Betrayal #2
“You tell that dragon to back off, or so help me, I will end you right here, right now,” Joss snarled as he slammed his scabbard into my gut this time, causing me to retch. Not having eaten for days, I thankfully didn’t have anything to give up.
“No,” I wheezed before Joss began to rain blow after blow down on me. I tried to curl into a ball, but the restraints wouldn’t let me, so I twisted to give him my back. I could handle more abuse that way.
“You fucking bitch, I won’t let you do this to me. I’ve come too far to see it ended by some cursed black dragon and his mercenary whore.” Joss jumped into the back of the wagon with me so he could land his blows with more force.
A mighty roar filled the night as the air seemed to ignite. Heat seared against my skin, causing it to prickle with pain.
“Jump,” I heard one of the guys yell as the wagon began to shift wildly.
The crates around me began to slam into me, and one rolled over my legs, trapping them.
I screamed as another slammed into my back, unable to avoid it.
Then the whole wagon began to shift to the left.
The crate rolled off my legs and slammed into the sidewall, smashing through it.
The rope around my legs jerked me down, causing the ropes around my wrists to bite into my skin.
The rope on my legs snapped under the pressure, freeing me to pull myself up to the front wall of the wagon. The knife I’d hidden in my boot was still there, and I managed to wiggle it free. My wrists were bound too tightly together to cut them apart, but I sawed away at the tether.
Once free, I looked out the front to see the horses had gotten loose, and the wagon was now careening right into the raging river.
Learning how to swim was something I’d yet to master in my training.
I knew in the pit of my stomach that without free arms and legs, there was no way I was going to live if I ended up in the water.
This left me with one option.
Taking a deep breath, I grabbed onto what was left of the sidewall of the wagon and tossed myself over it.
Unable to do the move correctly with my limbs restricted, my legs scraped against the jagged wood of the broken sidewall, which tore through my leather pants and into my skin, making me grit my teeth.
Tossing myself out of a swiftly moving wagon would definitely gain me a few good cuts from my less-than-skilled maneuver, but I did my best to avoid real damage, slapping the ground and rolling in the direction I hoped was away from the river.
Finally coming to a halt, I landed facing up, looking at the sky as it began to lighten with the first signs of morning.
I’d made it. I survived.
My body screamed at the abuse it had been put through, and I could feel the warm trickle of blood as it ran down my leg. The wind whipped up a flurry of dust and debris, choking me. I rolled over, covering my face with my arms until the air settled.
I recognized the commotion as a sign of a dragon landing nearby. I could hear its wings settle back against its body, and even if I didn’t already know, I would have been able to tell it wasn’t Vasin. There was no connection, no bond. Just a hollow space in my heart, knowing he was so far away.
Now to pray that whoever this was would be a better option than Joss and Penn.
“Hey, are you okay?” a man’s rough voice asked.
His voice was oddly husky like it had been overused or damaged and gone hoarse.
I peeked out from under my arm and found myself looking into the most beautiful light green eyes I’d ever seen.
They stood out against his dark copper skin, the likes of which I’d never seen before.
When I didn’t answer but kept staring, he gave me a gentle smile before reaching for the knife on his belt.
Slowly, he moved over to me and cut the rope around my ankles.
As he bent over, I saw his hair or what I thought was his hair. It was in a style I’d never seen before. It went past his shoulders but seemed to be wound in tight braids? But that wasn’t the right word for it. Gently, he took my hands, drawing them away from my body and cutting them free.
“Thank you,” I said, sitting up and rubbing the raw skin where the ropes had been.
I kept watching him out of the corner of my eye. It was hard to tell anything about him from his appearance. He had on basic leather pants and a long-sleeve jerkin that were well worn, sharing no clues.
Then the red dragon approached, drawing all my attention. It lowered its head and took in a long, deep sniff of me, then snorted it out like I smelled bad. I’m sure that being in the same clothes for the past few days, unable to wash, hadn’t helped.
The dragon surprised me by letting out a happy chirp, then a hum, butting the man still crouched next to me closer.
The man smiled and shoved the dragon’s head away playfully. “I’m guessing by Tahir’s response, you’re the reason he hijacked me to come here.”
Tahir hummed again, bobbing his head as if answering the question.
I reached out a hand, and Tahir extended his neck to put his snout against it in greeting. “Thank you for hearing my call, Tahir. You both saved my life.”
Showing off, Tahir let out a puff of smoke and a chirp before he stepped back, giving me and his pair-bond some room.
“I’m Cassarah, by the way,” I offered, smiling.
I decided to trust my instincts about this man and his dragon, seeing how they’d saved me.
“Jade,” he said, returning my smile. “So what brings you dangerously close to the Errit border? Norden hasn’t been on good terms with them for the past few years if you didn’t know that already. Their border patrol would have killed you on sight.”
“It wasn’t by choice. I was kidnapped,” I said bluntly.
“Why would they kidnap you?”
“I would love to know that answer myself. I can’t for the life of me figure out how I’m connected to any of this or what it would do for them,” I grumbled, heaving myself to my feet.
I was willing to trust him, but not with everything.
I wanted to hold some cards close, like being the future Queen of the Mercenaries.
“Right now, I need to find a horse and return home. I have people who will be worried sick that I disappeared.”
Just as I tried to take a step and put my plan into action, I cried out as pain shot up my leg, causing it to give out on me.
Thankfully, Jade caught me before I kissed the ground. “You're in no shape to go anywhere with a wound like that.”
Looking down to see what he was talking about, I saw a large wooden shard sticking out of my leg. “Well, that’s not good.”
Jade helped lower me safely back to the ground. “Let me grab a few things, and we can get you fixed up. You’re lucky I was just coming back from a supply run for my village.”
He rummaged through two large saddle packs on Tahir that I hadn’t noticed before. The dragon also had a fitted saddle of sorts for Jade to sit more comfortably on Tahir’s back. It gave me ideas for fitting Vasin with something similar for longer trips.
Jade returned with some bandages and a bottle of clear liquor. Using his knife, he cut up my pant leg so he could get a better look at the damage. I had a few deep cuts, but the major issue was the obvious shrapnel.
“You want a swig before I pull this out?” Jade asked, offering me the bottle.
I shook my head and closed my eyes. “Just go for it, but don’t… holy dragon balls,” I screeched as he yanked the wood from my leg.
As I was trying to learn how to breathe again, he poured the liquor over the wound, causing me to swear like never before.
Cole clearly was a bad influence on me. Jade chuckled as he cleaned up the rest of my leg and started to bandage it.
His strong, sure hands made quick work of the task like he’d done this a time or two.