside him as he reclaimed his cloak. Melody slept on, shivering lightly as the extra warmth disappeared and biting cold brushed over her. Lothaedus reached into his boot for the knife he kept there, slipping it from the sheath without a sound. He turned, rising up on one knee for a better angle, and there was no hesitation in his cold fingers as he raised the weapon high.

  The wolf
howled again, so close and so loud that the sound startled even the deeply focused Lothaedus. The mare screamed in terror.

  Melody’s eyes flew open, focusing immediately on the gleaming knife raised high above her. From her position, all she could see were the man’s cold gray eyes above the dark shadow of his arm, and her heart lurched in her chest, shaken by memory.

  Acting on an instinct she didn’t know she had, Melody sat up and grabbed the man’s arm with both hands, thinking to block or turn the knife away— just as a huge, dark, growling shape launched out of the darkness. Hot pain tore through her upper arm as the thing’s teeth found her flesh, and she was knocked to one side from the impact as the beast slammed into both her and the man with the knife.

  Her frightened cry drew the thing’s attention, and when it turned away from the man and looked straight at her, bared teeth red with her blood, Melody panicked. She scrambled through the wet leaves, awkward and gasping, but her wounded arm refused to support her weight. She fell heavily against the base of a tree and she turned, bracing her back and facing the beast. There was no way she could escape.

  It was watching her. Rain soaked her hair and dripped into her eyes, but she could still see the thing in the faint haze of the pre-dawn glow. It took a step closer, never taking its eyes from hers, and Melody stared back.

  The thing’s deep evergreen eyes were almost luminescent, both baleful and alert. They sat atop a snout full of pale teeth, exposed in a hunter’s grin. It was a wolf, she realized, though like none she’d seen before. This was much too large, too thick— It lifted its nose, sniffing the air. Her blood, she thought. It smelled her blood. Thick muscles rippled and bunched, and Melody’s whole body went weak with fear. It was going to attack her.

  Melody sang.

  Power had flooded into her at her first cry of pain, eager to be released. She could have directed the massive surge as fire or lightning, she could have summoned vines or insects or any of the other things her father’s journal had taught her, but there was no time to think about what to do. Her first instinct, as it had always been, was her lullaby.

  There, in an unfamiliar clearing in the rain with her unfamiliar hair plastered to her cheeks and her unfamiliar skirts soaked to her skin, cradling her burning, bleeding arm, Melody’s voice rang out clear and sweet – and the creature paused.

  Sleep, she willed as she sang the tune she knew so well, the song that had saved her and the brothers from rats so long ago underneath Cabinsport, and delayed the soldiers outside Foley…

  Movement behind the massive wolf caught her eye, and Melody thought she saw a man staggering away, but she could spare no attention - the beast in front of her had paused when she began to sing, but it appeared to have no intention of sleeping. Rather, it regarded her with something akin to recognition, or perhaps curiosity. She put more power into the song, insisting that the wolf close its eyes, lie down, sleep…

  The mare succumbed almost immediately, leaning against the tree she had been tied to and forgetting all about the wolf in the clearing. The beast shifted and sat back with a yawn, still not sleeping, but no longer aggressive. It would have to be enough.

  Melody kept singing, her voice shaking as hard as her body in the freezing pre-dawn rain. She was lightheaded and dizzy, sickened by the smell of her own blood but afraid to look at the wound, or away from the wolf. She knew it was bad. She also knew if she stopped singing and the beast attacked her again, it wouldn’t matter.

  Water dripped from her nose and hair, down the back of her useless cloak and still, she forced herself to sing. As the sun made its appearance, Melody’s song broke off in a sudden sneeze that closed her eyes, shook her body, and made her wounded arm shriek in protest. She quickly looked back to the creature, afraid that in her silence it would pounce … and could not believe her eyes.

  In a shimmering moment of insane emptiness, the monstrous wolf became not there, and the man from Ravenglass - Aggravain Pike - picked up his head to meet her disbelieving stare. It wasn’t that the creature disappeared, it was simply no longer there, but something was definitely not where it was, until it was Aggravain. He was naked, crouched there on the wet spongy moss, and his brown curls were damp as they framed his unreadable face. He looked around the tiny clearing and then at her, curious. Recognition dawned.

  “Nia Stone.” His voice was hoarse, full of apology and shame. Aggravain lifted his head, smelling the air, and his gaze went immediately to her arm. “You’re wounded.”

  He stood to approach her, then remembered that he was naked. As he looked around for something to cover himself with, Melody forced herself to her feet. She awkwardly pulled off her soaking wet cloak and threw it towards him, wincing as the motion sent a fresh rush of blood down her arm, then leaned once more against the tree.

  Stay back. Don’t touch me. Her voice had failed her, and she sent him the thought instead. He raised a surprised eyebrow as wrapped her cloak around himself. The cold, damp air that lifted his careless hair bit into Melody’s wet clothes, and she continued to shake. She sneezed once more.

  “I’m so sorry.” Aggravain could still taste her blood in his throat, the scent of it filled his nostrils, and he was hard-pressed to keep from being sick. Why hadn’t he killed her? He knew better than to leave survivors, even when the change was upon him he held on to that much. He had worked for years to gain that small measure of control, his father had insisted on it.

  She was why, he realized. Her magic. Nia had stopped him, somehow.

  Aggravain had never meant to wound her - he clearly remembered the man with the knife, remembered the intent to kill him, but she had reached for the weapon after he was airborne. He’d controlled the urge to bite her, he’d turned his head, but the damage was done. That left him no choice but to kill her. Except before he could, she had … what? What had she done? A memory surfaced, a sound, barely heard. She had sung to him. He’d heard her voice and he’d forgotten…

  Now here she stood, small and determined and undeniably, tragically alive.

  “I’m so, so sorry.” The sadness in his evergreen eyes was enormous.

  Melody found it difficult to imagine him as the snarling monster that had been there just moments before. She watched as he retrieved a pair of Douglas’ trousers from the mare’s saddlebag and put them on. They were too short, she noted.

  Douglas, she thought, remembering the man who had insisted that he would protect her. Where was he? She looked around, but there was no one but herself and Aggravain Pike. A cut on one of the man’s shirtless forearms appeared to be disappearing the longer she looked at it. Nothing seemed real.

  What are you? The actual words wouldn’t come, but after what she had seen, being cautious about using her own power seemed pointless.

  Aggravain’s face was unreadable. He walked closer to her, stepping slowly with his hands extended in a gesture of peace, her cloak in one of them.

  “More than a man,” he replied. “Less than human. It doesn’t matter now.” He waited, watching her as she leaned against the tree, trying to find her balance. The wound on her arm was serious. He could smell fresh blood still welling up in it, but she’d never let him close enough to tend it. “You should sit,” he advised. The fever from a bite came on quickly, he knew, she wouldn’t keep her feet for long. Not even her magic could protect her from that, he suspected.

  Stay back, she sent again. I’m leaving. Melody looked for her staff. She didn’t know where she would go, but she knew she didn’t want to be here, with whatever Aggravain Pike was.

  “Easy,” he told her, stopping his forward progress. “You’re not going far, not like that.”

  Melody looked down at her wounded arm, instantly regretting it. Between the smell of the blood and the sight of her own ripped flesh under the shreds of her sleeve, her stomach threatened to overturn the uneasy peace between them. Everything inside her was hot, but she couldn’t stop shivering with the cold, and her vision was blurring and clearing in time with her h
eartbeat. She searched for answers in Aggravain’s face, and found only regret.

  What’s happening?

  “The fever,” he replied. “It will get worse, but try to relax. There’s a town across the river - Gira. I’ll get you there, Senna will help.”

  Melody gritted her teeth as another burning wave of pain tightened down on her arm. It… hurts.

  Aggravain nodded. He remembered that pain - it wasn’t something he could forget, even after so many years. “I know,” he said. “I’m sorry.” He should have killed her, he thought again. He should kill her now— but he wouldn’t. He understood his father’s choice more now than ever.

  Melody was not comforted. She took several deep breaths, struggling to get enough air, to stay conscious - it was no use.

  Aggravain moved quickly when the girl’s eyes rolled back into her head, catching her when her knees buckled. Gira was farther than Ravenglass, he knew, but Senna was the only person who might be able to help - and Senna was in Gira. He needed to work quickly if he was going to get her there before the next moonrise.

  Aggravain tightly bandaged her arm with strips of fabric he ripped from her sodden skirt, shaking his head at the torn skin above her elbow. What little memory he kept after a change was clear, and he’d been fully focused on the man with the knife. If she’d stayed down, he thought, he never would have bit her.

  The man with the knife. Aggravian looked around, seeing only the girl and the horse. The man who pretended to be less than he was, the man he’d followed and meant to kill, was nowhere to be found. He left the girl where she lay for a moment, moving to where she had been. The man’s knife was in the leaves, edged in his own wolf blood where the man had tried to defend himself.

  Aggravain took the knife and sniffed the air - his senses weren’t as sharp as they were in his other form, but they were still better than any human. He smelled the trace of his own blood from the blade, the surge of the girl’s … there. He looked at the tree, seeing the small scrape of blood on the bark. He remembered colliding with both of them, turning his head when he felt the girl’s flesh in his mouth… The man had been thrown backwards, into the tree. Aggravain had meant to finish him, but the girl’s cry— there was magic in it, he’d been curious, and then…