Adan shouts sharply, “Bertine! Iskander!”
The other two men storm in through the door. It isn’t lost on me that if they heard Adan just now, then they must have been close enough to hear my screams when Maks tried to rape me. Anger drips down the back of my throat, setting my belly on fire, prodding my rage until it’s buzzing like the bees.
My four abductors stare at me, covered in bees, in shocked bewilderment.
Moving my lips slowly so I don’t unintentionally harm the bees crawling around my mouth, I say in measured words, “I have a reaction to bee venom—a single sting almost killed me once. Whatever King Joruun is paying you, if you lay one finger on me, I’ll be dead in minutes, and you’ll lose every last coin he promised.”
Chapter 20
Wolf
Dusk chews up the forest as Myst and I stand on the edge of a clearing, facing a cottage that’s seen better days. We’ve been pursuing Sabine and her captors since daylight. We followed the river from Blackwater for half a day to the Old Innis Mill, where a fishing sloop was docked. Buried under waves of briny stink was the delicate scent of violets. We tracked five sets of horse prints into the woods about twenty miles south of the Blackened Forest—and now we’re here.
They’re inside. Sabine and four men. I’m sure it’s her—I’d recognize the swift patter of her heartbeat as surely as my own. For the last five minutes, Myst and I have been waiting as I listen for details of their conversation and movements, so I can track how best to attack.
But now they’ve been strangely quiet. They’ve used each other’s names—Adan, Maks, Bertine, and Iskander—but only to pass around a bottle. I hear their glugs of booze, their boots scuffing, a rocking chair’s creak, but barely more than a few spoken words, like all five of them are just sitting around staring at one another. I shift on Myst’s back, fingers tightening in her mane.
“I don’t like this. Something’s wrong.”
The buzz of a bees nest somewhere close dulls my ability to pick up on smaller sounds. I’m about ready to dismount, say fuck it, and simply kick the door down, but then one of the men speaks.
“You can’t stay like this forever, girl,” he snaps in frustration. “It’s been hours.”
Sabine’s voice, gravely with exhaustion, replies firmly, “Then do what I told you. Leave. Go back to the river. Once a bird confirms that you’re on your boat, we go our separate ways.”
She’s negotiating with her captors? With what fucking leverage? What could possibly be the source of this stand-off?
Myst blows steam into the cool night air. She’s getting impatient. So am I. Night darkens the forest, and the growing shadows ignite my desire to slit each one of their throats and listen to them choke on their own blood. It’s a sound I’m going to fucking relish.
“I’m not giving up the bounty!” another man barks.
I still can’t be certain of the scenario in that cottage, which is a major disadvantage. There’s one of me and four of them. I’d confidently take those odds if I knew what kind of fighters they were, so I could play to their weaknesses. But I don’t know if they’re soldiers or farmers, fishermen or spies. They could be godkissed, like their speedy friend back in Blackwater.
But there’s one thing I do know: Sabine is, at the moment, alive. And I can’t say how long that state will last.
I pat Myst’s shoulder like we’re old comrades. “Have we heard enough, my friend?”
Her muscles bunch under me, ready for action even after our long ride. It brings a grim smile to my lips. This crazy mare might just have won me over. Besides, she’s not the only one antsy for a fight. The familiar prickle of anticipation shoots up my spine until I’m licking my lips, squeezing my calves around the horse, flexing my hands into fists and straightening them again. Fantasies play out in my head of kicking open the door, sinking my knife blade into every last one of them. The cottage is too tight to use my bow, or else I’d shoot them each through the eye first to prolong the pain.
The ache to fight them is visceral, arousing.
Is Sabine frightened? Does she believe I’ll come for her? I can hear her body’s clues, but that doesn’t mean I can read her mind.
“Let’s have some fun,” I murmur in dark delight as I dig my heels into Myst’s sides.
The horse surges forward like she’s been anxiously awaiting my signal. Her hooves pound over the hardpacked ground as she stampedes toward the cottage with thrilling speed, not showing any signs of slowing. She thunders up the porch stairs. The whole cottage rattles.
Then she rears up, a bloodcurdling whinny on her lips, and brings down her front hooves to break down the door.
The door splinters around its meager bolt. I ride Myst straight into the cottage, ducking to get through the doorframe, greedily drinking in the chaos our arrival causes.
The four men jump to their feet. They’re blonde. Burly. Volkish raiders for sure. But they’re unarmed and half-drunk; their guard was down. The sudden appearance of a mounted rider inside their kitchen has them scrambling for weapons. One of them snatches an axe. Another grabs a heavy cast iron pan. Another moves to block Sabine.
Sabine. She’s in a chair, her hands bound. Garbed in a peasant’s dress. Her long hair is gone—cut to her chin. Bees crawl all over her face. It’s a horrific scene, straight out of the Book of the Immortals.
There’s something else. Some people’s bodies emit a spoiled-fruit scent when around bees if they’re highly susceptible to bee venom, and Sabine reeks of it.
If she gets stung . . .
She starts to scream to me, but the man clamps a meaty hand over her mouth to muffle her cries, flinching as bees sting his palm. My heart shoots to my throat, afraid she’s stung, too. But she controls the bees—so why is she putting herself at risk?
She’s doing this on purpose. Her insurance policy. Clever fucking girl.
“Who the hell are you?” the man with the axe roars.
He’s the youngest. Maybe twenty years old. The bland kind of good looks that would make him a prize in a village of a hundred people and utterly insignificant anywhere with a larger population. The perfect type of unintimidating boy to appeal to a skittish, naive girl who’s been locked away for twelve years with old women.
“Adan, I take it?” I growl low. “Yeah. I always knew you’d turn out to be a motherfucking bastard.”
With a cry, Adan draws his arm back to swing the axe at my thigh. Myst sidesteps to dodge before I even have to signal her. I swing my left leg over her back so I can dismount in a slide, which sends me slamming into Adan and knocks us both to the floor. His head glances off the kitchen table as he falls, which makes him drop the axe. I land in a crouch with one knee pinning his arm.
My nerves burn from the pleasure of his scream.
It’s fucking on.
I love this—love the fight. It’s fucked up, but that’s what happens when you raise a boy on a diet of violence and starve him for anything else. My only reward in Jocki’s fight ring came when I drew blood. So when it appears on Adan’s temple, dripping onto the floor, I lick my lips.
Two of the raiders try to corral Myst into the bedroom, but she turns a tight circle, knocking over chairs, and snaps a kick at them with her hind legs.