Fate War: Alliance (25 page)

“Thank you, Lord Cole.” The grateful woman bowed as they left her home. Sam stole a kiss when the door shut.

“What was that for?” Cole teased and captured her hands.

“For being so remarkable.”

“Oh, the irony.” He sighed.

The rest of the day Sam worked beside Cole making sure parents knew how to treat the symptoms of the disease. Each new person she met took in her clothing and hair, but quickly dismissed her appearance with a friendly smile and often times a bow or curtsy. By the time evening approached there were no more quizzical looks and Sam found herself entertaining a few children who were well, while Cole talked to their parents. He explained where to find the medicinal herbs the family hadn’t foraged for and how to prepare them.

The only child she had ever been around was herself, and that was a long time ago. She found the experience freeing. They spun in a circle, abandoned to the will of centrifugal force and gravity. She fell to the ground at the appropriate time indicated by the game, the world twirling in her vision. She never knew physics could be so fun.

The children were already up and whirling again, silhouetted by the setting sun, but Sam had to wait for her vision to clear. She had the oddest sense that someone was watching her. Still fighting to focus, she thought she saw a woman peering from a doorway down the lane. She looked familiar, at least to her disoriented eyes. When her vision returned, the woman was gone.

A grunt and barrage of innocent laugher brought Sam’s attention to a spray of dust beside her, where presumably Cole had completed the children’s game. She couldn’t help but laugh along as he extracted himself from the giggling, wiggling pile. He finally gave a mighty roar with his hands up like claws and the children scattered in mock fear.

“Oh, God, I’m tired.” He stood then pulled her to her feet, and they both dusted themselves off. “We have a long night ahead though.”

“Oh? There are more sick?” Sam asked. It felt as if they had seen the entire town already.

“Just one more,” he chuckled. “But the town is having a dance in our honor. Since they know the children will be fine and in bed, it seemed the perfect time to celebrate.” Sam had to laugh at the audacity of the parents.

“Which way for the last family?” she asked.

“Why don’t you go back to the inn and wash up for the dance? I’ll take care of this one.” He kissed her forehead and spun her in the right direction with a smack on the behind.

“I want to stay with you.” She turned back around and tried to hide the surprise at what she saw. Love may be hard to spot, but deceit was as clear as country air and Cole was hiding something from her, just like this morning.

“Please, Sam, the dance is soon, and I want you to look your best.” She tried not to look hurt as she turned toward the inn. “I’ll be there in a minute,” he called after her.

Her heart pounded like Freedom’s hoofs in her ears as she trudged to the inn. When she rounded the corner, a quick sidestep put her in the shadow of the bakery. From here she could see Cole walk back toward the block of houses. He turned and scanned the area where she should have disappeared. Changing direction he hurried down one of the only other streets in town. At just the right moment, she followed, completely concealed from his view by staying perfectly in his blind spot.

The patterns in human movement were much easier to read than emotion, but not as easy as other animals. Sam could see enough in most people to stay invisible. As a child she could sneak out no matter how many guards were posted. Even now, there were very few circumstances where she couldn’t stay completely hidden if she wanted to and remained focused.

Right now she didn’t want to be seen, and Cole didn’t see her even though he checked over his shoulder several times. He came to a small cabin not too far down the lane and practically skipped the last few paces to the door. He knocked a merry rhythm and looked back her way once more before the door opened. He never saw her.

But Sam saw the other woman when she opened the door. The woman Cole had met in the courtyard back in Arborea. She saw the affectionate smiles spread across both their faces as he entered the house.

Sam’s instinct carried her unseen to a window sheltered by an oak tree. She could see in, but the shadow it created in the approaching night would help to conceal her. She perched beneath the window and could hear their voices, but not actual words. The tone and cadence were of old friends, family and lovers, not random townspeople. The people inside knew each other well.

Sam listened for the right moment then peeked inside. It felt like a mechman was constricting her heart. Cole’s arm was around the woman’s shoulders and hers around his waist. They both looked lovingly on a young boy who proudly showed Cole a carved steam engine. She had seen the boy before. Christopher. In the meadow, he had run from the mechmen to Cole. He hadn’t been afraid to approach the Prince or hug him. He had called him Cole, not Prince or any other formality.

Cole dropped to a knee to inspect the carving closer then embraced the boy and ruffled his hair.

“Coh!” a weak voice called out. Sam had been so intent on the scene before her, she missed the small cot directly below the window and the small child it held. The girl obviously suffered from the sickness, her eyes glassy with fever.

“No,” Sam hissed.

Tiny fevered eyes that faded blue to green. Sam stepped back into the shadows clutching at her heart.

“How’s my girl!” Cole came to sit on the edge of the bed and smoothed back the child’s dark curls.

The sound of Sam’s heart ceased in her ears. It must have stopped. Everything stopped. Nothing existed except the people in the window.

“Wuv you,” the child said and wrapped her arms and legs around Cole who held her tight.

The woman sat beside him on the cot and tested the girl’s forehead for fever.

“She isn’t as hot,” the woman said.

“She’ll be fine.” Cole squeezed her shoulders with his free arm.

“What about you?” the woman queried, an unfamiliar pain in her eyes. “And your wife?”

“We’re fine.”

“You haven’t told her.” The woman quirked an accusing eye brow. “Cole, I’ve known you too long for you to lie to me. We miss you. She needs to be okay with this and until she knows – “

“It’s not exactly the most natural conversation to bring up, Hope.” Cole interrupted. “What should I do? Bring it up over breakfast? By the way, I have another family living in town.”

Sam didn’t hear another word. She turned back to the inn. Or the direction she thought was the inn. The world spun like it had after the children’s game. Her hand scraped along the trunk of her concealing tree and she braced herself there. Breathe. She gasped for air. She needed to breathe, but she couldn’t find her nothing. All she found was Cole and another woman and the idea that she may never want to breathe again.

“It’s not exactly the most natural conversation to bring up, Hope. What should I do? Bring it up over breakfast? By the way, I have another family living in town.”

“You’re right,” Hope sighed. “Do you think she’ll be okay with you coming around though?”

“Hope, she is the most remarkable human being I’ve ever met, and I think she is capable of accepting many things most people can’t.”

Hope narrowed her eyes at him, and a mischievous smile played at the corners of her mouth.

“You love her.” She raised an eyebrow and crossed her arms.

“I –,” Cole began, but the faint sound of retching outside the window drew their attention.

“Looks like the festivities started early,” Cole chuckled and he laid little Charlotte back on her cot. With the fevered child settled, he peered out the window.

“Clinker!” he cursed, seeing Sam leaning against the tree.

“Cole, language,” Hope chastised.

“Coh! Cwinker!” Charlotte parroted.

“Sorry,” Cole apologized over his shoulder as he stumbled to the door. “Sam’s out there, and she’s not well.”

A sickening sense of foreboding settled in Cole’s stomach as he rounded the corner of the house.

“Sam, what happened?” he asked, hurrying to her.

“You,” she hissed and snapped an accusing finger at him. The venom in her voice brought him up short and he stood a few paces away, hands held up helplessly.

Sam wiped vestiges of sick from her mouth with the back of her other hand. “You, liar!”

Her eyes bore into him, dark pools of anguish. This was the look he hoped never to have aimed at him. Cole had the sinking feeling that if she wished it, she could snuff out his life as easily as the oil lamp that cast the dim glow in which they now stood.

“I heard you,” she spat out, the reproving finger pointing to the window. The foreboding ache was now full on regret that she found out this way.

“Sam, I can explain,” Cole said and reached out his arms in offered comfort.

“Explain what?” Sam screamed and slapped his hands away, then pushed her own into his chest knocking him back a step. “You have a family!”

Regret gave way to fear.

“Sam, shhh,” he said calmly, hoping she would lower her voice.

“They’re your family, Cole!” she said spitefully loud. “Don’t you want everyone to know?”

“Sam, shut up.” Now he was just angry. He never imagined she would be this upset. “They have to stay a secret.”

“Don’t tell me to shut up! You don’t get to tell me to do anything
ever
again!”

Cole couldn’t allow her to continue screaming, and bring more attention to them.

The fact that he was able to grab her, and put his hand over her mouth, showed just how unthinking she was at the moment. She continued to scream behind his hand and tried, successfully, to kick his shins. He hauled her bodily to the nearest building, a barn. There was no need to subject the children to her raving.

“Sir, I respectfully request you to unhand the Princess.”

Cole turned from the barn door to see Captain Jensen striding toward him. The soldier’s hand rested at the ready on his partially sheathed sword.

“Open the door for me, Jensen, then just walk away,” Cole said wearily.

Jensen tottered on obedience, looking between the still struggling Sam and her captor.

“That’s an order,” Cole said in his most official tone, then softened. “I’m not going to hurt her, Jensen. Just open the door.”

Sam took advantage of the distraction and bit Cole’s hand. He reflexively moved it, and she snuck out “Bastard”, before he covered her mouth again.

Jensen seemed to be forcing his limbs to comply as he sheathed his sword and opened the barn door.

“Thanks,” Cole said, as he dragged a thrashing Sam past the Captain. “Now walk away.”

Cole slammed the stable door with his foot on the gawking Captain and released Sam, who tripped through the ankle deep hay in her haste to make distance between them. She turned to face him, tears streaking her face.

“Sprocket Activate.” It was a whisper, but held the conviction of an executioner. Sprocket unfurled himself and crawled to her shoulder. He shook his gold wings filling the air with the buzz of a metallic cicada. Sprocket swayed in time with Sam and whirred a low growl.

“Sam, stop it. You know that thing makes me uneasy.”

A slight lift of her brow confirmed her intensions to do just that.

“Sam, I was going to tell you. I really thought it could wait, and I certainly didn’t think it would upset you this much. I honestly thought you’d understand.”

“Slag you,” she sobbed, and Sprocket jumped from her shoulder to pace like a hungry lion between them.

He covered his eyes for a moment, running a hand over his face to wipe away moisture from profuse sweating, then crumpled to the ground in pain from Sam’s boot slamming between his legs. His vision faded to white and multicolored stars. He panted through the agony radiating from his groin and clenching his stomach.

“You mother-slagging-ashpan-clinker-faced-bastard!” Sam shrieked.

That might have been funny if it weren’t for his lunch trying to play an encore and Sam’s distress. Even if he could think of a reply he couldn’t say it. Curling up like a baby was all he could attempt at the moment. He couldn’t even flinch when tiny pinpricks traveled up his leg, announcing Sprocket’s proximity.

“You think I’d understand? You
think
I’d understand?” His eyes were squeezed tight against the pain, but he could hear Sam’s agitated pacing in the hay strewn floor near his head.

“You think I wouldn’t be upset that you already have a family? That you already have children?”

No. Oh God, no. He struggled to his hands and knees and tried to take in a full breath so he could speak.

“No.” Is all he could manage.

“No what?” She asked and placed her foot on his hip. It took very little effort to push him back over to his side, but she used extra force for good measure. “No you didn’t expect me to understand, or no I shouldn’t be upset?”

“Not my children,” he croaked and wished he could add that she had probably just ruined any chance of him siring any. The scuff of her boots stopped, and he was grateful she’d heard him.

“So you just adopted a random fatherless, husbandless family? Even you’re not that valiant, Cole.” That hurt, but she was right.