“Well, if they were at the Scholomagi, there’d be a record of it somewhere in that dusty old heap,” Daks said with a chuckle. “They love their records.”
He’d had no idea Ravi was such a romantic under all that crabbiness. It was sweet. His enthusiasm was contagious, and Daks briefly toyed with the idea of hanging around Scholoveld for a while after they delivered Ravi, to see if they could solve the mystery. But he quickly came to his senses again when a cold breeze blew smoke from the fire into his face. He shifted uncomfortably under Ravi’s bright, hopeful gaze and added, “But we need to get there first, so enough stories for one night. Let’s get some sleep so we can get to Traget all the faster tomorrow.”
He felt a twinge of guilt when Ravi’s open expression shuttered, but it was for the best. They’d all be parting ways soon enough, getting all romantic and dewy-eyed over a story—or a storyteller—would only lead to more pain later.
Shura took the first watch, and Daks curled up in his bedroll. One more full day of riding and they’d be out of this eerie place for good and in Traget buying their passage to freedom.
Chapter Nine
IN THE morning, Shura roused Ravi from another uneasy dream of that terrifying gray wall with a steaming mug of tea and some melted cheese on toasted three-day-old bread. He mumbled a hoarse thank-you as he sat up and took the offered meal, struggling to shake off the last cobwebs of sleep.
The ubiquitous fog crowded around them, much like his dream, shrouding everything beyond their little circle in dirty white and concealing the rest of the boglands from view. Ravi couldn’t decide if this was a good thing or a bad thing as he bit into his toast and chewed.
Like he’d admitted to the others last night, after perhaps too much ale, the bogs had been a lot more romantic in his childhood imaginings. But the reality possessed a certain haunting charm of its own, a sense of mystery, of waiting and longing that could definitely fuel countless stories. Who knew? After this adventure, he might have a story or two of his own to tell… if they ever made it out of Rassa.
“The fog is worse today,” Shura said, drawing him out of his thoughts before his mood could sour any more.
“We should be out of it soon enough,” Daks replied with his characteristic unwarranted optimism, though his tone seemed more clipped and businesslike than his usual smug drawl. “We head back toward the Matna and the King’s Road today.”
He stood by the horses, checking straps and fiddling with their packs, his back ramrod straight, his attention fully focused on the task. Instead of the leather breeches Ravi had come to appreciate, he’d donned wool trousers and a linen tunic cut in the Rassan style. He’d also tamed his bushy mane of hair into a braid down the back of his head that ended in a severe knot wrapped tightly in a leather cord. Even his whiskers had grown out enough to mask the scars on his jaw and neck, making him look almost respectable in the morning light.
The clothes should have been comfortingly familiar to Ravi, but they didn’t hug the man’s ass and thick thighs nearly as well. And for some reason Ravi couldn’t quite fathom, his fingers itched to free Daks’s hair from that uncomfortably tight-looking braid.
He shook his head and turned his attention back to what was left of his breakfast. Too many days of close contact with the man after more than a decade without touch had his mind going places it had no business. Whether or not he found the man attractive at all was pointless and irrelevant. Besides, Daks hadn’t so much as looked in his general direction this morning. He’d obviously imagined the interest he’d seen in the man’s eyes last night during his story.
Tales were tales and real life was real life. He was doomed if he hadn’t learned that by now.
“Let’s get going. We’re wasting daylight, such as it is,” Daks ordered without bothering to look up from whatever he was doing.
With a sigh, Ravi stood, walked to a pool of brackish water, and rinsed his mug before washing the grease from breakfast off his hands. After relieving himself behind one of the few moss-covered, drooping trees, he moved to stand behind Daks to silently await his turn to mount.
Without acknowledging him, Daks called out, “Shura, I want to give Horse a bit of a rest today, so I’ll ride your mare for a while.”
Ravi frowned at Daks’s back before swinging a nervous glance in Shura’s direction, hoping that didn’t mean what he thought it meant.
The woman’s black brows furrowed. “Is he showing signs of strain?”
Daks shrugged, still without deigning to acknowledge Ravi’s existence. “I don’t think so, but he’s borne double the weight of the others for most of our journey. I think it best not to push him, just in case.”
Much to Ravi’s dismay, Shura simply shrugged and came toward them as Daks stepped away from the stallion. Ravi was tempted to voice an objection. He might be able to use his curse as an excuse not to come in close contact with yet another person. But they were in the woods, still a day’s ride from Traget, so even if he had a Vision, it probably wouldn’t be a big deal. Plus, it would mean admitting he was as scared of Shura as he was, and that he preferred having Daks pressed against his back. Neither seemed appealing, so he kept his mouth shut and prayed the woman wouldn’t dump him off the horse at the first opportunity… or knock him out again at the first sign of a Vision.
The morning passed so slowly it was agony. Ravi kept himself as stiff in the saddle as he could without every muscle in his body cramping, making sure no part of him touched any part of her, if he could help it. Since she was still the best tracker, they took the lead on Horse, but the unnaturally heavy fog made traveling quickly impossible. They had to stop frequently for Shura to get down and check the track.
By what he thought might be noon, judging only by the slight change to the brightness of the fog around them, he’d fallen into a miserable stupor. No one had spoken a word in at least an hour, and even when they did speak, the fog seemed to muffle the sounds. He would have liked to throw a few glares back at Daks as he silently swore at the man for making a miserable trip even worse, but he doubted Daks would have been able to see him do it, and he sure as hells didn’t want to risk locking gazes with Shura in the attempt. He only roused when the stallion suddenly stopped, making Ravi yelp and clutch the saddle.
Shura tugged on the reins and clucked at the beast, but it didn’t move. After a few more tries, she let out what sounded like a curse in what was most likely Cigani and dismounted.
“What is it?” Mistress Sabin called behind them.
“Shura?” Daks called from farther back.
“Wait,” Shura replied, holding up a hand as she took a few steps away, studying the trail and the heavy mist before tipping her head back and squinting upward.
“This is wrong,” she growled. “I must have missed a split in the trail in all this blighted fog. We should have been heading north and east by now, according to the map farmer Vasin drew for us. We’ve been heading farther into the boglands for too long.” She swore another couple of times in her own language while Daks let out a curse of his own. “It’s a good thing this horse is so damned stubborn, or it might have taken me another hour to realize it,” she muttered, coming back to them.
“We’re lost?” Ravi asked and winced as his voice cracked.
Shura narrowed her eyes at him. “Not lost. We just missed the track back there. We’ll have to turn around and try to find it, if this blighted fog will let us.”
She was obviously not in a good mood, so he clamped his mouth shut on any further commentary while she pulled the map from one of the packs. Daks dismounted too and started toward them.
Deciding to take the opportunity presented to him, Ravi dropped awkwardly to the ground to get some blood back in his legs and unlock his spine. Once he was on his feet, his bladder complained, and he moved away from the others as Daks and Shura bowed their heads over the map. Finding somewhere private wasn’t much of a challenge in the heavy curtain of fog, so he didn’t have to venture far off the trail
. He could still hear the others discussing their predicament, but as soon as he was “alone,” their voices sounded strangely far off, and an ominous feeling tingled along his spine, sort of like….
Hells!
His chest tightened as he nervously searched his surroundings. This wasn’t a Vision, though, but one of those feelings Daks had told him to look out for.
“Guys,” he called, rushing back to them.
As he drew closer, the mist cleared enough for him to see Shura coming toward him, with Daks a close second. He was just about to explain when he tripped over something hidden in the long grass. As he struggled to right himself, a rope snapped taut near his head, forcing him to duck to the side. He let out an embarrassingly high-pitched yelp as he broke into a stumbling run toward the others.
Daks cried out a warning, and Ravi spun around in time to see the large tree limb barreling toward him, but not in time to do anything more than close his eyes and cringe. The wood caught him in the chest and sent him flying. Before he could even register the pain of the blow, he hit the water. Momentarily stunned, all he could do was sink below the murky surface until instinct took over and he flailed his arms and legs. The bog wasn’t deep, but mud and reeds beneath the surface clutched at him, tangling worse the more he struggled. He started to panic, clawing at whatever clung to his legs as foul-smelling water tried to force its way into his nose and mouth. But then a large body crashed into the water nearby and a strong arm wrapped around his middle.
“Ravi, stop! Stop struggling! I got you,” Daks yelled, and finally the man’s oddly strained voice registered through his terror and he went limp with relief.
Daks pulled him to the solid ground and collapsed next to him as Ravi fell to his hands and knees and started coughing out the foulness he’d inhaled. His chest hurt a lot where the limb had hit him, and it took every ounce of his concentration to try to pull air into his lungs after each cough.
“Ravi, are you all right? Where are you hurt?”
Daks’s voice shook so much Ravi hardly recognized it. He wanted to say something comforting back, but he couldn’t get enough air. Trembling fingers fumbled at his throat, and soon the unbearable weight of the sodden wool cloak fell from his shoulders. Ravi sucked in a relieved breath, thinking he might at last have enough air for a thank-you or a reassurance, but it stuttered in his chest as Daks’s big, frantic hands began roaming his body.
“Tell me where you’re hurt,” Daks rasped.
Ravi had almost reached the point where every breath was no longer agony, but he hesitated, oddly enjoying the attention. Then guilt made him pull away and wave Daks off with one limp hand.
“Give me… a minute,” he wheezed. “Breath… knocked out of me.”
He settled onto his ass, his boots still trailing in the mud, and put a hand to his diaphragm while he propped himself up with the other.
“Shura, are you okay?” Daks called harshly, and Ravi turned to find her nodding as she held her left arm close to her body
“It just clipped my shoulder,” Shura bit out, before turning to glare at Ravi. “What were you thinking? Of all the idiotic, useless—” She let out a string of words in her own language Ravi didn’t understand, but he was pretty sure they weren’t flattering, until Daks cut her off.
“That’s enough, Shur. It wasn’t his fault, and I’m all right.”
They shared another one of their long looks, before Shura nodded once, begrudgingly, and turned to Mistress Sabin, who hovered at her elbow.
Ravi clenched his jaw in both guilt and anger and attempted to struggle to his feet. Daks appeared at his side before Ravi got even halfway up, though he didn’t seem completely steady either. They were both soaked to the skin, shivering, and covered in muck that smelled as bad as it looked.
“I’m okay,” Ravi protested, which was mostly true.
He’d have a huge bruise on his chest and it hurt to breathe, but he could stand without aid. Daks’s dark blue eyes seemed a little wild when Ravi met his gaze, but after a few seconds of study, Daks nodded, blew out a shaky breath, and withdrew his hands. Without another word, Daks turned and headed toward the women.
“Is it bad?” Daks asked Shura.
Her dark eyes were oddly intent as she studied Daks’s face. “No. It’ll hurt for a while, but I can still use it.”
To demonstrate, she flexed and rotated it while Mistress Sabin pressed her lips together in obvious disapproval.
“What happened?” Mistress Sabin asked.
“Trap,” Shura answered grimly.
She was still watching Daks closely, but she spared a small glare for Ravi before turning back to stare at her partner… but Daks’s eyes had that vacant look they took on when he used his gift.
After a few seconds, he shook his head. “If there’s anyone out there, I can’t sense them. There’s no magic.”
He moved to the branch that had struck them and crouched down, examining the ropes. “This has been here a while. I don’t think it was meant to do any real harm, only deter unwanted visitors. It’s just our bad lu—” He cleared his throat. “We just ventured too far from the safe path.”
“But that’s dangerous, leaving something like that out here,” Mistress Sabin protested. “Anyone could chance upon it. That could have killed a child.”
“I imagine anyone out here who’s supposed to be would know how to avoid it. I think the moral of the story is, don’t stray too far from the road.”
Ravi winced, but how could he have possibly known? As if the bugs, the muck, the wet, and the cold weren’t enough, he had to worry about traps too? He’d only wanted to pee.
“Ravi, can you travel?’ Daks asked brusquely, jerking Ravi’s attention back to him.
“Yes.”
Even if he couldn’t, he certainly wouldn’t have admitted it.
Cursed. I’m cursed.
“Good. Let’s get the horses turned around and see if we can find that trail we missed.”
Without a backward glance, Daks moved to where the horses and the mule had retreated and began sorting them out. Luckily for all of them, Horse seemed to have corralled the other three and kept them from bolting in the excitement.
Daks didn’t seem at all bothered by the fact that he was soaked from the neck down anymore, but Ravi shivered again as he grabbed his sodden borrowed cloak off the ground and made his slow, somewhat pained way to join the others. At least the fog seemed to be lifting. That was something.
“We should take a look at your wound too,” Shura called out as she approached them.
“It’s fine.”
“Vaida, you may have torn the stitches we put in at the farm,” she argued.
Daks shook his head. “It’ll wait.” He turned to Ravi, his face set in a frown. “You can change into dry clothes now if you need to, but I’m going to wait until we’re closer to Traget and I can find a clean stream or pool in the river to wash in.”
Ravi’s lovely borrowed clothes were clammy, covered in mud, and smelled of bog, but he shook his head and said, “I’ll wait.”
With a brusque nod, Daks turned to Shura. “Take the mare up front. We’ll follow.”
While Ravi blinked at him in surprise, Daks collected the heavy sodden cloak from him and walked to the mule. When he returned, he carried Ravi’s old cloak, freshly cleaned and mended.
“Climb up,” Daks ordered, handing him the cloak and nodding to the stallion.
His face was still set in a heavy frown, and Ravi wanted to snap something biting to defend himself. He hadn’t done anything wrong. Daks had no right to be mad at him. But since he hadn’t exactly been looking forward to sharing another ride with Shura, especially while she was angry with him, his chest hurt, and he smelled like he did, he kept his mouth shut. He’d say something later… much later, like when they were safely in Samebar kind of later. Then he’d tell both of them to go to the Seven Hells.
Much to everyone’s relief, Shura found the track they should have taken easil
y, now that the fog had cleared some. The entrance was completely overgrown, and Ravi probably would have missed it even on the second pass, but he didn’t try to offer those words of comfort to her. Her scowl was nearly as forbidding as Daks’s.
The rest of their ride that day was still miserable, despite the air clearing and the sun brightening the farther they headed away from the bogs. Damp, muddy, and shivering, Ravi had to work for each breath around the throbbing band of pain across his chest. Having Daks’s big body pressed to his back, solid and warm, helped, but he wouldn’t mention that either. Best to keep quiet and hope everyone forgot he was there.
The sun had sunk low in the sky by the time they crossed the shallows of the Bael river a few hours south of Traget. When Daks dismounted on the far bank and said he was going to head upstream to wash and change, Ravi followed him. He wasn’t looking forward to the frigid water, but the promise of clean, dry clothes gave him courage.
He kept his hood up and trudged along silently, lost in his own thoughts, until Daks stopped abruptly and began stripping. Ravi stood rooted to the spot as Daks removed each piece of muddy clothing and tossed it into a small pool of water nestled among the reeds and rocks, seemingly unconcerned or unembarrassed about having an audience. Biting his lip, Ravi turned away, wondering if he should find his own bathing place, but the sounds of splashing drew his gaze back to Daks like a lodestone.
The man was undeniably well put together. Barrel-chested and broad shouldered, with thick arms and thighs—everything about him was thick. Ravi swallowed against a suddenly dry throat. When Daks caught him staring, the frown he’d sported for hours morphed into that infuriating grin, and he winked and quirked an eyebrow, making Ravi flush and turn his head away again. The man was impossible.
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