White Horse Black Nights (The Godkissed Bride, #1)(53)

Myst whinnies and kicks the door urgently.

“You saw them, didn’t you? You saw the man who took her?”

You’re talking to a horse, Wolf, a voice reminds me. I don’t have Sabine’s godkissed ability to talk to animals, and I can only imagine that Myst has no clue what the sounds coming out of my mouth mean. But Myst and I are perfectly clear on one thing: We both care about Sabine.

The three of us have been together on the road for weeks, silently adapting to each other’s quirks and habits. She’s a stubborn horse, I’m a stubborn man; but Sabine is the sun between us, keeping the both of us firmly in her orbit, circling her so steadily that we haven’t knocked heads with each other too hard before now. And maybe we can call a truce.

I roll open Myst’s stall door, holding out a staying hand. “Okay. Look, you haven’t always liked me, and I haven’t always liked you. But we have to put our differences aside for Sabine. Agreed?”

She snorts again, but it’s mollified. Her hoof scrapes against the straw-covered floor. I ease into her stall another step, keeping my hand extended like I’m taming a wild animal.

“Easy, Myst. I’m a friend.”

Her black eyes roll, but she doesn’t bite my outstretched hand, which is a good sign. Slowly, I place a hand on her mane, and another on her back.

“Don’t worry, crazy mare,” I murmur, a trace of affection in my voice. “There aren’t any two souls in this world who want to find her more than us. We’ll get her back.”

I heft myself onto her bare back, wrapping my legs around her sides, and grip a fistful of mane. Riding bareback isn’t my strength, but Myst and I are a team now, and she readily heeds my direction.

I scoop up the rucksack on our way out of the stable, and then let all other stimuli fall away except for Sabine’s scent. I hone in on it on the street, ignoring the distant crowds still putting out the fire, the reek of smoke, and the townpeople’s shouts on the wind.

“This way.” I nudge Myst, and we follow Sabine’s scent for a few blocks, eventually ending up at the docks, where her scent abruptly ends.

Well, fuck. That means she boarded a ship, and scent is nearly impossible to track over such a large waterway. But I’m a hunter. This is what I do. Sabine said Adan’s original plan was to rendezvous at an old mill, and a mill needs a river to turn its water wheel.

So, I click for Myst to head upstream, and the two of us set off at a gallop—Sabine’s best friend and the man who will move heaven and earth to get her back.





Chapter 19





Sabine





When I wake up, my mouth is parched. I feel jolted out of sleep, with lingering nightmares flashing in my mind. I don’t know how much time has passed. Hours, maybe? My muscles are cramped from sleeping on a knotty pile of fishing nets, my limbs balled up in the sloop’s narrow cabin. The crofter’s dress Adan gave me is itchy.

I comb my fingers through my hair instinctually, freezing when it doesn’t have its usual heft. For years, in the Convent of Immortal Iyre, I fantasized about being free and light, with shoulder-length hair blowing in the wind as I rode Myst at breakneck speed through open fields. Now, I’m outside the walls, but I don’t recognize this version of myself from any fantasy. Not this frightened girl in a hole that reeks of fish.

The sloop jolts again, and I realize we’re docking somewhere. The repetitive rocking of floating on the river has been replaced with clomping footsteps on the deck overhead. Someone calls out, then throws a thunking rope.

My breath goes rickety. I grip the cabin’s narrow walls to steady myself against the boat’s jostling. I barely have time to chase away the remnants of nightmares and get my head on straight before the cabin’s trapdoor is thrown open.

Bright sunlight stings my eyes. I turn away from it, holding up a shielding hand. Adan’s silhouette eclipses the opening.

“We’re here.” His voice is laced with excitement like a kid on a summer morning. He extends his hand down to me. Outside, seagulls’ lazy caws, mixed with a warm breeze, unwind the worst of the knots that formed in my muscles overnight. In the light of day, my fears look overblown. Adan saved me. He might be a stranger, but that doesn’t make him a villain. He could truly be the kind-hearted boy from a big, boisterous family who wants to take me to Salensa and marry me.

Even though my rational mind tells me all this, however, my gut doesn’t believe it. I saw something in Adan and his brothers last night that scared me.

Still, I’m here, now. And gods, I want off this stinking boat.

So, I let Adan help me up. It’s mid-morning, judging by the sun’s position. On deck, I get a clear view of an open river valley. An overgrown apple orchard hugs one side of the river, and the other is bare fields, plowed into tidy rows in preparation for planting. The dock belongs to a mill with a rusted-out waterwheel; it doesn’t look like it’s been operational in years.

On the riverbank, a blonde man in a cloak sits atop a horse with four more saddled horses at the ready.

I glance at Adan’s two brothers, who are unloading duffle bags of supplies and affixing them to the saddles. Last night, they didn’t bother to introduce themselves. They still don’t.

“Where are we going?” I ask Adan, nodding toward the horses, trying to keep my voice from breaking and betraying my nerves.