Chapter 8 Scarlette #3
I slid down the wall, knees buckling. My hands shook so badly I could not unclench them. I felt the panic and shame rise together, a hot pulse that left me gasping for air.
He knelt beside me, his hand hovering over my shoulder, not quite touching. “You’re okay,” he said. “They’re gone.”
I looked up at him, saw the question in his eyes, the worry. “For now,” I said, and the words sounded like a curse.
He nodded. “For now.” Then, softer said, “You did well.”
I wanted to say something brave, something sharp. Instead, I curled into the heap of pelts and let the shudders wring me out.
The rest of the day passed in a haze. I remember the fire being rebuilt, the careful way Moab checked the window each hour, the slow return of feeling to my hands.
I remember the twilight, the way the light slanted through the hides and painted his face in orange and black.
He watched the world, never speaking, always alert.
I wanted to thank him, or at least to offer a share of my courage. But there was nothing left to share.
When the last color bled from the sky, and only the fire’s pulse lit the lodge, I lay back and listened to the sound of his breath, steady and present.
For the first time since I’d run, I slept without dreams of pursuit.
***
I woke in darkness, the air inside the lodge stilled to the hush of an old cathedral after the congregation had left.
The fire had retreated to its embers, glowing red in the stone throat of the hearth.
In the quiet, I could almost imagine I was alone—no hunters, no voices, no strange men or impossible storms. Only the old stones, the breathing of the walls, and my own pulse, steady now, almost sane.
I shifted on the pallet, wincing as the pain in my ankle made itself known.
But the sharpness was gone, replaced by a dull ache that meant the body had begun to heal.
I stretched, careful not to disturb the bandages, and listened to the world outside.
There was nothing. Even the wind had run itself out.
For a long time, I didn’t move, just watched the faint flicker of firelight on the beams above.
Then a shape shifted in the corner. Moab, slouched against the wall, boots crossed at the ankle, eyes closed but not sleeping.
In the dark, he was nothing but angles and shadow, as if the world had sketched him in haste and never filled in the color.
I watched him for a minute, letting the night press in. The words I’d left unsaid before, the terror and the shame, the strange new hope, crowded at the back of my throat.
He didn’t open his eyes, but spoke anyway. “You awake?”
“Yes.” My voice sounded small. Not frightened, just small.
He stood, rolled his shoulders, and crossed to the hearth in three silent steps.
He crouched, poked the embers to life, and fed in a few splinters of birch.
The smell was sweet, and for a moment I was a child again, sneaking away from the manor kitchens to listen to the stories the woodcutters told when they thought no one could hear.
Moab didn’t look at me, but I could feel his attention, the way you feel the cold on your neck before a storm. “You slept all day.”
I nodded, though he couldn’t see it. “I haven’t slept for days,” I said. “Not really. The nightmares—” I caught myself. “They’re better now.”
He grunted, not unkindly. “Yeah. Sometimes it’s the only way to heal.”
The fire grew, painting the walls with thin light.
“You want to talk about it?” he asked.
I almost lied. I almost said no, that it was nothing, that I would be fine. But something in the way he crouched, the patience of his stillness, made it impossible. The words spilled out, slow at first, then in a rush.
“I was meant to be married,” I said. The words were dry, brittle as old bone. “To Sir Aldric. My father owed him. There was a debt, or else a favor, and I was the price.”
He didn’t flinch, didn’t offer pity.
“He’s twice my age. He’s—” I searched for the word, but the English of my childhood had no word for what Aldric was. “He likes to break things that are soft,” I said at last. “He collects obedience. Mother said it was my duty to the family. That I should be grateful.”
Moab poked the fire again, sending up a shower of sparks. “So you ran.”
“I ran.” I smiled, but there was nothing of joy in it. “They didn’t expect it. I was always the good one, the quiet one. I think even now, my mother hopes it’s a misunderstanding. That I’ll come to my senses and walk home.”
He nodded, then met my gaze. “You’re not going back,” he said. It wasn’t a question.
“No,” I whispered. “I’d rather die.”
The fire had taken, and the room was brighter now, full of shifting gold. Moab sat back, arms folded, and watched the flames.
“You ever think about what happens after?” he said.
I thought of the world beyond the woods, the stories told by the kitchen maids of witches hanged and girls drowned for less than what I had done. “I don’t know if there is an after,” I said. “Not for people like me.”
He smiled, crooked. “There’s always an after.”
I stared at the coals. “What about you?” I asked. “Why did you follow me through the stones?”
He hesitated, and in the silence I heard the lie before it was spoken. “I was looking for answers,” he said. “Didn’t expect to find them here. Or to find you.”
I waited, but he offered nothing more. I could feel the wall he’d built around whatever truth he carried, and knew better than to press.
Instead, I changed the subject. “They’ll come back, you know. Aldric and the others. They’ll search every house, every barn. They won’t stop just because you scared them off once.”
He nodded, serious. “That’s why we’re not staying.”
The “we” caught me off guard. I had not let myself hope that he would stay, not after my own usefulness wore thin. But I tried not to show it.
“You know these woods,” he said. “Better than I do. You know how to hide, and I know how to fight. I say we stick together, at least until they lose the scent.”
It was more generous than I expected. I considered it, then said, “Agreed.”
He stood, paced to the door, and tested the latch.
The wood was splintered from where the men had forced it.
He frowned, then went to the corner where the old bench stood.
With a few blows of his heel, he broke off a leg, wedged it against the door, and braced it tight with a log from the firewood stack.
“They can get through, but it’ll slow them down,” he said.
I watched him work, the economy of his movements. “You’ve done this before,” I said.
He snorted, a real laugh this time. “More times than I can count.”
I sat up, swinging my legs off the pallet. My foot barely touched the ground, but it was enough to remind me of the pain. I winced, tried to hide it.
He crossed the room in two strides, crouched to check the bandage. “You’ll have a scar,” he said, voice softer. “But you’ll keep the foot.”
“It doesn’t matter,” I said, and meant it. “I was never meant to be beautiful.”
He looked up, and for the first time, there was something like sorrow in his eyes. “Don’t say that.”
I didn’t know what to do with the kindness, so I looked away. “We should bank the fire,” I said. “Too much smoke will show them we’re here.”
He nodded, and together we pulled ash over the coals, leaving just enough light to see by. The lodge grew cold again, but it was a clean, good cold, the kind that clears the air and sets the mind straight.
The night pressed in, thick with the smell of snow and sap. I could hear, faintly, the distant call of a hound—just a note, then gone. I wondered if it was memory or real, if the world outside was waiting to pounce.
Moab stretched out by the fire, boots crossed, hands laced behind his head. He looked, for all the world, like a soldier after the battle, waiting for the next command.
I joined him, sitting on the edge of the furs, careful to keep a handspan between us.
“Do you miss your world?” I asked, after a long while.
He was quiet, then, “Not as much as I thought I would.” He rolled his head to look at me. “Sometimes you have to leave a place to see what it really was.”
I understood more than I wanted to admit.
I thought of the manor, the garden, the river in summer, where I used to read in secret while the servants slept.
I thought of my mother’s hands, the way they smelled of lavender and smoke, the way she would brush the hair from my eyes when no one was looking.
I thought of Aldric, and the way he had stared at me, always hungry for something I could never give.
Moab must have sensed my mood, because he shifted closer, just a fraction. “If we make it through this,” he said, “what then?”
I laughed, surprised by the question. “We’ll see,” I said. “Maybe I’ll become a legend. Maybe I’ll grow old in a cottage and tell stories to children who don’t believe a word.”
He smiled, and I saw a future that wasn’t just running, or hiding, or being hunted to ground.
The fire faded, and the lodge went dark, save for the faint pulse of the coals. I drew my knees to my chest, wrapped my arms around them, and let myself be still. Moab lay beside me, a quiet shadow, not touching but close enough that I could feel the heat of him through the night.
Outside, another hound called, answered by a far-off horn. The search would go on, and maybe tomorrow we would have to run again, or fight, or find some new place to make a stand.