Chapter 9
The man remounted his horse and kneed him to walk.
After his horse took several steps, the rope grew taut, and Tashama was pulled from the tree where she leaned.
She cried out again, but when the soldier stopped his horse, the prince hesitated.
How would his men view him if he showed mercy to the prisoner?
Weakness, that’s what it would indicate.
He was only seven when he ascended to the throne and began his reign as ruler of Maldovia.
Carissian had drummed into him how important it was not to show any weakness when dealing with the enemy.
But she was only a woman. The pained expression on her face made him motion to the guard. “Carry her on your horse.”
One of the men dismounted from his own, then lifted Tashama to the other’s saddle.
Aleron tried to ignore her, to be hard and unyielding, but his gaze more than once drifted back to her.
She was the most stubborn woman he’d ever met and the most enticing.
Her golden hair dripped over her shoulders in wet curls.
His brows rose slightly as her nipples poked at the drenched fabric. Her eyes met his, and he stiffened his back. Her alluring green eyes narrowed at him like a wildcat preparing to pounce on its prey. He tilted his head up and turned away.
Now what? He couldn’t return her to the compound.
She couldn’t go back to her chamber. She would just escape again.
The tower. He pursed his lips. Women didn’t go to the tower.
For her, he would have to make an exception.
She couldn’t run away from there. At all costs, he didn’t want to lose her. He had to know who she was.
When they rode into the courtyard, the man handed her down to another guard, then jumped from his horse. He held the rope tied to her hands while he waited for word from the prince.
“Take her to the tower.” The prince waved his hand in the direction of the prison. “She’ll find it difficult to escape from there.”
“But, sire,” one of the men said, “shouldn’t your healer see to her first?”
“You should not have stolen away like you did.” The prince glowered at Tashama, then he turned to the soldier. “Have the healer see her in the tower.” Then he stalked off to the great hall.
When the prince disappeared, Tashama’s guard asked, “Where do you hurt, miss?”
She stared at the floor in silence.
“I must know where you’re injured to apprize the healer…”
Tashama shook her head.
“You’re limping. You must have cut your feet on the forest floor. The stickling burs are bad this time of year if you’re not wearing boots.” He reached for her leg.
“Let go of me,” she growled. If the prince was going to treat her badly, she would deal with it in her own way. And here she had a tender spot in her heart for him. No, more. He is my enemy. Learn your lesson well, Tashama.
“Let me see your feet.” He lifted her foot as if he were examining his horse’s hoof. Shaking his head, he pulled three burs. He moved to the other side, and one of the ladies joined him.
“What’s happening to the prisoner?” she whispered.
“The tower, Princess Listra.” The man tried to lift Tashama’s left foot, but she lost her balance and grabbed Listra’s arm to keep from falling. Listra gasped in surprise when Tashama cried in pain.
“What’s wrong with her?” Listra held Tashama’s arm while he pulled off the stickers from her foot.
“The thorns have left a poison in her feet.”
“No, she hurts elsewhere.”
“She won’t tell me.”
“I’ll get the healer right away.”
He tucked the burs into his leather pouch. “See if you can get some salve for the poison from the burs.”
“I don’t understand why she’s being sent to the tower.”
The guard shook his head. “Carissian says she’s a danger to our people. The prince feels she cannot escape from there.”
When the guard arrived with Tashama at the round, stone tower, he set her on her feet while she gripped his arm.
The black-haired and bearded tower guard frowned at her.
He looked like a grizzly bear, barrel-chested, thick-necked, with beady black eyes.
“What’s the matter with you?” he said to the royal guard. “Women don’t come to the tower.”
“By the prince’s orders, Toscarlo.”
The tower guard grunted. “She won’t be safe in there.”
“The prince’s orders. Find a place where she’s safe then. Be careful with her as she has been injured.” The guard untied the rope from her wrists.
“She must have murdered the prince’s best friend to have earned a room in this place. Wounded prisoners don’t come here.”
“She escaped from the palace.”
The tower guard’s bushy black brows arched. “Why would anyone want to leave the palace?”
“She’s a Karthlander prisoner.”
“Oh,” he grunted. “I must be dense—didn’t even notice her fair features.” Then he scratched his head. “What would a Karthlander woman be doing as a prisoner of the prince? Only the men are taken prisoner.”
“This one is special—apparently.”
“So special she gets the tower.” The tower guard shook his head. “Well, come on, you.” He grabbed her arm and pulled her toward the room. She cried out in distress as pain filled her chest and the wooden floor pressed against her sensitive, swollen soles.
“She’s injured, I tell you.” The soldier raised his voice in irritation.
“All right, all right. I’m not used to having a woman…an injured woman…and a Karthlander up here to boot.”
He walked her into the cell where several male prisoners loitered in the expansive round tower.
All eyed her suspiciously when the guard made her sit near the window.
She lay down on the straw, and the guard turned to the prisoners.
“Stay away from the woman, prince’s orders.
Anyone who bothers the lady will be flying out yonder window.
Since we’re ten stories high, it wouldn’t make a pretty sight on the stone pavers beneath the window. ”
The tower guard hesitated when he considered Tashama, then glared at the men. “Don’t test my resolve in the matter.”
Before he left the room, the healer hurried into the cell. “I understand you have a wounded prisoner.”
The massive hulk of the guard moved out of the way and waved his hand at Tashama. The healer gasped. “A Karthlander woman. What is she doing here?”
“Prince’s orders.”
The healer hurried over to Tashama, then knelt at her feet. He examined the punctures already swelling with the effect of the poison. After rubbing a salve on her feet, he wrapped them with cloth. Then he touched the rope burns on her wrists.
“I don’t understand why the prince is so angry.” He applied medicine to her wrists, but when he lifted her arm higher, Tashama groaned in pain. “Where do you hurt, miss?” the healer asked when a tear rolled down her cheek.
“My heart hurts, Healer.”
The man touched her lower rib cage, making her cry out.
He nodded and felt the rest of her ribs.
Convinced there were no breaks, he turned to the tower guard.
“I want to give her something to help her bruised ribs heal, but it’ll make her sleep through just about anything. She’ll be more vulnerable.”
The tower guard nodded. “Do what you must. I’ll ensure the lady’s sleep is undisturbed.”
The healer gave her the tea, and Tashama reacted to the drug as before. In a haze, she watched the guard tie the men together. He looped the rope to a metal rung on the wall opposite her.
“You breach our rights!” one of the men shouted.
“Write up your grumble and send it to the prince.” The tower guard turned to Tashama as she closed her eyes. “Sleep well, miss.”
Before he could take a step out of the room, Carissian appeared. She felt his presence at once and opened her eyes. Carissian folded his arms when the guard blocked his path. “I want to see the prisoner.”
“She’s asleep, Carissian.”
“Then I will wake her. I want a word with her.”
“She was wounded.”
“Yes, I’m well aware of this.” A muffled laugh escaped his lips when he observed the prisoners tied to the wall. “Close the door,” he ordered the guard.
“You want to be alone—”
“Close the door,” Carissian reiterated, his voice growing low.
“Of course.”
Tashama closed her eyes before Carissian could turn to face her. His footsteps grew closer. Feeling his mind probing hers, she could sense his frustration.
“You’ve been drugged. I can see nothing of your thoughts. Yet, it is as though you read mine.” His knees creaked when he knelt beside her.
He unwrapped her right foot while one of the prisoners said, “The prince made her walk on the poisonous burs of the forest. Even a prisoner condemned to die wouldn’t have been made to suffer so.”
“Go to sleep.”
“The healer said her ribs were bruised. Did the prince have her beaten as well?”
“Sleep. And do not disturb the lady.”
“She says her heart is broken.”
She opened her eyes slightly when the sorcerer tilted his head in surprise. “Who did she say this to?”
“To the healer, when he asked her where she hurt.”
“I wonder.” Carissian tapped his chin with his finger. “Sleep,” he commanded the prisoners.
Tashama sighed deeply, wondering where Balthazar was and if he would ever help her out of this mess, when Carissian’s footsteps hurried out of the room.
The prince reclined in his bed as the stars filled the night sky. He shook his head when Carissian walked into his chambers. “It’s a little late for sorcerer tales, is it not?”
“Sire, the lady shouldn’t have been made to walk on the poisonous burrs. The notion is quite barbaric.”
“Who tells such lies?”
“I’ve seen the wounds myself, sire.”
Her feet were bare and softened by the water. “I hadn’t realized—”
“How long do you intend to keep her locked away in your tower, sire?”
“As long as it takes.”
“As long as what takes?”
“To break her, of course. Once she’s broken, she’ll be no threat to me.”
“She wasn’t any threat to you, sire, while she was in her room.”
“She escaped—remember?” The prince motioned for his servant to leave the room. “What are you getting at? You have told me she is dangerous to me.”
“The woman is injured; she’s remanded to the tower where women are never sent. What are you thinking?”
“You said she’s dangerous to me. She won’t be able to escape from the tower. Isn’t that so?”
“Yes, sire.”
Aleron stared at Carissian. He’d never known him to advise him wrong in a matter before. But his contradictory behavior toward the woman made him wonder what was going on in his mind. “Why is she so dangerous to me?”
“I cannot say, sire. I just haven’t been able to fathom who she is or what makes her so different. Call it sorcerer’s intuition.”
Aleron left his bed and walked over to his window. He’d never distrusted his advisor before, and sorcerers were known to be highly loyal to the ruler they served, yet… He turned as Carissian watched him, listening to his thoughts. “Well, what did she say?”
“She was asleep when I saw her.”
“And her dreams?”
“She had none.”
“None?”
“No, sire.”
“All right, then. I’ll see you in the morning.”
“I believe she’s growing more of a threat to you all the time. She says her heart is broken, sire. I believe she refers to you.”
The prince stared at his sorcerer, then took a deep breath. “I didn’t realize you had a sense of humor, Carissian.”
“She is dangerous.” Carissian vanished.
Aleron swore under his breath.
Later that evening, Aleron arrived at the guard tower, and the guard nearly knocked his stool over in his haste to stand. “Sire.”
“I want to see the prisoner.”
“The woman?”
The prince glared at him.
“Yes, sire.” He fumbled with his keys, then finally unlocked the door. Pushing it open, the prince brushed past him.
“Pretty wench, ain’t she?” one of the men bound to the wall said.
Aleron ignored him and walked over to the straw where she was sleeping.
With the moon clinging to the black velvet in a shimmering sphere of white, casting a light into the room, he knelt beside the window and touched Tashama’s cheek.
How will you hurt me? He ran his fingers over her soft skin.
Her lashes fluttered, and he nearly fell backward.
Regaining his balance, he lifted her hand from her breast and touched his lips to her fingers.
He’d never desired a woman before like this one.
What made her so appealing? Besides her looks, of course…
then the thought occurred to him. She wouldn’t bow down to him.
That’s what it was. She wouldn’t bend to his desires.
He smiled. She was the most significant challenge he’d ever faced, and he loved a challenge.
Early the next morning, darkness hung like ebony drapes at the naked window, and Tashama stirred.
She focused on the shadowy forms of the men bound across the room, then she attempted to sit.
She breathed deeply, relieved to find that her ribs were no longer sore, but when she tried to stand, the tea had made her dizzy.
“I have to have food,” she said under her breath. Her soft voice woke one of the men, and he sat up to observe her.
“I do not believe you’re as much of a threat to the prince as he seems to think,” the gruff voice said.
Tashama touched her left foot and gasped as the sole was still painful to the touch. She rolled onto her knees and hands, then made the slow crawl toward the prisoner. His eyes grew big, and a slight smile appeared on his lips.
“Would you like a good-morning kiss?” He puckered his lips.
“What are you in here for?” Tashama made it halfway to his location. If she could, she would set the prisoners free. All she could think of was getting back at the prince. Served him right. He would not keep her enslaved.
“Thievery.”
“And the others?” Tashama studied their sleeping forms. One, a young boy dressed in blue, couldn’t have been older than sixteen.
“The same.”
“No murderers or well…or other sorts are here?