Chapter 3
Smoke seeped through the trees, rising from the valley below, and stung Peter’s eyes. Entangled branches overhead filtered out some of the smoke and shielded them from the ashfall that followed. Still, the suffering of the past day was heavy, sticking to them like an ever-persistent shadow.
Peter and Ana María had walked far into the forest until she had practically collapsed.
He had his pack and a few materials to tie up a makeshift tent for her under a weeping fig tree, camouflaging the entrance with fallen branches.
He slept across the campfire on his blankets.
The space between them, he hoped, would provide a sense of propriety and security for her.
Luckily, as an officer, he had known where to find supplies.
He even shot down a few birds and cooked them to give them strength to continue.
The aching in Peter’s head and ringing in his ears were slowly subsiding, but he doubted that the guilt that split his heart ever would.
How could he have allowed such a thing to happen to her?
Every time Peter looked at Ana and saw the scrape marring her cheek and the lesion encircling her throat, he nearly lost himself to outrage.
Her dress was pockmarked with tears and burns, and her wrists were a painting of purple bruises and red swelling.
He wished he had an ointment or salve to provide her some sort of relief.
The sight of her, the reminder of the pain she endured, made his hands shake and his stomach roil.
Then his mind would spiral, questioning what would have happened if he had not found her when he did.
In those soul-blackening moments, he wanted to storm through the trees and strike down as many of the soldiers as he could reach.
But that would not help her. What she needed now was a protector.
She would likely say that she could have fared just as well on her own, and he knew not to doubt her resilience.
But she was clearly still recovering from her attack, her movements slow and staggered, pain creasing her forehead continually.
She might have found shelter, but she would likely be prey to attackers.
Peter never could have left her there in San Sebastián, not after the carnage he had seen from his countrymen, not after the trust he had shared with her father.
He felt a sense of responsibility for her.
And he thanked God continuously that she had trusted him enough to leave with him after the unspeakable pain one of his own countrymen had caused her.
Still, he found it difficult to reach her.
For once, the vibrant, passionate Ana María was silent, distant, and dazed.
Even when he asked how she was faring in his cumbersome, too-flat Spanish—“Estás bien?”—she remained unresponsive.
Only when he touched her could he bring her mind back to their present circumstances.
Upon touching her shoulder, she would jerk away like a lost, young child.
So he learned to communicate with her by squeezing her hand.
The contact dragged her out of the horrors in her mind and grounded her back into the present, at least long enough for her to communicate a hint of her feelings.
Although perhaps it was a blessing that they were not able to talk extensively of their feelings at present.
The silence between them could comfort her, help her feel safe.
He was at a loss as to how to care for her injuries when they were of such a private and delicate nature.
Particularly when this sort of pain was just as much emotional as it was physical.
When he had suffered more invasive injuries in the war, he knew that lots of rest would be most helpful—something that was not easy to achieve in the woods.
He needed to move her somewhere safer. But first, he needed to check back in with his regiment.
Allowing the army to think that either he or Ana had abandoned their posts and deserted would only lead to more challenges.
Peter had known a few deserters. Many of them had been made examples of, their good names and reputations scathed forever after facing legal trials.
The rest were outcasts. They were shadows, largely unnoticed by society.
But that was how they had chosen to live after being publicly shamed and cast out from the country that welcomed their brothers home as heroes.
The army was not for everyone. Even those who escaped unscathed without significant physical injury often had nightmares that haunted them for the rest of their days.
Some people could not survive, even after deserting the army, and found their way into an unmarked grave, just like many before them.
Peter would not let Ana María become one of those mounds of earth, forever uncared for, forever forgotten.
“Miss Bailon, I need to meet with my leaders. I promise I’ll only be gone a short while.”
Vacant eyes met his. Had she heard him?
“Poco tiempo. Yo voy. Sí?” he said, the words bumbling and awkward in his mouth as he tried to explain he would only be gone a short while.
She blinked, and a hint of fear rippled across her face. Her lips pressed together, her jaw clenched.
“You are safe here, I promise. Just stay covered and quiet. I will be quick. Muy rápido.”
Ana María nodded but didn’t duck into the tent.
He moved, slow and cautious, until he grasped one of her hands.
He squeezed twice, questioning how she fared, as was their tradition now.
She squeezed twice back. “Estoy bien.” She was as fine as she could be, given the circumstances.
Wrapping his jacket, a makeshift blanket, around her shoulders, Ana moved into the tent.
Peter flattened his hair with one hand while wrapping a bandage around his head with the other.
The coastal air, thick with humidity, made it difficult for him to rein in his curls.
He needed something to imply a head injury, to account for his absence over the past day.
He had plenty of bruises and soreness but needed something more visible than that.
He shrugged on his red coat and straightened his uniform.
Most importantly, he could not draw attention to Ana’s absence—that is, if any of them remembered her.
While hiking back to the field officers’ headquarters, Peter’s mind was overrun with questions.
He had never witnessed such devastation, such violent carelessness on the battlefield.
How would the officers be disciplining the errant foot soldiers?
How many of the hundred foot soldiers in his company had been involved?
Would the investigation and military code involve a military court?
And most importantly, how could he protect Ana?
He needed to return to camp today to account for his absence over the last twenty-four hours and to divert any attention away from her absence. He would also gather more supplies.
As an officer, he assumed he would have some role in the disciplinary action that would take place among the offending soldiers, and he wanted to be fully involved. He had to ensure that the people of San Sebastián were treated with care and mercy after all they had been put through.
Finally, he broke through the forest’s edge, and the charred remains of San Sebastián were revealed.
Only a handful of houses remained, standing solitarily in the ash and wreckage.
Pain sliced through him at the too-recent memory of the suffering he witnessed.
But now all was silent. Peter jogged to the former center of the infantry camp and encountered the first snag in the carefully woven fabric of his plan.
The camp had been laid waste as well. Most tents were blown over and singed.
Trampled food crates and souring wine mixed with the dirt, creating a repugnant smell.
Even the few adobe brick buildings that the officers had commandeered for their sleeping headquarters were in disarray, with broken window glass scattered on the ground like a mosaic.
It was little wonder that Major Bailon had not been safe, even at headquarters, from his drunken allies.
Disgust squeezed Peter’s stomach again, and he pressed his eyes shut against the wave of nausea.
Finally, Peter located the tent where the field officers’ meetings were held.
The low murmuring of voices greeted him, cutting through the eerie silence.
Two sergeants stood outside and stepped aside at the sight of Peter’s uniform, identifying his rank.
He grabbed the fabric door of the tent, ducked inside, and fell into rank among the captains gathered at the back.
“Ah, Captain Ashmore. We worried when you didn’t report back to camp last night. Any injuries to report?” Captain Davies inquired.
“Some pain in the head and blurred vision after a run-in with the French. I needed to take some distance from the smoke.”
The others nodded, seeming to believe him.
He wasn’t lying—but the head pain wasn’t from any physical injury.
His head hadn’t stopped pulsing since the carnage he’d witnessed.
It was one thing to defend innocent people against the French, but it was another thing entirely to see his own turn on those innocents and ravage them.
Peter turned to Captain Davies. “Has a camp physician been to see the women and children in the city?”
Davies stared at Peter for a moment, his brows furrowing in confusion. “They are fully occupied with our injured.”
“We can’t leave those innocents to suffer, not when we are partly at fault for their pain. If we merely make our way up there, we can rest assured they’ll be taken care of. I can organize a group—”
“You’ll do no such thing, Ashmore.”
“But the women . . .”