by Linda Mooney
“I’m...sorry,” Atty managed to say. Dimly she wondered who was holding her up, since Yulen had placed his body in front of her to shield her and prevent the woman from inflicting any more harm.
“You’re sorry?”
“Danna, go home,” Yulen ordered in a soft but threatening voice.
The woman turned to the Battle Lord. Her body now shook uncontrollably as she realized there would be no retaliation. “Go home?” she repeated incredulously. “Go home to what? How dare you, sir! How dare you tell me to go home, when you have this...this...” She pointed a finger in Atty’s direction. There was no mistaking the disgust on her face or the hatred in her voice.
Two soldiers ran up to offer their assistance. Yulen broke his gaze away from the woman long enough to order one of them to fetch MaGrath. Atty saw her reflection in his eyes, and it wasn’t pretty.
“Are you in a lot of pain?” he asked her under his breath.
“Sir, want me to escort Mrs. Abalam back to her home?” the second soldier inquired.
Atty lifted her hand. “No,” she managed, surprised she still had the ability to think. “No. Let her have her say.” A lock of hair fell over her shoulder. A streak of blood coated the ends, trailing a vivid red stain across the front of her white shirt.
Shakily, Atty managed to stand on her own. It was then she noticed who was holding her around the waist. Giving the knife smith a nod, she waited until Cavender stepped away before facing the woman again.
“Okay. What is it you want to say to me?” Atty asked. “Speak freely.”
But by now the brunt of the widow’s anger had vanished, drained away after the attack. Atty understood the loss the woman was experiencing. If circumstances had been different, if Yulen had been the one to fall in combat, she knew she definitely would have lashed out at the person responsible.
“You don’t belong here,” the woman finally said through her tears. “I don’t care if your bow can conquer the entire eastern coast. You’ll never belong here. Every day I see you I’m going to be reminded why my husband is no longer with me. Every cold night in bed, every empty place at the table...because of you.”
The woman stared at Yulen. “And you! One of your own kind wasn’t good enough for you anymore?”
In answer, Yulen reached out and pulled the bucket out of her hands.
The crowd that had gathered to witness the aftermath now parted to let in MaGrath and the soldier who’d gone for him. Atty heard his quick intake of breath as he caught sight of her face, and she lowered her head.
“Who did this?” the physician demanded, his eyes raking the market area as he reached toward Atty’s face to assess the damage. To his shock, she waved away his hands.
“No, Liam.”
“Atty, you weren’t yet healed completely from the your last attack,” he admonished her.
Taking a step back, Atty closed her eyes and reiterated, “No, Liam.” Already she could feel a dull puffiness around one eye as the swelling set in.
“Atty.”
Her eyes snapped open to see Yulen staring intently at her.
“I have never before given you a direct order. Now, I am. Let Liam examine you.”
MaGrath nodded. “I may need to reset a bone.” He reached out again. Atty took a wobbly step backwards, bumping into Cavender.
“I’m going inside to get a cold compress,” she informed MaGrath. “Yulen, promise me you won’t seek any kind of retribution in my name. She’s suffered enough.”
“Atty...”
“Promise me.”
Yulen sighed. “My word.”
Bowing her head, Atty started for the side door of the main lodge, pausing for a moment to accept her dagger from its maker, who had rescued it from where she’d dropped it in the dirt. Giving him another word of thanks, she managed to exit the walkway without assistance.
A full minute of silence passed as the crowd came to understand what had happened. Yulen felt his original anger fading as it was replaced by a deep sense of disappointment and sadness. He finally broke the stillness to turn to the physician.
“You told me to let her meet the people. You almost had me convinced they might accept her after they talked to her and got to see what she was like,” he said bitterly, directing his comments more toward himself than at MaGrath. “Well, you were wrong, weren’t you? She could spend the rest of her life protecting this compound, and for what? They’ll never accept her. They’ll never get to know who she is. They’ll only see what she is.” Ramming his sword back into the scabbard from where he’d half-way drawn it before Atty had stopped him, Yulen turned and headed for the main lodge.
Cold, overwhelming anger boiled up inside MaGrath’s chest. He’d sworn to dedicate his life helping others, even when the injuries they incurred were from means he personally detested. The attack on Atty, while not unexpected, was unquestionably brutal. It was also unforgivable, despite Atty’s insistence. She may have asked the Battle Lord not to intervene, but she had not made him give such a promise.
Around him the crowd began to disperse, now that the drama was over, and their callousness became the last straw.
“What was done here today,” he began, “was the most hateful, the most disgraceful, and the most disgusting thing I have ever seen in all my years as a physician.”
The undisguised fury in his voice made them pause and turn back. MaGrath was not a man of emotion, and he rarely, if ever, addressed them as a whole. Silently they gave him their full attention.
Pointing a finger at the woman who had started it, he gritted his teeth to keep from saying the first thing that came to mind. “Do you think you are the only person in the world to suffer?” he finally asked her acidly. “Do you think the Battle Lord isn’t aware of what happened? Do you think he enjoyed laying sixteen of his men to rest? Men with families and loved ones whom he personally knew?”
“She killed those men, and then he brings her here and expects us to welcome her with open arms,” a voice from the back called out.
“He took her to his bed, and now he wants to marry her!” another commented.
The crowd shuffled their feet but remained gathered.
MaGrath nodded, fighting back tears.
“Very well. I can see you already have your minds made up. But before you go back to your homes to lick your wounds and pat yourselves on the back for showing the Mutah woman how much braver and fearless and superior you are to her, allow me a few more words. Allow me to tell you some things you’ve never known...until now.
“Two weeks ago our advance party smelled wood smoke and food cooking over an open pit. They followed the scent deep into the woods, well away from the main road. They found a Mutah compound hidden in the densest part of the forest, camouflaged so well they almost ran into it before they knew what it was. They sent back a man to let the Battle Lord know what they’d found, and he ordered a phalanx of men to go ahead and attack the compound while he and the rest of his soldiers followed behind as back-up. Standard procedure.
“Our soldiers beat down their gates and entered the compound. And once they were inside they began to slaughter every man, woman, and child inside.”
MaGrath paused to get a grip on himself. If he allowed his anger and sadness to overcome him, he would never be able to face these people again. These people, whom he’d sworn to serve the rest of his life. Clenching his fists at his side, he continued.
“Have you ever witnessed the total extermination of a species? There’s no mercy. No justice. No thought as to how much pain you can inflict upon another sentient being, and that’s what Atty’s people were. Sentient beings. Living, breathing, loving, learning, laughing, crying beings who planted crops, made soap and candles, and protected one another to the best of their ability.
“Danna, your husband pulled a young woman from the bundle of prisoners, prisoners!, unarmed people!, and he sliced her face from her skull. And while she writhed in the dirt in agony, he shoved the tip of his sword into b
oth her breasts until she stopped moving.
“Karla, you lost Joel. He singled out one of the little boys. Dragged him from the protective arms of his mother. And then he laughed as he cut off one of the boy’s hands. Then the other. Then one foot. Then the other. And when he was finished, he stood and watched and waited until the child had bled to death in the dirt. Karla, that little boy couldn’t have been more than six or seven years old!”
Pointing overhead as if he were pointing to the building itself, MaGrath coldly told them, “While all this was going on, while the screams of her family and friends filled the courtyard, one lone girl was faced with a predicament. You see, there was no one left in the compound to defend it. All the other hunters had left to try and find food so they could survive the winter. Atty had been lucky that day. She’d found a badger and brought it back so everyone wouldn’t starve. Then she’d gone home that night and found out her mother and sister, her entire family, was gone. Killed. She thought we had killed them. And now we had descended upon her home, her compound, in the middle of the night and had begun to butcher everyone there. If you were her, if you had her ability to protect and kill, what would you have done? Huh? I’ll tell you. You would have climbed up to the roof of that building, just like she did, and you would have begun to put an arrow through every man there.”
MaGrath narrowed his eyes. “Our men didn’t just kill the Mutah. They heartlessly mutilated them. They chopped off heads, then placed bets to see whose victim survived the longest. They slit huge, gaping wounds in the woman’s stomachs, removed the unborn fetuses, and threw the babes into the cooking fire. And all because they looked different from us. Because they were not normal.
“Before that night Atty had never killed another man. She had twenty-two arrows in her quiver. She told me she knew she had to make each one count because she never believed she would live after that night. Our men tortured and maimed, and her people died slowly. Agonizingly. And she placed an arrow into sixteen of our men cleanly, efficiently, expertly.” He snapped his fingers. “Our men died instantly. No pain. No suffering. Every one a merciful shot. Now tell me which of us is humane. Convince me who is the more superior.”
A tickling in his nose made him sniff. It was then he realized he’d been crying, and he wiped his face with the sleeve of his shirt.
“I don’t know what happened, what...miracle...occurred between her and Yulen. One moment I saw where our men had beaten her senseless, almost killing her, and the next moment there was this...this knowledge that there was something rare, a feeling, an attraction...I don’t know what to call it, but you could see it growing and becoming stronger between them.”
Casting the crowd a final, sad glance, the physician shook his head. He was drained and saddened beyond all rational thought. “Atty knew she was entering the lion’s den when she came here. She knew the chances were against her, and that she might never be accepted. Not even for who she was or what she could do. But she was willing to risk it because of her love for our Battle Lord, and his for her. She loves him, and she will defend him, and this compound, and all your unworthy asses with the last drop of her blood! And all she and Yulen wanted in exchange was for her to be able to walk among you, weaponless, and not fear for her safety.”
Looking directly at the woman who now was as white as a sheet, MaGrath restated, “She was weaponless. And trusting. She trusted that no one would hurt her. So did Yulen. He trusted you. He trusted you not to hurt the woman he loves. His people.”
He closed his eyes, unable to continue.
“You people make me sick,” he spat bitterly, then turned on his heel and walked back in the direction of the main lodge.
Behind him several women began to cry softly, and men stared in shocked silence at the departing figure. An hour later every stall in the market place had been closed or dismantled, shut down early in deference to what had happened that morning.
For the first time that anyone could remember, a Saturday afternoon passed empty and quiet and cold, despite the warmth of the spring sun.
Chapter Thirty
Shift
Berta walked out of the storeroom after counting the number of forks she had on hand. Faydra, the new kitchen help, had a bad habit of tossing the utensils out with the garbage. And now, as head of the staff for the Battle Lord and the main lodge, Berta was discovering that they were starting to run short of the necessary items they needed to feed all the soldiers who came in to eat.
Rounding the corner of the storeroom on her way to the back stairs, the older woman nearly ran into the hunched form leaning heavily against the railing. Seeing the wild mane of glossy blue hair that shielded the woman’s face from view, she pressed a hand to her ample bosom and heaved a sigh of relief.
“Oh, goodness! You almost frightened me to death!” she half-accused the young woman.
Something fell to the floor from the girl’s bowed head, and the servant’s eyes were immediately attracted to the movement.
Blood. Fresh blood.
A trail of droplets led from the steps back to the side door of the lodge. Berta felt herself grow cold with the realization, and she started to move toward the girl when the Battle Lord suddenly came running around the corner. Spotting the figure, he let out a heavy sigh and reached for her.
“Berta, bring up some cold compresses to my room,” he ordered the servant as he tenderly pulled Atty into his embrace. The servant shuddered as she saw the bloody mess that used to be the woman’s beautiful face as he propped her head against his shoulder. When Atty whimpered in pain, Berta winced in sympathy. “What happened to the dear?” she asked him, watching as he carefully picked her up in his arms to carry her the rest of the way upstairs.
“Never mind what,” Yulen told her. “We’ll need fresh bandages, too. Hurry, Berta. Please.”
The servant woman turned to obey, but not before she heard him murmuring against the woman’s hair, “I’m sorry, my love. I’m so sorry.”
Yulen rushed Atty upstairs and into their bedroom to lay her on the bed. From the bathroom he grabbed some towels and a bowl of fresh water, and took them back to the bed to begin washing away the blood and dirt that was already beginning to coagulate. Moments later, Berta knocked on the door and let herself in, assuming the Battle Lord would be too busy taking care of the Mutah woman to answer it himself. Yulen gave her a nod of thanks.
“MaGrath should be here any moment,” he informed her.
Berta nodded. There also would be no meal tray brought up at midday. Silently she propped the bow against the wall beside the door. “She dropped this on the stairs,” she explained at his quick questioning glance. As she turned to depart, she asked him if he needed anything else.
“Not at this time, thank you,” he told her, keeping his attention focused on the woman on the bed. Berta nodded again and opened the door to leave, and was nearly knocked down by the physician running into the room.
“Is she conscious?” he asked the Battle Lord, darting around the servant woman.
“Yes, I’m conscious,” Atty managed to whisper.
Closing the door behind her, Berta hurried back downstairs. Something had happened, and she was determined to know what. Who would attack the Battle Lord’s lady? And how had they been made to pay for the atrocity?
Scowling, the servant woman paused at the bottom of the landing and turned to glance back up at the door at the top of the staircase. When did you suddenly care what happened to the Mutah woman? she chided herself. What provoked such an attack on the girl when—
Atty
—had done nothing at the compound but prove over and over her fidelity and loyalty to the Battle Lord?
Grasping the edges of her apron, Berta headed for the kitchen where she knew the help was waiting, and hopefully, had more information to share.
* * * *
“Yulen? Come on. Let’s leave her alone for a few hours.” MaGrath gave the Battle Lord’s shoulder a shake. “She needs as much rest and quie
t as possible. Let’s go downstairs and have something to eat.”
“You go on,” Yulen said. “I’m not hungry at the moment.”
“Then, as your physician, I’m ordering you to come eat with me. You need to keep up your strength, she needs to be left alone, and I hate dining by myself.”
Yulen glanced up at the man standing beside him. MaGrath had given her a thick, black liquid that had put her under almost immediately. Then, with the Battle Lord’s help, he’d reset the cheekbone and hoped the damage wouldn’t permanently mar the woman’s features. Although he had only treated a few Mutah in the past, all of them had healed quickly and much more rapidly than Normals. Atty had shown that same tendency on their return to Alta Novis, thank goodness.
Giving him a soft grunt in response, Yulen rose from his chair and followed the man downstairs and into the main hall. Taking a seat at their usual table, Yulen’s eyes scanned the room. His sixth sense had picked up on the fact that something was different. Was it a shift in attitude? It was hard to pinpoint, and even harder to explain. Yet there was no escaping the furtive looks shot their way from his men.
“Liam?”
“Yeah.”
“What’s going on?”
MaGrath gave him a puzzled glance, unprepared for the anger in the man’s blue-gray stare. “There’s been a hell of a lot that’s happened today, Yulen. Can you be more specific?”
Yulen lowered his voice so that only the physician could hear. “Something’s changed among my men. Something’s...different. And, frankly, it’s making the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end. If I’m going to place my life in their hands, and theirs in mine, I need to be aware of every shift in their mood. And right now, something major is happening. It’s like a change in the weather, and I can’t predict if it’s going to be fair or foul.” He paused, testing the air again. “Can it have something to do with Atty?”
