Royal Outlaw: (Royal Outlaw, Book 1) (42 page)

“You breathed softly, peacefully as you slept. I could have driven a knife through your child’s heart and ended your life quickly.”

His eyes hardened. 

“But that would have been too merciful and you don’t deserve mercy.”

He released his hold on her and she fell like a rock. A single crack sprang up in this portion of the ice that was thicker than the area where Iyela had fallen.

A part of Mariel became conscious, but it did not force her body to move, it simply prayed to Narel that the crack in the ice would widen and the frigid waters of the lake would swallow her whole. She could not bear the thought, the fear, of being killed by the Brown-Spider-Man. She would rather freeze to death.   

Narel did not answer her prayers.

“Your mother tasted sour,” the Brown-Spider-Man said. “She was happy to die as she watched you flee to freedom.”

He kicked her in the ribs, but she did not grunt with the pain.

“You will be the sweetest of them all. Your fear is delicious.”

The Brown-Spider-Man circled her, the ice holding beneath his feet despite its initial crack.

“Where should I bite first?” he wondered aloud. “The neck is the most delectable, but it will kill you fastest.”

He continued to circle her. Mariel no longer watched him. She stared up at the sky. Nothing looked back at her except the stars. No goddess in fox form leapt from above to attack the Assassin and no mother gave her life to save her daughter’s. She had escaped several assassination attempts, but there would be no lucky break for her this time. She would go down a coward, unable to fight.

Energy and purpose swept through Mariel, bringing strength back to her numb body. She was not weak. She rolled upright and let the momentum carry her forward toward the Brown-Spider-Man. Her body slammed into his and he fell backward. She hit him with her fists.

The victory was short lived.

The corrupted zreshlan pushed her off him and reached in to take a bite. Mariel moved in time to escape the sharp teeth, but the momentary strength and bravery she had felt began to ebb. The memories began to crush her again, whirling at a pace she could not hope to follow, let alone think with them loose in her mind.

It would be the memories that would be her downfall. They kept her from thinking clearly, from allowing her body to move in the way it normally did. The memories inspired paralyzing fear of the assassin and it would be that fear that ultimately killed her.

With her cheek resting on her arm against the ice, she watched through the blur of memories as the Assassin approached. She could see him hovering over her in her room at Remel as he woke her from a deep, dreamless sleep into a nightmare. She watched as he leaned over her mother. Crouched behind the protection of a rock, she saw him standing above her. In the convent, she knelt before the statue of Narel as he stroked her cheek. Tonight, he walked delicately across the thin space of ice that separated them, a smile of redemption on his face.

The ice shuddered with each step the monster, but it did not crack. Mariel’s eyes were fixed in horror on the pale face of the Assassin. The corrupted zreshlan gazed longingly at the princess of Natric.

The Assassin’s expression changed to shock and pain. He cried out once and then could only groan. Beneath his grey robes, his knees buckled and he dropped to the ice.

Mariel watched him fall and curl up in agony. Thick, maroon blood spilled across the ice. Someone screamed at Mariel, but all she could hear was the sound of the Assassin in pain. All she could think about was that the Assassin was not really hurt. It was an illusion. He would get up and then he would kill her. She started screaming. All of her fear and terror went into that scream.

Something pushed her and tried to drag her upright, but Mariel was dead weight. She kept screaming as someone lost their balance on the ice and fell onto the princess. The moonlight reflected in coppery hair. Cara.

Mariel cut off her scream as Cara regained her balance. Aracklin, covered from tip to hilt in maroon blood, was in Cara’s hand. The lady’s maid pushed her friend until Mariel moved. Fear continued to weigh Mariel down, but with effort, and Cara’s help, she slipped and slid across the ice until she reached the bank. Iyela waited for them at the edge of the lake, the ice unable to hold her weight.

When they reached the snow-covered shore, Mariel collapsed on the bank. Iyela sent the feelings of worry and fear, but Mariel barely registered it. Cara cleaned Aracklin in the snow and, with shaking fingers and several failed attempts, managed to return the sword to the scabbard that still hung from Mariel’s waist.

Cara and Iyela forced Mariel to stand and, with prodding and cajoling that was none-too-gentle because of their own fear, they were able to get the princess onto the unicorn’s back. Standing on a log, Cara clumsily clambered onto Iyela’s back to sit behind Mariel.

As Iyela launched into motion, Mariel stared at the frozen lake. The bright night revealed the trail of blood across the icy surface, leading to a grey robed figure that slowly crawled to the edge of the frozen water.

He isn’t dead
was the last thought in Mariel’s head before the power of fear finally took her into unconsciousness.

* * *

Colorful words met Mariel upon awakening. What she found most unfamiliar about them were not the words themselves, but the person who spoke them.

“Cara?” Mariel asked in confusion as she slowly sat up and groaned. It felt like her entire body was bruise and she had numerous small scrapes.

Cara cursed again and dropped the tools she had been using in an effort to light a fire in the old grate. Spinning around to face her friend, Cara blushed and ducked her head.

“Sorry,” she muttered. “I’ve been trying to light the fire and it isn’t working.” She paused and then asked almost tentatively, “How are you feeling?”

Mariel rubbed the back of her head which hurt fiercely. She found dried blood there. Fear began to creep into her and she looked around the room frantically.

The room was relatively small for a sitting room, which was obviously what it was . . . or at least what it had been. A thick layer of dust coated the furniture and artwork of the room. The once plush couches and chairs were moth-eaten and deteriorated. Cobwebs clung to the paint-faded ceiling and the sconces. The hearth that Cara crouched in front of was made of heavy stone and drew the attention of the room. Above the mantle, a lighter space on the wall revealed where a portrait had once hung. Mariel’s eyes traveled down to the base of the wall next to the hearth where the missing portrait had fallen, its dust covered occupant staring directly at Mariel. She looked away.

Cara approached and sat beside her. The younger girl said nothing. Mariel put her head in her hands. She could not look at this room anymore. Not when the memories threatened. She had avoided this place for a reason, and now she was here again, but she did not remember coming here.

“I forgot again, didn’t I?”

“Yes,” Cara said softly.

She did not ask what the last thing Mariel remembered was. In a way, Mariel was grateful for her friend’s kindness, but the princess could not contain her own curiosity.

“What happened after we ran passed the ravine?”

Cara was quiet, but her silence told Mariel more than words.

“The Assassin.” It wasn’t a question.

“We escaped,” Cara stated the obvious. “You were unconscious most of the journey. Iyela’s outside. She’s not a normal horse is she?”

A brief smile flitted across Mariel’s lips. “She’s a unicorn.”

“She talks in pictures.”

“It can be annoying can’t it?”

“Pictures don’t tell me where I am.”

Mariel did not respond. She stood and walked toward the wall next the hearth and knelt in front of the portrait. With care, she brushed the thick coat of dust and sticky cobwebs away so that the brushes of paint could be seen more clearly.

“This picture can.”

“What do you mean?”

The princess tried to smile and failed. She spread her arm to indicate the room. “Don’t you think it’s odd that this place is decaying, but otherwise untouched from when its inhabitants left it?”

Cara’s expression changed. She became wary and uncertain as she looked around the room.

“This place was deemed haunted after what happened here,” Mariel paused and picked up the portrait. “I don’t know what happened here.” She pointed at the young green-eyed occupant with thick brown curls. “But she does.”

The young noble girl gazed around the room with new appreciation. “We’re at Remel.”

Mariel set the portrait against the wall, unwilling to look at the cheerful, spoiled girl who had existed before the Assassin paid a call.

“Why would Iyela bring us to Remel? It is weeks from the capital in carriage travel time!”

It was a good question. Mariel could say that Iyela brought them here because she knew it was not haunted and no one would think to look for them there. But that would be a lie.

“Cara,” Mariel began and then hesitated. She closed her eyes and gathered strength before continuing. “I need you to help me face my memories.”

A brilliant flash of light flared. Mariel lifted her arms and turned away as Cara screamed. When Mariel looked back, she found what she expected: a black vixen with amethyst eyes surrounded by a cloud of light.

“At last,” Narel said.

The goddess did nothing to inspire confidence in Mariel with the decision she had finally made.

“Why do you always appear in your fox form?”

“That is irrelevant. You are merely stalling.”

Mariel knew it was true.

“Come,” Narel said. “Both of you.”

Fear squeezed Mariel. “Why can’t we stay here, and do it in this room?” Mariel did not want to leave this room, but none of the events of the forgotten part of her memory had happened here or else the memories would have seized her when she opened her eyes.

“We must return to the place where it began.”

“Where is that?” Mariel choked, fear getting the better of her.

“You must be brave, Mariel de Sharec. You must not let your courage fail you.”

“I’m not scared.”

Narel snorted in an un-godlike way and Cara gave her such a dubious look that Mariel shifted uncomfortably. “Okay, I-I . . . never mind.”

“Say it!” Narel commanded.

Mariel could not say it. She could not admit it. Fear was something only cowards felt. Fear was something that inhibited strength and thought. Fear could corrupt. Did the zreshlans not tell her that on the eve before she left?

I have admitted fear
, she told herself. The night James returned from speaking with the zreshlans he had tried to persuade her to face her memories. Fear and the rapid events that followed left her so drained that she had sunk low enough to admit she was scared. James had slept beside her that night, holding her and banishing her fear. If she could admit it to James Snaketongue, why could she not admit it to Cara, who trusted her completely? And the goddess already knew. Mariel wished Narel would leave and let her face her memories without an arrogant immortal watching. Narel obviously heard the thought because her fox lips curved up cruelly.

“I’m afraid of remembering,” Mariel said softly, almost too quietly to hear. She felt dampness on her cheeks and hurriedly wiped the tears away.

Comforting arms wrapped around her waist and Cara laid her head on her friend’s shoulder.

“Come,” Narel commanded. “I have little time to waste on mortal emotional problems. The distraction I left for my brother will only last so long.”

“You could always leave,” Mariel snapped.

“I wish to witness this. Now,
come!
”

Mariel felt the command deep within her, so deep her muscles moved involuntarily and she walked without willing herself to. Cara was forced to release her embrace and instead grabbed Mariel’s hand as they left the room.

The princess kept her eyes riveted to the erect tail of the vixen who led the way through the large house. She was afraid to look at anything else because she did not want to face the memories until she absolutely had to.

Narel led them up a flight of familiar stairs. The girls had to be careful because termites had invaded the wood. Mariel thought wryly that Darren had spread the rumor that the place was haunted to keep thieves at bay, while the nobles had avoided it for the same reason, but nature would not leave the fief to stand for all time. Nothing lasted forever, especially nothing living.

Mariel stopped walking. Cara, who had an iron grip on her friend’s hand, tripped and fell onto the landing. The older girl refused to take another step. What was she doing? She did not need to remember her mother’s murder. In this one area, curiosity released her. She did not want to remember.

But if she did not face her memories, she would eventually go mad or be paralyzed with fear her every time she faced the Assassin. She knew that this happened, even though she did not remember. The Assassin would come again, and next time luck would not be with her. Death was not something she feared, but she liked living too much to throw her life away. She had learned that in the City of the Gods when the Deputy Provost had nearly hung her.

With strength of will, she forced herself to step onto the landing. Cara took her hand again and the two girls caught up to the goddess, who had not stopped, as though she knew Mariel would decide to keep going without force.

Narel led them down a long hallway and turned at a door that hung on its hinges. Mariel took a deep breath and stepped into the room. A scream ripped from her throat as the memory slammed into her.

* * *

The beautiful twenty-two-year-old exiled princess looked to the ceiling in exhalation as she finished Mariel’s favorite song about a princess being rescued by a daring prince.

“One more, Mother.”

The woman swooped down and kissed her daughter’s forehead. “Tomorrow.”

“Pleeeeeeease?” Mariel did her best to look pathetic.

Princess Carolina laughed.
“
My little actress! You are cunning like your father.”

“Another song?”

“Tomorrow,” the princess repeated as she stood and smiled down at her little girl. She swept out of the room without a backward glance, leaving a single candle flickering. The light from the candle had always kept the monsters at bay from Mariel’s dreams. But that night it did not.

A soft caress woke the child. She fluttered her eyes sleepily before she finally opened them. The scream she uttered was unlike anything that had ever escaped her throat before.

“Now, now, child, no need for that.”

But there was a need for screaming. A monster from something worse than a nightmare stood above her, his pale, striped face visible in the small amount of light produced by the candle.

“Get out of bed,” he ordered.

She sought to bury her face beneath her covers, but as she finally tore her gaze away from the striped monster, she saw that her blankets moved. Her scream rose to an unnatural pitch as she launched out of her bed away from the creature and away from the spiders.   

Over her screams, the striped monster yelled something, but she could not hear. The next thing she was aware of were large shaking hands on her. She recoiled, but the hands held her.

“Calm down, Miss,” the nursemaid whispered. “If you scream too much, he gonna kill you!”

The Spider-Man laughed. “I’m going to kill her anyway.”

* * *

“Stop!” Mariel screamed. “Stop!” She sobbed into Cara’s shoulder while Narel watched calmly, no sympathy in her eyes.

“No more, please don’t make me remember anymore.”

No one said anything. It was in that moment that Mariel realized she did not remember any more than what had happened in this room. The flood of memories had not come. Only the memory from this room.

“Are you doing that?” she asked the goddess.

“Yes.” Narel did not ask her what she meant, she already knew. “Tell us what happened in this room.”