Chapter 5 A Fiery Intervention
A Fiery Intervention
As much as he tried, Morfran couldn’t sleep. His tongue was coarse against the roof of his dry mouth, he was shaking from his lack of sustenance, and every muscle in his body felt like it’d been pulverized to nothing.
Ten days ago he’d been in his cottage with Benjamin, serenely plucking his lute as she dozed.
Now he could hear that same lute in use just outside the hut around some campfire, except it was squawking in protest. He sighed. Lutes were not to be throttled. You had to pluck it. He wanted to strangle the faux musician for making him suffer through such a racket.
He slumped down, wriggling his wrists in an attempt to get feeling into them.
Brim and his men might not kill Benjamin tonight, but he’d seen desperate men before.
He didn’t want to be tethered to a random post while Benjamin was at risk of being slaughtered.
He’d been a coward earlier when he hadn’t spoken up, but he wouldn’t sit by. No, it was time to act.
Finally, when the laughter around the campfire faded, and that hellish, tormented scream from his lute died, he began to yank his hands free of Bronwen’s ropes.
He hadn’t truly tried yet; he knew it would take him a good bit of time and that each movement was going to bring tears to his eyes.
If Ravana could see him like this, perhaps even she would take pity on him.
Take pity and then continue the torture, this time with an eyelid peeler and a sack of burning peach-sized coals she intended to make him ingest.
The ropes busted free on the third yank.
Morfran froze. Then, slowly, in severe disbelief, he raised his freed hands up in front of his face to confirm that it truly had taken just three measly jerks to escape.
Look at that, he thought. For all her bravado, that woman is inept at knot tying.
He paused before admitting,
And I’m stupid for not trying to escape earlier.
For a blissful half minute he rubbed both his tender wrists, flexing his fingers to get the blood pumping. Right. Now all he had to do was find his sword and pack, grab Beni and the kids, and get out of—
The hut flap rustled. He slammed back onto his butt at the base of the pole, shoving his hands behind him as though he were still bound.
The door flap opened. In the glow of the lantern, he saw green skirts and a shawl, and a long, distinct tassel of a brown braid.
Bronwen. What could she possibly want? Was it her turn to torture him?
He scowled, though with half his face numb and smeared with blood, it had none of the intended effect.
She just held the lantern up high, studying him. After a long quiet moment, she gestured at his bruises and bleeding cuts. “They did all this to you, and you still wouldn’t talk?”
He said nothing, too spiteful to reply. Something about her set his teeth grinding. Ravana hated the silent treatment. Perhaps Bronwen would, too.
A corner of her mouth tipped up, as if she found his pouting amusing.
He hated that it brightened the green in her eyes.
He didn’t want to look at this random forest woman and be reminded of home.
“Look. If you would only confess a few details of which of Morfran’s men sent you and what their plan is, we might consider a deal. ”
Liar. He wanted to spit. But he doubted his throbbing jaw would allow him that pleasure, and his mouth was so dry that he feared his saliva would only make it onto his chin, so still he said nothing.
“No?” She sighed, as if resigned. “Fine. You’ll be tortured tomorrow as well, then. And the next day, and the day after that. Until we know what you know.” She turned towards her pocket, and he tensed. But instead of a weapon like he expected, she drew out a water skin and a crust of bread.
She brought him food and water? It was likely drugged, or poisonous. At this rate, he’d happily take something drugged. As for the poison…yes, he’d take that, too.
She set the lantern on the crate and slowly ventured towards him, her hand resting over her skirt pocket. “I’m going to feed you now. But I swear, if you try any funny business, I have no qualms about kicking an already injured man in the head.”
He couldn’t remain silent at this. Both his throat and tone were dry as he said, “I would never harm a benevolent lady like yourself.”
She arched her eyebrow, probably at the word benevolent. “But you were quick to trip one.”
“You got in my foot’s way,” he argued.
“Maybe I’ll chop your foot off, then.”
“Or maybe you’ll just trip again trying.”
She pressed her lips flat, as if he were an insubordinate child constantly back-talking in class. Her gaze skimmed over him a second time, slow and purposeful. “Or maybe I’ll just castrate you and see if you’re as full of bravado afterwards as you are now.”
Good gods, her hostility is something to behold.
Yet he’d flustered her earlier. Perhaps if he said something similar, he might get under her skin.
“I knew it,” he murmured, giving his head a little shake.
“You just want to see me without my pants on, don’t you?
Go on, then. I dare you. Follow through with your words.
Show me you’re not just full of bark but that you can bite, too. ”
Bingo. Her cheeks flushed pink. This time he was pretty certain it stemmed just as much from bashfulness as anger. “I’ve bloodied my hands plenty. And I’m happy to bloody them again with yours if you keep mouthing off.”
He grinned, spiteful, goading her. “Bite me, then.”
Another flash of quick anger lit her eyes. She dropped to her knees before him, suddenly too close. He couldn’t help but flinch.
“Don’t get excited,” she said, right before shoving the bread at his face. “Eat before I change my mind. We need you alive and conscious for questioning.”
Well, if that’s what they needed, he’d rather be dead and unconscious. He mumbled, “I can’t.”
“Can’t what?”
“My jaw,” he said, morose. “It’s more than likely broken. I can’t open it wide enough to take a bite.”
She looked at him with wild disbelief. “Yet you could open it wide enough to fling insults.”
He shrugged. “That was a necessity.” She just stared at him. “The water, please?”
Her chest fell with a sigh that said she found him beyond burdensome, but she did set aside the crust of bread and turn to where she’d set the water skin down, and that was when he launched at her.
In no time at all he’d snatched her and had her back pinned against his chest, his hand slapped over her mouth so she couldn’t scream.
She’d touched her outer skirt pocket earlier, which indicated she’d stashed her stishovite dagger inside it.
He found it with ease and pressed the knife against her throat to get her to stop thrashing.
“Easy.” He seethed as she bucked once more before giving in. Her fingernails dug into his forearm, her entire body tense. He pressed his lips against her ear, her soft hair tickling his cheek as he whispered, “Now, listen to me. We are going to take a walk—”
A loud, metallic jangling erupted from somewhere outside in the trees. It was discordant—the only thing he could compare it to was someone rifling through an enormous bucket of utensils. Whatever it was made Bronwen buck again, fiercely. It was only when she bit his inner hand that he withdrew it.
“Ouch! You savage little—”
“Soldiers!” Her anger was quickly draining into panic. “That’s the alarm for soldiers invading!”
They’d found him? But…how? He hadn’t seen them since that day he’d fled his homestead. He shoved up to his feet—a major dizzy spell turning his vision granular—and found Bronwen already at the door, armed with one of the rakes that’d previously leaned against a barrel. She raised it towards him.
She was pale. “You led them here somehow.”
“You don’t know what’s going on,” he replied. The exit—and freedom—was right behind her. But she wasn’t budging, and he was dizzy from torture and weak from lack of food and water. “Now get. You’re in my way.”
“I’ll kill you before you set foot outside.”
He palmed the stishovite dagger in his hand. “What are you going to do? Rake me to death?”
Her eyes flashed with anger. “I told you! I am not just some commoner—”
Whatever she said after that, he didn’t hear it. The hut flap flew open, and in the light of the lantern he saw the tall shape of a man. His black armor was refined and polished, with the slightest purple sheen to it, like a magpie’s feathers. One of Ravana’s men. He was staring right at him.
“You.” His voice was sharp. “Look at me.” The command was unnecessary, as Morfran was already looking, and perhaps it was Morfran’s appearance being that of a recently beaten prisoner that tipped the soldier off that he was at odds with the dwellers, for he didn’t seem to recognize Morfran’s bloodily rearranged face, only the possibility that it could be him.
Swiftly, the soldier raised his sword above Bronwen’s back to hack her down before she could even turn.
And in that split second before it fell, Morfran weighed his options: be prisoner to an armored soldier who would forever have bragging rights about finding and imprisoning his ex–Dark Lord for his queen…
or to a forest woman with anger issues and a rake.
He chose the latter. The stishovite dagger blurred as he chucked it, a black arrow bolting through the air.
It sank right into the man’s forehead, knocking him back a step.
For a moment none of the three of them moved.
It took both Bronwen and the soldier a few seconds of staring at each other to register that the soldier was a dead man standing, and, because dead men do not stand and blink in stunned confusion with daggers in their heads, he did the natural thing and collapsed to the floor like a puppet whose strings were snipped.
Morfran exhaled in relief. Bronwen stared at him wide-eyed.
“As I said before.” He moved past her, leaning over without slowing to remove the stishovite dagger from the soldier’s noggin. “You’re in my way.”