Chapter 17 Ahnna
Ahnna
Ahnna needed to escape.
Just because James was struggling to kill her himself did not mean he wouldn’t drag her back to Harendell so an executioner could do the job, and while James seemed to think that her death would sate demands for war between Harendell and Ithicana, Ahnna had no such delusions.
Alexandra wanted the bridge, and even if James dragged her corpse before all the nobility in the Sky Palace, the queen would only manufacture another justification for war.
Aren needed to be warned, and time was of the essence.
Which was all well and good, but Ahnna had yet to figure out how she was going to escape her bindings.
James knew his business: There wasn’t an ounce of slack in the rope digging into the flesh of her wrists and ankles.
She could barely breathe with the two gags and the blanket over her head, and James was only a few feet away from her.
Think.
He had to be exhausted. While she had the benefit of many hours of sleep in the cabin, James had to have been going nonstop since the avalanche that he’d somehow escaped, on top of what would have been a severe lack of sleep over the many days he’d pursued her.
If she waited until he nodded off, that would be the best opportunity she had to get free of these ropes.
Ignoring the crackle of the fireplace, she focused her ears on the sounds he made. The scuff of his boot heels as he shifted his position. His soft sigh of frustration. And then, after what felt like an eternity, his breath deepening with sleep.
Unless it was a trick.
Ahnna scowled at the blanket, not putting it past him to try to lure her into attempting to escape, but eventually she conceded that it was now or never.
Her mobility was severely constrained, her back bent with the way her wrists were bound to her ankles, but what James hadn’t taken into consideration was that Ahnna was very, very flexible.
Muscles screaming, she increased the bend in her spine and reached down and down until her fingers found her ankles.
A loud pop made her jump, her heart racing, but it was only sap in the firewood. She waited to see if James might stir, but his steady breathing continued.
Moving by feel, Ahnna picked at the knots holding her ankles in place, the pain in her back rivaling the pain in her battered skull as she dug her fingernails between the ropes. The first knot came loose, but James, curse his goddamned proficiency, hadn’t limited himself to just one knot.
Tears of pain leaked down her face from sustaining the position, but Ahnna kept going. One of her nails pulled up as she clawed at the ropes, and she clenched her teeth around the dirty blanket forming her gag. Then the knot came loose.
Last one.
No sooner did the thought go through her mind than James shifted, making a soft noise of protest. Ahnna froze, certain that he was about to rip the blanket off her and catch her in the act, but then his breathing steadied.
Just a dream.
Her head was pounding, her whole body trembling, but Ahnna set herself onto the last knot around her ankles as though her life depended on it. Which it did.
Finally, the binding came loose, and Ahnna carefully straightened her legs. Not waiting for the trembling in her muscles to ease, she managed to get seated, the blanket over her head falling to her lap.
Her eyes immediately moved to James.
He sat against the wall of the cabin, his head hanging down in deep sleep.
The fire had grown low, but it was enough to illuminate his face, and she took in the changes in him.
Shadows lay under his eyes; hollowed cheeks were partially hidden by enough growth of beard that she suspected he’d not picked up a razor since the night she’d escaped.
His clothes were travel-stained, and he had a scabbed cut beneath one eye.
Even in sleep, he seethed with tension, his jaw flexing and unflexing as dreams plagued him.
Alexandra had done this. Everything he was suffering was because of his bitch of a stepmother, and James didn’t even know it.
He betrayed you, her anger whispered. He took your heart and your body while knowing that his actions would destroy everything you fought for.
Yet as she looked at James, and at the toll the past weeks had taken written over every inch of his body, what she mostly felt was the hollowness of sorrow.
She was deeply familiar with the emotion, just as she was familiar with pushing past it, using pragmatism as her fuel.
They’d both been wronged, both been used as pawns, but she couldn’t risk trying to reason with him.
He’d proven he wasn’t willing to hear it.
The ropes binding her wrists dug deep into her skin as she looked around the small space for something she could use to cut them.
Her own weapons were sheathed and shoved far under the cot.
Reaching them with her hands was impossible, and trying to get them out with her feet, never mind unsheathing them, risked noise that would wake James.
Which left only one option.
Turning to the fireplace, she used the toe of her boot to carefully nudge an ember out onto the stones forming the front of the hearth. Turning her back to it, she checked that James was still asleep and then leaned back, easing her wrists toward the ember.
The heat grew, and Ahnna grimaced as the side of her wrist grazed the ember, burning her skin. Shifting, she got the angle right and pressed the ropes against it.
This was going to hurt.
The rope began to burn, and Ahnna cringed as flames licked her flesh. Straightening, she held her wrists out as far as she could from her back to keep her clothes from catching fire even as she strained against them.
Break, she pleaded, the pain excruciating. Goddamned break!
The burning ropes snapped.
Ahnna jerked her arms in front of her, and then cast the rest of the burning rope into the fire before smothering the cuffs of her shirt, which were aflame. The smoke had an acrid smell, and James shifted slightly.
She needed to hurry.
Easing to her feet, Ahnna slipped on her greatcoat because she’d never survive the cold without it. Her burned wrists stung as the rough wool rubbed over them, blisters already rising. But that was a problem for later.
Eyes on James, Ahnna reached under the cot, her fingers closing over her sword. Once she had her weapons, she’d go for Dippy and pray to every higher power that she could get her horse out of the stall without waking James.
As if Dippy heard her thinking about him, he chose that moment to let out a loud whinny.
James jerked, his eyes snapping open to fix on her. For a heartbeat, they stared each other down.
Ahnna moved first.
Jerking her sword out of its sheath, she managed to twist in time to meet James’s strike. The strength of his blow made her arm shudder, and she rolled, scrambling to her feet as she parried.
Whatever reluctance he’d had to kill her before was gone, his face a cold mask of fury as he came at her. Ahnna met him blow for blow, but there was no room to move in the tiny space.
She sidestepped as he lunged, his blade slicing through the air where her chest had been a second before.
She spun away, shoving the wooden chair in his path.
But James barely slowed, his gaze fixed on her with a deadly focus, his movements calculated, relentless.
Ahnna’s grip on her sword was slick with sweat, her breath shallow and fast.
“James, stop! Just listen to me!”
In response he came at her again, a quick, brutal swipe that she barely deflected, the force of it rattling up her arm. She countered, swinging low, aiming for his ribs, but he sidestepped her blow, catching her wrist in an iron grip and twisting.
The blisters on her burns ruptured beneath his hand, and she grimaced, her teeth bared, using the other hand to punch him in the ribs. He grunted, loosening his grip for just an instant—long enough for her to wrench free and backpedal, putting the small table between them.
“I’m not interested in your words,” he growled. “I’ve already paid enough for allowing you inside my head.”
Ahnna’s eyes flicked to the door to Dippy’s stall. She’d never get the latch open before he caught her. But the latch to the cabin’s entrance had been torn off when James had forced his way in, just his saddlebags holding it shut. Unless she killed him, that was the only way out.
She’d get her horse back later.
Ahnna attacked, but when James parried, she allowed him to push her back, hoping to lure him into a rush. Whether it was exhaustion or anger, she didn’t know, but he fell for the ruse and lunged. She sidestepped and slammed her elbow into his kidney, putting her full weight into it.
He grunted in pain and staggered a step.
She reached for the edge of the door, but James recovered quickly, catching her by the shoulder and yanking her back.
Ahnna spun and sliced at him, her sword carving through his coat and into his forearm.
He hissed in pain, but rather than recoiling, he grabbed her blade with his gloved hand and yanked.
Her hand was slick with sweat, blood, and fluid from her burst blisters, and he easily wrenched her weapon out of her grip, casting it behind him.
“I didn’t hurt them!” she shouted. “Alexandra staged all of it!”
“He wanted to make you queen!” James screamed back, not even seeming to have heard her words. “He was going to give you what you wanted, and you killed him!”
What?
Ahnna didn’t have time to think before James swiped his blade in a vicious arc toward her face. She ducked, feeling the air move just above her head, but then the tip of his sword caught in the doorframe.
She took advantage, bringing her knee up sharply into his thigh. James staggered back, but only a step. Just enough for her to reach down and yank the knife protruding from his boot top.