21. Maren
21
Maren
S creams sliced into my ears. Guards ran toward me; guards ran away. Rain cut from the clouds, icy and feral. A horse shrieked. I wavered over my feet, suddenly too exhausted to stand, the taste of rust thick and metallic in the back of my throat. A drop of warmth trickled down my nose.
Someone grabbed my hand. I whirled lethargically at the touch, but Kye was already pulling me from my roots, through the labyrinth of motion and sound. Some of the guards rushed to their captain’s side, some fled into the fortress. But most of them remained. Swords drawn, they trailed us as we reached Kolibri and Sero, though they gave us a wide berth. As though without Cenek to follow, they didn’t quite know what to do.
“The penalty for escaping Pevnos? M?tveho Mu?a is death,” the guard from the market called, his voice weak under the downpour.
Kye lifted me onto Sero’s back and then climbed after me. “The penalty for following us is the same.”
They didn’t seem inclined to test his promise, though the man who spoke angled his gaze on me. “We’ll patrol the harbors. We’ll watch the roads. You won’t make it to the mountains, if that’s where you’re headed.”
Thunder crashed in the sky. I sank into Kye’s chest, eyes drifting closed as he wrapped an arm around me. “Fuck off, Rivean,” he snarled, then clicked his tongue. My body jerked back as Sero shot ahead, Kolibri’s hoofbeats in the background. The fortress and its guards dropped away. Trees and rocks snapped past us, shapes and shadows of green and rust, the road ahead suddenly a river of smeared gray.
We rode until dusk drank us in, the rain squandering our tracks. I dozed through most of it, tucked against Kye’s warm body under the storm. Until he pulled off the road and into a cozy patch of grass along a rivulet not far from where we’d broken off. Birch trees provided our cover, but new trees I didn’t recognize grew here as well. Taller and thicker than the birches. Twisted and gnarled, their bark peeled like old, dead skin. Knots spiraled through their trunks like watching eyes, their roots a tangled web vanishing into the hardened earth.
Ash trees , Kye informed me as he dismounted and reached for me. Kolibri huffed, annoyed at our decision to stop when the open road lay so close. She pawed the ground, ears flat whenever Kye came too close, though he ignored her, holding my arm out to the side as studied me.
“I lost the corset,” I said.
“I don’t care about the sun-damned corset.” He unhooked the fur at my shoulders to find the remnants of Demyan’s attack stamped around my neck. His eyes flashed with fire. “That was reckless,” he said softly, thumb stroking across my throat.
“Breaking into a prison? Don’t pretend it’s any more reckless than something you would do. You're welcome, by the way.”
His mouth stretched with a small smirk. “Are you all right?”
“Perfect. Ready to take on the entirety of the Rivean army,” I wiped dried blood from my nose, glancing around. The ash trees grew dense as they traveled into distant foothills, thicker still as we neared the mountains, lending the name of the Rivean city just outside the mountain pass.
Mesto Popola, The City of Ash.
I took a step, then dropped into shaggy grass on legs that felt like jellyfish, my bones stabbing into my own muscles like knives.
Kye unstrapped his new bedroll from Sero’s saddle, unfurling it beside me, and I climbed on, listening to the sounds of the forest. The cheeps and clicks of small animals scurrying through branches, the rustle of silver ash leaves shifting overhead.
“We’re not far enough from the road to risk a fire until it's completely dark,” he said apologetically.
“It’s fine.”
“Are you hungry?”
“No. I want sleep.”
Kye settled onto his bedroll beside me. “Thirsty?” As if he’d known my answer, he offered a canteen to me, studying me in silence.
I gave him a small smile. “How much did you see?”
“The bolt that struck the captain from his feet? None.” He frowned at the hand he’d hit the guard with, flexing his fingers slowly. “I completely missed it.”
“Did you hurt your wrist when you punched him?”
“Well. It didn’t fucking tickle.”
I bit back a tired smile. “Want me to wrap it for you?”
“It’s fine.”
“Can you even use your sword with that hand?”
“Probably not. Want to wear it for me?” He raised a brow, but the humor in his voice lit something within my pride.
I shrugged as though I’d worn swords plenty of times before. “I could.”
Dark laughter danced in his golden stare. He plucked the baldric from the grass, fitting the straps on my shoulders. I closed my eyes, ignoring the sear of his fingertips as he pulled across me to tighten the buckles at my back, the width of his chest spread across my shoulders and beyond them. “How much are you going to ask me to explain?”
Kye leaned away to examine me, hiding a smile and crossing his arms. “How much are you willing to?”
“Very little.” I ran my fingers through my hair, eager to tie the length back with a braid, determined to ignore the weight the sword added to my body.
“Did he hurt you?”
“Who?” I raised my brows. “The weevil writhing on the floor when the guards opened the door? No.”
“Did he pull the laces out of this?” Kye asked, reaching to grasp the edge of my dress. I’d re-laced it on the road to escape the chill of the wind.
“No, I did.” I watched his long fingers run the length of the laces from under my chin. “I didn’t regret it until he kissed me.”
His fingers stopped. “He kissed you?”
I glanced up at the tone of his voice. Kye’s golden eyes held mine as he waited for my response, calm and patient. But his smile became strained. Heated metal drifted through the air, the scent of it almost wrinkling my nose.
“Well, yes. I intended for him to.”
His head tilted. “Oh?” The scent doubled.
“I seduce, Kye. I had to get inside somehow.”
Kye’s heart thundered. A small roar met my ears, the sound of blood crashing. Not my blood. His full lips thinned as his gaze shifted through the trees. He released a long sigh through his nose. “And did he think you came for more than a kiss?”
“I assume so,” I said flatly, gesturing again toward the laces I’d untied.
“Next time, Leihani”—he scrubbed a hand through his hair—“just let them fucking hang me.”
“Kye,” I chuckled, eyes flickering up at him in tired humor. But at the sight of him staring at me without an ounce of mirth, my words stopped short.
He crossed his arms again. “You’re my wife.” The words stirred a sudden heat within me, coiling in my center and vibrating in my chest. I swallowed, my throat suddenly dry. “If you ever seduce another man to save me, at least do me the favor of ensuring I can kill him afterward.”
My mouth opened to offer a retort, but my tongue refused to move. My mind refused to think. I sat arrested by his molten eyes, burning into mine. Rainwater dripped from the leaves all around us, catching moonlight as they fell.
And I thought I might fall with them, right there on the forest floor.