Chapter Eleven. In Which the Pair Does Not Make a Good First Impression #2
The burly man drew himself to his full height—which was less impressive than his girth—with his very broad shoulders and equally broad arms, so large they didn’t hang straight.
His mustache was the thinnest part of him, the ends curled with careful consideration.
Nothing about him suggested that he was old except for his hair, which was matted with stripes of gray.
His face remained unlined except for the deep divot between his eyes.
Worst of all, though, were those cold eyes, their warmth long cooled by violence. It didn’t help that the man stood right by his yellowed wanted poster, no red X across his face.
“Outside,” the man ordered, nose inches from Javi’s own.
“I’m already engaged,” the prince responded, gesturing idly in Risa’s direction.
“I don’t think he’s flirting with you,” Risa warned, aware that her bad luck had struck again.
“Hey!” A man with bright red hair and a gangly frame came forward, waving a piece of parchment. “There’s a reward for him!”
The mustachioed man snatched the parchment with a snarl, scanned it, then shoved the redheaded man so hard, he skidded across the floor and over the bar counter.
“Well, what do we have here,” Mustache growled, revealing the poster to them. Drawn in thick dark lines on thin parchment was a boy that could have been Javi if the prince were younger and uglier. “There’s a nice reward for whoever disconnects yer head from the rest of yer body.”
Javi gasped. “That is an old portrait from before puberty!”
“It is ye, then.” The man held the poster beside Javi’s face for comparison. It listed a paltry reward of a few thousand reales for Javi’s death, to be proved with a very real head.
The prince was indignant. “No.” He gestured at his chin, the cleft more pronounced with age. “Obviously not.”
“So yer not el principito?”
Javi made a dismissive gesture toward the poster. “I said I’m not the person in that grievously insulting flyer.”
The idiot was going to get himself killed. And Risa, too, in the process.
She jumped to her feet and leaned her hands on the wobbly table, hoping to gather everyone’s attention. “Would a prince be at a pub in outlaw country, when he should be doing whatever it is princes do?”
“Spending taxpayer money?” someone guessed.
Risa tried again. “Would the philandering youngest son of the king be out with a commoner like me?”
“You’re a country eight, city four at most,” Javi confirmed.
She shot Javi a glare. “Would the infamous seventh prince of Kheadon be caught wearing ugly clothes?”
Javi glanced down at his new attire, courtesy of the Cairn River Tailors, and glowered.
“She’s right. He’s a notorious snob,” someone shouted from a nearby table.
Javi scoffed, affronted by the accusation.
A man by the swinging doors pointed a machete in Javi’s direction. His eyepatch shifted as his wide nose twitched. “He looks like a prince.”
“I know he’s handsome enough to look the part—”
“You think I’m handsome?” Javi interrupted, suddenly turning to Risa, a small frown working at his lips. “I take back my ‘city four.’ I was just lashing out.”
“Unfortunately, he is a liar. I mean, last week he was telling me he was to marry the princess of”—once more, the words stuck fast, but she pushed through, racking her mind until—“Madros!”
One of the men near the bar snorted and lifted a pint of ale in a dirty glass. “There is no princess of Madros.” He smacked his gums as his eyes glazed over funny. “The royal family left … a year ago?”
Someone else interjected, “No, they died three years ago.” But the words were tremulous, shaky leaves on a dead vine.
A murmur of confusion rippled through the tavern. Many patrons shook their heads as if to clear some kind of fog, while others returned to their seats and drinks without giving further thought, eyes clouded over.
Mustache turned his glare back onto them, a tic in his jaw. He raised his arm midair, a weapon in hand that had appeared out of nowhere.
“I don’t believe ya,” Mustache declared. His buddy Eyepatch nodded in agreement. “I wanna hack his head off anyway, just to be sure.”
The words had an immediate effect. Everyone in the pub stood. It became clear how many had weapons strapped to their bodies. There was quite a questionable amount of leather and enough chains to seem impractical, too.
Javi stood and pulled Risa back so she was flush against his chest. Using her as a shield. Hot breath stirred her hair as he whispered, “Whatever magic you have, now is the time to use it.”
Everything was falling apart, and they’d only been in here for half an hour at most. Her bad luck worked faster than even Javi’s big mouth.
“I know it might seem like a grand idea to behead him,” Risa shouted over the tension. She would say anything to keep those weapons from swinging. “And trust me, I have imagined killing him myself numerous times. But do you really want to murder an innocent idiot?”
“Yes,” came an answer from somewhere in the back.
One of the other outlaws paused, head cocked in question. “Yer not his girlfriend?”
She guffawed. “Girlfriend? Me?” Turning to consider Javi, she let her eyes travel over his face. Took in the gentle arch of his brows. The pleasing spray of freckles across his nose and cheeks. “Not even if you paid me.”
He rolled his eyes at her. “Really?” he muttered.
“Who cares?” Mustache gnashed his teeth and raised his weapon. “Either way, we get money.”
“You know the rules.”
The voice was small and even-toned, the words unhurried. It came from a bundle huddled in the back of the tavern where light couldn’t reach through the grimy windows. The figure shifted, revealing half the face of a young girl with ocher skin.
Mustache frowned at the girl. “Who are ya?”
The girl stood. She was no taller than Bo but was painfully human. When she turned her face, a long scar became visible. It was a dark, angry thing of red tissue that slashed across her plump right cheek and marred an otherwise perfect canvas.
The girl was a mismatch of features. With a small, round face and pointed chin; large eyes upturned like a cat’s, irises the color of polished stone; a dark halo of tight black curls.
When Risa stared no longer than a few seconds, the girl’s features seemed to transform; the edges turned blurry and fuzzy, as if Risa had closed her eyes and could only see an imprint of the image on the backs of her eyelids.
Mustache reared back. “You’re the Wolf.”
There was nothing wolflike about the girl. But at the sound of the moniker, several outlaws tore down their wanted posters and hurried out of the tavern with one last wild-eyed look back, their faces carved with the panic of a hunted animal.
The Wolf did not break her focus. She pulled her hood farther over her face, hiding it from view as she stalked to the doors with slow, careful steps.
“Boss,” Eyepatch called, feet shifting with worry, hurrying away from the doors to stand beside Mustache. “The sheriff’s outside.”
Stillness. The flurry of activity ceased, all eyes fixed on the swinging doors. Everyone waiting with bated breath for the sheriff to stomp in.
The Wolf continued forward, her path clearing of people and tables. Quick as a flash, she had a dagger pointed at Risa and Javi.
“Get out.” She flicked the dagger toward the doors. “You have caused enough problems.”
Needing no further instruction, Risa grabbed Javi’s hand. “Absolutely. Immediately.”
She squeezed past Mustache and his eyepatch-wearing pal, her heartbeat stuttering in her ears.
Javi snatched his wanted poster from Mustache’s hands, and the man growled in response.
Suddenly, Risa caught a glimpse of something etched in crimson that peeked from beneath Eyepatch’s leather vest. But then Eyepatch shifted, the sliver of skin disappeared, and Risa was at the doors.
Before she, Javi, and Brunie could hurry out, the Wolf’s one visible eye flashed as she whispered, “Midnight. The inn stables.”
Risa hardly heard. She was already stepping past the doors, blinking into harsh daylight. A stiff figure stood in the distance, silhouetted by the sun.
She had no desire to meet the sheriff.