Mabel thought she was invisible on the battlefield, but she did not know that Shai had seen her, and that he was taking down enemy soldiers behind her in order to pursue her.
To keep her safe.
But at one point, they lost sight of each other, and no matter how hard he tried, he could no longer find her.
Below them, there was a downfall that would hold them above the hill, made of flowers, bushes and trees. A fall from up there would not kill, but would definitely leave some bruises. It didn't really matter, what Mabel had to do was to let go of his hands.
His armor did not give her a chance to attack him, no cracks, no opportunity, and he was so big that she started to think he was indestructible. But no one in this world was.
She did not stop to consider the odds as she stuck her fingers into his mouth, pulling it to the right, to the point where he leaned his head to the side. He released her, as Mabel thought he would, but then he hit her face with the back of his hand. It hurt, of course, but Mabel, for these past few days, was familiar with such kind of attack, and this time she did not falter. Instead, with her head, she pushed him by the belly to take him down the cliff.
Initially, he did not understand what she was doing while his body was dragged, backwards; he only realized what was going on when they rolled down the hill, injuring their bodies on rocks and thorns along the way.
When they reached the base, he got up much faster than Mabel, and walked in her direction, angry. Acting quickly, she caught sight of a long, thin tree trunk and took a few steps when she finally reached it.
At the same time, he attacked her around her belly, and until that moment she had not noticed he was carrying a dagger, and she not sees him pulling it from inside his armor.
She felt a pain in her abdomen, an uncomfortable pain that did not stop her from hitting his head with the trunk. The adrenaline was very convenient, and the only thing that went through her head was to immobilize the man. When he staggered in a sign of instability, she hit him again, and again and again, until he fell to the ground. And even though he was down, she did not stop hitting him, but on his back this time, so she would not kill him with a piece of log instead of the edge of her sword.
Until he passed out. At least that's what she was counting on.
Finally, the idea of having a general as a hostage seemed quite tempting. But she would think about that later. For now, she had to think of how she would prevent him from killing her when he woke up and stop him from getting to the village to kill Navon's soldiers. But how?
Up there, she could here evacuation words. Far away, she heard the enemy soldiers shouting, "Let's back off", in the absence of their general. Mabel shuddered at the idea of the soldier waking up and giving his location, and suddenly she remembered him.
He was still passed out.
As she walked toward the Tzarian, she wondered how she could move him. She dragged him by his feet to the nearest tree that did not have a broad trunk. It was so easy to drag him that she could smile at the situation, but she was nervous about whether she could catch him in time. She felt time passing by as she thought about how she would tie him up. With what?
Her head turned to her clothing, seeking a solution, and she ended up getting distracted when she saw that a part of her blouse was red rather than completely beige from the linen.
The Tzarian groaned, and Mabel returned to her initial problem. She tore a piece of her clothes, fast, and when she thought it was not enough, she tore a larger piece. Kneeling behind the tree, she pulled both of his arms and tied them around the trunk. Then she got out of the back of the tree and stood in front of him for an inspection. She waited for him to wake up. Meanwhile, she looked up to the cliff, wondering how she could get up there with the prisoner in her custody.
She was staring at him when he woke up. Noticing his situation, he tried to break free. But in vain. Mabel squeezed his hands so tightly that no one but a god with superhuman strength could be released from that situation.
"You..." He did not see that coming. He shouldn't have underestimated a girl.
"You're my prisoner now," Mabel said, casually. "You'd better choose your words carefully from now on."
He gave her a look of disdain. "And what are you going to do about it?"
"Not kill you, obviously. I will take you to the King's Army. You will be our hostage." She said with satisfaction. "I wonder what your men will think about their general being taken down by a girl."
"I was not the one who was stabbed."
"But I'm the one still standing."
At least for a while. How could she be chatting to an enemy soldier and not realize that her shirt was soaked with her own blood, instead of doing something about it?
She looked away from the soldier and tore a piece of blouse to serve as a bandage over the wound on her belly, and pressed it against her skin to contain the blood flow, not too intense yet. And that was the worst kind of wound, the one who would do a hell of a damage but you wouldn't feel it.
As she walked to lean her back on the tree, she felt dizzy, which was a consequence of the wound's effect. Mabel even stopped walking, because her vision suddenly blurred and she was afraid to take a false step and fall into an abyss.
"Is there poison in your dagger by any chance?" She asked, disoriented.
"Yes," He said with a cruel smile. "And you're going to get weaker and hallucinate, until you finally lose consciousness. But you won't die. If you're a lucky girl, you will actually. Otherwise, you will find out that there is something worse than death."
"And what would that be?"
He was amused. "Balthasar." His words came out with delight. "He's waiting for you, and I'll take you to him."
She wanted to have asked why Balthasar wanted her, but she would not have satisfied him by falling into his trap. "To do that you'd have to be free." She said, her mouth dry. "And you're stuck now."
"I will not be trapped for much longer." He was a general of an army, certainly he went through worse things to be able to survive. Raw flesh wound was nothing for him.
She leaned her back against the trunk of a tree and slid to the floor, her hand pressing her aching, bloody rib.
"I don't know if you have noticed, but you're losing to us." She was getting pale, her lips whitening, and sweat building in the corner of her forehead. "If you can get rid of my tie, which I don't think will be easy... once you get up there... the soldiers will capture you. You're surrounded anyway."
"I am the King's Winner. I will disregard your comments because you do not know me, you do not know what I am capable of." He continued to chew on the tie. "But I assure you; you will be the first person to find out when I escape."
Shai was looking for Mabel, trying to reproduce her footsteps. She was definitely out there, somewhere. Every step he took; he was afraid to find out what had happened to her. He should be looking for a moving body. Why was he looking for a dead body?
As he searched for her, the others were checking out the area, rescuing the wounded soldiers. Shai's way of looking for Mabel was different from the way they looked for the survivors; determined and distressed. In such a desperate way, that anyone around him would be nervous as well.
He looked down into the darkness of the trees, his feet were in the same spot where Mabel and the enemy fell down. Going through the same path, he did not identify any trace of Mabel around. That's when his eyes detected two fallen swords next to each other, and returned to the edge of the cliff, looking for signs of their owners.
He needed to go down and check the area. Anyway, it had been Navi's order to look for survivors everywhere.
Shai was holding a torch to light the way, and with the help of the sword, landing it on the ground, he walked down the sandy hill with difficulty and without patience. There was no chance of Shai finding Mabel, unless some supernatural force decided to guide him.
"Mabel?" He shouted, desperately trying to find her. And then he heard a noise that was not
made by him, and undoubtedly by no one in this world. A mystical sound of branch breaking, pointing a direction.
Without knowing it, Shai was close to finding them. And without knowing it, he called for Mabel without imagining that she was just behind the treetops.
It was Shai's voice that pulled Mabel out of her delirious and feverish thoughts. And it was by fearing that they would be found that the enemy got desperate. If she shouted back, he would be dead.
The soldier put the cloth back to tie his wrists on the trunk of the tree, more desperate this time, and just at the moment the tie loosened up, releasing him. The assimilation occurred to Mabel instantly. And to him as well. As Mabel opened her mouth to scream, the King's Winner finally got rid of the tie and was quick to cover up her mouth just as she began to shout in a weak tone, asking for help.
She was his prisoner now.
E P I L O G U E
"They say we know a hare holding it by the ears, there are signs to distinguish them. Suspended in the air, the male wildly kicks, while the females will stand still, with shifty eyes. But when a pair of hares run side by side, who will be so wise to tell if the hare is a male or a female?"
The Ballad of Mulan
◊
Mabel woke up with the carriage swing as they passed by the bumpy road and her head hit the seat. Still groggy, at first she wondered what she was doing in a moving car when she should have been on dry land. Because that was where she was for the last time.
And then, suddenly she remembered everything.
She was agitated, staring out the window. But it was impossible to escape, as Balthasar's guards escorted around the carriage, and there was not enough room inside that she could slip her body and escape. There were bars everywhere, and it seemed that this special chariot was taken all the way to Navon exclusively for someone special.
Someone like Mabel.
Returning to her seat, she remembered something else. Her hand went to her belly, lifting her blouse to check her wound. The last time she checked, she was bleeding to the point of losing consciousness.
It was healed, she realized surprised.
"I told you that you wouldn't die." It was a scratchy voice. The King's Winner was camouflaged in the shadow at the back of the carriage, as if he could appear and disappear whenever he wanted.
Mabel stared at him with all the courage in the world. "And why all this effort to let me live?"
"Balthasar wants to have a word with you."
"I have no family who can pay my ransom. No one is coming after me. Whatever Balthasar wants, he's wasting his time with me."
"Balthasar does not need a ransom for young ladies."
Her face burned with irritation. "Then why is he kidnaping me?"
"What brought you here was the fact you have joined Shai. From your expression of surprise, you must not know who he is, do you? You don't know he is Balthasar's missing brother."
"Shai is an exile, he has a marked neck. He had to enter the royal city for a matter of life or death, but he couldn't, so he had to ask me. He cannot be the missing heir you say he is, he's just a man marked and banned from Navon."
"Did you ever check his neck? Because there is no chance of him being marked in Navon because he never belonged there. Shai, actually, Golnar, used you. He manipulated you to get him an army and dethrone his brother, taking his place. You and Navon's army, just like all those outlaws who call themselves expatriates, were puppets in his hands."
Horror flashed in Mabel's wide eyes. "You were after him that day in Tenerife, weren't you? You were going to kill him. And to catch him, you took everything on the way. You might not be lying about Shai as you tried everything to capture him. I still don't understand what he has to do with me, for what reason I'm here. What do you want from me?"
"For some reason we cannot understand, Golnar is attached to you, and we'll take advantage of that. We will bring him to Balthasar."
"And what will happen if he doesn't come?"
"We will get rid of you."
"You mean he'll have to come and rescue me? Because if Shai is who you say he is, even I know he will not come."
He shook his head. "We did not miss the target. Balthasar has plans for you, and it won't be any pleasant. I warned you that death would be better than what is reserved for you."
"I'm no one for him to want anything to do with me."
"That's what you think. We've been watching you, Mabel. You've been looking for your brother, haven't you? But do you know why you won't find it?"
"Why?" She asked, her voice trembling. She finally fell into his trap. And now, he was amused by her despair. "Why?" She asked again, as she watched him lean back in the carriage, unconcerned and malicious, and suddenly anger stiffened her eyes.
While she was asleep for five days, the healer treated her wound and medicated her with herbs that would keep her sleeping until she was fully healed. She did not feel completely restored, but she was strong enough to ask for answers.
"You'd better not start saying things and then stop halfway. I'm not a bug for you to play around like this. Say what you want to say, and do not try to fool me!"
The King's Winner got up impetuously from his seat to go up to where Mabel was, and elbowed her face, leaving a hot and piercing trail on her, her eyes filling with furious waters. And when she tried to strike him back, he pushed her back into her place, causing her to bang her back and head against the metal wall. But she was feeling so used that she felt no pain. Only rage.
"No woman talks to me like that." And as he was turned around to go to the back of the carriage, he thought he had not been brutal enough. And this time, Mabel couldn't even look up.
"Your brother is dead." He announced, making sure to look at her. "And it was Golnar who did it."
She did not want to believe he was right about Gael and about Shai. If he was, she would have failed with Navon and her father. If he was, nothing that Shai proved to be was true. And it was so bad when her intuition was wrong about something.
"How can you be so sure about that?" Mabel gasped, angrily.
"Because I was there," He pointed out, satisfactorily. "When your brother was stabbed by him. Your brother was betrayed. We will see if you will be as well."
Mabel never really hated her brother. All this time she was just finding a way to keep him around. Even cursing him all the time, punishing him. It was possible when she finally saw him, her first words wouldn't be of accusation. She would have to keep all this guilt and anger inside her, once she would never see him again?
Once again, I was too late. It's always too late.
The escort started rushing the horses.
They had arrived.
A huge wall on all sides divided the border of Tzara so that from outside, nothing but the desert could be seen. On the other side, where the city was, you couldn't see anything either, only the top of some high buildings over the wall. Their villages and plantations were protected. They had mastered all forms of strategy; it was easier to leave than to enter the royal city.
It was absolutely impenetrable.
When Mabel noticed the castle's structures, she shuddered. Unlike Navon's, it was dark, and as she approached it, it would become even more frightening. What was he waiting for her? What would happen to her?
The carriage stopped and the door opened for Mabel.
Outside there was a huge group of soldiers to greet her, all in armor, looking transcendent, lifeless and empty. Was she that dangerous to them, or just too valuable? In any case, she was neither one nor the other. She was just Mabel, a girl and a soldier who from the beginning just wanted to help save her city.
Now she was days away from home.
The King's Winner stepped out after her and pulled her by the arm toward the castle, assuring that she would go through that door. Even Mabel had to admit that there was no chance of escaping; she was surrounded as he had been in her territory. However, unlike him, there was no way out for her there.
The heavy and noisy iron doors closed behind her, and Mabel knew that somehow her life will change forever from now on.
About the author
Ailisa Madrone graduated in Literature, and lives in Massachusetts with her husband. She is currently working on the sequel of Nevertheless. She wrote a dramatic book and a book about the supernatural that will never be published, but so far, fantasy is her most exciting genre.
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