“What’s so funny?” he called over the sounds of galloping hooves and rushing wind.
“You made fools of them,” she called back, “but you didn’t kill them.”
“They’re too pathetic to be worth it.” He snorted. “But I would have if they actually got their hands on you.” Damien’s eyes narrowed on the road ahead as if he could see the Righteous Sentries doing just that, bloodshed glinting in his irises.
She bit her lip, a fluttering in her stomach, but kept her voice raised so he could hear. “Oh, would you?”
He looked at her from the corner of his eye, fighting off a smile. “You aremycaptive, after all. No one’s touching you but me.”
CHAPTER 11
THE PRACTICALITY OF ESTABLISHING BASE UNDERSTANDING
Damien’s threat lingered in Amma’s mind like a cat looking for attention but not wanting to let on what it was doing. It lounged in every corner, making her wonder if it just wanted to be fed or if it were genuinely looking for human affection, but it was impossible to really puzzle out when on horseback.
They rode for the rest of the day over rolling terrain that meandered in and out of thickly-treed fields. Amma recognized many of the species, but some were questionable, and there were a few she’d never seen before. Durendreg had been outside of the realm, but the flora was most similar to the northeast of Eiren, and when she shared that information coupled with the orientation of the sun, Damien affirmed to know relatively where they were.
It was a place with no name, but Amma knew it as The Wilds. The realm of Eiren spanned to the sea on its westerly side, but the border ended at a thick forest on its eastern edge that ran from the frozen marshes in the north to the archipelagos of the south, the land beyond unprotected by the crown. The Accursed Wastes were even farther east, Damien explained, though the terrain made it abundantly clear they were far off from the flat plains where Xander called home.
Here, the trees were thick, and even in the chill of autumn, the vegetation was lush and verdant. The acorn Amma had tucked into her hip pouch bounced along as they rode, and she wondered absently if it really were possible that wild liathau could be living outside of Faebarrow despite what she’d been told all her life.
Sundown came sooner than when they were on the road before, fall coming all at once while they were locked away in Xander’s tower. Kaz lit a fire behind a copse to protect from the chilly breeze, and Amma was reminded of that night, the one she’d used to get close to Damien that had ended so horribly. She sat across the fire from him as he looked through loose pages this time, face twisted up into deep contemplation, and she weighed the merits of seduction against searching for the truth.
“Damien?” she asked, voice feeling heavy though it was quiet.
He blinked up at her, firelight warming his features, no annoyed pinch to his brow, and not even a frown creasing his face.
She swallowed. “What, um…what are you going to do with me?”
His mouth opened, eyes flicking over to Kaz who had curled into a ball with his tail tucked in around him, not yet asleep. The imp’s black, bulbous eyes glared back, and Damien fidgeted for a moment, scratched at his neck, and then huffed. “I’m taking you somewhere to get that talisman out of you.”
Amma pressed a hand to her chest as her body went cold. The strap of the crossbow cut into her palm, and her hand tightened around it. “You’re going to take me somewhere to kill me?”
“What, no, why would—oh.” He cleared his throat, sitting straighter. “I did threaten you with that quite a lot, didn’t I?”
She nodded, but her grip loosened.
“Amma, you are…” Damien was staring deeply into the fire as his words trailed off before he really said much at all. She leaned forward, waiting, but then his head snapped back up to her. “Well, you’re not some common street thief, are you? I don’t need the headache of a royal’s blood on my hands, so I’ve decided to find a cleaner method to retrieve Bloodthorne’s Talisman of Enthrallment from inside you. One that leaves you breathing and, you know, talking and smiling and doing all of those other annoyingly thoughtful things as you tend to do.”
Kaz groaned, but Amma grinned.
“It’s going to be arduous though, so I hope you’re prepared to suffer along with me until we can resolve this.” He rolled up the parchment he’d been looking over. “I reached out with Corben to some associates of mine a bit ago, and they’ve agreed to assist. As your god of luck would have it, they happen to be located just south of here. They have skills very similar yet drastically different to my own. I actually think you’ll like them quite a bit.”
Amma’s interest was piqued at the mention of both Damien’s messaging spell and these associates. She pulled the crossbow off her back and set it beside her. “You sent a raven to them from Xander’s tower? If it came back that fast, does that mean I’ll hear from Laurel soon?”
“Oh, no, no, I didn’t do this recently. They returned my message back in—” Damien caught himself, brow narrowing. “Well, who can remember exactly when?”
She sat back, a little disappointed, but knowing that if he asked for help with the talisman before the tower, then he’d made a decision about the worth of her life before knowing she was a baroness. She wanted badly to point this out, but settled instead on eyeing him and clarifying, “So, you’re reallynotgoing to kill me?”
He met her gaze. “Provided you refrain from irritating me.”
Amma snickered. “I’ll do my best.”
“I’m sure you will.”
Their gentle laughter fell away into the quiet din of chirping insects struggling to outlast the changing season. Amma picked at her cloak she sat atop. “You know, it’s sort of funny that those Righteous Sentries said I was enthralled by you, and that’s why I don’t want to go back with them.”
Damien grunted. “If you consider what that makes me out to be, it’s not reallythatfunny.”
