The
seskeesh
’s rumbling sighs cut off as she started awake. Gabrielle stirred as well. She stretched, wincing as she straightened her head, and raising a hand up to rub her neck before her eyes opened. She gazed at Féolan with that slightly blurry look he had come to recognize as the lingering remains of her trance—as though the world was not quite in focus. He couldn’t resist waving a hand.
“Over here, Sharp Eyes,” he teased in Elvish.
“I see you. You had better have some food at hand, or I’ll eat you alive.”
The green eyes were clear now, the smile tired but untroubled. She was satisfied, then, with her night’s labor.
Gabrielle squirmed around, laid a hand on the female
seskeesh
’s chest and murmured a few words. A thank-you, Féolan guessed, or perhaps detailed patient care instructions. He wouldn’t put it past her—her powers of communication, untrained as she was, were stunning. Untaught rather: she had trained herself to heal and evidently acquired other skills in the process. For a moment he was overcome by his feelings for her: his admiration, his desire. His father’s words came back to him and he sighed. When they got back to Stonewater, he would have to talk to her. He would rather be flayed alive than postpone their wedding, but he would urge her to do just that nonetheless.
“What’s wrong?” Gabrielle’s quizzical eyes upon him.
“Nothing. Just lost in the stream...”
“You were glowering as though you were lost in a pit of vipers.”
Féolan shook his head and offered what he hoped was a distracting smile. Not now. “How’s your patient?”
Now it was Gabrielle’s smile that was distracting. She was beaming. “I’m sure he’s out of danger. Once the repairs got started, and he got some strength back, it went amazingly fast. These creatures, Féolan, they are so...,” she groped for a word,”vital. I’ve never encountered anyone with such a strong life-force...”
Her words faded as she came back to reality. “Derkh’s even farther away now, isn’t he?”
Féolan gave a reluctant nod. “Only a few hours, I guess, and we had lost the trail anyway. If we make good time to the pass and hit it far enough to the north, we still have a chance of intercepting him.”
“Then let’s go.” Gabrielle got stiffly to her feet, making a visible effort to thrust away fatigue.
“Nay, Gabrielle. You will eat first and rest.” Féolan held up a hand to forestall her objection and spoke with quiet conviction. “We cannot overtake Derkh if I have to carry you over the mountains. Come and take some food.”
“
T
AKE
one more step, Sir, and I will kill you where you stand.” Rosalie had meant to sound commanding and confident, but the mortifying tremble in her voice betrayed her.
Tremble or not, the sight of her stopped the intruder in his tracks. For a second, shock and uncertainty played over his smooth features. Then, as he took in the silence of the second-floor hallway stretching behind Rosalie, the absence of any guards or companions rushing protectively to her aid, his face relaxed into a dismissive grin. “Good day, Mam’selle,” he replied with exaggerated courtliness. “I am afraid this is not a good time for archery lessons. You are to come with us.”
When the seas burn! thought Rosalie. Her voice might be wobbly, but her hands were steady. Steady enough. How steady did you have to be to hit a target straight on at ten paces? Just think of it as a target, she told herself. He has already killed at least once.
The man was muttering to his accomplice. Rosalie understood from their quick glance down the hall that he was sending the man to the back stairway. They would have seen it on the way in, she realized with consternation. He was out of her sight before she could gather her thoughts to act. Could she rouse the sleeping guards before she was sandwiched between the two men? You will have to shoot one of them—or both, she told herself sternly, though her mind recoiled from the coldness of it.
She kept her bow trained on the first man—the head, apparently, of whatever was going on here—holding him at bay, while her ears strained after the second intruder’s progress toward the back stairs. If she shot the one in the hallway the second he came into view, could she have the boss back in her sights before he reached her? She would do better, she knew, to shoot the one she had now, but she could not bring herself to hit a motionless man. She edged back a little into the hall.
He was talking to her, but she tried only to listen to the approaching footsteps. “There is no need for you to be hurt, Mam’selle. Simply put down the bow and come along with my colleague.”
Suddenly the back stairs thundered with running feet—he was coming for her, fast. Rosalie whirled about. The man was already charging down the hall at shocking speed. If she did not shoot now, he would have her. The bow twanged, and he fell, an arrow sprouting from his right shoulder. The sight of such a thing, in her own house, by her own hand, was paralyzing—yet she must move and now. Wrenching her eyes from the blood, pulling a fresh arrow from her quiver, she turned back to find the leader more than halfway to the top landing. She took two quick steps away, but could go no farther without losing her bead on his chest.
Once again they were at a standoff. Rosalie was light-headed with fear and shock, felt her arms tremble with it as she drew back the string. No doubt her assailant saw it too, for his elegant face regained its confident smile, and he dipped his head in mock admiration. His voice, however, was hard and commanding. “A lucky shot. I congratulate you. Yet it is time to stop this charade. You are outnumbered—the rest of my men are outside, awaiting my call, and you, young miss, are alone.” Behind her, Rosalie
heard furtive movement from the wounded man, the sound of a knife eased from its sheath. I should have killed him, she thought. He’ll throw the knife, and that will end it. Pray heaven he is not left-handed.
A slight movement yanked her jittery attention away from her opponents. Rosalie watched, aghast, as the front door eased open. Not more! she thought, desperation rising to drown out her courage. I cannot hold off more of them.
The leader’s grin broadened as he saw Rosalie’s face stiffen in dismay. “You see. It is better you come now, before I must use my knife. You cannot hope to shoot us all.”
“She can definitely shoot you, though,” said Tristan affably. He had slipped through the unlatched door and was nearly to the first stair. Now the trap was reversed, the would-be captor caught between a bow and an advancing sword tip. Even as he turned, he raised his knife-arm for the throw.
“Try it, if you wish to die.” Tristan’s voice rapped out, hard and arresting. “Rosalie can bull’s-eye a straw man at fifty paces. I’d put you at less than five.”
For a long moment the man considered Tristan’s words. Then, with a grunt that sounded more vexed than afraid, he glanced back at Rosalie. This time the bold eyes took in her neat stance, the relaxed three-fingered draw. With an ironic smile, he lowered his arm, turned his knife and presented its hilt to Tristan. “Well played. I concede.” A second later, Normand barreled in.
A door clicked open behind her, and Rosie’s heart surged. Then André’s voice floated down the hallway, bleary with sleep.
“Rosalie? I heard voices. Is Tristan back?”
Dizzy with relief, Rosalie surveyed the scene below. Tristan looked so calm, but his blue eyes blazed at her. Cornflowers on
fire, she thought. He can make a girl weak in the knees at fifty paces. Her own silliness made her laugh out loud.
“Yes, Father,” she replied. Her voice her own again, thank heavens. “Tristan is back.”
A
N AGE CRAWLED
by, it seemed, before Tristan was able to entrust the prisoners to Normand’s care and bound up the stairs to Rosie’s side. The off-duty guards had to be rousted out—incredulous, he was, at Rosalie’s sheepish admission that she had put them in the old servants’ quarters in the attic so they would be “less disturbed” by the noise of the household—the situation at the barn checked out, the grounds searched. The back-door guard, he was gratified to learn, had not been so easily duped, after all. Becoming suspicious about the source of the fire, he had left the water pump to other willing hands and investigated behind the barn. The night guards found him tying Thorn to the hitching post in the yard, both men coughing and red-eyed after a cat-and-mouse game through the smoke-filled building.
At long last Tristan and Rosalie sat together at the top of the stairs, arms twined about each other. She was perilously close to tears, he knew, but she would hold them back until the last stranger was out of her home. Now, as the dead guard’s body was carried outside, Tristan held her head against his chest and kissed her hair. He had been a good man, Brousseaux, conscientious and steady. Tristan thought of the man’s young wife—only a year wed, they were, with a baby on the way—and anger swelled in his heart that this man should escape the perils of war only to die under a countryman’s sword. How many other lives, he wondered, had LaBarque ruined over the years?
Dinner was delayed that night. The cook and maid had rushed
with everyone else to fight the fire. When they came back, they were so unsettled to learn what had happened that it was some time before they could stop fluttering and exclaiming and begin cooking.
Tristan, Rosalie and André retreated to the parlor to wait. Rosalie and Tristan seemed unable to let go of each other, sitting nearly in each other’s laps on the sofa across from André’s easy chair as each recounted what had happened. Tea, and then tea with brandy, was brought in, and the bracing glow of it was so welcome that if not for the lurking fear of some new trap that might yet be sprung, they would all three gladly have drunk themselves silly. They were still piecing together the full extent of LaBarque’s malignancy when the bell called them to table.
“Come back with me to Chênier,” Tristan urged as they made their way to the dining room, “both of you. A little holiday will do you good after all this trouble, and frankly, I’d feel better knowing you were safe.”
“It sounds like you were in greater danger than anyone, today,” observed André. He looked at his daughter, her chair pressed tight against Tristan’s, and favored her with an uncharacteristically broad smile. “However, I’m afraid it would take a bonemender’s blade to separate Rosalie from you right now. And you’re right, we could both use a change of scene. Give me a couple of days to put things in order here, and I will gladly accept your offer.”
Tristan nodded with satisfaction. “That’s settled, then. And you should sleep at Dominic’s in the meantime, just in case. Unless you have some objection?” He nudged Rosalie in the ribs.
“No objection,” she confirmed sedately. But her eyes danced, and she blew a kiss of gratitude to her father.
D
ERKH
groaned as another heavy blow sank into his stomach. His body convulsed, trying to double over despite the bonds that held him upright against a tree. He had been here all morning, left to stand hungry and immobile while the men went about their business. That was bad enough. The interrogation, which had begun after the midday meal, was much worse. For the last hour, maybe two, he had been giving the same answers to the same questions, and Tarkhet’s patience was wearing thin.
“Very soon now I will decide it doesn’t matter whether you are left able to walk, and begin breaking bones. I advise you to think
harder
this time. Start again with the first battle.”
Derkh spat blood. Somehow the fact that he hadn’t the strength to clear it past his own chin seemed worse than the pain he endured. He felt sick with humiliation as the slimy mess dribbled down his neck. He no longer cared if they found him “loyal to the Empire.” He had resolved, at the beginning of this ordeal, on just one thing: to keep the Elves and Gabrielle out of it. Not that they would believe either story anyway. He made an effort to pull his thoughts together.
“We won the first battle, as you know. Not easily, though. They were waiting for us. Somehow they knew we were coming.”
“How many of them?”
“Far fewer than us. Maybe three thousand.”
“Then why were they not pursued?”
“I don’t know. I told you already, I don’t know.” Derkh braced himself for another blow, but it didn’t come. “I was injured by then, half-dead. I showed you the scar. All I know is we stayed in our camp.”
“For how long?”
“I’m not sure. I was fevered. Not long, I don’t think. Then the camp was attacked by night.”
Tarkhet leaned in, pinning him with cold eyes. “Now be careful what you say. How in eternal night does a retreating army manage an ambush?”
Derkh closed his eyes. He heard again the shouting, saw the confused silhouettes of men running. Felt again Gabrielle’s arms about him before she slipped away. “I don’t know for sure. I couldn’t leave my tent. But maybe it was late-coming reinforcements arriving from another direction. There are four different countries here, you know.”
Tarkhet’s pale eyes narrowed. He
hadn’t
known, Derkh realized. Well, it wasn’t exactly a state secret. Be damned if he would tell this bugger anything useful, not if he could help it. His loyalties were clear at last. As far as Derkh was concerned the Almighty Emperor could eat dog turds.
Tarkhet nodded. “I’ll accept that for now. Then what happened?”
“They killed my father. Everything seemed confused. I don’t really—”
“ ‘Know anything, because I was injured,’ “ Tarkhet quoted, snarling. “If you was so badly injured, why ain’t you dead? That’s the big question, ain’t it? Too sick to rise from yer damned bed
even during an attack, and here you are large as life and flush with good health!”
“I got better,” said Derkh sullenly. That earned him a blow that snapped his head back against the tree trunk and sent the world spinning around him. Blackness bled into the edges of his vision, and he welcomed it.
A pot full of cold water brought him gasping back to daylight.
“The second battle,” Tarkhet prodded. “And don’t whine to me about your bloody deathbed! Let’s say reinforcements
did
arrive, enough to turn the tide. The fact remains that we sent ten thousand troops over the mountains, and only a handful made it back. Are you telling me they slaughtered ten thousand men?”