“Watch it!” a voice said. Hands grabbed her and helped her into a long boat, its decking a haphazard clutter of cloth sacks and wooden crates.
She sank to a bench. Three men eyed her, one of them grinning. She returned the inspection with a deadly glare, drew her sword, and lay it across her knees. “My friend has your fee.” She glanced up at Johzar’s sluggish descent far above her.
The man with the smile pulled at the oars, and she twisted to face him. “Go back for my partner.”
“Nae, nae, nae, Lady Danzell.” The man heaved on the oars, and his cohorts’ eyes bulged. “I recognize you all right. Unless you’re hidin’ a hundred gold chits on you, I know right where you’re headin’.”
A monstrous splash rocked the boat. Danzell’s sword sliced up, cleaving the man’s chin. With a grunt, she shoved it through the roof of his mouth. “Out of the boat!” she yelled at the other two, yanked the blade from the bloody skull, and pointed it their way.
“But—”
“Out!” The two smugglers jumped. She hunted for Johzar in the black water, certain the splash belonged to him. He thrashed in the swells. She reached for him with an oar, hauled him to the gunwale, and dragged him into the boat. It rocked enough to make her heart stop. “You can’t swim?”
He coughed. “Nae.”
“How does someone… never mind.” Other boats peppered the sea, most of them better crewed. Shouts rang through the night air, competing with the wind and crashing water. She handed Johzar the oar and shoved the dead man over the side. “We just stole a boat. I suggest we use it.”
~
Yozar thrived on ship building and trade with the foreign coasts of the Far South. The city lay close enough to Tegir to enjoy its protection and far enough to resent its taxation. News of the bounty had reached its shores but hadn’t filtered with the same fervor into every home and shop.
They’d rowed south, sharing duty at the oars, monitoring the shoreline for cliffs they could climb or rivers promising grassy banks. In the end, they’d scrabbled up a crumbling rock wall. It was that or perish from thirst.
Four days of hard travel by foot landed them on the tangled streets of Yozar’s northern district, its walled estates festooned with climbing ivy, guards at every gate. Danzell had visited the city before, a broad metropolis hemmed on three sides by a patchwork of farms. Its palace of gold-speckled limestone rose from its center like a cloved bulb, expanding at its belly with turrets and spires and tapering to a steepled tip.
“This way.” Johzar waved her toward one of the estates as the sun arced toward midday. They resembled beggars, encased in clouds of ripening stink. Her laborer’s clothes, which started out in a deplorable state, were travel worn and permanently stained.
The guards at the gate barred their way. Johzar handed them a sapphire earring. “Give this to Shonra or Vennic. Tell them Johzar is here.” The gem did the trick, and a guard jogged off toward the palatial home.
Before the city’s bells chimed the noon hour, Danzell and Johzar stood on the marble floor of the home’s grand foyer. Shonra swept toward them, the diaphanous silks of her azure dress at odds with the tattoos adorning her cleavage and arms. “Johzar.” She stopped short of embracing him, teeth gritted in a smile. “I see you’ve undergone an ordeal.”
“My apologies for our disguises.”
“Disguises? How convincing and intriguing.” She faced Danzell. “And you are?”
“Draeva,” Johzar answered. “My second.”
“Another slaver eschewing our signature tattoos.” She smiled. “It seems Johzar has rubbed off on you. What’s next? He’ll have us all riddled with angst regarding our unscrupulous morals.”
Danzell let slip a smile at the characterization. “It allows us to blend more easily into all levels of society.”
“True.” Shonra shrugged. “Welcome, Draeva.”
Johzar delivered an informal bow. “I dislike imposing—”
“But you wish to impose.” Shonra laughed. “Vennic is idling at the market, and he’d be livid at all of us if he missed you.” She clapped her hands, and two slaves scurried forward. “One room or two?”
“Two,” Danzell replied.
Shonra’s eyebrows bobbed. “Johzar never did mix commerce with carnality. Such a shame. I’ll send up wine and baths, since you sorely need the latter. And something to wear that isn’t growling at me. You’ll join us for dinner, and we’ll catch up.” She clapped her hands at the slaves. “You heard my orders. See to them.”
The woman waltzed away, swagged dress swirling behind her. Danzell widened her eyes at Johzar and followed one of the slaves upstairs to a lavish room with a downy bed. An hour later, she soaked in a scalding bath while sipping on a goblet of wine. When the water chilled, she dressed in clean clothes—well-fitted bloomers and a long jacket in a gray brocade, understated but appropriate for nobility. Shonra appeared sharper than she let on. Did she too wear a disguise?
Vennic greeted Johzar like a long-lost brother, and the two drank on the salon’s balcony before and after the meal. Danzell and Shonra joined them with cups of oily Anchi tea.
“During the day, we enjoy a view of the sea.” Shonra hooked arms with her husband. Vennic was built like a typical Ezari male, tall and broad, his hair black though threaded with gray. “Tell us, Danz…” Shonra quirked a smile. “Oh, my. Well, I suppose the secret wasn’t terribly secret if we all guessed it.”
“The Danzell?” Vennic’s chin retracted.
“Most of us anyway.” Shonra rolled her eyes.
Vennic dropped a hand on Johzar’s shoulder. “There’s a bounty of a hundred gold chits on her head.”
“I’m certain he knows.” Shonra’s gaze settled on Johzar. “I suppose you need passage. The question is where?”
“Avanoe,” Johzar replied. “For two.”
“Vennic will handle arrangements in the morning,” Shonra said. “This won’t come cheaply. You’re going to owe me, both of you, with interest.”
~
The morning brew delivered to Danzell’s room dispelled any lingering sleepiness. Dawn pearled the sky when Johzar tapped on her door. With nothing to pack, she buckled on her sword and belted her knife. Her desire to heed Laddon’s call and escape Ezar had grown during the night, and she wouldn’t breathe freely until she boarded their ship.
“You must hurry,” a voice said, and she spun. Laddon stood by the window, the hazy light lending him an ethereal glow.
“Don’t sneak up on me.” She draped her head with a light cowl. “I’m sure we’ll be on our way this morning.”
“You’ve been betrayed.”
Her stomach knotted. She stiffened and prayed it wasn’t Johzar. “By whom? Never mind, I can guess. Vennic.” The moment the name spat from her lips, she darted out the door. Johzar hadn’t waited for her. She sprinted down the corridor and yelled from the top of the grand stairs. “Johzar!”
Beyond her vision, chairs scraped on the floor. Johzar limped into the foyer, sword drawn.
“Vennic betrayed us. We need to run.”
“Vennic?” Johzar’s brow creased. He glanced at the ship’s tokens in his hand and spun.
A sword in his grip, Vennic strode into the foyer. “A hundred gold chits, Johzar. Do you have any idea what that will buy?”
Johzar’s sword flashed as he swung at his friend, his strike blocked. A heftier man, Vennic pushed Johzar back. Danzell slid her sword from its sheath and bolted down the steps as the two men’s blades clashed. Danzell met Shonra at the doorway to the salon, the woman’s face livid, hands up.
“What the fuck!” Shonra shouted, and for a heartbeat the clatter of steel on steel paused. Johzar backed out of Vennic’s reach, and Shonra confronted her husband. “What the fuck did you do?”
“He betrayed us!” The muscles in Johzar’s arms bunched.
“A hundred gold chits,” Vennic pleaded with his wife.
“You’re an imbecile!” Shonra shouted and turned to Johzar.
“Leave now. Even if I kill him, I’ll owe you for his life. Go!”
“Where’s the ambush?” Danzell asked. “At the ship?”
“Where?” Shonra demanded.
Vennic’s face soured to a deep shade of scarlet. “Here.”
“Shit!” Shonra gripped her skirt. “Follow me!” She dashed down the hallway and burst through several doorways, servants shouting and screaming as they leapt out of her way. She thrust open a final door leading to the sheds and pens and the barracks used by servants and slaves. “I’ll hold them off!”
The bellowing of guards echoed off the walls inside the house. Danzell bounded down the steps, Johzar on her heels, wincing as he landed on his lame foot. They charged through a line of waving laundry, around a woodshed, and through a gate into the street. A pair of guards patrolling the rear of the estate burst into a sprint. Danzell spun and met the charge. She slashed a thigh, reversed her momentum, and nearly sheared off the second man’s arm. Johzar clipped their screaming with two quick thrusts.
“The harbor?” Danzell asked as they fled into an alley. “Do you think it’s clear?”
“Let’s hope so.”
~22~
Bel woke on the road, slung over a horse, blood pooling in her face. Her stomach purged down the animal’s belly with her tears, and awareness broke her life apart in heaving gasps. She begged and squirmed. Her hands and knees thumped the horse’s flanks, driving it into a skittering run.
The woman with serpent tattoos, the only female slaver to survive the raid, reined in her mount and dragged Bel from the horse like a rolled-up carpet. Bel’s legs crumpled beneath her, and she fell to the road. The woman hauled her up and delivered a slap that kept her on her feet.
She blinked at the slaver. A blade had opened the woman’s forehead above her eye, and her jaw had swelled. And though Bel had no means to prove it, her injuries likely rivaled her captor’s, a mottled patchwork of scraped skin and purpling bruises. Her whole body throbbed, and she probed a crusty knot on her skull.
The woman leaned into Bel’s ear and whispered a warning, “There are foul tempers aplenty on the road. We’re riding to Avanoe. Don’t cause any trouble, and maybe you’ll survive the trip.” She bound Bel’s wrists, pushed her up onto the saddle and towed the horse on a long rope.
Bel obeyed and didn’t utter a word. As they rode, her eyes lingered on the secluded freeholds speckling the desolate landscape, grassy patches stitched over hills of evergreen. The love and dreams nurtured within their borders sent waves of despair crashing over her head. She persisted alone, an island in a storm-swept sea, crumbling as the breakers pounded the cracks in her walls.
On the wind-worn cliffs off the main road to Espen, Sajem and his five remaining slavers joined seven others. They boasted about battles, wounds, and death, oblivious to the suffering littering their lives. The additional crew members had ridden in the night before, fresh from Ferris with a new collection of bonds, and Bel sighed with relief that Vax wasn’t among them.
She stayed awake. Her arms hugged her knees, and fear pricked her eyelids every time they drooped. Sajem’s mood was blacker than a crypt. He threatened her with his fists and ranted at ghosts, leaving his crew vigilant and twitching at the slightest provocation. The bonded men and women huddled on the ground, silent and still as if a sinister magic had transformed them into a cluster of ancient stones. The slaver roared when he pissed, and if he’d had a mind for rape before meeting her knee, that desire had withered.
They took to the saddle in the morning, and this time, she sat behind the tattooed woman. She leaned around the slaver’s shoulder for a view of the road ahead. The autumn wind tickled her hair and rustled through the alders. They traveled like rainy-day snails, the bonded shuffling behind the horses, in no hurry to meet their fates. Only she rode. Why? Where did they intend to take her, and for what purpose?
Until her arrival at Raze’s freehold, she’d lived her life truthful to her nature and dreams, but she’d never experienced the unconditional embrace of love, not in the way the land basked in the sun or the way flowers welcomed bees. Her parents had sold her. Even the tinkers, men she’d cherished, had wished her gone when her presence became a danger.
The wiser part of her, her grandmother and all the generations collected in her head, grasped the singular nature of the soul. In truth, she would always journey through the world alone. Everyone did, each experience unique, every heart and soul molded into a different shape. Such knowledge, though meant to comfort, only sharpened her longing. She wished that the past days were a vile nightmare and she’d awaken in her lover’s arms. None of it was possible, all shards of a shattered dream.
The trees closed in at the road’s borders and blocked her view of the distant farms. The slavers stuck to the main thoroughfare, and she breathed a sigh when Sajem passed those havens by in peace. Shadows switched roadsides as the sun crossed the sky, and the roofs of Espen peeked through the branches. The slavers swung toward the buildings that spread across the barren scrub beyond the trees. Isolated and vulnerable, the village tensed like a living thing, a creature small enough to hold in her palm.
“Are we stopping?” She whispered to the woman, hoping. Her body ached, and she needed to stretch.
“Best not,” the slaver murmured. “We were run off the last time. They try that again, Sajem will slaughter half the village before he burns it down.”
Bel sagged, silenced by the peril. The horses plodded into Espen, and at the market square two men veered into the mercantile for supplies. Bel sat mute and helpless behind the saddle. She scarcely drew an eye from the villagers who hurried through doorways with their baskets and purses, their wives and children. A sole man leaned on the shingled wall of a quaint shop, unruffled by the slavers’ presence. He tracked her as she rode by, his Ezari features buried in the shadow of his cowl. A sword hung from his hip, visible for all to see. Tall and trim, his arms crossed, he met her eyes.
Raze.
Relief transformed into fear, and then a white-hot lance of fury that shot up her spine. She turned her face away and shook her head, denying him. Her emotions rebelled and tears dewed her eyes. He’d survived, but what was he thinking? Any attempt to free her would squander his life. No one but a fool would consider stealing her from a company of slavers, a merciless madman at the head of their ranks. If Sajem sold her in Avanoe, Raze could purchase her. He simply needed to wait. She held her breath, and when she dared a glance back, he was gone.
That evening, yet a half-day’s ride to the city, Sajem tied a noose around her neck and slung it over a branch. He leaned in and clicked his sharp teeth by her ear, his rambling grievances making no sense. “They say I should kill you. I should have gutted the others and dragged him behind my horse, but they don’t know, do they? They’re dead.”
He pulled the rope until it hung just shy of taut, and he scowled into the twilit trees. “I obey no one. Least of all some king and his mad queen. They want the gold, but it’s a game, a war we’ll hand them. I’ll empty their pockets of power. Nae. No one gives me orders, least of all you. What do they care? They like the taste the blood.” He laughed, voice full of mockery as he tied off the rope. “This is all they get. They’re already dead.”
Bel kept her mouth shut, face forward, stance unyielding though every inch of her skin recoiled. She avoided his red eyes, staring instead at the vermillion clouds burning like a bonfire over the sea.
The female slaver with the snaking tattoos walked up behind him, fists on her hips. “You’re going to force her to stand all night? You kill her, Sajem, we get nothing.”
His elbow snapped back and struck her in the mouth. She staggered backward with a cry and spat, a bloody tooth landing in the dirt with a wad of saliva. “You mad fuck,” she growled.
He laughed and faced the furious slaver. “You fancy your gold, hold her up.”
~
An owl hooted overhead. Raze ducked and winced, then eased forward toward the slaver’s
camp. Clouds blotted the moon, and the wind honed its knife, cutting through tuffs of grass and fluttering leaves.
The fire burned low, but they kept it going. At least four slavers were still awake. Two sentries idled on the camp’s perimeter, half -hidden in the tangled brush and flickering shadows. They didn’t attempt to conceal their boredom, one humming while across the clearing, the other chewed his fingernails. Raze could have killed each man easily but couldn’t risk someone noticing the deaths.
The other two silhouettes lingered beneath a tree, both of them women. He crept closer. One of the outlines was shorter, her long hair loose. Bel. She stood as straight as a ravenwood. A rope rose from her head to the limb above—a hangman’s noose. He narrowed his eyes, lips curled in a snarl. Part of him wanted to explode, leap forward, and kill. Another part, the composed calculation of a seasoned soldier, demanded caution.
Samoth’s patient demeanor struck Raze as less a natural reaction than a practiced forbearance. He tapped into it, breathed away the heat of his impulses, and sensed a broad approval as his heartbeat slowed.
Bel swayed, and the slaver tapped her shoulder. “Stay awake.”
“I’m sorry he hit you.” Bel raised her arms and clung to the rope, seeking her balance. “Thank you.”
The slaver’s hand rose to her damaged mouth. “He’s mad.”
“Why do you stay?”
The woman shrugged. “Gold, loyalty, stupidity.” She chuckled. “I’d join Johzar’s crew, but they’re in Tegir, and no one knows his plans. He’s unpredictable too. In a different way.”
Bel let an arm drop and leaned her head against the one still holding the rope. “Why don’t—”
“Save your advice, slave.” The woman leaned on the tree. “Just stay awake. I have gold riding on you.”
Raze gripped his knife and edged forward, testing the placement of each foot before he shifted his weight. Beneath the trees lay a litter of dead wood, and the barricade of underbrush scraped against his armor. He calculated the distance ahead of him. Could he slay the woman before she raised the alarm?
Legacy of Souls (The Shattered Sea Book 2) Page 14
