We were led to the upper bridges that looked down over the lower roads of the township at the base of the hillside. Vendors and tradesmen crowded the bridges and upper roads. It gave Stonehands a bit of respite to set his gaggle of visitors free to spend florin coin on a few pearl combs, exotic pastes for skin spots, or sugared strips of vibrant fruits from mountain orchards.
A woman in front of me clung to a man’s arm. She handled a new satin coin purse with delight while the man gave up two large silver florin.
I stepped across her path to be free of the crowd, but she waved me over. “Here alone?”
“In a sense.”
“Bold of you.” She looked at the man by her side. “We were recently wed, and took to traveling for a fortnight.”
Her new husband kissed the corner of her mouth, eyes alight with sickening affection. “How dull it must be to travel by oneself.”
“I’ve grown rather fond of it.” I offered a narrow look at Roark and Emi, both standing at the end of the bridge.
The woman lowered her voice, as though sharing a bawdy secret. “Ligstaad, the township in the easternmost hills, is the territory of Jarl Hendrikson and has a great many young men. You might go there next and find a husband of your own to join you.”
“Then I would be forced to share all the food.” I plucked a small sample of seasoned fish a vendor passed around.
“Jarl Hendrikson is my father,” she went on with a touch ofpompous propriety. “Travel back with us. It’s dangerous for a lady to be on her own.”
“How wonderous it sounds, but alas I’m doomed to die in these walls. See that man?”
Roark’s face shadowed when I pointed his way.
The jarl’s daughter blanched. “The Sentry?”
“Yes. He is my captor. Or guardian, if you ask him. I prefer captor. I am told I must attend the prince’s revel with him at my side. His sour disposition frightens away all the suitable…well, suitors.”
“Gods.” The woman pressed a hand to her heart. “Poor girl. Whatever did you do to be taken?”
“I fear I had the gall to exist.”
From the corner of my gaze, I watched Emi draw her bottom lip between her teeth, the way someone might if they were fighting back a laugh. By her side, her fingers ticked off to a count of three. In the next moment, heavy steps approached and Roark curled his hand around my arm, tearing me away from the crowd.
“Pardon me,” I said over my shoulder to the stunned woman. “My captor has need of me, it seems.”
What are you doing?Roark’s gestures were harried and angry.
“Making new acquaintances. Is that not what I should do since this place is doomed to be my fate?”
You want her to report you to her father? A tale of a captured woman?
My skin heated. Perhaps my moment of what I thought was cleverness was not so cunning after all.
He took a moment to write on the parchment.
It seemed Roark did not wish for me to miss a single word.
The Sentry leaned in, our noses nearly touching, and the grin he wore was colder than mine.
He did not pull back, not even when I read the scrap of parchment.
Let me tell you of Jarl Hendrikson. He would send a summons to King Damir. If you were not the melder, and the king gave you leave, Hendrikson would take you as a wife. When he tired of you, he would give you to his horrid sons to bed as they pleased.
I swallowed through a new thickness. “You are making assumptions, Sentry Ashwood. And they are wrong. I was not trying to leave.”
His cold grin grew colder as he spoke with one hand.I doubt that.
This close, I could make out the bits of black in the gold of his eyes. I hated him—triedto hate him—but was undeniably pulled into the fury and violence of the Sentry.
