VirtualWarrior

by Ann Lawrence

  “Something else we need, Lien—the leaf I gave you.”

  “Would you go?” He cupped her face and gave her a hard kiss. “We may not have much time. Find Nilrem.”

  “The leaf, Lien—”

  “Okay. Now go.” He gave her a push.

  “I need Einalem’s map,” she said.

  “Get it then, and go.” Ardra watched Samoht lift Einalem into his arms. The man appeared as confused as a small child.

  When he saw Ardra looking at him, he said, “This is my doing, is it not?”

  How to answer?

  He continued. “I loved her…” He broke off. Tears ran down his cheeks, and he buried his face in Einalem’s neck.

  “It was she who stole the Vial of Seduction, was it not?” Ardra asked.

  “She told me it was Tol who took it to barter for a potion to ease his pain.”

  “She lied,” Ardra said. “She wanted someone’s love, I imagine, as do we all.”

  Samoht tipped his head back and stared at the clear purple sky. “How can the sun still shine? How is it possible when she is dead?”

  “Get your map and go, Ardra,” Lien said, pointing to the forest. “He’s grieving now, but later he may decide that someone else is to blame.”

  She touched Lien on the arm, then went to Samoht, who had placed his sister on the bed in the cottage. Ardra made a show of arranging Einalem’s gown in a more decorous manner; in the process she plucked the map of the Tangled Wood from her bodice. It was curiously untouched by blood.

  Once outside, Ardra showed it to Lien. “When you’ve found Nilrem, you’re to hide,” Lien said. “Hide until I come for you. Do you understand?”

  “I will not hide. You might need my help.”

  “Damn it, I said hide. If something happens to you—” He jerked her against his body and kissed her hard, so hard she forgot all else save his taste, his strong hands.

  “Hide,” he ordered, “or I’ll take my stick to you when I find you. This isn’t about you and me. It’s about you being safe to look after your people.”

  He was right. “I will do as you say. The leaf, Lien. Do not forget.” She held him close for one more fleeting moment before darting into the trees, but paused to take a final look back at him.

  He stood alone in the clearing. The sunlight painted him bronze and gold. She thought of a statue, every muscle carved in perfect male beauty. He raised his hand to her, and the snake on his arm moved. Would she see him again?

  Ralen tried to get comfortable in his chair, but his arm throbbed in time to the hammer pounding away in his head. Too many people roamed the hall, all speaking too loudly.

  “Are you a pilgrim?” a young woman asked. She held a silver goblet in her hand.

  Suddenly there were two of her. Twins? Ralen tried to focus on her. He grinned and rubbed his eyes. ‘Twas but one small woman…a very beautiful one.

  “Are you looking for a pilgrim?” he asked. She was bountiful in all the right places.

  “I am seeking a pilgrim,” the woman said.

  “Then I will be one for you.” She dipped a moment, but he realized it was he who swayed, not she. Too much wine. Yet his mouth was as dry as the Scorched Plain.

  “Would you like a drink?” The lovely woman held out the cup. He took it, looked in, and was disappointed to see water, not wine. But he did not wish to disappoint her. And he would tell her so if she would only stand still a moment.

  He raised the cup. Some of the liquid slopped over the rim, across his fingers, as he put the cup to his lips. The water ran cold and sweet down his throat. When he lowered the cup, the woman rose on her tiptoes and kissed his lips.

  He lifted the cup again, thirsty for more.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Ardra found Inund in the kitchen. She wasted no time telling him what had happened. He ran off to get Nilrem, and she looked about the smoky room, where at least a dozen men and women labored.

  Where should she hide? It went against her nature to cower somewhere, but she would not disobey Lien.

  Ralen. They had forgotten Ralen. Surely Lien would want Ralen to know that Einalem was dead.

  Keeping to the shadows, Ardra crept up the steps the kitchen to the hall. The hall was crowded with warriors and servants.

  Where was Ralen?

  Then she saw Ywri, a delighted smile on her lovely face. A smile for Ralen. Ralen with his head back. Ralen with a cup to his lips.

  “Nay!” Ardra screamed. She flew across the hall and slapped the cup from Ralen’s hand.

  He staggered at the blow, knocked his injured arm against Ywri’s shoulder, then collapsed into his chair, his arm cradled against his chest. Ywri clapped her hands over her mouth and began to cry. Ardra pushed her aside.

  “You must rid yourself of the potion. Now, Ralen,” Ardra said, tugging on his arm. He sat as immovable as a statue.

  “Potion?” Ralen said.

  Ardra dropped to her knees by his side so that she might look him in the eyes. “Please, Ralen. Rid yourself of the potion. ‘Tis poison and will kill you.”

  Ralen leaned back in his chair, a vacant look on his face, a look not unlike Ywri’s, who cowered near the chair, weeping.

  “Who are you?” he asked.

  Inund entered the hall and ran to them. “What happened?” he asked.

  Ardra could say nothing, only point to the goblet on the floor, its seductive contents staining the polished wooden planks.

  “Too late, too late,” Inund cried. “And Nilrem is off to the forest to find Samoht and Lien. He cannot help us!” He put out a hand as if to touch Ardra, but withdrew it. His eyes, filled with sorrow, must have reflected the torment in her own.

  “Can you…?” Ardra nodded her chin toward Ywri.

  “I will see to her.” Inund took Ywri by the hand and led her away. His cheeks were as wet as the girl’s.

  Ardra watched myriad expressions cross Ralen’s features while she begged him again to purge himself of the potion.

  He shook his head like a great dragon waking from sleep. His fingers, locked on the chair arm, looked like claws.

  What was a hard but handsome face took on a malevolent cast. He licked his lips.

  She whipped around and impaled the nearest men with her harshest glare. They were Tol’s men. “Take him. Purge him. Else he will die! Now!”

  Two men rushed forward and tried to snatch Ralen from his seat. He fought them. He held off the two men with just one arm.

  His strength was terrible.

  Ardra hated what she must do. She reached into the hearth and drew out a length of wood. She doused the stick in a pail of water set nearby in case of fire, then turned and struck a hard blow across the side of Ralen’s head.

  He wheeled about to face her. For a moment she thought she saw some semblance of recognition in his eyes, but it faded, and he crashed back in his seat, still at last.

  As if someone had doused their fears like the flames on the stick, the folk in the hall fell silent.

  Ardra ordered them to remain where they were. Even Ralen’s and Samoht’s men obeyed. She stood over Ralen. If need be, she would hit him again.

  A sound drew her attention, but when Ardra turned from the unconscious Ralen, she saw all eyes on the hall entrance.

  Lien stood in the doorway. He wore only his buff breeches. His feet were bare. He shuffled forward like an ancient man, his face a stone mask.

  Cidre. Ardra looked about. Only Cidre could have such an effect on him.

  The goddess stood at the top of the stairs, hands resting on the railing, her face ugly with anger. She stared down at the unconscious Ralen.

  Ardra looked back at Lien. His wrists and throat were cuffed in so livid a red, Ardra feared that if she touched him he would bleed. She knew that if he could turn around, his back would bear the knotwork marks, that they would flare from his waist and rise like wings to his shoulders.

  Nilrem stood behind Lien with the metal-clad stick. The crowds of slaves
and warriors parted to allow the two men to pass.

  Ardra knew Cidre must not win. Her evil must not cripple the man she loved. Nor could Ardra allow Ralen to become the fiend Cidre so ardently desired.

  Ardra dropped the wood. She met Lien halfway. The pupils of his eyes were so wide, they appeared as solid and dull a black as the gem around Cidre’s neck.

  He opened his mouth, but no words came out. A commotion drew her eyes back to the steps.

  Cidre was coming. Flanked by two guards, she glided down the stairs. The torches held high by her men gleamed on the gold chains wrapped about her waist, on the Black Eye at her breast. The flames painted streaks of gold in the waterfall of her hair trailing behind her.

  Ardra realized that Cidre had garbed herself for some great event. If it was her own mating ceremony, it would not happen, Ardra vowed.

  Many in the crowd took a step back from the stairs in fear; Samoht’s men placed their hands on their sword hilts.

  Finally, the procession stopped at the hearth, with Cidre positioned in front of Lien and beside Ralen. “I am sorry I will not have you, pilgrim. But you had one thing I had not counted on.”

  When Lien spoke, his voice was low and halting. “Only one?”

  “Aye. The help of Venrali’s daughter. Did you know she is his child?”

  Lien’s face did not change, but Ardra felt his questions flow over her like a torrent of water. Why had she not told him? What must he think of her?

  “Aye,” Ardra said, knowing she must be honest now, before them all. “Venrali is my father. So you see, you already had a consort who had proved himself.”

  “That is the only reason I allowed him to serve me,” Cidre said.

  “He ran away from his people, away from retribution. I thought him dead until I saw him here. I had no idea what to do.” Although Ardra directed her words to Cidre, they were for Lien.

  “And now he is gone again,” Cidre said.

  “Gone?” The word was a strangled syllable from Lien’s lips.

  “Gone.” Cidre placed a hand on Ralen’s shoulder. “He knew he was no longer needed.”

  Ralen looked like the corpses that turned up in the thawing season from time to time, unfortunate souls who ventured too far upon the ice fields.

  Lien took a step toward her, but Cidre lifted her right hand and pointed at him. He swayed in place, one foot forward. “Come no closer, pilgrim. And you,” she swung her arm in Ardra’s direction, “stay there or my guards will cut you down.”

  Lien ignored Cidre. Ardra thought his feet seemed nailed to the floor, but he forced himself forward.

  One of Cidre’s guards stepped in front of Lien, but the goddess waved the man away with a short laugh. “The pilgrim is harmless. And so is Ardra—as impotent against my will as her father was.”

  “Ardra.” Her name came slowly but clearly from Lien’s lips. His hands rose from his sides, fisted, palms up, but so slowly she thought they would never finish their journey toward her.

  She knew what he wanted. Nay, needed.

  “I love you,” she said softly, ignoring all the crowds of warriors and slaves who huddled so close, forming an oval much like the arena for the stick fight. She ignored the consequences of telling a pilgrim she loved him. She ignored the consequences of taking sides. “Forgive me that I did not trust you enough to tell you the truth.”

  Lien’s lips trembled; then one corner kicked up in a macabre smile.

  She placed her fingertips on his clenched fists, feeling the intense heat, readying herself to absorb the shock that would radiate from the angry lines on his skin.

  “No.” He spat the word, and she jerked her hands back. “M-my w-waist.”

  His words drew her eyes to the lacing of his breeches. Not knowing what he wanted, she touched the soft, dark line of hair that disappeared into his breeches. He moaned, and she knew her touch caused him some physical sensation, whether of pain or healing she knew not.

  Silence fell around them. She heard the creak of wood beneath a nearby warrior’s boot as he shifted his weight.

  “Enough of this nonsense,” Cidre said.

  Fear of the goddess, her powers, of Ralen’s awakening, made Ardra’s hand shake, but she kept her eyes on Lien’s lips.

  He forced out another word. “Lower.”

  She skimmed her palm down his smooth skin to the lacings on his breeches and lower—and knew what he wanted. She smiled up at him and hurried to jerk the laces open.

  “Surprising man,” she said, and plucked the small square of white cloth from inside the waist of his breeches.

  With her back to Cidre, she opened the cloth and saw the leaf. Glossy. Supple. As fresh as if it had been plucked from the tree that moment. She tucked it into the front of her tunic, and although Lien’s whole body urged her to turn and help Ralen, she could not.

  Not yet.

  She took a huge breath and slapped her hands on Lien’s wrists. Hot pain shot through her. It surged up her arms and into her head.

  Behind her, Cidre laughed and a murmur rose in the crowd. Ardra hung on, her fingers wrapped around Lien’s wrists, her eyes locked on his.

  Her knees trembled, her insides churned. The burning sensation flowed from him along her fingers to her arms. A living river of pain. It was fire. It was ice. It traveled straight to her heart.

  And beneath it, another current. One as hot as the other, but without pain. His pulse. She felt the running stream of his blood in her fingers, her breasts, her insides.

  It aroused her. Here, before them all. Who saw it? Who knew it? He did.

  A flush stained his cheeks—the same flush he wore during lovemaking. A surge as intense as a climax made her cry out and tremble. But she kept her hands in place.

  Then his skin began to clear. The stain on his wrists, his throat, faded. With it went the fear, the pain, and the arousal.

  “Thank you,” was all he said. He turned his hands over, gripped her fingers for a fraction of a moment, then pulled his hands from hers.

  She plucked the leaf from the front of her tunic and slit the center vein with her fingernail. “It is the antidote.” She handed the leaf back to him.

  Their fingertips were stained by a spurt of red fluid that flowed from the opening, but he curled her fingers over the leaf. “I think you should give it to him, Ardra. It probably ought to be someone who is good and brave inside and out.”

  Ardra took the leaf which dripped its red essence over their fingers like blood.

  Cidre laughed when Ardra approached Ralen. “What is this?”

  “Step aside,” Ardra said.

  “There is nothing you can do. ‘Tis too late. He has had the potion. And a kiss. He is not the one I wanted, but as Nilrem says, beggars cannot be choosers. It will be soon, very soon. He will awaken. Watch him.”

  Ardra did. Ralen was no longer unconscious. His eyes watched her with avid curiosity. Before Cidre could stop her, Ardra grasped the thick hair tied at Ralen’s nape and jerked his head back.

  A gasp ran through the crowd as Ralen stared up at her. His ice-blue eyes looked so cold, she shivered. She raised her hand.

  The leaf’s blood dripped down the center vein, down the stem, down her fingertips, and onto Ralen’s lips. He licked it up as a predator licks the blood of his prey.

  Cidre no longer laughed. She raised her hand and cried out, “Enough of this. Take her.”

  Her guards tore Ardra away from Ralen. Lien growled like a feral animal. He snatched his stick from Nilrem’s hand and dealt the closest guard a blow on the wrist.

  The man gasped with pain and released her. She used the moment of freedom to smear more of the blood-red fluid across Ralen’s lips. Then Cidre ripped the leaf from her hand.

  The instant the goddess’s fingers touched the leaf, she screamed and dropped it.

  The second guard hauled Ardra away from Ralen’s side while more of Cidre’s men fell on Lien.

  He used his stick to hold them off. The swords struck
sparks on the metal snake that twined around it. As the crowd formed an oval, coins flew as if it were a simple challenge of warriors, not a fight to the death. And death would come, Ardra knew, her heart in her throat.

  She drew her dagger and stabbed her guard’s hand. He turned a shocked eye on her as he stared down at his bloody hand. Yet he did not relinquish his grip.

  With little thought, she reached across the man’s body and pulled the longer, sharper dagger from his belt. As she drew the blade from its sheath, she dragged it along the front of his tunic.

  He shrieked and released her. Ardra turned on Cidre—the source of all the evil. “Call them off,” she ordered as two more guards surrounded Lien, looking for their chance.

  “Never. You will both die here.”

  Men swamped Ardra from behind. Cidre’s men. One struck her a sharp blow on the chin and another hoisted her into his arms.

  Lien parried the guards’ blows. Small skirmishes broke out all around him as men chose sides. Women fled to the upper levels. He fought as he never had before, spurred on, by the sight of a guard running from the hall with Ardra in his arms.

  With all his strength Lien hurled his stick. It tangled the man’s feet, and with Ardra in his arms, the guard could not save himself. He fell, and Ardra scrambled from his grip. She grinned back at Lien and stomped on the guard’s hand when he went for his sword. In moments, Ardra had the guard’s sword in one hand and the snake-wrapped stick in the other.

  Lien ran to meet her.

  “Lace those or you will lose them,” she pointed out. He glanced down and grinned. He quickly laced up his pants and took his stick.

  “Cidre!” Nilrem shouted from where he stood atop a table. He pointed, and Lien saw that Cidre had made her way outside and was running across the courtyard.

  “Damn. Let’s go after her.” Together they ran into the courtyard, but they were a moment too late.

  Cidre had made it through the entrance, and the huge drawbridge was closing behind her. When they reached the gate, they saw a guard standing there, grinning. Next to him was a severed rope—a rope as thick as a man’s thigh, a rope that worked the gears to raise the bridge. There was now no hope of opening it without an army of help.