“I don’t mind it.” His hand landed on my thigh for a moment as the horse stepped into the divot, his palm hot. “For a long time, I was determined to do everything on my own. Then I learned that help was good and oftentimes smart to accept. It gives you more energy to focus on important tasks.”
I’d always seen favors as a sign of perceived weakness. Harthon’s perception was vastly different, and for someone with his strength to appreciate them…maybe I was reading too far into them. Or not. I wasn’t about to let this man start changing my perspective.
I thought then about yesterday when he’d shown me the magnificent view from the hilltop just because he thought I would like it. And I had liked it. So incredibly much. That wasn’t a favor, I didn’t think, but a random act of kindness—ora nice action strategically designed to gain my cooperation in his grand plan. Not that I’d be won over that easily.
Hours later, we were passing through another yellow field, the grasses taller in this one than in the others, when Harthon spoke again to tell me we were close to the border. I nodded, thoughts of the party and Josenne returning to my mind. I’d just opened my mouth to ask him what he does at Ellan’s gatherings when his body stiffened behind me.
Stefano, who rode next to us, snapped a sharp gaze to Harthon.
“Don’t react,” Harthon ordered quietly, our horse continuing at a steady pace.
“Don’t react to what?” I said, matching his low volume.
Stefano remained beside us, his face an impassive mask.
All too calmly, Harthon answered, “There’s a band of looters hiding in the grass.”
My skin prickled with the knowledge that we were being stalked. And yet Harthon seemed wholly unconcerned. “Why aren’t you doing anything?”
“I’m waiting to see what they do.”
“What ifwhat they dois kill us?”
Harthon scoffed at that. “You really do doubt how well my men are trained, don’t you?”
Frustration mixed with the panic that was accelerating my pulse. “What if they shoot arrows?”
“If you don’t have faith in my men, at least have faith in me.”
The grass seemed to go on forever, and it took everything in me not to scan my surroundings and give us away. The looters could be anywhere, buried between the tall strands.
“IthoughtI had faith in you. Now I’m doubting your sanity.”
He lightly laughed at that, and then he brought his head toward mine, his breath tickling my cheek. “I have a sense of where some of them are, but until they all stand and reveal themselves, we can’t fight them effectively. They’re scrappy, but they have no skill,” heexplained patiently.
Okay. So maybe he wasn’t a lunatic. Butwaitingto be attacked was a cruel torture—
A bird call arose from our right. All around us, patches of grass violently swayed. Mud-covered faces appeared, and then bodies careened toward us, carving paths through the field.
Harthon yanked us to a stop, dropping from the horse with relaxed agility. Around us, his men did the same, falling into formations of two with effortless organization.
He planted a firm hand over my knee, demanding my attention. “Stay on the horse,” he said mildly, even as they descended upon us like a swarm of flies. Then Harthon unsheathed the sword from his back, and in a single fluid motion, he slid the metal right through the grass-colored sack that hung from a looter’s body. The man didn’t even fall before Harthon removed the weapon and swung into another man’s neck with incredible ease.
Two thieves approached him at once. He spun and ducked low, allowing their axes to strike one another before knocking a knife out of another man’s hand and slashing deep into his thighs. A spinning kick and the butt of his sword disarmed the next attacker, and then he twirled a dagger in his hand, thinning the crowd that bombarded two of his men.
Harthon didn’t fight. Hedanced, moving with powerful grace and anticipating opponents’ maneuvers before they even thought of them. His men fared well too, and already, our attackers’ numbers were dwindling.
I now understood Harthon’s lack of concern.
I caught a glimpse of Stefano’s gangly figure, watching in fascination as he struck faster than a snake, carnage piling around him and his partner.
Scanning the crowd from atop the horse, I noticed a lone lootercrawling on his belly through the grass, attempting to surprise Harthon at his back. Harthon was tearing through a crowd of five, and he spared no glance to the swaying grasses that gave the thief away.
Harthon knew he was there. I mean, hehadto know.
But he wasn’t looking, and he was terribly preoccupied.
Damn.
