Chapter 23
Chapter
Twenty-Three
JULIANNA
I awoke with a start. My hands were bound behind my back, my body bouncing on a wooden plank.
It was dark out, the moon above. It took me a moment, but I realized I was in the back of a wagon, being wheeled along the stone streets of Korteria.
A rough woolen blanket had been shoved over me.
And from the sound of it, an ashvan was walking down the street, dragging me along.
My head ached, and I could feel my body had been scratched and bruised all over. My elbow and knees and the backs of my legs were aching, with fresh cuts burning. I tried to sit up, realizing then that my feet were also bound. Shit.
I sucked in a breath, trying not to cry as I let my awareness move between my legs, my body trembling. It wouldn’t have been the first time I was unconscious when they—when Kormac—
But there was no soreness, no strange sensations there.
Although there would be soon if I didn’t get out.
The wooden walls of the wagon around me were about as tall as I was from the looks of it.
I tried to stand up, managed to hold my balance for about two seconds—enough to learn that the walls only reached my chest—which wasn’t much better—before I fell over again.
Unable to brace my fall, my head slammed into the ground.
“You hear that?” came a voice.
I stopped breathing. Did they hear me? If they thought I was awake, or trying to escape, they’d only come back here and make it worse.
“Just went over a rock,” came another voice. “Hit the wheels or some shit. Vra. Faster, you stupid horse.”
“How much fucking farther?” asked the first.
“We’re near the border for Cretanya. The others are meeting us there. We’ll stop for the night, have some fun. Bring her to the Palace in the morning,” said the second voice.
I started to shake. No. No. No. Not again. I couldn’t do this again.
“Emperor’s going to pay us quite well for his favorite pet,” said the first.
I seethed, my hands trembling. That fucking nickname.
“Much better than the vorakh task force,” the second agreed.
Wind rustled through the trees and the wheels began to slow as we shifted off the stone ground onto grass, moving into a woodland.
I started straining against my bindings. Seeing if I could rip through the rope around my wrists, or kick off the ones around my ankles. But there was no give. None at all.
My only opportunity to escape might come from the moment they stopped. At some point, they’d release the back wall to pull me out. It would be a small moment. A blink of an eye. But if I could get my legs free, maybe I could run. But that was a huge maybe.
I closed my eyes. Fuck. How the hell had they found me? Was it Lady Aliyah? No. Alistair would have vetted her.
Someone with her that couldn’t be trusted? But these were Kormac soturi, loyal to the Emperor, enemies of El Zan Vylette. I didn’t think I’d been betrayed by any of my “supporters” though it had happened before.
I tried to think. As if knowing how would stop this from happening. But I needed to know. Needed to know if I truly couldn’t trust anyone. My stomach turned.
Was it possible that it was one of the chayatim from the Palace?
That was most likely. They could have a mind reader wandering Korteria, just listening.
If it was someone who knew me, knew my voice, it would have been easy.
Gods. Weeks of turning nahashim away and staying inside to avoid this very situation.
Being all cooped up as Dario would say. And here I was.
I’d done everything right. Again! And it still wasn’t fucking enough to save me.
“Shhh, whoa. Stop!” the first soturion yelled out.
“The fuck?” asked his companion.
I heard a whooshing sound, and then a scream, and a thud.
A sword was withdrawn, the metal singing in the air. “Show your face, you fucking bastard!” It was the first soturion.
I sat up, peering into the dark, my eyes straining. Something moved in the trees, shifting. A body. A soturion’s. My captor held up his torch, shining it up at the branches and I caught the profile of the man there. A strong broad nose, and curls tied on top of his head.
Dario!
My heart leapt.
He pounced from the tree, falling on the captor that remained. They both moved out of my sight, until all I could hear were grunts of pain, and the awful sound of flesh hitting flesh, followed by the singing of metal as swords were drawn.
Dario cursed, and then cried out.
There was something that sounded like a punch, and then some rustling noises and grunts. The second soturion was awake.
“You bastard,” he roared. “I’ll have your guts for this!”
“Not if I have yours first,” Dario taunted.
My breathing grew shallow and pained. Dario was strong. I knew that. But it was two against one. And these men were motivated by something more powerful than anyone realized. Money. I had to get out.
I inched my way across the floor, my shoes just barely sliding over the wooden planks beneath me. I reached the back of the wagon, and sucked in a breath, bracing my body. Then with all I had left, I slammed into the wall, again, and again and again. “Shit, she’s up! Get back there. Grab her!”
“No,” Dario roared. There was a slapping sound. Someone hit the ground, and the back wall of the wagon was pulled back.
I stared into the black eyes of the man who’d kidnapped me. Who’d climbed the tower, chased me back inside the balcony. He reached for my neck, fingers gripping my throat as he pulled me off the wagon.
I couldn’t even scream, or kick my feet as they dangled in the air.
A shadow appeared behind him. The hilt of a sword slammed into the man’s head.
His eyes rolled back and he collapsed, releasing his hold on me.
Dario caught me in his arms before I could fall, and a second later, he cut my bonds, freeing my hands and dropping to his knees to release my feet.
He took my hand in his and we raced to the front of the wagon. My other captor was laying on the ground, barely moving, his eyes still open, watching Dario with absolute hatred.
“They’re on their way, you fucking bastard,” the wolf said weakly. “More soturi from the Palace. You took the Emperor’s pet, and he wants her back.” He coughed.
“You look like you’re in pain,” Dario said calmly.
“Fuck you,” said the soturion.
“Dario,” I hissed. “Kill him. He’s seen you and me.”
His nostrils flared, but then he stood over the soturion, reached down for his dagger and handed it to me. “Hold this.”
He brandished his sword, holding it over the man’s stomach. His boot slammed down on the man’s torso, making him wheeze. The movement pushed his armor up, exposing more of his midriff.
“No! No! Please,” begged the soturion.
Dario’s eyes narrowed. “Since you said please.” He lifted his sword, and instead of impaling him, slit his throat.
I gasped and turned away. Dario reached behind my knees, lifting me into his arms and placing me on the back of the ashvan.
A second later, he’d sliced through the straps tying the wagon to the horse, and then he climbed up behind me. “Vra. Volara! ” he yelled. He tugged on the reins, one hand snaking around my waist, forcing my back against his front.
I tensed up, even though it wasn’t our first time touching, nor the first time our bodies had been so close.
“Hold on to me,” Dario said.
I hesitated. I hadn’t touched a man by choice since Seth.
And when Dario and I had escaped the inn. I grabbed hold of his arm, and squeezed my eyes shut as the horse reared back, lifting and kicking its front legs, and then we ran.
Only this ashvan didn’t fly.
“Fuck. Volara! Fly!” he yelled.
“He’s too old,” I said. “That why they had the wagon on him.”
“Shit. Okay. Hold on,” Dario said, turning the ashvan around. We raced through the trees back out through the woodlands that led to the Cretanyan border.
Within a few minutes we had reached the stone road again.
“Stop!” I yelled.
Dario slowed the horse. “Why?”
“Out on the road,” I said. “They’re there. Ka Kormac.”
Dario eased our ashvan forward, just enough to peek out from the woods. Sure enough I was right. There were at least two dozen of the wolves out there drinking, dancing, parading up and down the street.
“It’s Viktor’s Arkasva celebrations,” I said once the horse had stepped back into the shadows. “They’re never going to end.”
Dario sighed. “We can wait for them to pass.”
I shook my head. “They’re going to be out there all night. And if they see us—if they see me,” I swallowed, “you need to kill me first.”
“Jules, that’s not going to happen.”
I craned my neck, finding his eyes in the dark. “I mean it. I’d rather die.”
And as if to prove that the entire universe was against me—our horse decided that that moment was a perfect time to whinny.
Dario stiffened behind me, his aura flaring. I stopped breathing. But we’d been caught.
“Yo, there’s an ashvan nearby,” came a shout. “Who wants a ride?”
“Into the woods!”
“Go,” I hissed under my breath. My fingers dug into his arm. “Now!”
Dario turned, shout-whispering orders to the ashvan, backing us further from the street, deep into the wild bramble of the forest floor, and then we were running, tearing through the trees, low hanging branches cutting up my cheeks and arms, leaves sticking in my hair.
My heart pounded with every step the ashvan took. With every sound I heard that couldn’t be explained by our horse. Dario only slowed when he came toward a small mountain pass, its ridges barely outlined in the night sky above the trees.
“Let me see if we can take shelter there,” he said, leading us forward.
We walked on for several moments, and the woods grew still. Too still. And suddenly I remembered the other threat still out there. Just as grave as Ka Kormac.
Akadim.
I gripped Dario’s arm even harder. But the trees grew sparse, leading into a clearing that sloped down into the valley just before the mountain pass.
“I think there’s an opening,” he said quietly. “Is your stave on you?” he asked.