It took no time at all for me to reach the fighting at the base of the tree. Aneurin was outnumbered seven to one, but he was clearly an expert swordsman. Slavers were easy to spot a mile away; there was something about those who traded in unwilling flesh that made them putrid beings. Their garb and the dirt on their clothing marked them as what they were, as did their lack of heavy armor. Roadside bandits tended to be better armed.
Islwyn’s horse loitered under the tree, but Islwyn was nowhere to be found. I could taste every beat of my pulse as I skirted the edge of the fighting. I could deal with fighting if I had an advantage. But as I was a rather small woman, scarcely bigger than most pixies, taking on a full-grown man in a fair fight would end poorly for me. I had no misgivings about my chances in a fair fight. And that was why it took all the strength I had not to squeal when, after I’d jumped to pull myself onto the lower branches, someone grabbed my foot and pulled me back down.
I hit the ground with a grunt, and I could almost feel that adrenaline surge as my hood fell back and my hair spilled over my shoulder. The slaver laughed at me. He was filthy with layers of grime covering his skin and clothes. He wore a blood-spattered dark cap and shirt. I glared up at him, my eyes flashing fiercely as I scrambled to my feet. He seemed startled when I unsheathed my dagger and lunged for him. He dodged me and grabbed my hair.
“Pretty thin’, boss don’ wan’ no human bitches. Buh’ we can ’ave a spo’ o’ fun wit’ chu ’fore. After we collec’ your lit’le frien’.” I let him speak in garbled common as I tried to struggle free.
Never once did it occur to me to grab his hand. Oh no, I thought of the most vulnerable spots on a man. I elbowed him in the groin as hard as I could, and he went down like the worthless sack of shit he was. While he grabbed at his loins, I unsheathed my dagger and sliced him from ear to ear before he could recover. His blood was on my hands as I watched him die. Again I felt nothing, and I was only a bit disturbed when I jumped for the tree again and pulled myself up on the lower branches. Oh, they’d break bones on the way down when I cut them free, but better a broken bone or two than death.
I was so focused on cutting the seven choking humans down from the tree that I didn’t notice what had happened until it was too late. Three of the humans Aneurin fought remained alive, and Aneurin was covered in gore, his hair dripping with blood. He was moving slower than before, those lithe limbs seemingly having lost their lightning quickness. One human grabbed the collar of his jerkin, pulling him in close. Aneurin head-butted him and staggered backward. And that was when the other two set on him. One of those dying men hit the ground with a hard thud as I quickly covered my mouth to stifle my startled scream. The tears that blurred my vision threatened to slip down my cheeks as I watched the man he’d head-butted stagger over and hit him on the side of the head with the pommel of his sword.
“Might have to take this one’s teeth, but he’s almost prettier than that girl,” one of the men exclaimed as he held Aneurin’s unconscious body up by his blood-drenched hair, and then he dropped him like a heavy sack. “Bind him and shove him in the cart with the other feral piece of shit.” I’m going to kill you…slowly and with my bare fucking hands.
My jaw set as I watched the three men carry Aneurin to a nearby cart with a cage atop it. They threw him in, and I could almost make out Islwyn in there with him. I bit into the pad of my thumb to keep quiet as they started moving two carts away. I cut the remaining men down and slipped from the tree. Once on the ground I heard the faintest gurgling wheezing sound. I knew that sound. It was the sound of a life with maybe an hour left—someone slowly drowning in their own blood. Wiping my dagger on my trousers, I followed that sound until I found a wounded man with about five teeth in his mouth leaning against a tree.
“That’s a very slow death.” I grinned at him, setting my teeth into my bottom lip.
“Help me, Miss! My mates an’ I! Elf cunts set in on us!”
“I’m a Cunning Woman. I can help ease your suffering. I just want to know where they are going. Your friends looked wounded.”
“They went to the Ruby Finch. Damn, it hurts,” he wheezed. I turned from him and started walking away. “W-wait! You said!”
“I need herbs to treat you. I’ll be back.” I walked toward the rickety inn.
The door was in splinters. Inside, the bodies of the patrons who either had tried to resist or had inconvenienced the slavers littered the floor. It didn’t take long for me to find the medicine to ease the man’s suffering. It was a little oil lamp. The glass bowl on the bottom was full, and the flame danced on the wick to the tune that I whistled as I returned to the man. His eyes went wide when I stopped a few feet from him. He knew. I let him get a good look at me before I threw the lamp at him as hard as I could. The glass hit his chest and shattered, and he burst into flames. His desperate screams filled the air as I walked back to Ys. I wasn’t exactly sure where the Ruby Finch was, but I knew what it was. It was a brothel, and those were usually close to a city but not too close. Gathering Islwyn’s dapple, I fixed both horses to the hitch outside as the humans started to sit up, rubbing their throats and coughing. Not all of them sat up. Part of me wanted to help them, but a much larger part of me wanted to catch up with the slavers.
I wasn’t stupid. I knew I couldn’t take on three warriors on my own. I had never swung a sword before. I knew the concept of it—you stab them before they can stab you—but beyond that I didn’t have any delusions about my prowess in battle. So the fight wouldn’t be fair at all.
Walking back into the inn, I went straight for the larder. I sniffed the baskets of herbs they had on a shelf. Everything was standard culinary fare. I had everything I needed to make the fire mixture from before, but I hesitated. It could easily burn out of control as it had in Heves, and I couldn’t live with myself if Aneurin burned alive while I tried to save him. I screamed in frustration and threw a basket of lavender sprigs across the small storeroom. My face and neck were hot with impotent rage. Pacing nervously, in my peripheral vision I eventually spied a dust-covered cask.
Working the cork from the barrel, I was almost knocked off my feet by the smell of ammonia. I quickly recorked it and blinked a few times as tears spilled down my cheeks from that caustic odor. Someone cured leather in the fall. My smile grew as I set to work on what was going to end up being a bomb—or rather, bombs. I set their biggest cauldron on the fire and mixed in the ammonia from the barrel with their meat-curing salts. Then I slowly added sugar and poured the mixture into four jars. While waiting for it to set I walked up into the guest rooms and retrieved a linen sheet that I ripped into strips. There was one lone man behind the bar when I returned, I recognized him as one of the few I had cut down. He nodded to me and forced a smile but didn’t say a word.
I flipped one of the chairs back upright and sat in it as I braided the scraps of linen from the sheet into wicks for the bombs. I plaited the linen deftly, my attention only half-focused on the task. I had used this type of bomb before. But then it was to blow up a gopher hole. It had worked, and all I needed, this time, was to create a distraction.
“Do you have a bow?” I asked, glancing up at the innkeeper from the four thin, tight linen wicks I had created. He held up a finger before disappearing up the stairs, and then returned with a bow and quiver full of arrows. He set them on the table in front of me and went back to the bar. He pointed to a slender body on the floor, not much older than a boy. “It was his?” I asked, and the innkeeper nodded.
“My… son,” he choked out, holding his throat. Rhosyn’s husband was scarcely older than she was. He barely had peach fuzz on his chin.
“Well…those sheepfuckers will regret all of this. It won’t bring him back, but he’ll be avenged.” I sighed. I wished I could have said or done more. It was my fault. Maybe not the boy’s murder, but Aneurin and Islwyn’s capture certainly was. With a ragged breath, I walked back into the larder and finished setting the bombs, with their close-fitting caps sealed wit
h wax around the edges.
All my preparations took somewhat less than four hours, but four hours in a cart was the equivalent of an hour on horseback. I’d reach them before sunset, which would give me plenty of time to wait. After wrapping the bomb jars carefully in linen and placing them into my bag, I tied the reins of Islwyn’s dapple to Ys’s saddle and mounted the massive white stallion. I nudged him on with my heels, and he took off like he knew Aneurin was in danger. With a quick glance behind me, I could see two dark-clad riders heading up the road. One was so large I actually felt sorry for the horse that carried him. It was clear to me that it was Yorwrath and Grwn. No one was as big as Grwn. I urged Ys faster as I leaned over his powerful neck and pressed my face against his flowing silver mane.
I reached the slavers’ camp quicker than I’d anticipated. I dismounted when the light of their fire came into view and the caged carts were barely visible. I grabbed the striking stick from the saddlebags and pulled the bow over my shoulder and tied the quiver to my belt. Nearing the camp, I carefully watched the three men mill about the campfire before I chose the spot for the bombs, as the placement had to be perfect. Close enough to gain the attention of the men, but far enough that any rocks freed by the explosion wouldn’t accidently kill one of the captives. Admittedly I was guessing on all of it. It wasn’t something I had a great deal of knowledge on or experience with. I was a Cunning Woman, not a military strategist. I buried three of the bombs, staggering their placement, and then I set one slightly closer to the camp on top of the grass. One bomb was to bring them close; the three I buried were to do damage to whichever was stupid enough to fall for it.
Once everything was in place and darkness set in, I took out the striking stick and lit the fuse. I watched for a moment to make sure the wick was burning properly. Then I walked around to the opposite side of the camp and waited with an arrow in my hand and the bow at the ready. I had shot a bow before, and I didn’t figure shooting stupid sheepfuckers like the slavers was much harder than killing a doe, rabbit or squirrel—except a squirrel wasn’t likely to try and kill you if you missed. When I found my perfect little hiding spot, I knew I didn’t have much time left. And sure enough, a few seconds after I knelt in the brush and steadied my elbow against my knee, the first explosion rocked the earth. A shrill, excited cry sounded from the cages after the blast, a cry high pitched with youth—I’d almost had said it was that of a child. Sheepfucker-I-was-going-to-kill-slowly had the pliers in his hand and was on his way to the cage, but when the explosion sounded he paused, dropping the tool to the ground.
“Search the perimeter. I’ll be damned if I’m going to lose my fucking life or this haul because of those damned knife-eared whoresons,” he snarled to the others, drawing his sword.
The other two walked off and the second, larger explosion sounded, sending dead grass and rocks sailing through the air. I nocked an arrow, and took a deep breath and held it to further steady my hand. I aimed down the tip of the arrow at the man I could barely see in the distance. I almost heard my mother’s soft voice in my ear again, whispering to me when she took me hunting against my father’s wishes for the first time. “Always aim for the heart,” she had whispered. Releasing my breath, I let the arrow fly, and it hit true—the man sank like a stone in water. Squinting into the dark I could barely make out the struggling shape of the other man amidst the smoke and flames of the explosion, which had set fire to the grass.
Unfortunately, I spent too much time looking at him. Sheepfucker-who-would-die-slowly was advancing on me, glaring in my direction.
“Come here, little girl. I’m not going to hurt you,” he snarled as he darted for me. He was too close for me to use the bow, so I did the only thing I could think of. I grabbed a handful of dirt and threw it in his face. “You bitch,” he barked, reaching for me. He grabbed my hair and used it to throw me to the ground. “You think you’re a crafty whore, don’t you?” He tackled me, knocking the air from my lungs. I kicked and clawed at him as best as I could while he fought against me, attempting to pin my wrists to the ground. My teeth sank into his neck until I could taste blood in my mouth. He pushed me back and slapped me so hard my ears rang and my face stung. I yowled like a small rabid animal, and head-butted him. It was a mistake. A huge mistake. My whole world turned upside down and I saw stars. Clearly I had hurt myself more than him, though blood poured from his nose. “I’m going to enjoy this.”
“Fuck you.” I spat in his face.
“That’s the point. Me, then my men, then anyone with a copper in his pocket and a cock in his trousers, then the horses, and then and only then will I slit your throat, you dirty elf fucking whor—” he grunted, when a dark shape slammed into him, knocking him from on top of me. I scrambled to my feet but I was still dizzy as hell. I took two steps and fell back to my knees. It took a few seconds for me to see that the figure on top of sheepfucker-who-would-die-slowly was Aneurin. His hands were still bound, but that didn’t seem to stop him.
“You. Don’t. Get. To. Fucking. Touch. Her,” Aneurin spat as he shoved his thumbs into the human’s eye sockets and twisted. The man screamed. “What was it you said? You were going to take my teeth?” he almost whispered, grabbing a nearby rock. “I think I’ll fucking take yours instead!” As the human continued to scream in agony Aneurin brought the rock down six times, accompanied by a cracking sound as the man’s teeth gave way and his jaw broke. The sound warped in his mouth, and I slowly approached them. Aneurin turned and looked at me. “Do you want to kill him?” he asked. Up close I noticed he was sitting on the man, his weight pinning the man’s hips and his feet on the human’s shoulders.
“You should… My head.” I rubbed my temple, and he nodded slowly.
Sheepfucker-who-would-die-slowly did not die slowly. Aneurin leaned forward and bit a chunk out of the man’s throat, spitting the flesh into the brush. He sat there on top of him, and we both watched on as the slaver bled out in a handful of minutes.
“How did you get out of the cage?” I asked, tilting my head to the side. Aneurin continued to stare at the man, and I saw in his eyes a glimpse of what was probably his father. There was a wild and animalistic quality to his gaze that Yorwrath seemed to have all the time.
“Lockpick. This isn’t the first time I’ve been captured.” His voice, usually sweet, had a hard edge to it; the tone was all Yorwrath. “You shouldn’t have come.”
“If I had stayed away you wouldn’t have any teeth right now,” I muttered, rubbing my head. After a few breaths, he sighed as he stared at the corpse beneath him, and his face softened a bit.
“Thank you.” He flashed me a quick smile before covering his face with his bloodied hands. A horse whinnied down the road. Lowering his hands, he turned his attention in the direction of that noise, his eyes narrowing and taking in whatever was there in the dark that remained invisible to my inferior human vision.
“What is it?”
“Yorwrath and Grwn. Could you?” He held out his wrists, and I untied the tight knot. “Thank you.” There was an odd tension in his voice as he stood rubbing his bruised wrists. “I’ll teach you some swordplay while we travel. You’re good with a bow, but you need to learn to fight in close quarters in the open. But…” His voice trailed off as Yorwrath walked into view, leading a massive black warhorse with the same sort of full thick wavy mane as Ys’s. He also held Ys’s reins next to Islwyn’s dapple.
“Apparently I missed all of the fun, Brother.” Yorwrath smirked. “So has she figured out that you’re really just like me?” He cackled as Grwn approached and Islwyn finally got the other cage open. “Throw her down and have her. I bet your bloodlust still has you up and raring to go. The only thing that makes us harder than the steel we wield is when we take a man’s life, Valentina. Touch him. Gods, you just have to glance at the tent in his trousers to tell.”
Aneurin didn’t deny it, and I glanced at him and knew why. Yorwrath was right, you could tell. The leather of his pants was tight enough that yo
u could make out the shape of his overly obvious swollen erection.
“What do you want, Yorwrath?”
“You killed Pwyll.”
“Yes, and I’d plowing well do it again if given the option,” Aneurin snapped at his brother, that hardness returning.
“Oh?”
“Do you want to do this here? In front of Grwn? In front of those over there?” He gestured in the direction of the elves who stumbled out of the cage.
“Hey, sheepfuckers!” I whistled at them, and they turned and looked at me like they wanted to snatch off my head. “Even I know we can’t loiter on this road. There’ll be time for your pissing contest later.”
“Calm your Dy’ne, Aneurin. Or I’ll make you give her to me for a night and do it for you,” Yorwrath growled. I rolled my eyes.
“C’mon, you both know she’s right. If you want to do this, you can after we’ve set up camp further off the road,” Grwn reasoned, attempting to calm the brothers. Aneurin nodded and started to turn from Yorwrath, but it was Yorwrath who jumped his brother. “Fucking Yorwrath.” Grwn sighed, pulling the red bandanna from his head. “You’ll get used to this. They fight over the stupidest shit, and they fight a lot,” he offered. “Islwyn, help me separate them!” he yelled as he walked over to the two fighting brothers.
Yorwrath laughed and said something in their tongue as he punched Aneurin. Islwyn jogged over as the brothers grappled with one another. They were matched pretty evenly, but Aneurin moved with the sluggishness of fatigue. In no time at all Yorwrath had him in an arm bar, but Aneurin twisted out of it. I heard Yorwrath say my name several times, as they clawed, kicked, punched, and head-butted each other. And something made me feel that in reality the entire fight had nothing to do with Pwyll and everything to do with me.
Heart of the Forest (Arwn's Gift Book 1) Page 13
