The Blood Curse (16 page)

Prince Tomas snorted. “You’d beat me in a fight, a hundred times out of a hundred.”

Karel didn’t deny this. “Gunvald beat me once.”

Tomas snorted again. “Once. Out of how many times?”

Karel shrugged. He started walking towards the market square.

Tomas caught up with him, matched his step. “Were you Esger’s best?”

Karel considered this question. “One of them. I didn’t win every training bout. There were a couple of others who sometimes beat me.”

“Sometimes.”

“Sometimes.”

They walked in silence for the length of one street. Karel heard the twitter of birdsong, glanced up, saw birdcages hanging from the upper windows of a house.

“Are there many Esfaban armsmen?” the prince asked, when they turned the corner.

“I’m the first. There are others training.”

Prince Tomas gave a grunt of satisfaction. “Thought you might be the first. The best of the best. That’s what you tried to be. Am I right?”

Karel glanced at him.

“Your fighting skills. You have something to prove.”

“My family’s loyalty.” To save them from servitude again.

Tomas shook his head. “Not just that. You’re proving your people’s worth. Fighters, not slaves.”

Karel hesitated, and then nodded.

“And you threw it all away for Princess Brigitta.”

Karel felt himself flush. “Jaegar was going to murder those boys. And her, if she tried to stop it.”

They turned the next corner. The market square came into sight. “What now?” Tomas asked, his pace quickening.

“Now, we ride out to the six mile marker. See what we can find.”

T
HEY CAME ACROSS
signs of the battle well before the six mile marker: two wagons laden with dead horses. The prince counted the carcasses under his breath as the wagons lumbered past. “Seven,” he said.

Next, were a man and woman, both gray-haired. The woman wept quietly as she rode. The man was grim-faced. Not refugees; they carried no belongings with them. Mourners, Karel guessed. On their way back from seeing where their son had died.

No bodies lay on the road where the fight had taken place, but there was blood. Lots of blood. And half a dozen men, who reached for their swords.

Karel signaled for the armsmen and Prince Tomas to halt. He slowed his mount to a walk, his eyes skipping from one hostile face to the next. His gaze fastened on one man. “You Steppen?”

The man gripped his sword more tightly, his knuckles whitening. “What of it?”

He’s afraid the next blood spilled on the road will be his
.

Karel swung down from his saddle, but made no move towards the men. He stood quietly, his hands relaxed at his sides. “Rohmer sent us, said we could look around.”

“Why?” Steppen said, his grip on the sword still white-knuckled.

“We’re hunting the men who did this.”

Steppen examined him with a quick flick of his eyes, head to toe, and then the prince, and then each of the armsmen. “Hunting Fithians? Why?”

“To kill them.”

Steppen stared hard at Karel, eyes narrowed, then sheathed his sword. He swept his hand out in a broad, angry gesture, indicating the mess of hoof prints and boot prints, the dusty marks where bodies had lain, the discarded fragments of tack and clothing, the blood. “Look as much as you want.”

“Thanks.”

The armsmen dismounted quietly behind Karel.

“You seen anyone you can’t place here today?” Karel asked the watchman. “A young woman with golden hair? Dressed like a man?”

Steppen’s mouth twisted. “The one who started this?” He turned his head, spat into the dirt. “No.”

“And you’ve not seen any Fithians.” It was a statement, not a question. Steppen would have looked hard at every person who passed, every farmer, every refugee.

Steppen shook his head. “The men who did this, they’re long gone.”

Karel nodded. That was what his instinct told him, too.

Prince Tomas stepped up alongside him. He looked at the bloodstained road, and then turned to survey the ground on either side. “What now? We search for her?”

Karel glanced left and right, taking in the terrain. A rocky hillside clothed in thorn trees and scrub. The ground rose to the east. The princess would have run downhill, away from the road, into those dense thickets of trees. And the Fithians would have followed.

He imagined her running, imagined her fear.

“We search for her?” the prince said again, turning on his heel, examining the hillside as if trying to decide where to start looking.

“No,” Karel said.

Tomas frowned. “No?”

“These men are professionals. They know how to track people. They lost her. They found her. They left.”

“But—”

“We ride to the next village, ask questions, see who passed through. I’d wager the Fithians did some time this morning. If not, we come back here and search.”

Prince Tomas was still frowning. “But if she’s still here, we risk losing—”

“She’s not,” Karel said, his certainty gut-deep. “She escaped. They caught her.” He examined the scene again: the hillside, the thorn trees, the bloody road. Princess Brigitta was resourceful and courageous. She’d escaped from the Fithians, slowed them down, delayed them. “We’ll catch up with them soon.”

CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

T
HE
F
ITHIANS DIDN’T
punish her. They didn’t buy a cart at the next village and bundle her into it. They didn’t use All-Mother’s Breath on her. Leader simply tied her hands together, fastened them to the pommel of the piebald mare’s saddle, and let her ride.

My escape isn’t worth comment? Or warnings of dire punishment if I try again?

It made Britta angry. She’d ridden with three things: the painful ache of her throat where Pox had throttled her, the hot, swollen throbbing where he’d struck her face, and anger. She’d
escaped
. Had injured Plain. Brought Killer to his knees. How dared they not even mention it?

Beneath the anger, was a gray eddy of defeat. She’d escaped; they’d caught her.

T
HE ANGER—AND
the defeat—stayed with her all day. It flavored the dried meat she painfully swallowed for dinner. It blanketed her as she lay down to sleep. Britta closed her eyes and felt exhaustion weigh her down. Her wrists were still bound. Leader hadn’t untied them. Punishment? Her throat ached. Her cheek radiated heat, radiated pain.

Footsteps came towards her.

Britta opened her eyes.

Curly knelt, pulled a length of rope from his belt, and grabbed one of her ankles.

Britta tried to jerk free.

Curly’s fingers tightened, biting into her ankle, pressing flesh against bone. His gaze lifted to her face for an instant. The threat in his eyes was unmistakable.

Britta froze, held her breath.

Curly swiftly bound her ankles together. He stood and walked away without a word.

Britta lay wrapped in her cloak, feeling the tightness of the rope around her ankles.
They’re afraid I’ll escape again
.

A fierce bubble of exhilaration expanded in her chest. The ache in her throat, the throbbing heat in her cheek, evaporated. She grinned to herself. By the All-Mother’s name, they
should
be afraid, because she was cursed-well
going
to escape again.

And next time, they wouldn’t catch her.

CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

“S
EE IF
I
NNIS
will respond to your voice, Petrus,” Rand said, when they halted for the night. He’d napped in the wagon; his eyes looked brighter, his face less haggard.

Petrus climbed into the wagon. Innis lay in a bed of blankets. She looked as pale and fragile as porcelain. He knelt, took one of her hands, held it in both of his. Her fingers were limp, cool.

He bent his head, spoke softly in her ear. “Innis? Innis, can you hear me? You need to wake up.”

There was no twitch of her fingers, no change in her breathing, no flicker of her eyelids.

He tried again. “Innis, wake up!”

But no matter whether he spoke softly or loudly, no matter whether he couched his words as an entreaty or a command, Innis didn’t stir.

Finally he sat back and looked at Rand.

“Don’t look so upset, son. We’ll wake her.”

“How?” He heard desperation in his voice, took a breath, tried to speak calmly. “At the Academy they said that the longer a patient is unresponsive, the less likely—”

“I have an idea,” Rand said. “Something we can try.”

“What?”

“You said you’d told Flin about the dreams?”

Petrus nodded.

“How did he react?”

“Uh... he was angry Innis had told you and me, but not him. But then he asked some questions. I think he wants to know more.”

“Good.”

“You’re going to ask him to share a dream with her? Try to wake her up that way?”

“If he’s willing. Stay with her, will you?” Rand clambered down from the wagon.

Petrus looked down at Innis. He touched her cheek lightly, let his fingertips rest on her cool skin. The strongest shapeshifter in living memory, a powerful healer—and yet not an ounce of arrogance or conceit. Kind. Shy. Brave. Quiet. He thought about her solemn, dark gray eyes, thought about the flashes of mischief that sometimes lit her face, thought about how much he loved her.

The familiar, bitter jealousy surged in his chest. He remembered what Innis had told him in Ankeny.
You’re my family. I will always love you
.

But not as much as she loved the prince.

Footsteps approached the wagon. He heard Prince Harkeld’s voice. “Of course I will. Now?”

“Once you’ve eaten.”

T
HE PRINCE BROUGHT
his bedroll and blankets. “How close should I be?”

“Best be right alongside her,” Rand said. He turned his head, and peered across at the campfire. “Won’t be a minute. Need to talk to Malle before she turns in.” He disappeared into the dark.

The prince laid his bedroll next to Innis and spread out his blankets. Petrus’s bitterness returned. He tried to smother it, but Prince Harkeld must have sensed it. He stopped what he was doing, sat back on one knee, met Petrus’s eyes in the candlelight.

For a long moment, they stared at each other, and then the prince said, “I’m sorry.”

Was that pity in Prince Harkeld’s voice? Petrus felt his face stiffen. “For what?”

“I know how you feel about her.”

Petrus’s face seemed to become even stiffer. “No, you don’t,” he said, turning away, hot with anger, hot with humiliation. Pity? Rutting
pity
?

“Petrus...” The prince scrambled after him and grabbed his arm. “Don’t go.”

Petrus tried to wrench free, but Prince Harkeld’s fingers dug in. He turned his head and glared at the prince. “Let go of me.”
Or else I’ll break your face
.

“Hedín’s slept with me the last two nights; tonight I want it to be you. If Innis wakes up, you should be here.”

Petrus glared at him, hated him.

The prince released his arm. “I’m sorry,” he said again. His mouth twisted wryly. The expression on his face wasn’t pity. What was it? Fellow-feeling? Friendship? “Please stay.”

Petrus looked away. He wrestled with his pride, with his temper. “All right,” he said finally.