Ava, the forever undefeatable warrior, was on the ground in the snow. Kai had seen her cut down men without even thinkingabout the effort to hurt a man twice her size. Now, she looked almost small, paralyzed, as the man above her flicked open his cloak, reaching for the laces of his trews. His hand around her wrist he used to pin her chest into the ground.
He wouldnae…
Yet Kai didn’t even need to finish the thought to see what the man intended to do.
Burning with rage, he threw the reins aside and approached the man’s back. With the broadsword outstretched in front of him, he sliced it across the bandit’s back.
An almighty roar of pain erupted, making the wind stop whistling for a minute, as if cowered by the sheer amount of noise. He staggered away, releasing Ava’s wrist, allowing Kai to bend down and grab her other hand, pulling her up to stand in one jerky movement. Ava flung herself around Kai with a sob. Then, as if suddenly recovering, she pulled the basilard from her belt and held it high, ready to fight if needed, but he stood between her and the man.
He willnae get near ye again.
“Take another step forward, and I will kill ye,” Kai warned threateningly.
The man was clutching his bleeding back, the shock of red startling against the the ice white snow. There was somethingsadistic in the small smile that stretched across his lips. He took a step forward.
Kai moved toward him. He had every intention of running the bandit through with the sword when an arrow whipped between them, burying itself into the snow and forcing them both to step back.
In the distance, just visible as a shadow in the snow, another of the bandits had fired it.
“Run. Run!” he was ordering his friend. “Run now.” He raised the bow again, showing exactly how he would kill Kai if he went after the man.
As fast as Kai could blink, the man dressed in black turned and fled, running after his friends, streaking the snow with blood behind him. Kai didn’t dare turn his head away from the spot where the men had disappeared into for some time. He had to be certain the bandits were not coming back. The smell of fresh blood made his nose curl as he slowly turned to face Ava.
“Ava?” he whispered, nervous to speak.
Her whole body was shaking from head to toe. She didn’t even look him in the eye as she stood still like stone, the basilard raised over her shoulder.
“Ava?” he murmured her name again, moving to stand directly in front of her. She jerked her head around to face him, thoughher eyes were distant, rather glazed. “What has happened tae the warrior woman, eh?” He tried to lighten the mood as his hand wrapped around her own, lowering the basilard down to her side. “They’ve gone, Ava. They’ve gone.”
Yet it was as if his Ava had gone along with them. She was a shell, speechless, staring into the middle of his chest as her hand shakily returned the blade to her belt.
Kai had faced battles with Ava, fighting alongside her more than once, and she had never shown such fear. This was different. This Ava had emotion coming off her as if it was a waterfall.Fearwasn’t even enough to describe what she was clearly feeling. The word came to Kai in an instant as he tried to take her hand.
Terror.
She pulled her hand away, apparently confused to find Kai beside her at all.
“Ava, it’s me.” He acted on instinct, moving his hands to her waist, as he had been holding her seconds before they attacked. To his relief, she didn’t brush him off again, but stared up at him, blinking multiple times as if she was finally realizing who she was standing before. “They’ve gone. They cannae hurt ye now. He cannae hurt ye now.” He added the ‘he’ as an afterthought, but this seemed to break through to Ava more than anything.
“Aye, I ken that.” She bristled and shrugged her shoulders, backing up from him so that his hands dropped from her waist. “We… we need tae get some help. Me horse, Kai. It’s woundedand willnae be able tae ride far.” She was being practical, eminently so as she moved toward the mare and tried to bind the wound with a strip of tartan.
“It’s nothing, ye ken,” Kai said as he followed her, taking hold of the reins of his own horse and smoothly stroking his neck to calm him down.
“The wound is substantial.”
“That’s nae what I meant. I meant what just happened, Ava. We all freeze in battle sometimes.”
“That’s nae what happened.” She stood straight, sudden fire in her eyes. He knew that ferocity of old. It was one of the reasons she had first wormed her way under his skin. He was addicted to how passionate she could be. “I didnae freeze. I just… I couldnae reach me weapons.”
A lie.
Yet he didn’t argue with her. He nodded, pretending to believe it.
Once the horses were calm, they made a plan. They would take her mare to the nearest village and leave her there in a stable under the care of a groom to see if she could recover. They would ride on together, using just Kai’s horse.
As they reached the village, silence seemed inevitable. Kai arranged for the horse to be looked after then returned to hissteed to find Ava standing beside the horse, wringing one hand repeatedly around the other wrist. Kai stood before her, clearly startling her for she had been so lost in thought. When she looked tempted to jump back, he gently prized her fingers off her wrist.
There, burnished across the skin, were the red marks the bandit had left upon her.
