The Blood Curse (15 page)

Britta took two steps and halted. Someone stood alongside the nearest tree, his teeth bared in a silent grin.

Killer.

Britta’s heart punched against her breastbone. She turned to run—and froze. Pox stood with his boots in the creek.

Terror rooted her legs to the ground.

Pox stepped out of the creek. He struck her hard across the face.

Britta fell, tasting blood in her mouth, rolled and tried to scramble to her feet, but Pox grabbed a fistful of her hair, his knuckles digging into her scalp, and held her down.

Footsteps crunched across the stony ground. Someone crouched in her field of vision. Killer. His ice-blue eyes glinted. She saw how much he wanted to kill her.

Pox hauled her to her feet. Killer stood, too. He stepped closer. He held a rope in his hands.

Britta kicked out in panic. Her boot sank into Killer’s groin.

Killer uttered a strangled grunt and curled in on himself, collapsing to the ground.

Pox grunted, too. He released Britta’s hair, shoved her to her knees, and tried to haul her arms behind her.

Britta flailed and kicked and clawed, fighting Pox with all her strength.

Pox hooked an arm around her throat and squeezed.

Blood roared in Britta’s ears. She plummeted into blackness.

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

T
HEY RODE INTO
a town called Vermeulen in the afternoon. Something had happened here recently. Something bad. Karel knew even before they passed through the gate. It was in the way the gate guard looked at them, tense, his hand gripping his sword. It was in the busyness of the main street. Townspeople clustered together, grief on some faces, excitement on others. The men were all armed. The voices he heard were high-pitched. Karel caught words as he passed.
Dead. Fithian.

He dismounted in the market square. “We need to find out what’s happened here.”

“What do you mean?” Prince Tomas asked, glancing around.

“Can’t you feel it?” The air seemed to bristle with emotion. Tension. Fear. People were watching them. A babble of noise rippled outwards, shrill with alarm. He scanned the crowd, saw women catch children and hurry away, saw men step back, loosening their swords in their sheaths.
They’re afraid of us. Afraid we’re Fithians?

“Keep your hands away from your swords,” he told the armsmen quietly, and then raised his voice: “We need to speak with your watch captain. Where do we find him?”

Silence met his words. A silence filled with hostility and fear.

“Your watch captain,” Karel repeated loudly. “Where is he?” He stood with his feet slightly apart, as relaxed and unthreatening as he could be, but he knew what he looked like, what the armsmen looked like. Like soldiers. Like Fithians.

There was a stir in the crowd, someone pushing through. A man almost as tall as Karel, solidly built, with thick dark hair and a beard graying at the edges.

“I’m watch captain here.” The man stopped three paces from Karel. His chin was up, his voice level, but the skin was taut across his cheekbones.
He thinks we’ll kill him
.

Karel stepped slowly forward, keeping his hands well away from his sword belt.

The watch captain’s fingers twitched, but he didn’t unsheathe his own weapon.

“You’ve had trouble here recently,” Karel said, in a low voice. “What?”

The man blinked, and considered the question. “Why should I tell you, stranger?”

Bravado, or caution?

Caution, Karel decided. He lowered his voice still further, so no one in the watching crowd could hear. “We’re looking for some people. They’d have ridden through here yesterday. Does your trouble have anything to do with them?”

“What kind of people?” The watch captain’s voice was as low as Karel’s.

“Men.” Karel examined the man’s face, assessed him, decided on honesty. “Fithian assassins.”

The watch captain’s face tightened in a grimace. “They passed through.”

“What happened?”

The man assessed him in turn, his gaze flicking over Karel, over the prince, over the armsmen. “Why should I tell you? Who are you?”

“Not Fithians,” Karel said. “You can search us if you want. You’ll find no throwing stars.”

“Why are you following them?”

“They have something of ours.”

“What?”

“A person.”

The watch captain stared at him for a long moment, then gave a curt nod. “You’d best come with me. Leave those men of yours here.”

K
AREL TOOK
P
RINCE
Tomas with him. He left the armsmen behind with orders to look as harmless as they could. If ten strong, well-armed men could look harmless.

The watch captain walked at a brisk pace, not speaking. Along a street, then left, and left again. The building he led them to wasn’t Vermeulen’s watch house. The All-Mother’s circle held in cupped palms was carved into the wood above the door: the town’s infirmary.

The watch captain halted on the step. “Yesterday, close on dusk, a troop of our militiamen met some riders, about six miles east of here.”

“What happened?”

The man pressed his lips together, flattening them against his teeth, and shook his head. “I’ll let Eckel tell you.”

T
HE CAPTAIN LED
them down a wooden corridor scented with herbs. They entered a dormitory. Karel counted twelve beds. Only two were occupied. In one, an elderly man slept. In the other, a younger man lay. A woman sat alongside his bed, holding his hand.

The watch captain led them to the second bed. Karel and Prince Tomas followed, their boots clattering on the wooden floor. The scent of herbs was stronger in here.

The woman looked up, released the man’s hand, stood. “Rohmer?”

The captain nodded at her. “Good day, Mistress Tersa. I need to talk with Eckel here. Can you give us a moment?”

The woman ducked her head in a nod, gathered her skirts, and left the room.

Karel watched her go. Mother? Sister? Or the patient’s wife?

The captain, Rohmer, sat in the chair the woman had vacated. “Eckel? I need to talk with you again.”

Karel examined the man in the bed. Bandaged head, bandaged arm, flushed with fever. Younger than he’d thought, perhaps even younger than he himself was. The woman must be his mother.

“Cap’n.” The word was slurred. Eckel’s pupils were dilated, his gaze vague.

“Poppy syrup?” Karel asked, crouching alongside the bed. “How bad are his injuries?”

“He’ll live,” Rohmer said. “Unlike the others.” He pressed his lips together again, grimaced. “Twenty militiamen. Eckel here’s the only one still alive.”

“What?” Karel heard shock in Prince Tomas’s voice. “Nineteen dead?”

Rohmer didn’t answer, instead he turned to the man in the bed. “Eckel, tell me what happened again.”

Eckel didn’t answer for several seconds. He lay blinking, his eyes glazed and unfocussed.
Too drugged
, Karel thought, rising from his crouch. But even as he stood, Eckel opened his mouth and spoke: “On dusk, it were. We was headed home, just passed the six mile marker.” He rubbed his face, smearing his eyes with a clumsy hand. “Were these riders comin’ towards us. Didn’t look at ’em. Wasn’t thinkin’ of anything ’cept my dinner.”

Karel crouched again. “What happened?”

Eckel was silent for a moment, his brow creased below the bandage. “Hard to remem’er. Happen so fast.” He blew out a breath scented with poppy syrup, rubbed his face again. “One of them rid right into us. Yellin’, she were. Shoutin’ for help. Said she’d been kidnapped.”

Karel’s pulse picked up speed. “She?”

“Then it was jus’...” Eckel blinked, his confusion clear to see on his face. “It jus’ happen so fast. One minute we was ridin’, the next we was fightin’. There was swords and them star things. And then we was all dead on the road.”

“She?” Karel said again. “You’re certain it was a woman shouting for help?”

“Thought she were a boy,” Eckel said, squinting up at Karel. “Tried to grab her. Got her cloak, got a look at her. Not a boy. A girl. Yeller hair. Pretty face.”

“That’s her?” the watch captain asked. “The person you’re looking for?”

“That’s her,” Karel said.

“Who is she?”

Karel exchanged a glance with Prince Tomas. “A kinswoman.”

“What do the Fithians want with her?”

“I can’t tell you.”

“Can’t, or won’t?” There was a note of anger in the watch captain’s voice.

“Can’t,” Karel said, meeting the man’s gaze. “I would, if I could, but more lives than just nineteen depend on it.”
The lives of everyone in this kingdom, yours included
.

Rohmer stared at him, his mouth tight.

“I can’t tell you who we are,” Karel said quietly. “I can’t tell you who she is. But I need to know what happened on that road.”

“They killed everyone,” Eckel said, the words slurring together. “Tha’s what happened. Killed us all.”

Karel turned to him. “Except you.”

“’Cept me.” Tears filled Eckel’s eyes. “’Cept me.”

“What happened?”

“Got knocked off me horse. Can’ remem’er much after that, ’cept... ’cept it was all over. The fightin’ had stopped and they was... they was killin’ the wounded.” Tears spilled from Eckel’s eyes. “Saw them kill Lobel, and Ren. Knew they’d kill me soon as they got to me. So’s I got to me feet and grabbed the nearest horse an’ headed for Vermeulen. They follered. They was right behin’ me. One of them star things hit me in the arm. But it fell dark, an’ I knew the road and they didn’.”

“And you made it home.”

Eckel nodded, and wiped the moisture from his eyes.

“And the girl? The one with yellow hair?”

“She were gone.”

“Gone? What do you mean, gone?” Prince Tomas leaned eagerly over the bed.

“The one in charge of ’em, he were screamin’ at ’em to find her.” Eckel shivered. “In a murderous rage, he were.”

The prince turned to Karel, his eyes shining with excitement. “She got away!” His attention swung to Rohmer. “Did you look for her? Did you find her?”

“No,” the watch captain said. “We did not look for her. We lost nineteen men yesterday. We’re not looking to lose any more. You want her, you find her.”

Karel met the man’s gaze, saw the anger there. “Fair enough,” he said, pushing to his feet.

“But—”

“No.” He cut the prince off. “This isn’t their fight, it’s ours.”

Tomas closed his mouth.

Karel turned away from the bed, and turned back. “Eckel? How many Fithians were there?”

“Didn’ see, didn’ count. Mebbe five, six?”

“Any of them die?” He glanced at Rohmer. “You find any bodies you didn’t recognize?”

The watch captain shook his head.

Six against twenty, and the six win
. Karel grimaced. He walked quietly from the dormitory, careful not to wake the elderly man, then lengthened his stride in the corridor.

Princess Brigitta had escaped. Escaped from Fithian assassins. He felt like whooping until the corridor rang with his voice. His pride in her was enormous.

Karel stepped outside and halted on the stoop. Prince Tomas followed him out, and Rohmer. “Thank you,” Karel told the watch captain.

Rohmer acknowledged this with a curt nod and turned away.

The prince came to stand alongside Karel. “Nineteen dead.” His voice was dismayed. He didn’t utter the words, but Karel heard them clearly:
We haven’t a chance
.

The watch captain, Rohmer, heard it, too. He halted and looked back. “Our militia are farmers and shopkeepers. They’re volunteers, not soldiers. Not like you.”

We’re armsmen and a prince, not soldiers
. But Karel didn’t correct the mistake.

“Twenty to six, we hadn’t a chance. Twelve to six, you do.”

Karel studied the man’s face. He saw anger there, and bitterness. “Any of your kin die yesterday?”

Rohmer’s mouth tightened. “Two nephews.”

“I’m sorry.”

Rohmer’s lips pressed together. After a moment, he nodded. “My deputy’s in charge out there, at the six mile marker. Steppen. Tell him I said you could look around.”

“Thanks,” Karel said.

“Get the bastards.”

“We will.”

“All-Mother’s blessing go with you.” With that, the watch captain strode away.

Karel stood on the stoop, watching until he was gone.

“Nineteen dead,” Prince Tomas said again, in a more neutral tone.

“Untrained. Not expecting a fight.” Farmers and shopkeepers, the watch captain had said. Dressed in uniforms and with swords on their belts, playing at being soldiers. “We’re trained. We’re ready.”

The prince glanced at him. “You forget, I’ve seen them fight.” He touched the stump of his right ear, ran his fingers along the scar bisecting his cheek.

“Seen, and survived.”

“Because we had witches with us.” Tomas lowered his hand. “You’re the only one of us capable of killing a Fithian, one on one.”

And even I wouldn’t survive for long
. He’d had surprise on his side in Lundegaard. And the advantage of higher ground. Take those away, and the next Fithian he fought would probably be his last. “The rest of you are close.”