Redemption

by Anne Osterlund

  And die. Robert closed his eyes. That arc of cannon was no drawing on a map. The slope was no longer theoretical. And the feeling in his gut—the horror that had birthed on the day Lord Lester had shared his original battle plan—that horror rose before them all.

  Robert could not endorse that plan. “Darkness,” he whispered. His gaze returned to the guns. “We’ll move at night. Try to stay beyond range.”

  A disapproving rumble came from His Lordship’s throat. “We can’t fight blind.”

  “Then we won’t fight,” Robert said.

  Lord Lester sputtered, “Y-You think you’re going to sneak an entire army past that slope?”

  Not all of us. But more than would survive an open battle.

  The key would be for the leaders to ignore their training. And leave others behind.

  Robert swallowed, forcing himself to visualize the slaughter those cannon could achieve if an entire army became mired beneath them. “We’ll leave the wagons and travel in companies. Any group that is stopped will fight their way through. Everyone else will keep going. The Oracle’s men first. They can use their arrows to take out the sentries. His Lordship’s forces will move next. They travel more silently than the rest of us. Valerian’s men will follow his.”

  The Heir lifted his chin. The Oracle was nodding. Lord Lester was shaking his head.

  Aurelia was watching Robert. “Where will you be?” she whispered.

  “You will go in the first Fortress group,” Robert told her, “with His Lordship. They have the best chance of getting through without hindrance.”

  Her stepfather stilled. Then his chest lifted and his head dropped in a quick nod.

  Robert continued his directions. “Once you pass the royal army, you cut through the orchards. Don’t go into Sterling. And don’t stop. We’ll regroup in the northwest corner of the Kryshan Forest.”

  “When shall we commence?” Valerian whispered.

  “Tonight.” It was the Oracle who answered.

  Robert nodded. The longer the delay, the more likely their arrival at the Asyan’s edge would be detected.

  Aurelia’s fingers curled around his own, her touch pulling his gaze. Her eyes looked straight into his. “Where will you be?” she asked again.

  In the only place he could—after giving those orders. “Last,” he answered.

  • • •

  Robert lacked the courage to tell her good-bye. She failed to argue with him, and instead remained at his side through hours of mundane preparations: the clarification of orders, the organization of men, the shifting of supplies from wagons to packhorses. And as darkness replaced the dusk, any chance for a private departure from her had fled. The entire revolutionary army had now moved up to the forest’s edge. The frontiersmen behind him, the Oracle’s and Lord Lester’s men lost somewhere in the shadows to the right, Valerian and his men still visible to the left.

  Robert knew she was afraid for him. Her hand gripped his. Her eyes avoided his gaze, looking past his shoulder as though at Horizon, then sweeping the dark, open stretch ahead and darting toward Valerian. She had questioned privately whether the plan could afford the weakness of the Heir’s leadership, but Robert suspected the Valshone general was the braver of them both tonight.

  The forest breathed with sweat, nerves, and the press of anticipation. All constrained by the threat from the nearness of the royal forces. And the demand for silence.

  Save for the voices of ghosts.

  You didn’t fail, Robert’s father had said.

  She should finish the expedition. That was Thomas.

  You’ve fallen just as hard. Chris’s mockery joined the onslaught.

  Robert had fallen—had fallen very, very hard for the living and breathing young woman at his side. For two years he had known he loved Aurelia. Had pretended her lack of verbal response did not matter. Had tried to trust that what she felt in her heart was more important than what she confessed with her lips. But if that was the entire truth, there was no explanation for the chaos her recent words had wrought within him.

  He had returned to Tyralt with the knowledge that he and Aurelia would both die.

  Rationally, they could not succeed. She would be a martyr and in a generation or two or three, her country might rise up out of her death and take its own freedom. He had known, from the moment he had stepped onto Tyralian soil, that neither he nor she would ever again leave Tyralt. She would not be allowed to live once they were captured. And he would die first. That had been the plan.

  But now she had told him she loved him.

  And suddenly the entire maelstrom of a plan seemed to be sucking him down to a place he could not bear to go. He wanted out! He wanted to live. Wanted her to live. His heart insisted love was worth living for. In a selfish, desperate desire to defend that love, he wanted to yank her from the role she had hurled herself into and wrest her from fate. He wished he could retreat to the person he had been two years ago. To convince himself he could persuade her to accept the futility of the situation. And that they could both escape. Hide.

  But she had refused to stay hidden. She was not going to abandon her people. Or the mission. And in a strange twist, he could not abandon it either. Her army followed him now as well as her. The force, once nearly five thousand, now cut by almost a quarter, hovered behind him in preparation to defy the most powerful army on the southern coast.

  Shadows shifted beyond the trees. The tribesmen. Leaving.

  His Lordship will be anxious. She needs to go.

  Robert tightened his grip within Aurelia’s. After the kiss by the fire, he had restricted himself from the inside of her tent. Afraid he had lost the ability not to touch her. The political cost for her potential loss of virtue, perhaps selfishly, had never concerned him. But he was not going to sever her choices. Which meant, right now, he had to let her go.

  The shadows were gone.

  He turned to face her.

  I might never see her again. Robert didn’t care how many men were watching. He cradled her head in his hands and kissed her, fiercely. Her palms tightened behind his neck, and she kissed him back with strength equal to his own. He didn’t regret falling in love with her—would never regret this choice. “I love you,” he breathed against her ear.

  “I love you,” she said, her voice clear. “I’ll see you in the Kryshan.”

  And she withdrew into the dark.

  He could not follow her.

  His country had demanded priority.

  I can’t believe you rode all the way back to the palace without at least some thought of saving this country, Thomas had once said.

  But when Robert had last ridden to the capital, he had thought only of her. He had been a boy. Naïve. Blind. Certain that the sole obstacle to his heart was the need to prove himself. That truth, justice, and the king were one and the same. And that he, Robert, could save her from any danger.

  He had not understood then that she could not love him as long as he placed her above her country. And that he could not protect her without defending their country first.

  Silence stretched now, shadows drifting beyond the trees.

  If he died tonight …

  No, he could not think that way. He needed to focus, instead, on the men directly behind him. Men who had survived siege and battle and life on the frontier. Men he must not let down. He took a deep breath, making a silent plea for courage.

  At last the signal came—the disappearance of Valerian’s men. Robert began counting silently. There would be no advantage to being caught trapped at the back of another group. Ninety-eight. Ninety-nine. One hundred.

  He gripped his stallion’s reins, swung onto the horse’s saddle, and urged the bay out of the forest. Into emptiness.

  Every sound seemed to echo. Footsteps, hoofbeats. The rustle of cloth, metal, flesh. What Robert wouldn’t have given for a harsh breeze on this still summer night!

  Or a quarter moon instead of a half. The shrill white glow beamed down on him, yet
illuminated nothing. He forced himself to pull Horizon to a halt—to hold back the men behind him—and to wait, in the glare of that beam, for his eyes to adjust. He could not afford to allow fear to force him into the cannon’s range. Wait.

  A dark wall appeared behind him. The forest. He loosened Horizon’s reins, guiding the stallion east. He intended to hug that wall as long as possible. Though the quicker route would be a diagonal approach. Quicker and more deadly.

  Shadows shifted ahead. Valerian’s men.

  Curse it! Robert was riding too fast. He shortened the reins, defying his instincts. Every muscle in his body wanted to rush—to crouch low over Horizon’s neck, give the horse his head, and race past that slope.

  You achieve nothing if you reach the Kryshan alone.

  Robert focused on the sounds of the men behind him. Slow. Careful. Together. He could sense the formation: the center on foot, riders along the edge. Together. Together.

  How much time had passed since the Oracle’s men had taken out the sentries? And how much could remain before those sentries were missed?

  Don’t think. Just ride.

  He tried to submerge his mind into the frontiersmen’s pace. Slow. Painfully slow. How far could he have ridden? A quarter of a mile? An eighth? His gaze swept the space before him. The landscape had opened beneath that moonlit glow, but there were no clear landmarks. He would have to guess when to turn south.

  He told himself he should be grateful. If he couldn’t see the slope, then the men guarding those cannon couldn’t see—

  Crack! A shot rang out.

  A moment of silence.

  Then a volley of musket fire. Robert’s thoughts leaped to Aurelia. Where was she? Could she have made it past the far reaches of the slope? He didn’t think so, could not make himself believe—

  Boom! The roar of cannon urged him forward. No point in silence now—only in speed. And judgment. Cross the valley. Even Tyralt, with its vast expanse of desert, mountains, and frontier, had asked only this of him. Cross this valley.

  Boom! Another cannon. Too close.

  Screams. Valerian’s men.

  You don’t help by staying. You help by bringing your own men around. Robert yanked Horizon to the left, forcing the frontiersmen to dodge trees along the Asyan’s edge. Dangerous. He knew he risked running into the ravine. But if he stopped, if he and his men retreated, they would never reach the Kryshan.

  Victory lay there.

  Boom! More screams. Robert’s gut roiled at the knowledge that they belonged to the Valshone. Too close, logic argued again. Mortar fire from weapons on the slope shouldn’t have been able to reach—

  Clash! Bayonets ahead of him. He took that as the signal to turn. South. Everything was south now: the battle, victory, her.

  He could no longer hear the formation. Robert twisted.

  His men were still with him.

  Then Horizon screamed.

  Robert spun back. War horses—too large not to be from the royal army—swerved in front of him, steel brandished in the riders’ hands. His stallion lurched forward, gouging hooves into the beast directly in his path.

  Riders emerged at Robert’s side. Mounted frontiersmen. He hadn’t called them or asked for a guard. But they closed around him, swinging rifles at the assailants.

  And cutting him off. The stallion reared in protest.

  Then Robert’s men broke through. Somewhere.

  Boom!

  He saw the firing cannon, a large, hulking spout. Manned by soldiers who must have rolled the weapon from its perch. Reason argued that he should ride on—that to assault the weapon was death.

  Cross the valley, his mantra returned. Across the valley is victory.

  But behind him the men of the Valshone were dying.

  “Spike the cannon!” he shouted, discarding his mental reservations.

  Frontiersmen rushed the weapon. A volley of muskets answered, smoke obliterating the view. His guard whirled to join the fight. Bayonets clashed.

  Then Horizon screamed again. Robert looked up to see another rider. A royal crest. A saber swinging.

  Robert drew his sword.

  Blocked.

  The saber swung back. And he saw the opening. The upraised arm.

  Another sword slashed across his line of vision and plunged into the assailant’s chest.

  Robert lurched sideways. His gaze rose to acknowledge Valerian.

  The Heir wrenched his blade free and gave a sharp nod toward the cannon.

  Frontiersmen stood over the dead gunmen. That weapon would not fire again this night.

  Valshone were pouring from the darkness.

  Robert lifted Horizon’s reins and spun. He did not attempt to divide the frontiersmen and Valshone. They were all his men. And all Aurelia’s. All headed toward the Kryshan. He could see stars now, pointing the way.

  Valerian rode at his side.

  Boom! Another cannon.

  But the sound was distant. Firing in the wrong direction.

  If the royal army wanted to stay behind and fire their cannon into darkness, perhaps Robert and all of Aurelia’s forces could pass and reach their distant goal.

  A wall of shadow rose. More trees.

  And then that goal no longer felt so distant. A narrow gold strip of dawn lit a path through the orchards.

  She was ahead of him, he told himself, and Tyralt would live to see morning.

  • • •

  They traveled hard—Robert, Valerian, and the men who followed them—cutting across orchards in a blatant, illegal path that ultimately intersected with desert horses’ hoofprints. Robert tracked those prints. He knew scouts from the royal army could track as well, but his men did not wait. Or sleep. They stripped their meals from trees and traveled for two days straight.

  Victory, his foggy head insisted as the last of the men slipped within the fir trees of the Kryshan. Melony’s army had lost one battle in a forest. He doubted her generals would risk the same defeat again.

  Robert dismounted and cared for Horizon in a stupor.

  Then collapsed to exhaustion.

  • • •

  His eyes opened to a gray haze. Dusk. The spiritual leader of the Geordian had dismounted to stand beside him. Three of Aurelia’s generals had lived. The Oracle gave a slow nod before stepping away to speak to his own men.

  The language of the desert drifted among the trees, and Robert returned to sleep. He did not dream.

  Ultimately a shout yanked him awake: “His Lordship!”

  Four. Her entire council had survived. They had crossed the valley. Had won. Had circumnavigated the most powerful army on the southern coast. Her army had survived under his own command.

  Robert opened his eyes to daylight. Aurelia’s image flooded his mind. If the men from the Fortress were here, she should be here as well. He scrambled to his feet. Voices swirled around him. His gaze scanned the trees for Aurelia.

  Then halted at the sight of her stepfather. Lord Lester was slumped in his saddle, his head down. A bandage wrapped his thigh, the cloth dark with blood.

  Robert rushed to the man’s side.

  “He took a bayonet spike to the leg,” a Fortress corporal explained. “Didn’t slow him. He killed at least five men after that attack.”

  Why is he here at all? Why not send someone else to seek us? Robert offered a hand to help the wounded general.

  But Lester failed to accept the support. He made no move to dismount. His head remained bowed over the neck of his horse, and words scratched as he spoke. “They were waiting.”

  “Yes,” Robert answered. “The royal army knew we were coming. It was just a matter of—”

  “We were caught at the end of the slope.” The older man groaned. “I sent her ahead. With my guard. She didn’t want to leave. She wanted to fight me on it.”

  “She refused to go ahead then?” Robert lifted his gaze again to scan the trees.

  “She went. I told her she was a danger to the men if she stayed.”
r />   “You should dismount, Your Lordship. And rest. We’ll find her.”

  “No.” Haunted eyes lifted. Lester’s face was streaked with lines. “Men were waiting for her. In the Kryshan. I never saw them. But my guards—the ones I sent with her. They were slain. We found them all. Only two survived, shot from behind.” The voice faltered. “They heard her scream. We searched … for hours. Found that bronze mare running wild, but her rider …” His trembling hand rose to cover his eyes. “She’s gone.”

  Gone. The word was a death knell in Robert’s chest.

  If her assailants had not killed Aurelia on sight, they would take her straight to the palace dungeon, inside the Tyralian wall. And neither he nor what remained of the revolutionary army could cross that barrier without her. She was either dead, her body being carted back for display on the gates of the capital as a warning to the people. Or she was being hauled back alive … so that her death could become that display.

  Nothing existed.

  Not him, not the revolution, not her.

  Without Aurelia, there was no victory.

  Chapter Twenty

  DEVASTATION

  Her death destroyed the air. A gray unbreathable nothingness shrouded the Kryshan. Robert lived within that shroud—that is, if life could be defined as days with only a vague sense of rough bark at his back, damp cold earth beneath him, rocks, and branches beyond reach.

  The shroud rejected all sound, all color, all emotion save grief. His mind insisted on trying to run through every memory he had of her. Warned that if he failed to remember a single detail, it could be lost. But the task was impossible. Aurelia was not ten memories or a hundred or a thousand. She was his life.

  Fourteen days she had been gone. He knew six would have been enough for her captors to drag her into the Central Plaza. And finish her. Had she been shot? Hung? Stripped and flogged? Burned on a stake? Forced to kneel before an ax?

  Had his inability to imagine a future with her ensured that she would have none? He had not told her how much he loved her. Had run from the compulsion. Treated his instincts to ask her to marry him like a mistake. Had never been brave enough to say, “I will love you forever and honor you forever and give you forever. Please share my life.”