27. Penny
Penny
The ride to Forstford was miserable, and the company was even worse.
By company, I meant Merrick’s squad of assigned guards—one for each of us, armed with crossbows in case we tried to run—whose constant oversight squashed any chance for conversation.
Kit was distant, though thankfully not physically.
He liked to keep a hand on me, almost possessive, but I knew it was a message as much as anything.
He would stand between any source of harm and me.
Unless the source of harm was of my own making.
Determined as he was to serve as our watchman, his lack of sleep caught up to him early that first evening. He dozed off with his head in my lap and an arm stretched across my thighs before it was even full dark. Isla wasn’t far behind, nodding off propped up against the sideboard beside Rosie.
My own eyelids drooped as the guards grumbled and chattered amongst themselves about our progress.
They didn’t intend to stop yet, wanting to make it a bit farther from the last village we passed before setting camp along the road for the night.
They wanted to be as far from any towns as possible, and farther still from any militia outposts, in case one of us decided to try to run.
Not that we had any intentions of attempting to escape. Kit was right that certain plans had to be abandoned. Some hopes lost.
But I was not willing to bring destruction to Kit’s hometown, and neither was Rosie. She made that much clear when she waited until our overseers were distracted before reaching into the folds of her skirt.
The movement looked almost obscene, and blush burned my cheeks as I jerked my gaze away.
“Pen!” Rosie hissed, and something flat and hard slapped my arm.
I glanced back to find her clothing restored to order and my sheathed dagger in her hand.
My eyes flashed wide as I snatched it from her and tucked it between my thigh and the rough wooden floor of the wagon. Kit shifted at the movement, but didn’t wake.
“What’s this for?” I whispered, tapping the hilt that poked out from beneath my leg.
Rosie’s head whipped around, braids dusting her shoulders as she checked to ensure we weren’t being overheard.
“There’s a bigger town coming up a ways from here,” Rosie replied. “We’ll probably come upon it early tomorrow morning.”
“What of it?”
“We need to stop. If we can get them to pull off the road, we can get word to someone and have them pass it ahead to Forstford.”
I gestured to the pile of supplies shoved in the corner of the cart. We had ample provisions for the journey. At least enough for the guards and the horses. I was sure they wouldn’t mind if we recruits went without.
“Cut a hole!” Rosie whispered. Her dark eyes were emphatic as they darted to the bag of grain. “It will leak out. At the rate we’re moving, they won’t notice until it’s near gone. Then they’ll have to stop if they want the horses to keep going.”
I glanced at the guards currently engaged in conversation.
They never talked about anything interesting, so I’d given up actively eavesdropping earlier in the day.
They’d stopped paying too much attention to us, too.
We’d become little more than cargo, and that had benefits.
Namely that I disturbed no one but sleeping Kit as I pulled over my satchel and slipped it under his head as a replacement pillow before creeping toward the burlap sack.
The knife caught the last blush of sunlight as I pulled it from its sheath. It flashed like a warning I feared our captors would see, so I shielded it with my free hand before nicking the bottom corner of the bag. As expected, a thin trail of grain began to spill out.
It ran between the boards of the floor of the wagon and littered the road beneath us.
I sheathed the knife and stashed it, Kit and Isla dozed, and Rosie and I exchanged knowing smiles. And we kept riding.
Judging by the speckle of stars and the deep blue-black of the sky, a few hours passed before the guards decided to stop for the night.
They continued to ignore us while tending to the horses, and I watched with bated breath as one of them hefted the grain bag out of the cart and found it lightened.
I had been near giddy watching the sack collapse in on itself as the miles passed, and I had to bite the insides of my cheeks to keep from grinning at the look of shock and dismay on his face.
“There’s a damn hole in it,” he told the other guards. “Some kind of vermin must’ve gotten to it back in Ashpoint. We’ll have to get more.”
Rosie popped one eye open from where she’d been pretending to sleep. She pumped her arm in blatant glee, and I settled in to sleep myself, curled up next to Kit who would loath to have been left out of all this.
Actually, that may have been better. We were breaking his rules, after all. Scheming and plotting and causing problems he would take it upon himself to fix.
I felt at peace with it, though—with so many things—and I snuggled in and didn’t wake until morning.
Voices roused me, and I found Kit upright and alert, watching our escorts with his dark eyes sharp and narrow.
I must have slept through getting back on the road, because when I sat up, too, we were stopped outside of a sprawling town at least twice the size of Eastcliff.
One of the guards was lounging on the driver’s bench while another stood beside the horses and stretched.
The other two were conferring at the side of the road.
“We weren’t supposed to stop till Forstford,” Kit muttered, suspicious while I bubbled with excitement.
We had a chance. To do something more than be driven into the destruction of so many lives.
“We can’t both go,” one of the guards by the road was saying to the other. “We can’t leave our men that outnumbered. Best for three of us to wait with the initiates.”
His thumb jerked in our direction, and I took that as my invitation to speak.
“Need help carrying anything?” I chirped, earning the same narrow glare Kit had been turning on our captors.
Scooting toward the side of the wagon, I vaulted over it and landed in the dirt, practically throwing myself into action.
“I’m a lumberman, you know,” I said, taking a page from Anders’s book as I curled one arm to make the lean muscles bulge. “I’ve felled many trees, and I have quite a strong back. Comes from growing up on a farm.”
Rosie snickered, and I bit my cheeks again. It didn’t help that the guards looked incredulous. And that was worsened when Kit offloaded to insert himself between me and the guards.
“If it’s a pack mule you need, take me.” His body bumped into mine, and his dismissal made me bristle.
They couldn’t choose him. He wasn’t privy to the plan, and our opportunity would be wasted. I didn’t even have time to explain as it seemed they were in a hurry to resupply and get back on the road. I’d never seen people so eager to cause destruction.
Considering the way the guards backpedaled when Kit entered their proximity, it was little surprise they shook their heads at his offer.
“I’ll take him.” One of them indicated me. “Seems harmless enough.”
So much for all that lumbering…
Kit braced, readying further protest, but I wormed around him, all but looping my arm around the guard’s in my haste to get on into town. The earlier I made contact with someone able to send a missive to Forstford, the better.
Fending off tendrils of guilt was as simple as keeping my back to Kit as I walked away, and trying very hard not to envision the confusion and worry that must have been written all over his face.
The walk into town was nice for stretching my legs.
My backside was sore from being bumped around in the cart for hours, and my brain was due for a reprieve from the same trees and fields rolling by for hours on end.
I thought about making small talk with my grouchy escort, but the plan was more important.
Find a messenger. Send a missive. Save Kit’s town.
I couldn’t very well do one—or any—of those things with Merrick’s hired help breathing down my neck. So, I had to rid myself of him. Somehow.
There weren’t many excuses I could think of for time alone.
Being a terrible liar was often a terrible inconvenience.
I was sure he would see the deception all over my face the second I started making requests to get a drink that wasn’t from the barrel of water in the cart, or a fearsome hunger that wouldn’t wait till we returned to the others.
It needed to be more urgent than that.
Or perhaps, rather than making an excuse to get away from him, I could give him an excuse to get away from me.
We’d barely breached the edge of town when I slowed my stride, falling back and doubling over to grip at my stomach. A low, miserable groan petered out of me, and I dared a glance to make sure my escort had taken notice.
“Hurry up,” the other man grunted, still walking.
I took another step, then moaned louder, wondering if I could force a belch noisy enough to prick his ears. Maybe if I gulped down enough air…
“Ugh,” I grunted. “I don’t feel so good.”
I peeked again and found that he’d stopped. His glare was edged with impatience. “What’s the problem?”
“My stomach,” I whimpered. “Must’ve eaten something…” Here came the belch, wet and foul enough to make me shudder.
The guard scowled, then glanced around. “You’re goin’ to have to keep it to yourself. Swallow it down or something.”
He started moving again, leaving me no choice but to follow. I wondered if he’d walk far enough away that I could duck into a shop or stall. If he would be that careless. The glance he cast over his shoulder a moment later proved he would not.
So, I trudged, trying to look as miserable as possible and add appropriate sounds whenever I could.
The people in the square took notice of the scene, which only spurred me on.
Watching my unhappy companion’s shoulders and back tense up every time I faked a gagging sound made me want to giggle instead.